The Press.
London, England, 1857-11-28 00:00:00

THE PRESS, NOVEMBER 28,1857.

selling for four rupees, and you may depend our fellows
were not behind them lt is suppoLod the
Rifles will go to England with upwards of 1,000/. each,
though General Wilson has issued an order that the prizes
shall be all put together and divided. Most of our men
are worth upwards of 100 rupees

Another writer gives us some of the details con-
nected with the capture of the Princes. The letter
is dated Dugshaie, a place about forty miles from
Delhi, the 29th of September last :

A few days ago Captain Hodgson (of ours) went out and
captured the King, and brought him in a prisoner. He is
at present confined in his own palace. A few days later be
went out again, and came up with the King's sons and
grandson. He had only 100 native horsemen of his own
regiment with him, and the enemy about 10,000, 3,000 of
whom were fully armed sepoys. Hodgson cum it was of
no use attacking them, so he sent an emissary to tell the
Princes that the game was up with them, and that they had
better surrender, which they did after some time, and came
up to Hodgson, who immediately surrounded the carriage
with his men. He sent for their arms, and, after hesita-
ting some time, these also were given up, with seven
elephants and lots of stores. On reaching the gaol Hodg-
son ordered the Princes out of the vehicle ; they, imagining
all was right for themselves, began (native•like) to talk,
and say they hoped there might be an inquiry into their
conduct. Hodgson said " cheeproks " (be quiet), and
ordered them to take off all their fine clothes. When this
was done he said, " Now get in again," and ordered the
driver to proceed. He then beckoned to one of his men,
and asked for a carbine, and with his own hand shot each
and all of the three Princes. He then took their bodies
into the city, and laid them out for inspection in front of
the Kotswallie, where these wretches had laid out their
victims during the massacre. There are lace upon lace of
treasure and prize property in the city, and if the city
itself was put up for ransom It would fetch upwards of
fifty lace.

An Engineer offic3r engaged in the: siege declares
it as his opinion that if we had attempted to storm
the city before, not a man would have escaped to
tell the tale, and he grounds this opinion first on the
weakness of our forces, and secondly on the strength
of the rebels' position. Alluding to the proposed
assault on the 12th June, he writes :

M 3 own (and, I think, the general) conviction is that
our force, so contemptibly small as it then was, would have
been completely lost in such an immense city, and, unless
the enemy bad been moat completely panic-stricken,
would have had little chance of holding any temporary
advantage that we might have obtained in the first rush. I
could enumerate instances of the same kind without num-
ber, but it would try your patience. I think few can
ponder on all that has happened and imagine our work in
India is done, and that Providence has altogether for-
saken us.

He then describes the progress of our bombard-
ment :

We opened our trenches on the 7th of September, and
the way in which we accomplished this was one of the most
wonderful parts of the siege. Breaking ground so close to
the walls was a bold manoeuvre, which few circumstances
would justify, and one which we fully expected would cost
us many valuable lives. Judge, then, of our surprise to
find scarcely any notice whatever taken of our proceedings.
It is the more remarkable as there seemed to be no attempt
at secrecy on our part, and we ourselves could hear the
enemy's sentries on the ramparts. Our working party was
an excessively large one, and had the enemy taken common
precautions ( for they could not have been ignorant of our
presence) they must have inflicted very heavy losses, if,
indeed, they had not entirely stopped our works. Vigilant,
however, as we have always found them, this first night
God seemed to have blinded their eyes to all sense of
danger ; fur, with the exception of one shower of grape and
two or three round shot directed at us, which injured no
one, they fired away at our batteries on the ridge as usual.
In the morning they acted very differently, for they com-
menced, and through the day kept up, a very hot fire ; too
late, however, for we had managed to obtain pretty good
shelter by that time, and our first battery on the right was
not only finished, but armed and hard at work breaching.
You would think that after the experience of our first night
they would have allowed us little peace in breaking fresh
ground nearer the walls ; however, even then there was not
very much tire, and it was only on the third night that they
seemed to awake to a sense of their danger ; and from that
time they kept up a pretty steady fire of all sorts, includ-
ing musketry, and we certainly lost some men. You may
fancy that the engineers had little time to themselves. I
was not in bed for four nights, and, as you may imagine,
pretty well done up. There was only one battery (only
150 or 200 yards from the walls) to be finished, and it was
the excitement alone that kept us awake. I bad a party of
her Majesty's 61st and Bth Regiments under me, filling
sandbags. The fire was very hot, and I was anxious to get
my men under cover in some pits, where the earth was
softer to dig. I was leading them to the pit, when, the
night being dark, I fell into one that I had not seen, and
sprained my leg and ankle so severely that I was obliged
to be taken to camp in a dhoolie. There I lay on my back
till the day of the assault. I don't think that anybody in
camp knew for certain the time of the assault till within
two hours of the time. I was in my tent, away from the
mess, and therefore had no opportunity of hearing anything
about it till the rattle of musketry told me that something
was doing. Of course, stopping in bed was out of the
question, and as my charger was hors de combat, I had no
choice but to mount my little pony Donald. I had my
doubts about my new charger, a very pretty little beast,
and perfect in every respect except courage, being one of
the most determined shyers that I have ever seen. How-
ever, I had no choice, so I mounted, and in due course of