CHAP. 1759 in imitation of the Prussian hussars. The battle of XXVII. Warburg, fought on July 31, was largely a British battle, decided by a charge of the heavy cavalry under Granby, which resulted in the French being driven across the Diemel with a loss of 1,500 men and ten guns. Nevertheless, the allies were unable to do more than maintain themselves in the field, a not inconsiderable achievement in view of their numerical weakness, and of importance as contributing to the increasing exhaustion of France. Further east, the campaign of 1760 continued the series of Prussian misfortunes, until Frederick's victories at Liegnitz on August 15 and at Torgau on November 3, relieved him for a while from the pressure of the Russians and Austrians. But nine days before Torgau, George II. had died, and the power of Frederick's constant ally, Pitt, was already beginning to wane. During the winter of 1759-60 Pitt renewed preparations for the next American campaign with the energy he had displayed twelve months before. To Amherst was assigned the attack on Montreal, the operations being left to his own judgement. The French at Montreal were conscious that the next campaign would decide the fate of Canada. The British garrison of Quebec was, they well knew, in evil plight. By April, 1760, when the winter was breaking, the 6,400 men who had been left under General Murray's command in October had dwindled to some 3,900 effectives. On April 26, Lévis, the French commander-in-chief, disembarked a force of 8,000-9,000 men at Pointe aux Trembles and marched on Quebec. Murray had no choice but to fight. "The place," as he wrote, "is not 1 Colonel Home's MSS., pp. 123-28, Hist. MSS. Comm., 1902. 1760 SURRENDER OF MONTREAL TO AMHERST. 473 XXVII. French beat a hasty retreat. Two days later1 a squadron CHAP. under Lord Colville anchored before Quebec. The reinforcements and supplies so ardently expected by the French were dispatched too late, and were intercepted on July 14 by Commodore Byron on the north coast of New Brunswick. This success cut off the last hope of the French at Montreal of offering an effective resistance to the forces converging upon the capital, for Colville's fleet was now blockading the mouth of the St. Lawrence. The winter and spring of 1759-60 had afforded Amherst time to mature his plans. Montreal was to be attacked by three columns simultaneously. Murray was to ascend the river from Quebec. Brigadier Haviland, starting from Crown Point, was to follow the old route by Lake Champlain, Amherst himself to lead the main body from Lake Ontario down the St. Lawrence. On the evening of September 7, the three columns lay outside the walls of Montreal. Against the united army numbering 17,000 men resistance was impossible. After twenty-four hours of negotiation Vaudreuil had no choice but to yield to Amherst's terms, which the British general resolutely refused to modify. On September 8 the capitulation was signed. Religion and property were guaranteed. The French troops and officers were to lay down their arms, and be conveyed to France on undertaking not to serve again during the war. Canada and all its dependencies passed to the British crown. When the news reached Madras in August, 1756, of the outrage of the Black Hole of Calcutta, perpetrated on the previous June 20, Clive, then governor of Fort St. David's, shipped his troops, the British 29th regiment ("Primus in Indis"), 1,200 sepoys and some artillery to Calcutta, routed the native army and compelled the nawab to come to terms. The nawab signed a treaty on February 9, 1757, restoring Calcutta to the British, and promising compensation for their losses. Three days later he signed a second treaty of offensive and defensive alliance. At the very moment of his success Clive found himself exposed to a new peril. News reached Bengal of the declaration of The 18th. The date has been variously stated. Horace Walpole, confusing Lord Colville's with Swanton's squadron, states it as May 9; Kingsford, History of Canada (1890), iv., 373, as the 17th. It is now fixed by Colville's dispatch to Pitt of May 24, printed in Pitt's Correspondence, ii., 290 (1906), XXVII. CHAP. war between England and France. The treacherous disposition of the nawáb was notorious, and at the neighbouring settlement of Chandernagore on the Hooghley the French maintained a military force of 500 Europeans and 700 sepoys, a constant menace to Calcutta. After an attack by land and water, Chandernagore capitulated to Admiral Watson and Clive on March 23. But the nawáb was tired of temporising. He marched to Plassey, about seventy miles north of Calcutta, having first sent a letter of defiance to Clive. Clive's position was perilous. His force consisted of 750 British soldiers, fifty sailors, 2,100 sepoys and ten field-pieces; the nawab's of 35,000 infantry, 18,000 horse, and fifty guns; but the foot were badly armed, some of them only with bows and arrows. A party of forty to fifty French from Chandernagore with four field-pieces was its most efficient element. At a cost of seven British and sixteen sepoys killed and thirteen wounded Clive's victory of Plassey on June 23 established British supremacy in Bengal. Clive recognised as nawáb Mír Jafar, his enemy's commander-in-chief, whose treachery had contributed to his success, Unexampled as the exploit of Clive had been, the supremacy of the British in India was as yet by no means assured. The design of the French ministry to take up the work of Dupleix and sweep the British out of Southern India, appeared on the very morrow of Plassey in a fair way to be accomplished. On May 2, 1757, a fresh armament left Port