The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1895-02-14


ment, present the fight of this one
family from Delhi merely to illustrate
the desperation of the times. The fact
was that the Sepoys had taken posses
sion of the city of Delhi, ,and they were,
with all their artillery, fighting back
the Europeans who were on the outside
and numbering all the Europeans who
were inside. The city of Delhi has
circulated wall on three sides, wall
So miles long, and the fourth side of
the city is defended by the river Jum-
ma. In addition to these two defenses
of wall and water there were 10000
Sepoys, all armed. Twelve hundred
British soldiers were to take that city.
Nicholson, the immortal general, COM
manded them, and you must visit his
grave before you leave Delhi. He fell
leading his troops. He commanded
them after being mortally wounded.
You will read this inscription on his
tomb. r...
John Nicholson, who led the as
sault of Delhi, but fell in the hour of
victory, mortally wounded, and died
23d September, 1857, aged 35 years.
With the guns and men Gen. Mich
olson could muster he had laid siege
to this walled city filed with devils.
What fearful odds! Twelve hundred
British troops uncovered by any
military works, to take a city sur
rounded by firm and high masonry, on
the top of which were ia guns and de-
| Tended by 10000 ,foaming Sepoys. A
larger percentage of troops fell here
than in any great battle | happen to
know of. The Crimean percentage of
| the fallen was 17.4S, but the percentage
| of Delhi was $40. Yet that city must
be taken, and it can only be taken by
such courage as had never been record
ed in all the annals of bloodshed. Ev-
cry charge of the British regiments
against the walls and gates had been
beaten back. The hyenas of Hindoo-
ism and Mohammedanism howled over
the walls, and the English army could
do nothing but bury their own dead.
But at this gate I stand and watch an
exploit that makes the page of history
tremble with agitation.
This city has ten gates, but the most
famous is the one before which we now
stand, and it is called Cashmere gate.
Write the words in red ink because OF
the carnage. Write them in letters OF
light for the illustrious deeds. Write
them in letters of black for the, bereft
and the dead. Will the world ever
forget that Cashmere gate? Lieut.
Salkeld and Home and Sergts. Bur
CESS, Carmichael and Smith offered to
take bags of powder to the foot of that
gate and set them on fire, blowing oper
the gate, although they must die il
doing it. There they go just after
sunrise, each one carrying a sack con
tanning "a pounds of powder, and doing
this under the fire of the enemy.
Lieut.. Home was the first to jump
{ into the ditch which still remains be
) fore the gate. AS they go, one by ont
!. falls under the shot and shell. One 0
the mortally wounded as he fall
, hands his sack of powder with a box o
| lucifer matches to another, telling hin
to fire the sack, when, with an explo
: sion that shook the earth for 20 mile
around, part of the Cashmere gate wa
= blown to fragments, and the bodies o.
, some of these heroes were SO scattered
r they were never gathered for funera
: or grave or monument. The Britisl
e army rushed in through the broker
/ gate, and although six days of har
: fighting were necessary before the cit
: was in complete possession the crisi
e was past. The Cashmere gate oper
e the capture of Delhi and all it cor
tanned of palaces and mosques an
4 treasures was possible. ..-....
$ Lord Napier. of Magdala, of whol
/ Mr.. Gladstone spoke to me SO affection
: ately when I was his guest at Harvard
), en-, Eng, has lifted a monument nea
i this Cashmere gate, with the names {
= the men who there fell inscribed the-,
s on. That English lord, who had see
It courage on many q battlefield, visite
). this Cashmere gate and felt that tE
i men who opened it with the loss {
d their own lives night to be commem
o grated, and hence this cenotaph. Bu
e after all, the best monument is tt
gate itself. with the deep goug'
e in the brick wall on the lie
z side made by two bombshell
If and the wall above torn by ten bonn
e shells, and the wall on the rigl
l. side defaced and scraped and plowt
and quilted by all styles of long reac
le ing weaponry. Let the words Gas
d mere gate,'' as synonym for patrio
If ism and fearlessness and self sacrifie
E. go into all history, all art, all liter
.e ture, all time, all eternity! My friend
h. that kind of courage sanctifed will v
n take the whole earth for God. Inde,
N the missionaries now at Delhi, toilil
te amid heathenism and fever and chs
re era, and far away from home and COZ
Or fort, and staying there until they dr.
,e into their graves, are just as brave
Of taking Delhi for Christ as were Mich,
10 son and Home and Carmichael in ia
~ ing Delhi for Great Britain. Take tt
at for the first sermon;c lesson.
We Another thing you must see if you
I'd to Delhi, though you leave ma
rs things unseen, is the palace of the n
O. guls 1t is an inclosure one thousa
in yards by five hundred. You ent
th through vauited hall nearly fo