and Afghans, whilst protecting the Sikh states on the British
side of the Sutlej, namely, Jhind, Nabha, and Patiala. Runjeet
Singh was naturally disgusted at being checked by British
interference. It was unfair, he said, for the British to wait
until he had conquered the three states, and then to demand
possession. Metcalfe cleverly dropped the question of justice,
and appealed to Runjeet Singh's self-interest. By giving up
the three states, Runjeet Singh would secure an alliance with
the British, a strong frontier on the Sutlej, and freedom to
push his conquests on the north and west. Runjeet Singh took
the hint. He withdrew his pretensions from the British side of
the Sutlej, and professed a friendship which remained unbroken
until his death in 1839; but he knew what he was about. He
conquered Cashmere on the north, and he wrested Peshawar from
the Afghans; but he refused to open his dominions to British
trade, and he was jealous to the last of any attempt to enter
his territories. … Meanwhile the war against France and
Napoleon had extended to eastern waters. The island of the
Mauritius had become a French depot for frigates and
privateers, which swept the seas from Madagascar to Java,
until the East India Company reckoned its losses by millions,
and private traders were brought to the brink of ruin. Lord
Minto sent one expedition [1810], which wrested the Mauritius
from the French; and he conducted another expedition in
person, which wrested the island of Java from the Dutch, who
at that time were the allies of France. The Mauritius has
remained a British possession until this day, but Java was
restored to Holland at the conclusion of the war. …
Meanwhile war clouds were gathering on the southern slopes of
the Himalayas.
{1732}
Down to the middle of the 18th century, the territory of Nipal
had been peopled by a peaceful and industrious race of
Buddhists known as Newars, but about the year 1767, when the
British had taken over the Bengal provinces, the Newars were
conquered by a Rajput tribe from Cashmere, known as Ghorkas.
The Ghorka conquest of Nipal was as complete as the Norman
conquest of England. The Ghorkas established a military
despotism with Brahmanical institutions, and parcelled out the
country amongst feudal nobles known as Bharadars. … During
the early years of the 19th century the Ghorkas began to
encroach on British territory, annexing villages and revenues
from Darjeeling to Simla without right or reason. They were
obviously bent on extending their dominion southward to the
Ganges, and for a long time aggressions were overlooked for
the sake of peace. At last two districts were appropriated to
which the Ghorkas had not a shadow of a claim, and it was
absolutely necessary to make a stand against their
pretensions. Accordingly, Lord Minto sent an ultimatum to
Khatmandu, declaring that unless the districts were restored
they would be recovered by force of arms. Before the answer
arrived, Lord Minto was succeeded in the post of
Governor-General by Lord Moira, better known by his later
title of Marquis of Hastings. Lord Moira landed at Calcutta in
1813. Shortly after his arrival an answer was received from
the Ghorka government, that the disputed districts belonged to
Nipal, and would not be surrendered. Lord Moira at once fixed
a day on which the districts were to be restored; and when the
day had passed without any action being taken by the Ghorkas,
a British detachment entered the districts and set up police
stations. … The council of Bharadars resolved on war, but
they did not declare it in European fashion. A Ghorka army
suddenly entered the disputed districts, surrounded the police
stations, and murdered many of the constables, and then
returned to Khatmandu to await the action of the British
government in the way of reprisals. The war against the
Ghorkas was more remote and more serious than the wars against
the Mahrattas. … Those who have ascended the Himalayas to
Darjeeling or Simla may realise something of the difficulties
of an invasion of Nipal. The British army advanced in four
divisions by four different routes. … General David
Ochterlony, who advanced his division along the valley of the
Sutlej, gained the most brilliant successes. He was one of the
half-forgotten heroes of the East India Company. … For five
months in the worst season of the year he carried one fortress
after another, until the enemy made a final stand at Maloun on
a shelf of the Himalayas. The Ghorkas made a desperate attack
on the British works, but the attempt failed; and when the
British batteries were about to open fire, the Ghorka garrison
came to terms, and were permitted to march out with the
honours of war. The fall of Maloun shook the faith of the
Ghorka government in their heaven-built fortresses.
Commissioners were sent to conclude a peace. Nipal agreed to
cede Kumaon in the west, and the southern belt of forest and
jungle known as the Terai. It also agreed to receive a British
Resident at Khatmandu. Lord Moira had actually signed the
treaty, when the Ghorkas raised the question of whether the
Terai included the forest or only the swamp. War was renewed.
Ochterlony advanced an army within fifty miles of Khatmandu,
and then the Ghorkas concluded the treaty [1816], and the
British army withdrew from Nipal. The Terai, however, was a
bone of contention for many years afterwards. Nothing was said
about a subsidiary army, and to this day Nipal is outside the
pale of subsidiary alliances; but Nipal is bound over not to
take any European into her service without the consent of the
British government."
J. T. Wheeler,
India under British Rule,
chapter 3.
ALSO IN:
J. D. Cunningham,
History of the Sikhs,
chapters 5-6.
E. Thornton,
History of British Empire in India,
chapters 21-24 (volume 4).
INDIA: A. D. 1816-1819.
Suppression of the Pindaris.
Overthrow of the Mahratta power.
The last of the Peshwas.
"For some time past the Pindaris, a vast brotherhood of
mounted freebooters, who were ready to fight under any
standard for the chance of unbounded plunder, had been playing
a more and more prominent part in the wars of native princes.