Lorient for the East Indies. At the head of the land force, numbering some 1,200 men, was Count de Lally Tollendal, son of Sir Gerard Lally, an Irish Jacobite refugee. He arrived at Pondicherry after a difficult voyage of nearly twelve months at the end of April, 1758. The junction of Admiral Pocock, who had succeeded to Watson's command, with Commodore Steevens, who with eight ships had wintered in Bombay, had taken place at Madras in March. The forces being about equal, two naval actions followed, in which the French sustained so much damage that the French admiral, D'Aché, was compelled to retire to the Isle of France to refit (September 2). Supremacy at sea proved for the English an effective set-off to the superiority of the French by land. It rendered difficult Lally's execu tion of the instructions of the French East India Company to uproot the British settlements on the coast. He deter 1758-59 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDIA. 475 XXVII. mined, therefore, to concentrate all available forces and when CHAP. the English fleet should be compelled by the monsoon to sail away, to make an attempt on Madras. It was a critical moment in Bengal. Clive's nominee, Mir Jafar, the new nawáb, was already in difficulties with an exhausted treasury, disaffected nobles, and an invasion of his northern frontier threatened by Shah Alam, a rebellious son of the King of Delhi. On the other hand, the government of Madras was pressing for the return of Clive and the Madras troops. In the teeth of the opposition of the council at Calcutta, Clive decided to dispatch a detachment to attack the French in the Northern Circars, a district contiguous to Bengal, which would serve to divert their operations in the Madras presidency. For this task he selected Colonel Francis Forde, "one of the great Indian soldiers of the century". Forde on April 7, 1759, with a force of barely 900 men, took Masulipatam by storm and made prisoners 500 French soldiers and 2,100 sepoys. This brilliant exploit was followed by an offer of alliance on the part of the Nizam of the Deccan ; French influence in the Deccan was destroyed and the Northern Circars, a territory of 17,000 square miles, was transferred by him from the French to the English East India Company. On October 16, 1758, Pocock sailed from Madras for his winter station at Bombay. The issue now lay between the land forces on either side. Lally with 3,266 French and 4,000 Indian troops on December 12 encamped before Madras. Fort St. George, also known as the White Town, to distinguish it from the Black Town or native quarter, was held by the veteran Colonel Stringer Lawrence, at the head of 1,758 British and 2,400 native soldiers. For fifty-four days the French batteries maintained an incessant fire. On February 16, 1759, Pocock's fleet returned from Bombay, and anchored before the city. The relief of Madras was the first success of the year of victories, 1759. Thenceforth the balance in the Carnatic inclined in favour of the British. In February, 1759, came the expected invasion of the territory of the Nawab of Bengal by Shah Alam, with an army of 30,000 men. Clive collected such forces as he could muster which, owing to the absence of Colonel Forde's command, numbered no more than 450 Europeans and 2,500 sepoys. XXVII. CHAP. With these he marched to the relief of Patna, besieged by Shah Alam's troops. The name of "Sabut Jung," "Daring in War," by which Clive was known among the natives, sufficed to put the invader to flight on the appearance of the British advance guard on April 4. Not long after his return to Calcutta, Clive was confronted with a difficulty involving European international relations. Prior to the invasion by Shah Alam of the nawab's territories, Mír Jafar's restless and intriguing son Miran, who cherished a dislike of the English, suggested the introduction of the Dutch by way of counterpoise to English influence. Irritation prevailed in England because the Statesgeneral refused to join in alliance against France, and in Holland on account of the confiscation of Dutch vessels carrying alleged contraband of war. An outbreak of hostilities was probable. In October, 1759, seven Dutch ships disembarked 1,400 troops, half Dutch and half Malays, near the Dutch settlement of Chinsurah. At Clive's orders they were attacked and routed by Forde and their ships taken by Commodore Wilson. Had a man of less promptness and intrepidity than Clive been in command, Bengal might have been lost to the company. With the expulsion of the French and the defeat of the Dutch Clive felt his work in Bengal completed. In three years, and at the age of thirty-five, he had forced Suraj-ud-Daulah to evacuate Calcutta, and at Plassey had avenged "the Black Hole"; had added a large tract of land near Calcutta and rich revenues to the possessions of the company; had driven the French from their concession in the Northern Circars and thereby from the whole Deccan; had excluded all rivals from the dominion he had acquired, and had established a virtual sovereignty over Bengal. His health was impaired. He was ambitious to receive his reward in England; and to exert the influence in home politics which his wealth had acquired for him. In England he was received with enthusiasm in July, 1760. He had proved himself the greatest English general since Marlborough, and his victories impressed both king and people the more that they followed upon a long succession of defeats, Elate with the news of Plassey, Pitt in December, 1757, had, during the debate on the mutiny bill, acclaimed Clive as a "heaven-born" general. His imagination was fired by the |