Imatges de pàgina
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the ship-owners to enter into a negociation with the seamen only increased their insolence and confidence of impunity. At length it was found necessary to resist by force this unlawful system of coercion. The military and naval forces were ordered under arms, and, while a body of marines seized the chain or bridge of boats with which the refractory seamen had so long stopped the mouth of the river, a body of regular cavalry and yeomanry made a demonstration to disperse the sailors who had assembled in great crowds on the south side of the Tyne. No resistance was offered, and no lives were lost. Oct. 21. The military were seconded by five hundred special constables, who were sworn in for the occasion, Sir Cuthbert Heron taking his staff among the first. Most of the committee were made prisoners. Af ter this victory, the ship-owners renewed their offers to take two men and one boy to every hundred ton of shipping, and to give some advance of wages. These terms were now gladly acceded to, and an insurrection, which had at first an alarming appearance, entirely subsided, as the seamen at Blythe, Sunderland, and other ports, immediately followed the wholesome example of submission. It may, indeed, be remarked, that the mutinies of seamen resemble in character those of schoolboys, entered into more frequently from wantonness than from a desire of mischief, sustained with sufficient activity and vehemence while the spirit of the frolic is up, but easily abandoned upon opposition, and seldom leaving any impression of permanent rancour on the minds of those engaged in them.

Ireland had this year her usual proportion of local and provincial disturbances, never to be mentioned without deep regret. This fine island resembles a volcano; the external beauty

and fertility are the same, and, like Etna or Vesuvius, the molten lava with which the interior regions are convulsed, bursts out perpetually, though at different craters. In 1815, Ireland was convulsed as usual; the immediate cause of complaint was the tithes, the tithe-proctors, and the exactions of the protestant clergy in parishes where the people were chiefly catholics. The renewed, or rather the continued, atrocities of the banditti called Carders, (from their employing woolcards to torture their victims) occasioned a revival of what was called the Insurrection-Act. Limerick and Tipperary were proclaimed according to the provisions of this law; but the dreadful and premeditated murder of Mr Baker, a highly esteemed magistrate, in the neighbourhood of Cashel, too plainly shewed that even these severe remedies, though they might repress general insurrection, were unable to prevent the system of private murder and assassination, by which the morals of the lower Irish have been destroyed, and their hearts hardened.

The usual debates about the catholic question took place at Dublin, when Lord Fingal declined to take the chair at the aggregate meeting of catholics, and left it to Mr O'Connor, whose opinion admits no compromise short of unqualified emancipation, though the conditions of restriction should be authorized both by the omnipotence of the British Parliament and the infallibility of the Roman See. The further proceedings on this matter (which, however, we regard less as a cause than as a mode of expressing discontent) we shall attempt to combine in a general view in our next year's volume.

The most interesting events in our foreign dominions occurred as usual in the East Indies. Victors over all the nations of Hindostan, the Indian

empire of Britain now approaches in many points to the natural boundaries of the huge chain of mountains which surround the level plains of India; and becomes, of course, exposed to annoy ance from the fierce tribes which inhabit those Alpine regions, whose names and existence were unknown in the days of Clive and Lawrence. Ambition, indeed, need seldom weep for more worlds to conquer, since the success of its own most promising schemes occasions fresh and more extended opposition from the new powers with whom that very success places it in contact.

Nepaul, a mountainous and intricate country, supposed by the natives to be under the immediate protection of supernatural powers, bounds on the north-east the British provinces of Oude and Bahar. This country is inhabited by tribes called Ghoorkahlees, who enjoy the highest character for hardihood and valour, and have all the predatory habits of savage mountaineers. Their depredations, incursions, and murders on the frontiers of the British territories, could not be restrained by mere defensive measures, or endured without disgrace to our arms, and a declension from that high reputation on which our authority in India principally rests. War was, therefore, determined upon by the governor-general, and the armies of Madras and Bengal were ordered to advance close to their respective lines of frontier, Lord Moira himself transferring his head-quarters to Futty-Ghur, in order to be near the scene of action, while a chosen army of thirty thousand men attempted the invasion of the Nepaul mountains, described by a late author as "a territory extending above eight hundred miles, and intersected by assemblages of hills, jumbled together in many forms and directions, sometimes in chains, lying

parallel to each other, but of no great extent, and often connected at their termination by narrow ridges, running at right angles across the intermediate valleys. The summits of all are very narrow, and of various forms, while the distance between each range is short; so that the valleys are extremely confined, and not a spot is to be seen in many of them that would afford room for one thousand men in tents. Some of these ranges are covered with forests, and are always verdant; others are naked and stony, neither yielding shelter to the birds of the air nor the beasts of the field,

"Immediately beneath these mountains commences a rich and well cultivated extent of country, with an active and warlike population, of which the tapahs, or cultivators of the land, are the most numerous and formidable."