As Free Lances, they had fought for the Peshwa at Panipat, had
shared in the frequent struggles of the Sindhias and Holkars
in Hindustan and Southern India, and made war on their own
account with every native prince whose weakness at any moment
seemed to invite attack. … From the hills and glens of
Central India thousands of armed ruffians sallied forth year
after year in quest of plunder, sparing no cruelty to gain
their ends, and widening the circle of their ravages with each
new raid, until in 1811 the smoke of their camp-fires could be
seen from Gaya and Mirzapur. … To thwart Maratha intrigues
and punish Pindari aggressions was the Governor-General's next
aim. In spite of hindrances offered by his own council and the
Court of Directors, he set himself to revive and extend Lord
Wellesley's policy of securing peace and order throughout
India by means of treaties, which placed one native prince
after another in a kind of vassalage to the paramount power
that ruled from Fort William. … By means of a little timely
compulsion, the able and accomplished Elphinstone baffled for
a while the plots which the Peshwa, Baji Rao, and his
villainous accomplice, Trimbakji Danglia, had woven against
their English allies. The treaty of June, 1817, left Lord
Hastings master of Sagar and Bundalkhand, while it bound the
Peshwa to renounce his friend Trimbakji, his own claims to the
headship of the Maratha League, to make no treaties with any
other native prince, and to accept in all things the counsel
and control of the Company's Government. Hard as these terms
may seem, there was no choice, averred Lord Hastings, between
thus crippling a secret foe and depriving him of the crown he
had fairly forfeited. Meanwhile Lord Hastings' fearless energy
had already saved the Rajputs of Jaipur from further suffering
at the hands of their Pathan oppressor, Amir Khan, and forced
from Sindia himself a reluctant promise to aid in suppressing
the Pindari hordes, whose fearful ravages had at length been
felt by the peaceful villagers in the Northern Sarkars. In the
autumn of 1817 Hastings took the field at the head of an army
which, counting native contingents, mustered nearly 120,000
strong, with some 300 guns. From east, west, north, and south,
a dozen columns set forth to hunt down the merciless ruffians
who had so long been allowed to harry the fairest provinces of
India.
{1733}
In spite of the havoc wrought among our troops by the great
cholera outbreak of that year, and of a sudden rising among
the Maratha princes for one last struggle with their former
conquerors, our arms were everywhere successful against
Marathas and Pindaris alike. The latter, hunted into the hills
and jungles of Central India, found no safety anywhere except
in small bodies and constant flight … and the famous
robber-league passed into a tale of yore. Not less swift and
sure was the punishment dealt upon the Maratha leaders who
joined the Peshwa in his sudden uprising against the British
power. His late submission had been nothing but a mask for
renewed plottings. Elphinstone, however, saw through the mask
which had taken in the confiding Malcolm. Before the end of
October an English regiment, summoned in hot haste from
Bombay, pitched its camp at Kirki, about two miles from Puna,
beside the small Sepoy brigade already quartered there. In the
first days of November Baji Rao began to assume a bolder tone
as his plans grew ripe for instant execution. On the 5th, a
body of Marathas attacked and destroyed the Residency, which
Elphinstone had quitted in the nick of time. A great Maratha
army then marched forth to overwhelm the little garrison at
Kirki, before fresh troops could come up to its aid from
Sirur. Elphinstone, however, who knew his foe, had no idea of
awaiting the attack. Colonel Burr at once led out his men, not
3,000 all told. A brilliant charge of Maratha horse was
heavily repulsed by a Sepoy regiment, and the English steadily
advancing drove the enemy from the field. A few days later
General Smith, at the head of a larger force, advanced on
Puna, occupied the city, and pursued the frightened Peshwa
from place to place. The heroic defence of Karigaum, a small
village on the Bhima, by Captain Staunton and 800 Sepoys, with
only two light guns, against 25,000 Marathas during a whole
day, proved once more how nobly native troops could fight
under English leading. Happily for Staunton's weary and
diminished band, Smith came up the next morning, and the
desponding Peshwa continued his retreat. Turn where he would,
there was no rest for his jaded soldiers. Munro with a weak
force, partly of his own raising, headed him on his way to the
Carnatic, took several of his strong places, and drove him
northwards within reach of General Smith. On the 19th
February, 1818, that officer overtook and routed the flying
foe at the village of Ashti. Bapu Gokla, the Peshwa's
staunchest and ablest follower, perished in the field, while
covering the retreat of his cowardly master. For some weeks
longer Baji Rao fled hither and thither before his resolute
pursuers. But at length all hope forsook him as the circle of
escape grew daily narrower; and in the middle of May the
great-grandson of Balaji Vishwanath yielded himself to Sir
John Malcolm at Indor, on terms far more liberal than he had
any reason to expect. Even for the faithful few who still
shared his fortunes due provision was made at his request. He
himself spent the rest of his days a princely pensioner at
Bithur, near Cawnpore; but the sceptre which he and his sires
had wielded for a hundred years passed into English hands,
while the Rajah of Satara, the long-neglected heir of the
house of Sivaji, was restored to the nominal headship of the
Maratha power. Meanwhile Appa Sahib, the usurping Rajah of
Berar, had no sooner heard of the outbreak at Puna, than he,
too, like the Peshwa, threw off his mask. On the evening of
the 24th November, 1817, his troops, to the number of 18,000,
suddenly attacked the weak English and Sepoy force of 1,400
men with four guns, posted on the Sitabaldi Hills, outside
Nagpur. A terrible fight for eighteen hours ended in the
repulse of the assailants, with a loss to the victors of more
than 300 men and twelve officers. A few weeks later Nagpur
itself was occupied after another fight. Even then the Rajah
might have kept his throne, for his conquerors were merciful
and hoped the best. But they hoped in vain. It was not long
before Appa Sahib, caught out in fresh intrigues, was sent off
a prisoner towards Allahabad. Escaping from his captors, he
wandered about the country for several years, and died at
Lahor a pensioner on the bounty of Ranjit Singh. The house of
Holkar had also paid the penalty of its rash resistance to our
arms. … On the 6th January, 1818, the young Holkar was glad
to sign a treaty which placed him and his heirs under English
protection at the cost of his independence and of some part of
his realm. Luckily for himself, Sindia had remained quiet, if
not quite loyal, throughout this last struggle between the
English and his Maratha kinsfolk. Thus in one short and
decisive campaign, the great Maratha power, which had survived
the slaughter of Panipat, fell shattered to pieces by the same
blow which crushed the Pindaris, and raised an English
merchant-company to the paramount lordship of all India. The
last of the Peshwas had ceased to reign, the Rajah of Berar
was a discrowned fugitive, the Rajah of Satara a king only in
name, while Sindia, Holkar, and the Nizam were dependent
princes who reigned only by sufferance of an English
Governor-General at Calcutta. The Moghal Empire lingered only
in the Palace of Dehli; its former viceroy, the Nawab of Audh,
was our obedient vassal; the haughty princes of Rajputana
bowed their necks, more or less cheerfully, to the yoke of
masters merciful as Akbar and mightier than Aurangzib. Ranjit
Singh himself cultivated the goodwill of those powerful
neighbours who had sheltered the Sikhs of Sirhind from his
ambitious inroads. With the final overthrow of the Marathas a
new reign of peace, order, and general progress began for
peoples who, during a hundred and fifty years, had lived in a
ceaseless whirl of anarchy and armed strife. With the capture
of Asirgarh in April, 1819, the fighting in Southern India
came to an end."
