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Another Random Scribd Document
with Unrelated Content
of death fizzing there within a few yards of them. But there was one
man on deck who saw what to do.
Acting-mate Lucas, on duty near one of the guns, promptly ran
forward and with iron nerve picked up the shell, dropping it instantly
over the ship’s side. The burning fuse sputtered out in the water, and
the shell sank harmlessly to the bottom.
Captain Hall, his commander, brought the plucky deed under the
notice of Admiral Napier, who, in writing to the Admiralty about the
young sailor’s bravery, trusted that “their Lordships would mark their
sense of it by promoting him.” This recommendation was acted
upon, Lucas being at once raised to the rank of lieutenant. When
later on the Victoria Cross was instituted the young officer’s name
figured duly in the Gazette.
Two other sailors who gained the V.C. for similar actions were
Captain William Peel, the dashing leader of the Naval Brigade, and
Chief Gunner Israel Harding of H.M.S. Alexandra, also a Crimean
veteran.
Whole pages might be written about Captain Peel’s exploits. All
the time the naval men were engaged with the troops round
Sebastopol he was ever to the fore, leading forlorn hopes and
fighting shoulder to shoulder with his soldier comrades whenever
opportunity offered. At Inkerman, at the fierce attack on the
Sandbag Battery, he was in the thick of it, and again at the Redan
assault.
Peel loved danger for danger’s sake. There was no risk that
daunted him. At the attack on the impregnable Shah Nujeef, at
Lucknow, in the Indian Mutiny, two years later, he led his gun
detachment right up to the loopholed walls, which were crowded
with rebel sharpshooters. He behaved, said Sir Colin Campbell, “very
much as if he had been laying the Shannon alongside an enemy’s
frigate.”
It was Peel who first demonstrated the practicability of fighting
with big guns in the skirmishing line. “It is a truth, and not a jest,”
he once wrote home, “that in battle we are with the skirmishers.”
The way in which the sailors handled their great ship’s cannon, 8-
inch guns, 24-pounders, and the like, was marvellous. A military
officer, in a letter that was written at the front, gives an interesting
reminiscence of the Naval Brigade. “Sometimes in these early days
of October 1854,” he says, “whilst our soldiery were lying upon the
ground, weary, languid, and silent, there used to be heard a strange
uproar of men coming nearer and nearer. Soon the comers would
prove to be Peel of the Diamond with a number of his sailors, all
busy in dragging up to the front one of the ship’s heavy guns.”
In a future chapter we shall meet again this intrepid son of Sir
Robert Peel, the great statesman, winning glory and renown under
Campbell and Havelock. For the present I must confine myself to his
career in the Crimea.
The most notable of the three acts, the dates of which are
inscribed on his Cross, was performed in October 1854, at the
Diamond Battery which some of the Naval Brigade were holding. The
battery needing fresh ammunition, this had to be brought in by
volunteers, for the horses of the waggons refused to approach the
earthworks owing to the heavy Russian fire.
Case by case it was carried in and stacked in its place, and right
into the midst of it all, like a bolt from the blue, dropped a shell. Peel
jumped for it like a flash. One heave of his shoulders and away went
the “whistle-neck” to burst in impotent fury several yards off—
outside the battery’s parapet.
The second date on his Cross notes the affair at the Sandbag
Battery, where he joined the Grenadier officers and helped to save
the colours from capture. On the third occasion when his bravery
was commended for recognition he headed a ladder-party in that
assault on the Redan in which Graham and Perie won such
distinction.
In this attack the gallant captain was badly wounded in the head
and arm, a misfortune which was the means of gaining the V.C. for
another brave young sailor. From the beginning of the war
Midshipman Edward St. John Daniels had attached himself to
Captain Peel, acting as the latter’s aide-de-camp at Inkerman.
During the battle he was a conspicuous figure, as, mounted on a
pony, he accompanied his leader about the field.
In the Redan assault he was still by Peel’s side, and caught him as
he fell on the glacis. Then, heedless of the danger to which he was
exposed, he coolly set to work to bandage the wounded man, tying
a tourniquet on his arm, which is said to have saved Peel’s life. This
done, he got his chief to a place of safety.
