Bengal Army

“ The Company's regular forces in India were formed into three distinct armies, namely, those of Bengal, Madras, and Bombay, and each army had its own commander-in-chief. The armies of Madras and Bombay were mostly recruited in their respective presidencies; but the people of Bengal are not a fighting race, and the Bengal army was mostly recruited from the warlike populations of Oudh and the North-West Provinces. Again the Bengal army was not kept within the limits of the Bengal presidency, but was distributed over the whole of Northern India as far as the north-west frontier. ”

“ It was just 100 years since the first regiment of the Bengal army was raised by Lord Clive in 1757, and from that date it had been gradually increasing until, in May, 1857, it numbered no fewer than 350,000 [15] well-armed and well-drilled men, officered by some of the best blood of Britain. Some of the foremost of our generals had fought in its ranks—Clive, Lake, Beard, Wellington, Hastings, Hardinge, Gough, Evans, Brown, Campbell, Havelock, Outram, Hudson, and others, had frequently led that deluded army on to victory. ”

“ After these battles the Mahratta army submitted to our Government, and in about a fortnight afterwards six or eight thousand of them actually volunteered to enter our service, and were at once formed into ten regiments under British officers selected from the Bengal native forces, and styled from that day “The Gwalior Contingent.” They remained faithful to our service until the general mutiny of the native Bengal army, and then I believe they joined the revolt to a man. ”

“ When I first saw them I was struck by their fine manly and soldier-like appearance, superior in every way to the Bengal native troops and evidently under better discipline, and now the best proof of this is that when the whole of the Bengal native troops, cavalry, artillery, and infantry, mutinied, and murdered their English officers in cold blood, not one single corps of the Madras native army wavered for a minute. ”

“ Bengal.—The English traders in Bengal were long restricted by the native princes to a military establishment of an ensign and 30 men; and this force may be taken as the germ of the Indian army. In 1681 Bengal received the first reinforcement from Madras, and two years later a company was sent from Madras, raising the little Bengal army to a strength of 250 Europeans. In 1695 native soldiers were first enlisted. In 1701–1702 the garrison of Calcutta consisted of 120 soldiers and seamen gunners. ”

“ The requisite new recruits were principally raised from Rohilkand and Audh the future nurseries of the famous Bengal army. The officers were the most respectable Europeans that the General could collect; and the non-commissioned posts were given to picked men of the old battalions. ”

“ On the 31st of March, part of the Bengal army, consisting of 2200 native troops, with 22 pieces of heavy ordnance, commanded by Brigadier-General Watson, joined the besieging force; and these guns were soon placed in battery, and opened on the fort. ”

“ The greater part of the Bengal army in open mutiny; sepoys murdering their officers, together with their wives and children; widespread disaffection among the native troops of both the other Presidencies. As written at the time, and when the intelligence was fresh: “It appears that the ostensible cause of the outbreak was the issue of cartridges greased with animal fat. But for a long time past a deep-rooted determination has existed among the natives to throw off a foreign yoke, and to raise for themselves a king of the Delhi line of succession. ”

“ His curse is dreaded as a fate worse than death itself, whilst his protection is earnestly sought after by means of small presents, and of what to them is more valuable, constant prostrations or salaams publicly performed, so as to show the world the extent of the belief in their mighty power. When it is considered that in each regiment of the Bengal Army there are several of these men, in many regiments from three to four hundred, the mighty influence they have in their power to exert for good or evil may be imagined. ”

“ Whilst the Bengal army was assembling on the northern frontier of India, under the personal command of Sir Henry Fane, another force was being collected at Bombay. It was composed of a brigade of cavalry, including her Majesty’s 4th Dragoons, a brigade of artillery, and a brigade of foot, consisting of two Queen’s regiments (the 2nd Royals and 17th Foot) and one Sepoy corps. Major-General Thackwell commanded the cavalry; Major-General Wiltshire the infantry; and Colonel Stevenson the artillery brigade. Sir John Keane, the commander-in-chief of the Bombay army, took command of the whole. ”