L. J. Trotter,
History of India,
book 5, chapters 2-3.
ALSO IN:
W. M. Torrens,
Empire in Asia: How we came by it,
chapters 19-20.
J. G. Duff,
History of the Mahrattas,
volume 3, chapters 17-20.
Major Ross-of-Bladensburg,
The Marquess of Hastings,
chapters 4-7.
INDIA: A. D. 1823-1833.
The first Burmese War.
English acquisition of Assam and Aracan.
Suppression of Suttee and Thuggee.
Rechartering of the East India Company.
It is deprived of its last trading monopoly.
"On Hastings' retirement, in 1823, the choice of the ministry
fell upon Canning. … Canning ultimately resigning the
Governor-Generalship, the choice of the authorities fell upon
Lord Amherst. The new Governor-General reached India at a time
when the authorities in London had a right to expect a long
period of peace.
{1734}
In fact, both in Hindostan and in the Deccan, the victories of
Hastings had left the Company no more enemies to conquer.
Unfortunately, however, for the prospects of peace, nature,
which had given India an impenetrable boundary on the north,
had left her with an undefined and open frontier on the east.
On the shores of the Bay of Bengal, opposite Calcutta, a
struggle had raged during the eighteenth century between the
inhabitants of Ava and Pegu. The former, known as Burmans or
Burmese, had the good fortune to find a capable leader, who
rapidly ensured their own victory and founded a Burmese
Empire. The successful competitors were not satisfied with
their own predominance in Pegu—they conquered Aracan, they
overran Assam, and they wrested from Siam a considerable
territory on the Tenasserim coast. The conquest of Aracan
brought the Burmese to the confines of the Company's dominions
in Chittagong. The conquered people, disliking the severe rule
of the conquerors, crossed the frontier and settled in British
territory. Many of them used their new home as a secure basis
for hostile raids on the Burmese. … The river Naf ran for a
portion of its course between the possessions of the British
in Chittagong and those of the Burmese in Aracan. With the
object of preventing the repetition of outrages, which had
occurred on the river, a small British guard was stationed on
a little island, called Shaporee, near its mouth. The Burmese,
claiming the island as their own, attacked the guard and drove
it from the post. It was impossible to ignore such a
challenge. The island was reoccupied; but the
Governor-General, still anxious for peace, offered to treat
its occupation by the Burmese as an action unauthorised by the
Burmese Government. The Burmese Court, however, instead of
accepting this offer, sent an army to reoccupy the island;
collisions almost simultaneously occurred between the British
and the Burmese on other parts of the frontier, and in
February 1824 the first Burmese war began. … If the war of
1824 may be excused as inevitable, its conduct must be
condemned as careless. No pains were taken to ascertain the
nature of the country which it was requisite to invade, or the
strength of the enemy whom it was decided to encounter. …
Burma is watered by two great rivers, the Irawaddy and the
Salwen. … In its upper waters the Irawaddy is a rapid
stream; in its lower waters it flows through alluvial plains,
and finds its way through a delta with nine mouths into the
Bay of Bengal. On one of its western mouths is the town of
Bassein, on one of its eastern mouths the great commercial
port of Rangoon. The banks of the river are clothed with
jungle and with forest; and malaria, the curse of all
low-lying tropical lands, always lingers in the marshes. The
authorities decided on invading Burma through the Rangoon
branch of the river. They gave Sir Archibald Campbell, an
officer who had won distinction in the Peninsula, the command
of the expedition, and, as a preliminary measure, they
determined to seize Rangoon. Its capture was accomplished with
ease, and the Burmese retired from the town. But the victory
was the precursor of difficulty. The troops dared not advance
in an unhealthy season; the supplies which they had brought
with them proved insufficient for their support; and the men
perished by scores during their period of forced inaction. …
When more favourable weather returned with the autumn,
Campbell was again able to advance. Burma was then attacked
from three separate bases. A force under Colonel Richards,
moving along the valley of the Bramaputra, conquered Assam; an
expedition under General Morrison, marching from Chittagong,
occupied Aracan; while Campbell himself, dividing his army
into two divisions, one moving by water, the other by land,
passed up the Irawaddy and captured Donabue and Prome. The
climate improved as the troops ascended the river, and the hot
weather of 1825 proved less injurious than the summer of 1824.
… The operations in 1825-6 drove home the lesson which the
campaign of 1824-5 had already taught. The Burmese realised
their impotence to resist, and consented to accept the terms
which the British were still ready to offer them. Assam,
Aracan, and the Tenasserim Coast were ceded to the Company;
the King of Burma consented to receive a Resident at his
capital, and to pay a very large sum of
money—£1,000,000—towards the expenses of the war. … The
increasing credit which the Company thus acquired did not add
to the reputation of the Governor-General. … The Company
complained of the vast additions which his rule had made to
expenditure, and they doubted the expediency of acquiring new
and unnecessary territory beyond the confines of India itself.
