The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1879-02-01 00:00:00

A VISIT to the CITY of JELLALABAD.

The Correspondent of The Times, writing from the Camp
at Jellalabad, on Dec. 24, says:—
To-day Major Bailey, of the 4th Battalion Rifle
Brigade, kindly went round the city with me and
pointed out various places of interest, where in-
cidents had occurred during the last war, when Sir
Robert Sale was holding the place, Major Bailey is,
I believe, the only man in the force who was
present at the campaign of 1839-41. His service
in this country lasted from 1838 to 1842. He
pointed out the spot where Colonel Denny was
killed ; it was near a mud fort on the river side of
the Cabul road, not far from where now stands Pie
palace of the Ameer. It was down this same Cabul
road that Dr. Brydon, the sole survivor of the
massacre of our men in the Khurd Cabal, came in a
half-dead state, and was taken in by. the garrison of
Jellalabad. Maj,r Bailey also showed •us the remains
of the bastion where his post was during the greater
part of the seven months that they were besieged in the
place, and the spot where Colonel Mofiteith was buried
alive for some time by the fall of the walla from an
earthquake. which also caused the garrison considerable
difficulty by injuring their fortifications. One tower,
that to the north-west of the city, was greatly wrecked
and was rebuilt by our troops, and even to this
day, when the old walls have considerably fallen
away, it bears signs of a different class of workman-
ship from that of the other parts of the city. Our
troops besieged here suffered rather severely from want
of food, being for a long period placed upon quarter
rations. Ail their ponies, mules, &c., were killed and
salted down. Luckily, they discovered when digging a
store of buried salt and tobacco, as also a case contain-
ing silver money. The enemy also, being armed with
jezails—long guns supported by a rest, and carrying
further than the muskets with . which our men
were armed—annoyed the garrison by firing these
weapons upon the loopholes, so thi t it became
dangerous for our men to show themselves by
darkening those places. The garrison consisted of
about 1,500 men, while the enemy outside numbered
several thousands. Curiously enough, the troops
seem to have suffered very little from illness during
the siege, while now we have a large number of men
on the sick list.
I visited the Ameer's palace, a house built outside
the town, surrounded with mud walls, with two or
three other houses and a Turkish bath adjacent to it.
The house consists of a ground fleor, a first flow, and
a flat roof. It is made of woodwork and mud and mud
brielis, with some attempt at ornamentation in a kind
of white stucco running round the doorways and over
the walls, with a good deal of lattice-work in the walls,
the gratings of which are cut into very pretty patterns
of stars &c. It contains on the first floor a good,
large, dark room for sleeping, and two large rooms,
one at the front and the other at the back, with
smaller rooms at the corners and sides. The view of
the plain, mountains, and Cabul River from the top
of the house is very charming. The staircase is
very rude and rough, and the place contains nothing
but some old matting, The gardens in front and
around it are laid out in the Oriental- style,
with a large square tank in the centre,
and long tanks on either side running . for
some 40 or 50 yards, arid divided into steps, so that
the water may fall in cascades towards the house. All
around are trees, chiefly orange and chunah, and large
spaces made into beds, where some flowers grow;
these are chiefly planted with balsam. This place, if
put in repair and if there should be no severe earth-
quake, would make very good head-quarters. There
are two other houses close to it, which are much in the
same style. . .