Daniels did another plucky action some months earlier, when he
volunteered to bring in ammunition from a waggon that had broken
down outside his battery. The fact that the waggon became
immediately the target for a murderous fire from the Russian guns
weighed little with him. He brought in the cartridges and powder
without receiving a scratch, and the battery cheered to a man as the
plucky little chap scrambled over the parapet with his last armful.
Along with Peel and Daniels must be named that popular idol
William Nathan Wrighte Hewett, known to his messmates as “Bully
Hewett.” He was nearly as picturesque a character as his
commander.
At Sebastopol, the day following Balaclava fight, Hewett (he was
acting-mate at the time), fought a great long-range Lancaster gun
that had been hauled up from his ship, H.M.S. Beagle. The gun drew
a determined attack on its flank from a very large force of Russians,
and orders were sent to Hewett by a military officer to spike the gun
and abandon his battery. The odds were too overwhelming.
In emphatic language the young sailor declared that he’d take no
orders from anyone but his own captain, and was going to stick to
his gun.
The other “Beagles” were quite of his opinion. In quick time they
knocked down a portion of the parapet that prevented the huge
Lancaster bearing on the flank and slewed the piece round. Then,
loading and firing with sailorly smartness, they poured such a hot
fire into the advancing horde of Russians that the latter beat a
retreat.
They used the big gun with great advantage at Inkerman, but the
young mate’s splendid defence of his battery was enough by itself to
win him a well-deserved V.C. Hewett died eighteen years ago, a
Vice-Admiral and a K.C.B.
A page or two back I mentioned Israel Harding, chief gunner, as a
third naval hero of the live shell. It was many years after the
Crimean War that his opportunity came, but his exploit may well be
noted down here.
Harding was a gunner on board H.M.S. Alexandra, when, in July
1882, Sir Beauchamp Seymour (afterwards Lord Alcester) with his
fleet bombarded Alexandria. On the first day of the action (the
11th), a big 10-inch shell from an Egyptian battery struck the
ironclad and lodged on the main deck. The alarm was raised, and at
the cry “Live shell above the hatchway!” Harding rushed up the
companion. There was luckily a tub of water handy, and having
wetted the fizzing fuse he dumped the shell into the tub just in the
nick of time.
As in Lucas’s case, promotion quickly followed with the gunner,
while the V.C. was soon after conferred upon him. The shell, it may
be of interest to note, is now among the treasures of her Majesty
the Queen.
So many naval heroes call for attention that I must hurry on to
speak of Lucas’s comrades in the Baltic who also won the coveted
decoration.
There was Captain of the Mast George Ingouville, serving in the
Arrogant. On the 13th of July 1855, the second cutter of his vessel
got into difficulties while the fleet was bombarding the town of
Viborg. A shell having exploded her magazine, she became half
swamped and began to drift quickly to shore. Observing this,
Ingouville dived off into the sea and swam after the runaway. He
was handicapped with a wounded arm, but being a strong swimmer
he reached the cutter just as it neared a battery. With the painter
over his shoulder he struck out again for the Arrogant, and towed
his prize safely under her lee.
At about the same time a gallant lieutenant of Marines—now
Lieut.-Col. George Dare Dowell, R.M.A.—did much the same thing.
When a rocket-boat of the Arrogant was disabled he lowered the
quarter-boat of his ship the Ruby, and with three volunteers rowed
to the other’s aid. Dowell not only succeeded in saving some of the
Arrogant men, but on a second journey recaptured the boat.
It was a lieutenant of the Arrogant, however, who eclipsed both
these deeds, brave as they were. The exploit of John Bythesea and
his ship’s stoker, William Johnstone, on the Island of Wardo, reads
more like fiction than sober fact. This is the story of it.
Early in August of 1854 Lieutenant Bythesea learned from a
reliable source that some highly important despatches from the Tsar,
intended for the General in charge of the island, were expected to
arrive with a mail then due. At once he conceived the daring idea of
intercepting the despatch-carrier and securing his valuable
documents. His superior officers thought the project a mad one
when he first broached it, but Bythesea would not be gainsaid. The
thing was worth trying, and he and Johnstone (who had volunteered
his services) were the men to carry it through with success. In the
end he had his way, though when the two plucky fellows quitted the
ship on their hazardous errand their shipmates bade them good-bye
with little expectation of ever seeing them again.
The lieutenant and the stoker had disguised themselves very
effectively in Russian clothes, and managed to get to land safely.