The ministry thought that these acquisitions were opposed to
the policy which Parliament had laid down, and to the true
interests of the empire. It decided on his recall. … William
Bentinck, whom Canning selected as Amherst's successor, was no
stranger to Indian soil. More than twenty years before he had
served as Governor of Madras. … Bentinck arrived in Calcutta
in difficult times. Amherst's war had saddled the Government
with a debt, and his successor with a deficit. …
Retrenchment, in the opinion of every one qualified to judge,
was absolutely indispensable, and Bentinck, as a matter of
fact, brought out specific instructions to retrench. … In
two other matters … Bentinck effected a change which
deserves to be recollected with gratitude. He had the courage
to abolish flogging in the native Indian army; he had the
still higher courage to abolish suttee. … In Bengal the
suttee, or 'the pure and virtuous woman,' who became a widow,
was required to show her devotion to her husband by
sacrificing herself on his funeral pile. … Successive
Governors-General, whose attention had been directed to this
barbarous practice, had feared to incur the unpopularity of
abolishing it. … Cornwallis and Wellesley, Hastings and
Amherst, were all afraid to prohibit murder which was
identified with religion, and it was accordingly reserved to
Bentinck to remove the reproach of its existence. With the
consent of his Council, suttee was declared illegal. The
danger which others had apprehended from its prohibition
proved a mere phantom. The Hindoos complied with the order
without attempting to resist it, and the horrible rite which
had disgraced the soil of India for centuries became entirely
unknown. For these humane regulations Bentinck deserves to be
remembered with gratitude. Yet it should not be forgotten that
these reforms were as much the work of his age as of himself.
… One other great abuse was terminated under Bentinck.
{1735}
In Central India life was made unsafe and travelling dangerous
by the establishment of a secret band of robbers known as
Thugs. The Thugs mingled with any travellers whom they met,
disarmed them by their conversation and courtesy, and availed
themselves of the first convenient spot in their journey to
strangle them with a rope and to rob them of their money. The
burial of the victim usually concealed all traces of the
crime; the secrecy of the confederates made its revelation
unlikely; and, to make treachery more improbable, the Thugs
usually consecrated their murders with religious rites, and
claimed their god as the patron of their misdoings. Bentinck
selected an active officer, Major Sleeman, whom he charged to
put down Thuggee. Sleeman's exertions were rewarded by a
gratifying success. The Thugs, like all secret societies, were
assailable in one way. The first discovery of crime always
produces an approver. The timid conspirator, conscious of his
guilt, is glad to purchase his own safety by sacrificing his
associates, and when one man turns traitor every member of the
band is anxious to secure the rewards and immunity of
treachery. Hence the first clue towards the practices of the
Thugs led to the unveiling of the whole organisation; and the
same statesman, who had the merit of forbidding suttee,
succeeded in extirpating Thuggee from the dominions over which
he ruled. Social reforms of this character occupy the greater
portion of the history of Bentinck's government. In politics
he almost always pursued a policy of non-intervention. The
British during his rule made few additions to their
possessions; they rarely interfered in the affairs of Native
states. … The privileges which the East India, Company
enjoyed had from time to time been renewed by the British
Parliament. The charter of the Company had been extended for a
period of twenty years in 1773, in 1793, and in 1813. But the
conditions on which it was continued in 1813 were very
different from those on which it had been originally granted.
Instead of maintaining its exclusive right of trade,
Parliament decided on throwing open the trade with India to
all British subjects. It left the Company a monopoly of the
China trade alone. The Act of 1813 of course excited the
strenuous opposition of the Company. The highest authorities
were brought forward to prove that the trade with India would
not be increased by a termination of the monopoly. Their
views, however, were proved false by the result, and the stern
logic of facts consequently pointed in 1833 to the further
extension of the policy of 1813 [see CHINA: A. D. 1839-1842].
… The inclination towards free trade was, in fact, so
prevalent, that it is doubtful whether, even if the Tories had
remained in office, they would have consented to preserve the
monopoly. … The fall of the Wellington administration made
its termination a certainty [see ENGLAND: A. D. 1832-1833].
… The Government consented to compensate the Company for the
loss of its monopoly by an annuity of £630,000 charged on the
territorial revenues of India. It is a remarkable circumstance
that the change of ministry which deprived the Company of its
trade possibly preserved its political power for nearly a
quarter of a century. … The Whig ministry shrank from
proposing an alteration for which the country was not
prepared, and which might have aroused the opposition by which
the Coalition of 1783 had been destroyed. Though, however, it
left the rule with Leadenhall Street, it altered the machinery
of government. The Governor-General of Bengal was made
Governor-General of India. A fourth member—an English
jurist—was added to his Council, and the Governor-General in
Council was authorised to legislate for the whole of India. At
the same time the disabilities which still clung to the
natives were in theory swept away, and Europeans were for the
first time allowed to hold land in India. These important
proposals were carried at the close of the first session of
the first reformed Parliament."
S. Walpole,
History of England from 1815,
chapter 25 (volume 5).
ALSO IN:
J. W. Kaye,
Administration of the East India Company,
parts 3-4.
Sir C. Trevelyan,
The Thugs
(Edin. Review, January, 1837).
Illustrations of the History of the Thugs.
M. Taylor,
Confessions of a Thug, introduction.
D. C. Boulger,
Lord William Bentinck,
chapters 4-6.
INDIA: A. D. 1836-1845.
The first Afghan war and its catastrophe.
Conquest and annexation of Scinde.
Threatened trouble with the Sikhs.