The British army was destined to enter this difficult country, from separate points, by four divisions. Two of these, commanded by General, then Colonel Ochterlony, and by MajorGeneral Rollo Gillespie, had the task of forcing, at different points, the passes into a valley, called the Deyrah Dhoon, and reducing that part of the Goorkah territory which lies to the west of the Ganges. General Gillespie, accordingly, secured with great promptitude and ability the passes which lead into the Dhoon, or valley, from the west, while Colonel Ochterlony, by a corresponding movement, marched against the principal army of the Goorkahlees, which, under their gallant and experienced leader, or Cazy, Ameer Sing Thappy, occupied an entrenched camp at Irkea, near the Sutledge river. It was the object of General Gillespie, by securing the passes and hill-forts in the valley in the rear of Ameer Sing, to cut off his retreat, when attacked in front by Ochterlony's division, interposing his

force betwixt him and the mountains of Nepaul.

When General Gillespie penetrated into the Dhoon, he found an unex pected and apparently insuperable obstacle to his further progress, in the strong mountain fort of Kalunga. It had been supposed that this post could be carried by a coup-de-main, and Colonel Mawby, with the advance of the division, had moved against it upon such information. But Kalunga proved to be a fort on the summit of an almost inaccessible mountain, covered with an impenetrable jungle, or thicket, the only approaches through which were commanded by the fire of the place, and secured by stockades. Colonel Mawby, therefore, paused till the arrival of General Gillespie with the main body. The general resolved to attempt carrying the position by storm, as possession of it was almost - indispensable to the success of the campaign. Having reconnoitred the position, he determined to make the assault by four columns moving simultaneously upon four different points, a mode of attack which is usually decisive, when the moving columns arrive on their respective points at the same time. The orders which General Gillespie issued upon this occasion give some idea of the difficulties to be encountered in the attacks which have so often cost the lives of the brave in India, and of the deliberate valour and steady discipline necessary to overcome them. The soldiers were exhorted to reserve their fire, to take a cool and deliberate aim, to rely on the advantage gained by a determined use of the bayonet, but at the same time to keep the enemies, who were dexterous in the use of a short sword, at the point of that weapon, and to avoid closing with them. The officers at the head of the columns were required to move deliberately, that the men might be brought up

without fatigue or loss of breath, and advance to the storm with the full vigour of high animal spirits and unimpaired physical powers. The strictest silence was recommended; the necessary word of command was to be passed through the ranks in a whisper. When the head of the column was to debouche on the point of attack, a short halt was to be made to gain breath, and form close and compact order. Firing, or stopping to reload, was forbidden, as frequently the cause of severe loss, which might be avoided by an unhesitating and spirited attack. "In case of ambuscade, or surprise," continued these remarkable orders, "a soldier requires all his natural courage; and when he is so situated as to be exposed to such attacks in jungles and narrow pathways, he must predetermine within himself to preserve the utmost coolness. Let emulation actuate all, but corrected by steadiness and coolness,-no breaking of ranks or contention which shall be foremost in the assault, each column must be a mutual support,-and every soldier, actuated by the principle of cool and deliberate valour, will always have the advantage of wild and precipitate valour."

These orders, which form such a lively picture of the difficulties of Indian warfare, were the last ever issued by General Rollo Gillespie, a tried soldier, of equal spirit and experience. Distinguished for the gallantry and presence of mind by which he had recovered the important fortress of Velore when in possession of the mutinous Seapoys, and by his conspicuous share in the conquest of Java, he was unhappily doomed to close his military career in the assault for which he was now preparing. By some unfortunate delays and miscalculation in point of time, that accident happened which the general had been most an

xious to avoid, and one column making the attack before the others, was exposed to the whole resistance of the garrison. The division, in its onset, drove before them a party of the enemy who held a position in advance of the fort, and, pushing them through the village, carried a stock ade under the very walls, but without being able to force their way into the place. At this crisis the general himself came up with reinforcements, and stationed two six-pounders within twenty-five yards of the walls. Under this cover the storming party advanced to the charge, but were driven back by an irresistible discharge of grape-shot, arrows, and various destructive missiles peculiar to the Indian warfare. The besiegers' party rallied and renewed their attempt, but with equally bad success. Some extra ordinary exertion was necessary to revive the spirit of the assailants, and General Gillespie, who, in leaving the batteries, had declared that he would carry the fort, or die in the attempt, placed himself at the head of the storming party, and, cheering the men with his voice, waving his hat, and pointing with his sword to the gate, led them a third time to the assault. Too obvious a mark to the enemy, he was shot through the heart when within a few paces of the walls; and all hopes of success being destroyed by his death, the senior officer, who succeeded to the command, ordered a retreat. What added to the public sense of this loss was, that, had the two columns which should have attacked on the opposite side of the fort come up to make the expected diversion, there is little doubt that the fort would have been carried. Nay, had it not been the loss of the scaling ladders, which could not be found at the moment of attack, the storming party would most likely have succeeded, as the walls were low, and the de

fenders were about to abandon the fort when General Gillespie fell. The fourth column, commanded by Captain Campbell, came up in time to secure the retreat of the storming column. The other two divisions never heard the signal for the attack, and consequently never got into action.