“ Four days afterwards, Lord Harris was able to announce that other regiments—the 17th, 30th, 36th, and 47th native infantry, and the 5th native cavalry—had in a similar way come forward ‘to express their abhorrence of the traitorous conduct of the mutineers of the Bengal army, and their desire to be employed wherever their services may be required.’ Besides thus providing faithful soldiers, the governor of Madras was in a position, at various times during July and August, to send large supplies of arms, ammunition, and camp-equipage, from Madras to Calcutta. ”

“ No choice was left; nothing could be done till the cold weather, except shelter themselves against the approaching rainy season, to which the Bengal monsoon is but as summer showers in comparison. During this season, the troops suffered much from exposure, from bad and insufficient supplies, harassment by the enemy, and continual petty attacks on stockades, so that when 372the season for operations arrived, it found an army of invalids, instead of one fit to take the field.
The Burmese recalled their army under Bundoola from Arracan, and it arrived in the vicinity of Rangoon in November. ”

“ The solidarity of the 50th gave the impression of irresistible force. The rush of cavalry, as, like a whirlwind, they went at full charge, to a great extent concealed in a cloud of dust raised by their horses’ hoofs; the magnificent and unsurpassed Bengal Horse Artillery, in performing the evolutions pertaining to them,—​these incidents struck us with amazement and admiration. Little did we think that not many months thereafter we were to be even more struck with admiration at the brilliant performance of some of those very troops in actual fight. ”

“ Two regiments which mutinied near Calcutta were easily disbanded; but a formidable and successful revolt of the sepoy brigade at Meerut, near Delhi (May 10, 1857) , was the signal for the outbreak of well-nigh the whole Bengal army.
The heir of the Moguls proclaimed Emperor at Delhi.
In the months of May and June, more than forty garrisons in the valleys of the Ganges and the Jumna mutinied. In most cases their rising was followed by hideous cruelty; the European officers were treacherously shot, and hundreds of women and children massacred. ”

“ The second column of the army, under Major-General Gray, consisted of the 3rd Buffs, the 50th Regiment, and the 9th Lancers. Also five regiments of Bengal native infantry, two regiments of Bengal native cavalry, and several batteries of European artillery, commissariat, and medical departments marched from Cawnpore and Allahabad and other stations in November, and were concentrated for the first time in brigades on a very extensive plain about half-way between Gwalior and Cawnpore. ”

“ I have seen the letter [71] from the Bombay army to that of the coast, and it is unqualified in its condemnation of the orders of the 1st of May, and its promise of support. Several private letters have been received from Bengal. An address from that army, to the same effect as that of Bombay, is expected: at all events they appear certain that no human power will lead the Bengal [125] troops to act against them. They calculate upon opposition from the King's army, and their plans are concerted to meet it. These deluded men are aware of the ruin they are bringing upon themselves ”

“ The sepoys of the Bengal army, the only part of our native army with which I am much acquainted, are educated as soldiers from their infancy—they are brought up in that feeling of entire deference for constituted authority which we require in soldiers, and which they never lose through life. ”

“ There are Europeans, Goorkhas, Sikhs, Punjaubees, Beloochees, and mountaineers from the Afghan frontier; but the only entry referring clearly to the Bengal native army is that of 78 men of the 4th irregular cavalry, and these appear in the unsoldierlike condition, ‘disarmed and unhorsed.’ The horse-artillery were frequently referred to in dispatches by the names of the officers in command—such as Tombs’, Turner’s, Renny’s, and Remington’s troops ”

“ The minds of men were concerned with so framing the new plan that another outbreak might have no chance of success. But by degrees the warnings of the Mutiny faded away, the Bengal Army had become unwieldy, and was fast tiding to an amalgamation of material, and it was only in 1879, when the Afghan War was teaching us a sharp lesson, that those who believed it to be possible to have a better system of administration, with a more scientific and a more secure plan, were able to obtain a hearing. ”