"With the accession of Lord Auckland, Bentinck's successor,
began a new era in Anglo-Indian history, in which the
long-sown seeds of fresh political complications, which even
now seem as far from solution as ever, began to put forth
fruit. All danger from French ambition had passed away: but
Russian intrigue was busy against us. We had brought the
danger on ourselves. False to an alliance with Persia, which
dated from the beginning of the century, we had turned a deaf
ear to her entreaties for help against Russian aggression, and
had allowed her to fall under the power of her tyrant, who
thenceforth used her as an instrument of his ambition. The
result of our selfish indifference appeared in 1837, when
Persia, acting under Russian influence, laid siege to Herat,
which was then under Afghan rule. While Herat was still
holding out, the Shah was at last threatened with war, and
raised the siege. Then was the time for Auckland to destroy
the Russian danger once for all, by making a friend of the
power which seemed to be the natural barrier against invasion
from the north-west. After a long series of revolutions, Dost
Mahomed, the representative of the now famous tribe of
Baruckzyes, had established himself upon the throne, with the
warm approval of the majority of the people; while Shah Sooja,
the leader of the rival Suddozyes, was an exile. The ruling
prince did not wait for Auckland to seek his friendship. He
treated the Russian advances with contempt, and desired
nothing better than to be an ally of the English. Auckland was
urged to seize the opportunity. It was in his power to deal
Russia a crushing blow, and to avert those troubles which are
even now harassing British statesmen. He did not let slip the
opportunity. He flung it from him, and clutched at a policy
that was to bring misery to thousands of families in England,
in India, and in Afghanistan, and to prove disastrous to the
political interests of all three countries. … Those who are
least interested in Indian history are not likely to forget
how the Afghan mob murdered the British Envoy and his
associates; how the British commander, putting faith in the
chiefs of a people whom no treaties can bind, began that
retreat from which but one man escaped to tell how 16,000 had
perished; how poor Auckland, unmanned by the disaster, lacked
the energy to retrieve it; how the heroic Sale held out at
Jellalabad till Pollock relieved him; how Auckland's
successor, Lord Ellenborough, dreading fresh disasters,
hesitated to allow his generals to act till, yielding to their
indignant zeal, he threw upon them the responsibility of that
advance to Cabul which retrieved the lost prestige of our
arms.
See AFGHANISTAN: A. D. 1838-1842, and 1842-1869.
{1736}
Thus closed the first act of a still unfinished drama. After
celebrating the triumph of the victorious army, Ellenborough
sent Charles Napier to punish the Ameers of Scinde [see
SCINDE], who, emboldened by the retreat from Cabul, had
violated a treaty which they had concluded with the British
Government. The result of the war was the annexation of the
country: but the whole series of transactions is only
remembered now as having given rise to the dispute on the
question of the guilt of the Ameers between Napier and James
Outram. Less talked of at the time, but historically more
important, was Ellenborough's reconstitution of the British
relations with the Sindia of the day. Political disturbances
had for some time agitated that prince's court, while his army
had swollen to a dangerous size, and, like the Sikh army since
Runjeet Singh's death, which had taken place a few years
before, had passed beyond the control of the civil power. In
these two armies Ellenborough saw a danger which might disturb
the peace of Hindostan. He foresaw that the Sikh soldiers,
released from the stern discipline of Runjeet Singh, would
soon force a government which they despised to let them cross
the Sutlej in quest of plunder. Two years later his character
as a prophet was vindicated; and, if he had not now, in
anticipation of the invasion which then took place, disbanded
the greater part of Sindia's army, and over-awed the remainder
by a native contingent under the command of British officers,
the Sikhs would probably have joined their forces with the
Mahrattas. … But the Directors took a different view of
their Governor-General's conduct of affairs. In June, 1844,
all India was astonished by the news that Ellenborough had
been recalled. He had helped to bring about his own downfall,
for in the controversies with his masters in which he, like
some of the ablest of his predecessors, had found himself
involved, he had shown an unfortunate want of discretion; but,
though by bombastic proclamations and a theatrical love of
display he had sometimes exposed himself to ridicule, many of
his subordinates felt that in him they had lost a vigorous and
able ruler. Sir Henry Hardinge, who was raised to the peerage
before the close of his administration, succeeded to the
office of Governor-General, and waited anxiously for the
breaking of the storm which his predecessor had seen
gathering. The Sikhs, the Puritans of India [see SIKHS], who
were not strictly speaking a nation, but a religious
brotherhood of warriors called the Khalsa, were animated by
two passions equally dangerous to the peace of those around
them, a fierce enthusiasm, half military, half religious, for
the glory of their order, and an insatiable desire for
plunder. By giving them full scope for the indulgence of these
passions, and by punishing all disobedience with merciless
severity, Runjeet Singh had governed his turbulent subjects
for forty years: but, when he died, they broke loose from all
control; and the weak Government of Lahore found that they
could only save their own capital from being plundered by the
Khalsa army by sending it to seek plunder in British
territory. Thus began the first Sikh war."
T. R. E. Holmes,
History of the Indian Mutiny,
chapter 1.
ALSO IN:
Sir L. Griffin,
Ranjit Singh.
L. J. Trotter,
The Earl of Auckland,
chapters 4-13.
INDIA: A. D. 1843.
Conquest of Scinde.
See SCINDE.
INDIA: A. D. 1845-1849.
The Sikh Wars.
Conquest and annexation of the Punjab.
"There had always been an expectation that whenever Runjeet
Singh died, there would be trouble with his soldiery; and it
soon appeared that some incursion was in contemplation, for
which the Sikh troops were prepared by an able European
training under French officers. While the strife about the
succession was going on in the Punjaub, the military element
of society there became supreme; and the government at
Calcutta considered it necessary to move troops to the
frontier to preserve peace, and reassure the inhabitants of
whole districts which dreaded the incursions of a haughty and
lawless soldiery. The Sikhs were alarmed at the approach of
English troops, and adopted the same course towards us that we
had tried with their western neighbours—they crossed the
frontier to forestall our doing it. Whether this move was a
device of the Sikh chiefs, as some say it was, to get rid of
the army, and perhaps to cause its destruction by the British,
and thus to clear the field for their own factions; or whether
war with the British was considered so inevitable that the
invasion of our territory was intended as a measure of
prudence, we need not here decide. The fact was that the Sikh
soldiery gathered round the tomb of Runjeet Singh, preparing
themselves for a great battle soon to happen; and that war was
virtually declared at Lahore in November, 1845, and fairly
begun by the troops crossing the Sutlej on the 11th of
December, and taking up a position near Ferozepore. The old
error prevailed in the British councils, the mistake denounced
by Charles Metcalfe as fatal—that of undervaluing the enemy.