Colonel Mawbey, who succeeded to the command, saw the necessity of perseverance in a case where retreat would have greatly affected the British military character. He ordered up a train of battering cannon from Delhi. They arrived on the 24th of November; and in three days effected such a breach as was reported completely practicable. A storming party, headed by Major Ingleby, advanced to the attack; but after being exposed during two hours of obstinate perseverance to a galling and destructive fire of musquetry and matchlocks, they found all their efforts inadequate to carry the place. In the arduous struggle, several brave officers and men lost their lives. The fire was then renewed from the battering guns and mortars, with such vivacity and effect, as to ruin totally the defences of the place, and convince the enemy of the inutility of farther resistance. And, early in the morning on the third day after the attack, the Ghoorkahs evacuated and abandoned to the British the dearly purchased fort of Kalunga, before which had fallen (in killed and wounded) nearly five hundred Europeans, a calamitous loss in the interior of India. The conquest was important, although thus dearly purchased. The English obtained thereby undisputed possession of the Deyrha Dhoon, or Sacred Valley, from which the enemy were completely exspelled; but the desperate defence of Kalunga, and the misfortunes which occurred before it, had hitherto deprived Colonel Ochterlony's division

1814. Nov. 30.

of the assistance which he was to have derived from the second division. The plan of the campaign was, therefore, resumed, so soon as Kalunga had fallen; and it was determined to proceed in the combined attack upon the principal Nepaulese army, which, be ing situated in a strong position to the westward of the Jumna, was separated from the capital and the eastern provinces by the occupation of the Dhoon, through which Ameer Sing had hitherto maintained his line of communication.

In the meanwhile, the division under General Ochterlony made some -progress, taking some small hill-forts, and Major Bradshaw reported the surprise of a Nepaulese Subah by one of his divisions, under Captain Hay. The Nepaul chief was slain in single combat by Lieutenant Boileau, who -received a deep sabre-wound in the

encounter.

The British government were now formally engaged in war with the state of Nepaul, and great efforts became necessary to bring it to an honourable termination. Ameer Sing Thappy, the chief commander of the Ghoorkahs, still occupied a strong position on a chain called the Malown mountains, supported by several strong hill-forts, particularly those of Malown and Thyeka, and by numerous redoubts and stockades. The troops, -by which this strong line was defended, were of a character superior to any hitherto exhibited by the natives of India. They had not only all the bravery of mountaineers, but an aptitude to observe and adopt the points of discipline which constitute the superiority of Europeans. Our officers were astonished to find them brigaded and arranged in regular battalions, and to observe that their selected troops were dressed in red, and used musquets and bayonets like the British Seapoys. It is reported that they

had even adopted the use of the Shrapnell shells, a species of missile so peculiarly British, that the French themselves, during our long use of them in the peninsular war, never could avail themselves of them. The Ghoorkahs had also a mode of attack peculiar to their own country. Their onset was made by night, supported by small guns brought to the field on the backs of elephants. To all this is to be added, their observance of the strictest discipline.

Sir David Ochterlony, who commanded in chief, made the utmost exertions to straiten and distress the Nepaulese army. With this view, he attacked several of the stockaded posts and carried them. Others, however, failed, with loss. Among the latter, was an unfortunate assault, by the Majors Ludlow and Dec. 27. Richards, on the strong fort of Jumpta, a stockaded redoubt, which covered a part of Ameer Sing's position, where the Ghoorkahs took advantage of a brave but ill-timed dash of the charging column to attack them with success, and occasion great loss. An attack on another stockaded work, by a part of the Jan. 3. division of Major-general Wood, was equally unsuccessful; they were repulsed by the enemy, and lost many officers and men. This latter disaster was owing to the treachery of a Brahman guide, supposed to be highly qualified for the task he had undertaken, being the man by whose assistance Mr Buchanan constructed his map of Nepaul.

1815.

The Ghoorkah general did not confine himself to defensive measures. The British post of Sumundpore was suddenly attacked by an overwhelming force of Ghoorkahs, with about twenty of their small guns. Captain Blackney fell in defence of the post; and the Seapoys, whom he commanded, gave way, and fell into some confu

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