The Press. — London, England, 1857-11-07 00:00:00

INDIA. THE OPERATIONS OF HAVELOCK. LUCKNOW-JUBBULPORE. Tln have not been many letters of interest pub lished during the past week, and in the absence of any further or later intelligence from India we will confine ourselves to a selection of the most striking points in the history of the operations of our troops, or of the movements of the rebels, brought f.rward by the different writers. With the fall of Delhi, and in the absence of any details, the public interest for the moment centres itself upon Lucknow. We have all "serious apprehensions," as Lord Broug • ham expressed himself last Tuesday, with respect to the present safety or future fate of the three hundred English men and women shut up in the fort of this city and closely besieged by a population of fanatics who detest the British rule and who are thirsting for British blood. At the thought of Havelock and his gallant few every heart throbs with the ardent hope that he way be in time. But meanwhile what is the nature of the obstacles which may impede his pro• gress? In this case we may, perhaps with some degree of certainty, anticipate the future by studying the past, and this opportunity is afforded us by a co temporary, who has published a long and most inte resting letter from Havelock's camp, written by an officer of rank. The writer describes wit h much minute ness of detail the operations of General Havelock in Oude previous to the arrival of Sir James Outram at Cawnpore. It will bo remembered that General Havelock had crossed the Ganges by the 25th July. On the 29th the advance towards Lucknow began in earnest. The force moved off at daylight, and after marching some four miles came on the village of Unao, when three guns opened fire, and " a hue of white puffs of smoke " from the orchard and garden wall gave evidence that " the matchlockmen meant to show fight." Our skirmishers carried these out posts with a dash, but when the troops attempted to follow up their success and clear the village " they were met by an opposition, and which," tells the writer, "fairly astonished the English soldiers ": These mud-walled villages of Oude and their fighting inhabitants are among the most peculiar features of the country. Every hamlet is at chronic feud with its neigh bours, and all of them look upon open rebellion against the farmer of their taxes as a sacred duty. The conse (pence is, that a century of practical experience in the art of seltdefence has converted these villages into almost impregnable fortifications, and the villagers themselves into, probably, the best garrison troops in the world. A huudred Oude men will flee from ten on the open plain, but. place ten of the same men behind a loophole mud wall, and they will hold their own against a hundred, nor think it much to do. Such► was the case now in the petty village of Uuao. Our troops were in the palace, and all round it, yet they could do comparatively nothing, and were dropping fast under the bullets of their unseen foes. Thrice did a portion of the best regiment in the field charge a mud walled inclosnre, containing a number of men, and thrice were they driven back, with heavy loss of officers and men. At length it was determined to fire the place ; the artillery drew back, portfires were laid to the thatch, and the men of the light companies stood waiting round the outskirts with eager eyes and rifles cocked, like terriors looking for the rats to bolt. Just at this moment the enterprising field engineer of the force, who had ridden on round to the front by himself to reconnoitre, came spurring back in hot haste with the information that a very large force of infantry, cavalry, and guns was rapidly advancing from the other side upon Unao ; whereupon the work in the village was left half done for the Sikhs to finish, and the whole force was ordered to turn the village by the right, and move on to the front as fast as possible. This was no easy matter, as far as the artillery were con cerned, for the ground was heavy, and often the guns stuck in a swamp for five minutes together, under a galling fire of matchlocks; but at length the main road was gained again, and we pushed on through the groves which encircled the. place. Beyond these trees lay a level swampy plain of vast extent, traversed by a raised road, and over this we now beheld a force of fully 0,000 men coming down at full swing on our front and left flank, with their guns in ad vance, distant about 1,500 yards. Our leading artillery gun instantly unlimbered, and came into action at the edge of the grove to check this advance, and give our infantry time to deploy, while the other guns, as they came up one by one, went into action in line with the first. By this time the enemy's artillery had closed to within a thousand yards, and opened fire. The sun was at the backs of the English gunners, and they had distinctly•seen objects to fire at. In ten minutes they had silenced the fire of the enemy's leading guns, and the whole English force was marching forward on the foe, with the artillery in the centre, moving along the raised road. I declare, the disproportionate idea of such a proceeding seemed almost ludicrous to me, as I looked forward at the Past musses of infantry sad THE PR E S S,, NOVEMBER 7, 1857. cavalry with which the plain swarmed in front, and then backward at the small, thin line of men struggling ou, with sloped arms, knee•deep in swamp. Yet there was not one of those grim-bearded Englishmen that did not know we should beat the foe ; and a groan ran down the line, " Oh, that we had cavalry to cut the dogs up !" During this advance the artillery came into action as there was occasion for it, and pressing forward, gun after gun of the enemy was abandoned on the road. while those in the front of the left flank stuck in the swamp as they tried to carry them off, and were left to their fate. At last our guns came near enough to open on their infantry, and saddles began to empty amongst their cavalry under the fire of our Enfield rifles on the right. The horsemen went threes about; there was a waver amongst the infantry ; and then the whole went off pell•mell to a village in the distance across the plain, where we saw them huddled together like a flock of sheep, leaving us masters of the field and fifteen captured guns. It was now past two p.m., and the troops halted where they stood, for a couple of hours, to cook and eat. After this they marched to Busarut Gunge, a walled village surrounded by swamps, about eight miles ahead, to which the enemy had retreated, and where they made another stand : On reaching this place we found they had three more guns in position—two behind a mud wall built across the road, and one on an elevated mud bastion. The two guns on the road were quickly smashed and silenced by the fire of our artillery, but the little fellow in the bastion—a small native piece—remained popping away after our troops had advanced, till a lucky 9-pounder knocked him off his perch. The aepoys made but a feeble defence, and were apeedily driven out of the village. Not so the match lockmen. They fought boldly and well, but our men were fierce and flushed with success, and house after house was stormed and carried till the village was finally evacuated. _ _ _ _ _ Here I cannot help putting on record the indomitable courage—after his own fashion—of one of those Oude villagers, who was in a little mud fort at the entrance of the place which had been stormed, and carried first of all. This single man had hid himself, and escaped the general bayoneting, and after the soldiery had passed on there was he, firing his solitary matchlock as briskly as ever, on the guns, the baggage, the elephants—everything that came near him; and he wouldn't be quiet though called to repeatedly. So the end of it was a party of Sikhs went and smoked him out; and the poor wretch was shot through the head as he was craning over the parapet for a last hit at his enemies. The English troops encamped that night on the causeway beyond the village, having fought from sunrise to sunset, and captured twenty-one guns, amongst which were two complete 9.pound English batteries, bran new, from the Cossipore foundry. The resistance was so great and so unexpected at these villages, and the loss inflicted upon our little army so severe (nearly 100 killed and wounded), that General Havelock determined to retreat. So the force marched back to the village of Mungulwarra, and, strengthening their position, waited for reinforce ments. At this time a manifesto was issued to the villages of Oude, stating the reason why we had entered their country, &c. Sce. In the opinion of our correspondent, this was injudicious in the face of our retreat, and in endeavouring to estimate the obstacles to the present attempt of Havelock to relieve Luck now, it is important to notice the effect he attri butes to this manifesto and our retreat : Had this proclamation been issued when the English army first crossed the river the people fur whom it was intended would have received it at more than its full worth; it would have quieted the minds of the cultivators, and the effect ou our operations would have been proportionate. It was not done; we marched on ; and the men of Oude stood in doubt as to whether our hostilities would be directed against them or not. But when the proclamation came forth, after the English had retreated !—to use the quaint language of my informant the spy—" Now the zemindars laugh; and those who sat quiet in their houses before rise up and gird their swords round their loins, and are off with their fifteen or twenty matchlockruen to join the Nana Sahib '—for I forgot to mention that this arch. villain is, as I anticipated, by no means defunct : he crossed the river into Oude, fought against us at Busarut Gunge, and was the first to run away. That this, is not exaggeration, we shall see in the future operations related of the force. On the 4th August, Havelock once more advanced, having received reinforcements of some 150 men and two 24-pounder guns. The enemy had again come down to Busarut Gunge, and were said to be collected in great numbers, and strongly intrenched at a place called Nuwab Gunge, five miles beyond, on the road to Lucknow. The troops bivouacked at Unao that night, and on reaching Busarut Gangs next morning were met by the fire of two guns : To these our heavy guns responded, doing fearful execution amongst the crowds which filled the village; while the position was turned by a flank movement to the right of a portion of the force, consisting of the 78th, the Fusiliers, and the Royal Artillery battery. The remainder of the troops then passed on through the village, and came to the causeway crossing the swamp, from the other side of which the enemy were keeping up a hot fire of match looks and guns, both on the causeway and on the right 1071 wing of our force, who returned their fire with interest across the water. Taking advantage of the diversion thus made, the 84th dashed across the causeway and began skirmishing on the other side. The heavy guns followed, and opened fire at grape range on the enemy's cavalry, who were scattered to the four winds by three volleys. We were now in a thickly