The Sikhs had been considered unworthy to be opposed to the
Afghans in Runjeet's time; and now we expected to drive them
into the Sutlej at once; but we had never yet, in India, so
nearly met with our match. The battle of Moodkee was fought
under Sir Hugh Gough, on the 18th of December, and 'the
rabble' from the Punjaub astonished both Europeans and Sepoys
by standing firm, manœuvring well, and rendering it no easy
matter to close the day with honour to the English arms. This
ill-timed contempt was truly calamitous, as it had caused
miscalculations about ammunition, carriage, hospital-stores,
and everything necessary for a campaign. All these things were
left behind at Delhi or Agra; and the desperate necessity of
winning a battle was only enough barely to save the day. The
advantage was with the British in the battle of Moodkee, but
not so decisively as all parties had expected. After a
junction with reinforcements, the British fought the invaders
again on the 21st and 22nd, at Ferozeshur. On the first night
our troops were hardly masters of the ground they stood on,
and had no reserve, while their gallant enemy had large
reinforcements within reach.
{1737}
The next day might easily have been made fatal to the English
army, at times when their ammunition fell short; but the Sikhs
were badly commanded at a critical moment, then deserted by a
traitorous leader, and finally driven back. For a month after
this nothing was done by the British, and the Sikhs crossed
the Sutlej at their ease. The valour of Gough and of Hardinge,
who, while Governor-General, had put himself under the orders
of the Commander-in-Chief, had saved the honour of the
English; but their prestige was weakened among their own
Sepoys, and even the European regiments; much more among the
Sikhs; and most of all in the eyes of the vigilant surrounding
states. It was a matter of life and death now to bring up
guns, ammunition and treasure. A considerable portion fell
into the enemy's hands on the 21st of January, on its way to
the relief of Loodeeana; but the battle of Aliwal on the 28th
was again a true British fight. The Sikhs were driven into the
Sutlej; and as soon as they had collected in their stronghold
of Sobraon on the other side, they were driven thence by a
closing struggle on the 10th of February. The Sikhs were
beaten, with a slaughter of 5,000 (some say 8,000) men;
against 320 killed and 2,000 wounded on our side. The
Maharajah submitted, the road to Lahore lay open, and the
Governor-General could make his own terms. He flattered
himself that he had arranged a protectorate of the Punjaub
which would render annexation unnecessary; and all who could
believe in it rejoiced that means had been found to escape the
necessity of adding new conquests to a territory already much
too large. As the Punjaub could not pay its amount of tribute
to the Company, Cashmere and some other territory was accepted
instead, and given, as a kingdom, to Gholab Singh … on his
paying a portion of the debt, thus reimbursing the Company,
and lessening the overgrown power of the Punjaub rulers. When,
at the close of 1846, the English troops should be withdrawing
from Lahore, the Sikh chiefs begged that they might remain,
and take care of the Punjaub till the young Maharajah should
grow up to manhood."
H. Martineau,
British Rule in India,
chapter 20.
"Lord Hardinge entrusted the government of the Punjab to a
Council of Regency, consisting of Sikh nobles under the
guidance of Sir Henry Lawrence as British Resident. He refused
to create a subsidiary army, but he left a British force to
protect the government until the boy Dhuleep Singh reached his
majority. Two-thirds of the Sikh army of the Khalsa were
disbanded. The Jullunder Doab between the Sutlej and the Beyas
was added to the British empire. … Lord Dalhousie succeeded
Lord Hardinge in 1848. Shortly afterwards the Punjab was again
in commotion. Sikh government under British protection had
failed to keep the peace. The army of the Khalsa had
disappeared, but the old love of license and plunder was
burning in the hearts of the disbanded soldiery. The Sikh
governor of Multan revolted; two Englishmen were murdered. A
British force besieged the rebels in Multan. It was joined by
a Sikh force in the service of the Council of Regency
commanded by Shere Singh. So far the revolt at Multan was
regarded as a single outbreak which would be soon suppressed
by the capture of the fortress. In reality it was the
beginning of a general insurrection. Shere Singh, who
commanded the Sikh force in the besieging army, suddenly
deserted the British force and joined his father Chutter
Singh, who was already in open rebellion. The revolt was
secretly promoted by the queen mother, and spread over the
Punjab like wildfire. The old soldiers of the Khalsa rallied
round Shere Singh and his father. The half-and-half government
set up by Lord Hardinge was unable to cope with a revolution
which was restoring the old anarchy. In November, 1848, Lord
Gough advanced against the rebel army. Then followed the
famous campaign between the Chenab and Jhelum rivers about 100
miles to the north of Lahore. In January, 1849, Lord Gough
fought the dubious battle of Chillianwallah, near the spot
where Alexander the Great crossed the Jhelum and defeated the
army of Porus. Meanwhile Multan surrendered, and the besieging
force joined Lord Gough. In February the Sikh army was utterly
defeated at Gujerat."
J. T. Wheeler,
Indian History,
chapter 11.
"Gujrat was essentially a forenoon battle, with the whole day
before the combatants to finish their work. It commenced with
a magnificent duel of artillery; the British infantry
occupying post after post as they were abandoned by the enemy;
and the British cavalry breaking up the Sikh masses and
scattering them by pursuit. Of the sixty Sikh guns engaged,
fifty-three were taken. Lord Dalhousie resolved to make the
victory a final one. 'The war,' he declared, 'must be
prosecuted now to the entire defeat and dispersion of all who
are in arms against us, whether Sikhs or Afghans.' General
Gilbert hurried out with a pursuing force of 12,000, horse,
foot and artillery, the day after the battle. In the
breathless chase which followed across the plains of the
Punjab to the frontier mountain-wall, the Sikh military power
was destroyed for ever. On the 12th of March, 1849, General
Gilbert received the submission of the entire Sikh army at
Rawal Pindi, together with the last forty-one of the 160 Sikh
cannon captured by the British during the war. While the Sikh
army heaped up their swords and shields and matchlocks in
submissive piles, and salamed one by one as they passed
disarmed along the British line, their Afghan allies were
chased relentlessly westwards, and reached the safety of the
Khaibar Pass panting, and barely twenty miles in front of the
English hunters. The horsemen of Afghanistan, it was said,
'had ridden down through the hills like lions and ran back
into them like dogs.' The question remained what to do with
the Punjab. The victory of Sobraon in 1846 gave to Lord
Hardinge the right of conquest: the victory at Gujrat in 1849
compelled Lord Dalhousie to assert that right. Lord Hardinge
at the end of the first Punjab war in 1846, tried, as we have
seen, an intermediate method of ruling the province by British
officers for the benefit of the infant prince. This method had
failed. … In determining the future arrangements for the
Punjab, Lord Dalhousie had as his advisers the two Lawrences.