Here they learned from their informant, a Swedish farmer, that the
mail had not yet arrived, but was expected at any hour. When
darkness fell, therefore, the two Englishmen found a good hiding-
place down by the shore, and commenced their vigil.
 This was the evening of the 9th of August. It was not until the
12th that the long-awaited mail came to land. For three whole days
and nights they had not ventured from their concealment, save once
or twice when the vigilance of Russian patrols had forced them to
take to a small boat and anchor about half a mile off the coast.
On the morning of the 12th, Johnstone, who spoke Swedish
fluently, learned from the friendly farmer that the mail had arrived,
and was to be sent to the fort that night. Great caution was to be
observed, the farmer added, as it was known to the Russians that
someone from the British fleet had landed. At dark, therefore, the
two took up their position at a convenient spot and awaited the
coming of the mail-bags. In due course they heard the grating of a
boat’s keel on the beach. A few Russian words of command were
given, and then sounded the tramp of feet on the road that led up to
the military station.
 THE ESCORT CAME SWINGING UP THE ROAD
WITHOUT A SUSPICION OF DANGER.—Page 53.

The lieutenant and his companion were ready at the instant. A

hasty glance at their weapons satisfied them that these were in
order, and moving a bit nearer to the roadway they waited until the
escort approached.
In the dim light they perceived that the Russian soldiers in charge
of the bags numbered five. It was heavy odds, but the prize was
great. They could not dream of drawing back. The escort came
swinging up the road without a suspicion of danger, and just as they
passed the spot where a clump of bushes provided secure shelter
out leapt the two Englishmen with cutlass and revolver.
The cold steel did the work effectively; a pistol shot would have
raised the alarm. Three of the soldiers were cut down in the surprise
attack, while the remaining two yielded themselves prisoners to
these redoubtable assailants. As quickly as possible prisoners and
mail-bags were hurried to the water’s edge, where a boat lay in
readiness for them.
In half an hour’s time the despatches were being examined in the
captain’s cabin on board the Arrogant, their contents proving to be
of the utmost importance. Bythesea had captured the details of
certain extensive operations planned against the Baltic fleet of the
Allies and the army in the South. Such a service was worthy of the
highest honour, and both the lieutenant and Stoker Johnstone
received the Cross for Valour for that desperate night’s work.

Down in the South, in the Sea of Azov, which the map shows us to
lie just north of the Black Sea, our Bluejackets were doing splendid
service in the latter months of 1855. The towns of Genitchesk and
Taganrog were shelled with great loss to the Russians, but as they
moved their stores farther inland the occasion arose for individual
expeditions which aimed at destroying these. The story of the fleet’s
operations in this quarter, therefore, resolves itself into a relation of
the several attempts, successful and otherwise, to harass the enemy
in this way.
That the task of setting fire to the store buildings was attended
with tremendous risk was proved over and over again. One or two
daring spirits, including a French captain, were caught and shot by
Cossack patrols. But there are always men to be found ready—nay,
anxious—to undertake enterprises of so desperate a nature.
Wellington had the renowned scout, Major Colquhoun Grant
(whose adventures in the Peninsula teem with romance), doing
wonderful “intelligence” work for him; and to come to more recent
times, we may call to mind Lord Kitchener’s daring journey through
the Soudan in 1884, disguised as an Arab, for the purpose of
learning what were the intentions of the various tribes with regard to
Egypt.
In the Crimea such men as Lieutenants Day, Buckley, Burgoyne,
and Commerell acted as the eyes and ears of their commanders, and
volunteered for those little jobs that so infuriated the Russians when
the red glow in the midnight sky showed them where stacks of
forage and other stores blazed merrily.
Day’s V.C. was awarded him for a most valuable piece of work. His
ship was stationed off Genitchesk (frequently spelt Genitchi), in the
north-eastern corner of the Crimea, and it was deemed necessary to
reconnoitre the enemy’s lines to ascertain the full strength of the
Russians. For this dangerous service the young lieutenant
volunteered.
Accordingly, one night he was landed alone on the Tongue, or
Spit, of Arabat, at the spot he had chosen whence to start.
Cossacks, singly or in small companies, policed the marshy wastes,
but Day wriggled his way between their posts and eventually got
close to the Russian gunboats. The dead silence that prevailed
misled him as to the numbers thereon, and convinced that the
vessels were deserted he returned to report the facts to his captain.