cultivated country, studded with petty hamlets, each of which was filled with match locknien. The whole force crossed the causeway and spread out to right and left, engaging the villagers and driving back the sepoys in front, while the guns moved along the road in advance. In this order we passed through the belt of cultivation, and came out on an open plain, where stood large tents and small, and half a dozen diffe rent camps crowded with troops under as many different fortified villages, bristling with matehlockmen. Our artillery immediately opened fire on the largest camp, where was a pretentious red and white striped tent, with numbers of cavalry and infantry, and some guns, all of which beat a most precipitate retreat directly the '2 I.pound grapeshot and shrapnel began to drop amongst them. But our guns were far in advance of our infantry, and could not venture to follow up without support ; a halt was therefore sounded, to allow of the remaining troops coming up : and when they arrived the order was given to cook and eat, while a consultation was held as to the expediency of pursuing the advantage already gained, and going on to attack Nuwab Gunge. That a council of war never fights is proverbial, and so the result of their deliberations is easily an. ticipated. The council decided on a retreat : And, in my humble opinion, wisely so, for the chance was gone. Before this we had only a few wrongheaded zemindars to contend with o►► the side of the mutineers ; now the whole population were up in arms against us. The sepoys we held of small account; but it would be no slight thing for a thousand people to fight a whole people. Besides which, there was no concealing the fact that our English soldiery were now to a certain extent disheartened. Sickness, exposure, and unremitting fatigue had done their work. Cholera, fever, and dysentery were rife in the camp ; and a late order containing an insinuation against the courage of an unnamed portion of the force—that force which had fought and done so much for its com mander—had, as a matter of course, been taken to itself by each individual regiment, and created a feeling of uni versal dissatisfaction. It was stated—with what truth I know not—that the cause of the previous retreat was the receipt of a positive order from the Governor-General, which reached the officer commanding the force on the evening of the first fight at Busarut Gunge, to retreat upon Cawnpore, and that the advance upon this occasion was made solely on the general's own responsibility, in direct opposition to his order. If so, it is greatly to be regretted that this amount of moral courage on the part of the general should only have been displayed at a time when its results were utterly futile. Before, such disobedience of orders would in all probability have saved Lucknow; now, it only entailed a useless fight, and prostrated so many more of our scanty force by death, wounds, and sickness. The army marched back once more to Mungul warra, commenced preparations for recrossing the Ganges, and had pissed over all their stores and baggage by the 11th August, when suddenly infor mation arrived that the enemy were coming down in force. The " turn out " was sounded, and in less than an hour the troops were once more off in ad vance, with their arms in their hands, the clothes on their backs, and without another thing : When they reached Una°, lo I there WRS not a soul to be seen; but there came in real information to the effect that the enemy, under the impression that we had crossed the river two days previously, had really come down in force to Busarut Gunge, and that 4,000 infantry and NO cavalry, with one horse•battery and some native guns, were now lying encamped in front of that place. Having gone so far, therefore, it was now impossible to retreat in the face of the enemy without a fight. Accordingly, the English force bivouacked that night on the plain, and marched forward at dawn next morning. Meantime the enemy, hearing of our advance, bad worked hard all night intrenching themselves, and when we drew near we found them very strongly posted—their right resting on a small village on the main road, where they had guns in battery—their left on a mound about 400 yards distant, which they had cut down into another battery mounting three guns—the interval between con nected by a ditch and breastwork lined with infantry, with cavalry massed on their left flank, ready to act—if they dared. To oppose these we had not, I believe, more than 800 effective men in the field, for 2(X) had been left behind to guard the river. The plan of battle was soon formed. The 78th Fusiliers and four guns moved off on the right to attack the left of the enemy's position ; the heavy guns on the left, supported by the 84th, went along the road to encounter the enemy's right battery, and the remaining troops and guns took the centre. Our right, for the ground was good and the men fresh, moved fast, and soon came into action with the enemy's left. They seemed particularly jealous of this movement, and turned all the guns they could bring to bear upon us. I certainly was never under so heavy a fire in my life. In five minutes after we came into action, ever] man at the gun I was laying was wounded with grape, except the sei geant and myself, and four of our gun•cattle were knocked over by round shot. The other three guns suffered nearly as much, and we found our fire had little effect on the battery in our front—their guns were too well protected. So we limbered up and got out of that as fast as we could, taking ground more to the right, and then found it was MN ■