Sir Henry Lawrence, the former Resident at Lahore; hurried
back from his sick-leave in England on the breaking out of the
war. He was of opinion that the annexation of the Punjab might
perhaps be just, but that it would be inexpedient. His brother
John, afterwards Lord Lawrence, who had also acted as
Resident, although as much averse in general principle to
annexation as Henry, was convinced that, in this case,
annexation was not only just, but that its expediency was
'both undeniable and pressing.'
{1738}
Lord Dalhousie, after a full review of the efforts which had
been made to convert the Sikh nation into a friendly power
without annexation, decided that no course now remained to the
British Government but to annex. … The annexation of the
Punjab was deliberately approved of by the Court of Directors,
by Parliament, and by the English nation."
W. W. Hunter,
The Marquess of Dalhousie,
chapter 3.
ALSO IN:
Sir H. B. Edwardes and H. Merivale,
Life of Sir Henry Lawrence.
R. B. Smith,
Life of Lord Lawrence,
volume 1, chapters 7-11.
E. Arnold,
The Marquis of Dalhousie's Administration of British India,
volume 1, chapters 1-7.
H. B. Edwardes,
A Year on the Punjab Frontier, 1848-49.
Sir R. Temple,
Men and Events of My Time in India,
chapters 3-4.
INDIA: A. D. 1848-1856.
Lord Dalhousie's minor annexations.
The lapse of dependent Native States.
The case of Nana Sahib.
"In applying the doctrine of lapse to the Hindu chiefdoms, on
default of natural successors or of an heir legally adopted
with the sanction of the Ruling Power, Lord Dalhousie merely
carried out the declared law of the case, and the deliberately
formulated policy of the Government of India, years before he
arrived in the country. In so doing, however, Lord Dalhousie
became the unconscious but effective instrument by which the
old India of Lord Wellesley at the beginning of the century
was prepared for its conversion, in 1858, into the new India
of the Queen. … The fundamental question was whether we
should allow the government of a dependent State, in absence
of natural heirs, to pass like mere private property to an
adopted son. The Court of Directors had at one time permitted
the adoption of a successor in special cases to a principality
on failure of natural heirs. It declared, however, in 1834,
that such an 'indulgence should be the exception, not the
rule.' … As the evils of the old system of government by
sham royalties further developed themselves, the Government of
India determined in 1841 to enforce a more uniform policy. …
What Lord Dalhousie did, therefore, was not to invent a new
principle of Indian law, but to steadily apply an old
principle. … The first case in which this principle came to
be applied, shortly after Lord Dalhousie's arrival, was the
Native State of Satara. That Maratha principality had been
constituted by the British Government on the general break up
of the Maratha power in 1818, and confirmed to the 'sons and
heirs, and successors' of the recipient in 1819. In 1839 the
reigning prince was deposed for misconduct by the British
Government in the exercise of its Suzerain rights. By the same
rights the British Government then set up the brother of the
deposed prince on the throne. … The Raja, whom in 1839 we
had placed on the throne, applied for permission to adopt a
son. The British Government deliberately withheld the
permission; and in the last hours of his life the Raja, in
1848, hastily adopted a son without the consent of the
Government." Lord Dalhousie, with the advice of the Court of
Directors, declared in this case that the territory of Satara
had lapsed, on the death of the Raja, by failure of heirs, to
the Power which deposed, and it was annexed, accordingly, to
the British dominions. Under kindred circumstances the Native
States of Sambalpur, on the south-western frontier of Lower
Bengal, and Jhansi, a fragment of the Maratha dominions in
Northern India, were absorbed. "The same principle of lapse on
failure of heirs was applied by Lord Dalhousie to several
other dependent States. Jaitpur in Bundelkhand, Baghat a petty
hill Chiefdom of 36 square miles in the Punjab, Udaipur on the
Western frontier of Lower Bengal, and Budawal in Khandesh,
passed under direct British rule from this cause. The fort and
military fief of Tanjore were annexed after Lord Dalhousie's
departure from India, but practically on the grounds set forth
by his government. … By far the largest accession of
territory made during Lord Dalhousie's rule, to the British
dominions on the failure of heirs, was the great central tract
of India known as Nagpur. This Maratha principality as now
constituted into the Central Provinces, and after various
rectifications of frontier, has an area of 113,279 square
miles, with a population of 12,000,000 souls. The territories
annexed by Lord Dalhousie in 1854 make nearly four-fifths of
the present Central Provinces. … It is difficult to find any
ground for the charge which Mr. Kaye brought in 1865 against
Lord Dalhousie, for 'harshness' towards the man afterwards
known as the infamous Nana Sahib [see below: A. D. 1857
(MAY-AUGUST)]. As this charge, however, is still occasionally
repeated, and as it has even been suggested that Lord
Dalhousie was to some extent responsible for the Mutiny of
1857, in consequence of his action towards Nana Sahib in 1851,
I must briefly state the facts. In 1818, the Peshwa of the
Marathas, completely beaten in the field, threw himself on the
generosity of the British. Sir John Malcolm, then the
Governor-General's Agent in the Deccan, assured him of his
protection, and engaged that he should receive an allowance of
£80,000 a year for his support. … There could not be the
slightest pretension that it was ever anything more than a
personal annuity; and from first to last all mention of heirs
is carefully excluded. The records show that the ex-Peshwa,
Baji Rao, was well aware of this. Baji Rao lived until 1851,
leaving to his adopted son, Nana Sahib, an immense fortune
admitted to amount to £280,000, and believed by the Government
of the North-western Provinces to greatly exceed that sum. The
Government of India at once acknowledged the adopted son's
title to this splendid heritage, and out of its own
beneficence added to it the Jaghir, or grant of land, on which
his father had resided in the North-western Provinces. But the
pension, paid out of the tax-payers' pockets, lapsed upon the
death of the annuitant."