The next day circumstances induced him to suppose that he had
been mistaken. He decided to make a second journey without loss of
time, and one night very soon afterwards saw him again on the Spit.
Day soon discovered that large reinforcements had arrived on the
mainland, and at once made haste to return to his ship.
The long detours he was now obliged to make, to avoid contact
with the Cossack sentries, led him through quagmires and over
sandy stretches that severely tried his endurance. When he reached
the shore at last, well-nigh exhausted, nearly ten hours had elapsed
since his start, and it is not surprising that, having heard shots fired,
his comrades had given him up for lost. He got back after a most
providential escape, however, and made his report. But for his
discoveries an attempt would certainly have been made to seize the
Russian boats, in which case the result must have been disastrous.
Lieutenants Buckley and Burgoyne distinguished themselves by
landing near Genitchesk at night and firing some immense supplies
of stones. With the seaman, Robarts, who accompanied them, they
were nearly cut off by Cossacks on their return, and only a fierce
fight enabled them to escape. All three won the V.C. for this daring
piece of work.
Lieutenant Commerell (afterwards Admiral Sir J. E. Commerell,
G.C.B.) performed a like action later on the same year, which gained
the V.C. for him and one of his two companions, Quartermaster
Rickard.
Their objective was the Crimean shore of the Putrid Sea, on the
western side of the Spit of Arabat. They accomplished their task
successfully, setting fire to 400 tons of Russian corn and forage, but
were chased by Cossacks for a long distance. In the helter-skelter
rush back for the boat, about three miles away, the third man of the
party, Able-Seaman George Milestone, fell exhausted in a swamp,
and but for Commerell’s and Rickard’s herculean exertions must have
fallen a victim to the enemy.
Making what is popularly known as a “bandy-chair”, by clasping
each other’s wrists, the two officers managed to carry their
companion a considerable distance. A party of Cossacks at this
juncture had nearly succeeded in cutting them off, but the sailors in
the boat now opened fire, while Commerell, dropping his burden for
a moment, brought down the leading horseman by a bullet from his
revolver. This fortunately checked the Cossacks, who were only some
sixty yards away, and by dint of half carrying, half dragging
Milestone, the plucky lieutenant and quartermaster eventually got
him to the boat, and were soon out of reach of their pursuers.
 The foregoing deeds of derring-do worthily uphold the finest
traditions of the Royal Navy. How more largely still was the “First
Line” to write its name in the annals of the Victoria Cross will be
seen in the succeeding pages.
 CHAPTER VII.
PERSIA.—HOW THE SQUARE WAS BROKEN.

Among our little wars of the last century that with Persia must not
be passed over here, inasmuch as it was the means of three
distinguished British officers winning the V.C. These were Captain
John Wood, of the Bombay Native Infantry, and Lieutenants A. T.
Moore and J. G. Malcolmson, of the Bombay Light Cavalry.
The war originated in the persistent ill-treatment of British
residents at Teheran, and in the insults offered to our Minister at the
Persian Court, Mr. Murray. No apologies being forthcoming,
diplomatic relations were broken off early in 1856. In November of
the same year, after fruitless attempts had been made to patch up
the quarrel, Persia revealed the reason for her hostility by violating
her treaty and capturing Herat, and war was declared.
Herat from time immemorial had been subject to Afghanistan, and
as, from its position on the high road from India to Persia, it formed
the key of Afghanistan, it was long coveted by the Shah. He laid
violent hands upon it in 1838, but the British Government made him
withdraw. This second insolent defiance of our warnings could not
be borne with equanimity; a force comprising two British and three
native regiments was despatched from India to read the Persian
monarch a lesson. Sir James Outram commanded the expedition.
The capture of Bushire was the first success scored by the British
troops, and it was in the attack on this coast town in the Persian
Gulf that Captain Wood gained his Cross.
At the head of a grenadier company Wood made a rush for the
fort. Persian soldiers were in force behind the parapet, and a hot
rifle-fire was poured into the advancing infantry, but under the
inspiration of their leader they held bravely on. The captain was the
first to mount the wall, where his tall figure instantly became a
target for the enemy. A score of rifles were levelled at him, and
some six or seven bullets found their mark in his body.