“ On the 24th marched for Bangalore, in three columns: the artillery on the right, infantry in the centre, and cavalry on the left; to keep the enemy’s cavalry at a distance, the European regiments were equipped with the iron 12–pounders from the park, and on several occasions their services were found very useful on the march to Bangalore, before which the army took up their position on the 5th March. ”

“ I am prepared to wait if I see that the Government with our help can raise a large army in Bengal to-day to face a great danger—if I see that and if I find that such a course is likely to succeed, I am prepared to wait till the war is over for the fulfilment of those broken pledges. ”

“ I stated that it seemed the feeling in the army was excited more by the apprehension of further reductions than by the establishment of the half- Batta stations; that if concessions were made to the Bengal army, the other armies would be discontented and further demands would be made. ”

“ The new bearer of the title, with Sher Singh's wives and remaining children, was removed a safe distance into British territory, and the work of pacifying the state, by hunting down the remains of the insurgent army and of the revolted Granthi regiments, proceeded apace. In fact, it was so quickly done that new force was given to a body of opinion that was gradually gathering strength. Now that the Agpur campaign could be viewed as a successful whole, men began to contrast it with that other warfare which was engaging the energies of the Commander-in-Chief and the entire Bengal Army. ”

“ They have found out that the “Feringhee ray”—English reign—is not all over out here, and that civility is much cheaper than shot, shell, cold steel, or a rope. As for a Native army, we must keep up one, or send out at least 50,000 more men, to hold this vast country. The old Bengal Native Army has been almost destroyed. There are a few regiments that have remained loyal, and the places of the others are filled up with Punjaubees and Afridis—inhabitants of the lower range of the Himalaya Mountains. One would almost pity some of the old mutineers that escaped the ravages of war. ”

“ It is especially worthy of note, that any distrust of England, arising out of annexation policy, was likely to be more intense in Oude than anywhere else; for three-fourths of the infantry in the Bengal army 35had been recruited from the inhabitants of that state; they were energetic men, strongly attached to their native country; and when the change of masters took place, they lost certain of the privileges they had before enjoyed. The Bengalees proper, the natives of the thickly populated region around the lower course of the Ganges, have little to do with the Bengal army ”

“ A junction took place with the main army on the 10th November, and both armies followed Tippoo, to relieve Trichinopoly, and after some desultory operations, the campaign concluded.
In November and December Lieutenants Jones and Nash, of the artillery, died, and Lieutenants T. Green, Exshaw, McLeod, Drummond, and Buchan came round from Bengal to join the battalion. ”

“ At these, the insurgents, who had seized the fort, laughed, and on his attempting a parley with them, attacked and wounded his elephant and chuprassees, and forced him precipitately to retreat. Reinforcements and a battering train were sent for from Sagur; but the country had been so denuded of troops to form the army of the Indus, that, had it not been for the Mhow troops just being relieved 407from Bombay, a very insufficient force could have been collected. ”

“ The army commenced its march on the 10th December, and met with no difficulties until the 16th March, 1839, when they entered the Bolan pass, a pass as terrible to the Indian, as that of Avernus to the classical, imagination. Here the toils of the campaign began, and, as usual in such cases, a double share fell to the artillery. The horses, overweighted and ill-fed, with difficulty dragged the carriages through its stony lengths ”

“ Owing to the paucity of artillerymen, men had been taken from the horse-artillery to serve the heavy guns in the field; and the troops—three if not four—to which they belonged, were left behind in camp. The services of these troops would have been lost to the army on the 10th February, had not Sir Henry Hardinge, while the battle was yet raging, ascertained that the ammunition of the heavy guns was nearly expended, and deduced, from this misfortune, the more than fortunate conclusion, that the horse-artillerymen would soon be again available for their proper duties. ”