The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1858-03-16 00:00:00

THE INDIAN MUTINIES.

THE SIEGE OF DELHI.

The following letter was written by a lady (one of the
Indian sufferers whose husband was killed in the mu-
tiny at Gwalior) to her father, dated December 21st,
18,67 :
. . . We arrived in Delhi on Friday after-
noon from Meerut, having left Agra on the 12th of
December, and entered by the Calcutta-gate across the
bridge of boats. The principal street, the Claimdney
Chowk, is very curious; it is the bazaar, full of na-
tive shops and houses; many of the latter are painted in
a very strange way : one or two I will describe. On
the walls flowers, odd signs, stars, and crescente,
and pictures of lions and tigers; one is an absurd picture
of an English officer—a little man, with • very red face
and beard on a horse suspended in the air, fighting with
a lion, and several other figures of ladies and gentlemen.
The Chadney Chowk did not look any the worse for the
siege, none of the houses are destroyed, and the streets
are far too crowded with gaily dressed natives, seated
before their shops very busy buying and selling, and all
looking much too impudent. This street is the only one
that does not show signs of the siege. It was very
amusing to see English soldiers in their bright uniforms,
Sikhs on their wild horses prancing about, the funny
little Ghoorkas ; ladies and children riding on immense
elephant.; gentlemen on camels, horses, and ponies;
and a prize agent in • very pretty carriage, with ser-
vants in handsome livery, and his children after him
mounted on an elephant. To nee all this was so exciting
after my long, wearying six months' imprisonment in
the Fort at Agra. The contrast of the different shops
houses, and costumes, and gay pieces of calico hung
across the streets, the blue sky, and green trees made a
very pretty picture ; one might have forgotten for the
time the fearful things that had happened there but for
two large gallows in the middle of the street, on which
some wretches almost daily pay the just penalty of their
crimes. It is the beck streets and bye lanes, of which
Delhi is full, that show you a siege has taken place;
numbers of houses are riddled with shot, the trees torn
up, walls and houses entirely destroyed by shells, heaps
of rubbish lying about, and the place haa • horrid death-
ly feeling; it was thew streets m which so many of the
fights took place and which were found full of dead
&pop ; in the Chandney Chowk only • skeleton or two
were seen when our army entered. It seemed, if the
streets had been well defended, the city never could
have been taken; the houses are all made as if for that
purpose, with fiat roofs, and little passages and corners
where the enemy could hide and fire on our troops.
This they did and killed numbers; but if they had de-
ft nclod the place well it never could have been taken.
In the evening we went out by the Lahore Gate, round
by the Sikhs' camp; the walls are very mush destroyed
in some places, particulary the Mane Bastion, nearly
opposite Hindoo Eao's house, and the little mosque,
where our bastions were. Old Delhi, which is about •
quarter of • mile from the new city, is, they uy, full
of Mohomedans, most of them Ghasies. All outside the
walls are miserable little mosques and Musulman burial-
grounds. On Wednesday the Neivab of Nijjur was
hung; it is a Feat shame the horrid old Ring is not
hanged also, since he gave out 44 poor Europeans to be
murdered; of them were hid in the purlieus of

many or
the palace. On Thursday morning I drove with Cap-
tain G-- to see our camp and cantonments : all the
housee are burnt and destroyed. I saw the Flog Staff,
and Captain 0— told me when they came there they
found a (artful of skeletons, which they buried. He
showed me the burialgroand where they buried all the
soldiers, and he had just marked out • new one, as the
old one was full of our poor soldiers. The ground all
about our camp and Hindu Rao's house is very broken,
covered with very large stones and • prickly bush, which
afforded a capital cover for the enemy, who used to
OJIIIB out in swarms the first month and try to drive our
troops from that position. We had two bastions close to
Hindoo Rio's house occupied by Ohoorkas and the
Rifles.
"The old mosque is marked all over with round shot
and shells, and so near the walls that when our men
used to sing there the enemy could hear them. The
ground is rather nigh on which Matto° Rio's house
stands; it forms • sort of ridge, from which you look
down on one side into the city, and on the other on our
cantonments; all the trees are broken and injuradl
the 'hot, and the ground marked by shells. me dad
stillness was quite painful, and it did not seem as it
snob dreadful soonest bad been emceed there ao lately.
Captain 03— showed me • room thicbmcwhire

the killed end wounded had been brought after an en-
ppment, and said he had often seen it swimming with
blood and echoing with the scrums of the dg and
wounded. I saw Sir Theophilus Metcalfe the or day;
beta held in greet dread here by the natives and Is
every day trying and banging all he can catch. The
room in which poor Miss Jennings, her father, and Miss
Clifford were is now a memoom, and die stains of
Mies Jennings' blood and the hacks of the swot& are to
be net on the walls.
"The whole city teems with horrors; there 11
a home in which some horrible some hes nor=
place. I won* rue the place Id the greutid t it is teo
fearful, and the atrocities too borrfftle ever hgahrto be a
pines for happiness. Al 'T drove with Ulakhr and
Kn. 0— they kept saying 'Here is the place were so
many poor people were measured, and this is the house
where So-and-So was murdered, and here poor young
Fagan wee cut down." . . .

TIODELEI Pans Mom—An officer at Meerut writes
the following, dated Jan. 28, 1858 :—" There is much
clisoontent about prise money not being allowed for
Delhi. I should imagine the people at home would be
very indignant. Lord Canning seems to consider that.
six months' heft.' la ample reward for the troops who
captured Delhi and defended Luoknow. If there are
any lwal objectiona to the prise money being given, they
should give every officer and soldier at Delhi and in
Luolmow 12monthil pay clear, and allow them to count
one year's service for every month they were under fire.
All the troops in the provinces should get 19 months
batta. Our men here at Meerut, for months before
Delhi was taken, were on duty every other day—l mean
besides their common daily routine of duty, which for •
cavalry soldier is very great. Half the men were always
on guild; so that they had one night in bed, and the
next on guard or picket. Everyone here had double
work to do. They stopped our pay, and we had to leave
our houses; and now that we are settled everything is
so dear that we can scarcely live."
Tan QUILIN AND THE WOUNDS]) INDIAN OFFICTILB.
—We are informed that as sonn as the news reached-the
Queen at Osborne of the arrival at Southampton, in the
Pere steamer, of the wounded officers from India, Her
Majesty telegraphed to the Admiralty-office at that port
requesting to be furnished with their names and any
other particulars respecting them. The strong personal
interest taken by Her Majesty in all that relates to the
army is well known to the public, and we trust that this
prompt act of condescension may be looked upon as the
forerunner of some appropriate reward to oftsre who
have deserved so well d their country.