Badly wounded as he was, Wood jumped down into the midst of
the enemy, killing their leader and striking terror into the hearts of
the rest. This desperate charge, completed by his men, who had
quickly swarmed up the parapet after him, carried the day. The fort
was surrendered with little more opposition.
The feat of arms, however, which led to Lieutenants Moore and
Malcolmson being decorated, was of even greater brilliancy. To
Moore belongs the almost unique distinction of having broken a
square.
It was at Khoosh-ab that his act of heroism took place. Near this
village, some way inland behind Bushire, the Persians were massed
about eight thousand strong. Outram’s little army had made a
successful advance into the interior and routed the Persian troops
with considerable loss on their side, and was now making its way
back to the coast. Surprise attacks at night had been frequent, but
this was the first attempt to make a determined stand against our
troops.
It was by a singular irony of fate that in this war we should have
had to fight against soldiers trained in the art of war by British
officers. But so it was. After Sir John Malcolm’s mission to Persia in
1810, the Shah set to work to remodel his army among other
institutions, and British officers were borrowed for the purpose of
bringing it to a state of efficiency. The soldiers who gave battle to
our troops at Khoosh-ab, therefore, on February 8th, 1857, were not
raw levies. But, for all that, when it came to a pitched battle the
Persians showed great pusillanimity. At the charges of the Bengal
Cavalry their horsemen scattered like chaff before the wind.
Most of the infantry, too, fled when Forbes’ turbaned sowars of
the 3rd Bengals and Poonah Horse rode down upon them, as panic-
stricken as the cavalry. But there was one regiment that, to its
honour, stood firm. In proper square formation they awaited the
onset of the charge, the front rank kneeling with fixed bayonets, and
those behind firing in volleys.
With his colonel by his side, Lieutenant Moore led his troop of the
Bengals when the order was given to charge, but Forbes having
been hit the young officer found himself alone. He had doubtless
read of Arnold Winkelried’s brave deed at Sempach, when “in arms
the Austrian phalanx stood,” but whether this was in his mind or not
he resolved on a bold course. He would “break the square.”
As he neared the front rank of gleaming steel, above which,
through the curls of smoke, appeared the dark bearded faces of the
Persians, Moore pulled his charger’s head straight, drove in his
spurs, and leapt sheer on to the raised bayonets. The splendid
animal fell dead within the square, pinning its rider beneath its body;
but the lieutenant was up and on his feet in an instant, while
through the gap he had made the sowars charged after him.
In his fall Moore had the misfortune to break his sword, and he
was now called on to defend himself with but a few inches of steel
and a revolver. Seeing his predicament, the Persians closed round
him, eager to avenge their defeat on the man who had broken their
square. Against these odds he must inevitably have gone under had
not help been suddenly forthcoming.
Luckily for him, his brother-officer, Lieutenant Malcolmson, saw his
danger. Spurring his horse, he dashed through the throng of
Persians to his comrade’s aid, laying a man low with each sweep of
his long sword. Then, bidding Moore grip a stirrup, he clove a way
free for both of them out of the press. What is certainly a
remarkable fact is that neither of the two received so much as a
scratch.
Malcolmson’s plucky rescue was noted for recognition when the
proper time came, and in due course he and Moore received their
V.C.’s together. The former died a few years ago, but Moore is still
with us, a Major-General and a C.B.
 CHAPTER VIII.
INDIA.—THE GALLANT NINE AT DELHI.

The early part of the year 1857 saw the outburst of the Indian
Mutiny which was to startle the world by its unparalleled horrors and
shake to its foundations our rule in India. Never before was a mere
handful of white men called upon to face such a fearful ordeal as fell
to the lot of the 38,000 soldiers who were sprinkled all over the
North-West Provinces, and the record of that splendid struggle for
mastery is one that thrills every Englishman’s heart with pride.
There are pages in it that one would willingly blot out, for from
the outset some terrible blunders were committed. Inaction,
smothered in “the regulations, Section XVII.,” allowed mutiny to rear
its head unchecked and gain strength, until the time had almost
passed when it could be stamped out. But if there were cowards and
worse among the old-school British officers of that day, there were
not wanting those who knew how to cope with the peril. We are glad
to forget Hewitt and those who erred with him in the memory of
Lawrence, Nicholson, Edwardes, Chamberlain, and the many other
heroes who came to the front.