Sir W. W. Hunter,
The Marquess of Dalhousie,
chapters 6-7.
Duke of Argyll,
India under Dalhousie and Canning.
INDIA: A. D. 1849-1893.
The life in exile of Dhuleep Singh, heir to the Sikh throne.
"Few careers have ever been more instructive to those who can
see than that of the Maharajah Dhuleep Singh, who died in
Paris on Sunday [October 22, 1893] of apoplexy. He finished
life a despised exile, but no man of modern days ever had such
chances, or had seen them snatched, partly by fate, partly by
fault, so completely from his lips. But for an accident, if
there is such a thing as accident, he would have been the
Hindoo Emperor of India.
{1739}
His father, Runjeet Singh, that strange combination of Louis
XI. and Charles the Bold, had formed and knew how to control
an army which would have struck down all the native powers of
India much more easily than did any of the Tartar conquerors.
Without its master at its head, that army defeated the
British, and but for a magnificent bribe paid to its General
(vide Cunningham's 'History of the Sikhs') would have driven
the English from India, and placed the child, Dhuleep Singh,
upon the throne of the Peninsula, to be supported there by
Sikh and Rajpoot, Mahratta, and Beharee. Apart from the
English, there was nothing to resist them; and they were
guided by a woman, the Ranee Chunda Kour; who of all modern
women was most like Mary of Scots as her enemies have painted
her, and of whom, after her fall, Lord Dalhousie said that her
capture would be worth the sacrifice of a brigade. How Dhuleep
Singh would have reigned had Runjeet Singh's destiny completed
itself is another matter—probably like a Hindoo Humayoon—for
even if not the son of Runjeet Singh, who, be it remembered,
acknowledged him, he inherited ability from his mother; he was
a bold man, and he was, as his career showed, capable of wild
and daring adventure. He fell, however, from his throne under
the shock of the second Sikh War, and began a new and, to all
appearance, most promising career. Lord Dalhousie had a pity
for the boy, and the English Court—we never quite understood
why—an unusually kindly feeling. A fortune of £40,000 a year
was settled on him, he was sent to England, and he was granted
rank hardly less than that of a Prince of the Blood. He turned
Christian—apparently from conviction, though subsequent
events throw doubt on that—a tutor, who was quite competent,
devoted himself to his education, and from the time he became
of age he was regarded as in all respects a great English
noble. He knew, too, how to sustain that character,—made no
social blunders, became a great sportsman, and succeeded in
maintaining for years the sustained stateliness of life which
in England is held to confer social dignity. Confidence was
first shaken by his marriage, which, though it did not turn
out unsuccessfully, and though the lady was in after-life
greatly liked and respected, was a whim, his bride being a
half Coptic, half English girl whom he saw in an Egyptian
school-room, and who, by all English as well as Indian ideas
of rank, was an unfitting bride. Then he began over-spending,
without the slightest necessity, for his great income was
unburdened by a vast estate; and at last reduced his finances
to such a condition that the India Office, which had made him
advance after advance, closed its treasury and left him, as he
thought, face to face with ruin. Then the fierce Asiatic blood
in him came out. He declared himself wronged, perhaps believed
himself oppressed, dropped the whole varnish of civilisation
from him, and resolved to make an effort for the vengeance
over which he had probably brooded for years. He publicly
repudiated Christianity, and went through a ceremony intended
to readmit him within the pale of the Sikh variety of the
Hindoo faith. Whether it did readmit him, greater doctors than
we must decide. That an ordinary Hindoo who has eaten beef
cannot be readmitted to his own caste, even if the eating is
involuntary, is certain, as witness the tradition of the
Tagore family; but the rights of the Royal are, even in
Hindooism, extraordinarily wide, and we fancy that, had
Dhuleep Singh succeeded in his enterprise, Sikh doctors of
theology would have declared his re-admission legal. He did
not, however, succeed. He set out for the Punjab intending, it
can hardly be doubted, if the Sikhs acknowledged him, to make
a stroke for the throne, if not of India, at least of Runjeet
Singh; but he was arrested at Aden, and after months of fierce
dispute, let go, on condition that he should not return to
India. He sought protection in Russia, which he did not
obtain, and at last gave up the struggle, made his peace with
the India Office, took his pension again, and lived, chiefly
in Paris, the life of a disappointed but wealthy idler. There
was some spirit in his adventure, though it was unwisely
carried out. The English generally thought it a bit of
foolhardiness, or a dodge to extract a loan from the India
Office; but those who were responsible held a different
opinion, and would have gone nearly any length to prevent his
reaching the Punjab. They were probably wise. The heir of
Runjeet might have been ridiculed by the Sikhs as a Christian,
but he might also have been accepted as a reconverted man; and
one successful skirmish in a district might have called to
arms all the 'children of the sugar and the sword,' and set
all India on fire. The Sikhs are our very good friends, and
stood by us against any revival of the Empire of Delhi, their
sworn hereditary foe; but they have not forgotten Runjeet
Singh, and a chance of the Empire for themselves might have
turned many of their heads."
The Spectator,
October 28, 1893.
INDIA: A. D. 1852.
The second Burmese War.
Annexation of Pegu.
"While Lord Dalhousie was laying out the Punjab like a Scotch
estate, on the most approved principles of planting,
road-making, culture, and general management, the chance of
another conquest at the opposite extremity of his vice-kingdom
summoned him to Calcutta. The master of a trading barque from
Chittagong, who was charged unjustly with cruelty to a pilot,
had been fined £100 by the authorities of Rangoon, and the
captain of a brig had in like manner been amerced for alleged