In every great crisis such as that which shook India in 1857 the
occasion has always found the man. The Sepoy revolt was the
means of bringing into prominence hundreds of men unsuspected of
either genius or heroism, and of giving them a high niche in the
temple of fame. Young subalterns suddenly thrust into positions of
command, with the lives of women and children in their hands,
displayed extraordinary courage and resource, and the annals of the
Victoria Cross bear witness to the magnificent spirit of devotion
which animated every breast.
 One hundred and eighty-two Crosses were awarded for acts of
valour performed in the Mutiny, the list of recipients including
officers of the highest, and privates of the humblest, rank; doctors
and civilians; men and beardless boys. In the following pages I shall
describe some of the deeds which won the decoration and which
stand out from the rest as especially notable, beginning with the
historic episode of “the Gallant Nine” at Delhi.

The Indian Mutiny was not in its inception the revolution that
some historians have averred it to be. It was a military mutiny
arising from more or less real grievances of the sepoys, to which the
affair of the “greased” cartridges served as the last straw. Moreover,
it was confined to one Presidency, that of Bengal, and it is incorrect
to say that the conspiracy was widespread and that a large number
of native princes and rajahs were at the bottom of it.
As a matter of fact only two dynastic rulers—the execrable Nana
Sahib and the Ranee of Jhansi—lent it their support. The majority of
the native princes, among them being the powerful Maharajah of
Pattiala, sided with the British from the first, and it was their fidelity,
with their well-trained troops, which enabled us to keep the flag
flying through that awful time.
“There were sepoys on both sides of the entrenchments at
Lucknow,” says Dr. Fitchett in his Tale of the Great Mutiny. “Counting
camp followers, native servants, etc., there were two black faces to
every white face under the British flag which fluttered so proudly
over the historic ridge at Delhi. The ‘protected’ Sikh chiefs kept
British authority from temporary collapse betwixt the Jumna and the
Sutlej. They formed what Sir Richard Temple calls ‘a political
breakwater,’ on which the fury of rebellious Hindustan broke in vain.”
Had the Mutiny indeed been a national uprising, what chances would
the 38,000 white soldiers have had against the millions of natives
who comprised India’s population?
 It is important to bear all this in mind while following the course of
events which marked the progress of revolt. We shall not then get
such a distorted picture of the whole as is too frequently presented
to us.
The Mutiny was a military one, as I have said. It began
prematurely in an outbreak at Barrackpore, on March 29, 1857. Here
a drunken fanatical sepoy, named Mungul Pandy, shot two British
officers and set light to the “human powder magazine,” which was all
too ready to explode. On the 10th of May following came the
tragedy of Meerut, where the 3rd Bengal Light Cavalry, the 11th and
20th Regiments of Native Infantry rose and massacred every
European not in the British lines, and this despite the presence there
of a strong troop of horse artillery and a regiment of rifles, 1000
strong!
After the carnage at Meerut the mutinous sowars poured out
unchecked along the high road to Delhi, to spread the news of their
success and claim in the old, enfeebled pantaloon Mogul king in that
city a political head to their revolt. Delhi received them open-armed.
There were no British troops there, by special treaty, only a few
Englishmen in charge of the great magazine and its stores.
It is quite clear that the 31st of May (a Sunday) was the day fixed
for the sepoy regiments in Bengal to rise simultaneously. Unforeseen
events had precipitated the catastrophe by a few weeks. In Delhi,
which was a nest of treason and intrigue, arrangements had been
perfected for the outbreak there, one of the first objects to be
attained being the seizure of its arsenal. Hither, then, the mutineers
turned at once after their triumphant entry.
The magazine of Delhi was a huge building standing about six
hundred yards from the main-guard of the Cashmere Gate. Within its
four walls were guns, shells, powder, rifles, and stores of cartridges
in vast quantities, from which the mutineers had relied upon arming
themselves. And to defend this priceless storehouse there was but a
little band of nine Englishmen, for the score or so of sepoys under
their command could not be depended on.
 The Nine comprised Lieutenant George Willoughby, Captains
Forrest and Raynor, Sergeants Stuart and Edwards, and four
Conductors, Buckley, Shaw, Scully, and Crowe. Willoughby was in
charge, a quiet-mannered, slow-speaking man, but possessed of
that moral courage which is perhaps the highest of human
attributes. When the shouting horde from Meerut swarmed in and
began to massacre every white person they met, he called his
assistants inside the courtyard and locked the great gates. At all
costs the magazine must be saved from falling into the hands of the
mutineers.
There was not a man of the eight but shared his leader’s
determination. With set, grim faces they went about their work,
preparing for the attack which must come sooner or later. There
were ten guns to be placed in position, several gates to be bolted
and barred, and, last of all, the mine to be laid beneath the
magazine. Help would surely come—come along that very road
down which the sowars of the 3rd Bengal Cavalry had galloped with
bloodstained swords and tunics. But if it did not, the Nine knew their
duty and would not flinch from doing it.
With all possible speed the front entrance and other important
vulnerable points were covered with howitzers, loaded with grape-
shot. Arms had been served out to all, including the native
employees, but the latter only waited the opportunity to escape. In
the meantime Conductor Buckley saw to the laying of the mine,
connecting it with a long thin line of powder that ran out to the
centre of the courtyard under a little lemon tree.
Conductor Scully begged for the honour of firing the train when
the fatal moment came, and obtained his desire. A signal (the raising
of a cap) was then arranged to be given, at which he was to apply
his port-fire to the fuse.
All being at last in readiness, the Nine stood at their several posts
waiting for the enemy to make the first move. They had not to wait
long. Within half an hour came an urgent messenger from the Palace
bearing a written summons to Willoughby to surrender the
magazine. The Head of the Nine tore up the paper and gave his
answer.
Soon after appeared a body of sepoys, men of the Palace Guard
and of the revolted Meerut regiments, with a rabble of city people.
“Open the gates!” they cried. “In the name of the King of Delhi,
open the gates!”
Getting the same curt refusal that had greeted the previous
summons, some went off for scaling-ladders, and as they heard
these being fixed against the outer wall the Nine knew the moment
for action had come. The sepoy employees of the Arsenal were in
full flight now, but Willoughby let them go. He had no shot to spare
for them. So over the walls they scrambled, like rats deserting a
sinking ship, to join their compatriots without.
As the last man of them disappeared the rush of the mutineers
began. Swarming up the ladders they lined the walls, whence they
fired upon the brave group of defenders, while the more intrepid
among them leapt boldly down into the yard. The rifles of the Nine
rang out sharply; then at the word “Fire!” the big guns poured their
charges of grape into the huddled mass of rebels.
By this time a gate had been burst open, and here the 24-pounder
was booming its grim defiance. The sepoys hung back in check for
some minutes before the rain of shot. Behind them, however, was a
rapidly increasing crowd, filling the air with the cry of faith—“Deen!
Deen!” and calling on their brothers in the front to kill, and kill
quickly. At this, though the ground was littered with dead, the
rushes became more daring and the yard began to fill with dusky
forms, driving the Englishmen farther back.
The end was very near now. The sepoys were dangerously close
to the guns, and Willoughby realised that in a few moments he
would have to give the fatal signal. One last quick glance up the
white streak of road showed him no sign of approaching aid. They
were helpless—doomed!
Willoughby threw a last charge into the gun he himself worked.
 “One more round, men,” he said, “and then—we’ve done.”
The big pieces thundered again in the face of the dark crowd by
the broken gate, and at the groups along the wall. Then, dropping
his fuse, Scully ran swiftly to the lemon tree where the post of
honour was his.
It had been arranged that Buckley should give the signal at a word
from Willoughby, but the brave conductor was bowled over with a
ball in his elbow. It fell to Willoughby himself, therefore, to make the
sign. He raised his cap from his head, as if in salute, and the same
moment Scully bent down with his port-fire over the powder train.
There was a flash of flame across the yard to the door of the big
store building, a brief instant of suspense, and then, with a
deafening roar which shook Delhi from end to end, the great
magazine blew up.
A dense column of smoke and débris shot high up into the sky,
which was lit with crimson glory by the leaping flames. The smoke
hung there for hours, like a black pall over the city, a sign for all who
could read that the Huzoors, the Masters, had given their first
answer of defiance to Mutiny.
In that tremendous explosion close on a thousand mutineers
perished, crushed by the falling walls and masonry. Of the devoted
Nine five were never seen again, among them being Conductor
Scully. The four survivors, Willoughby, Buckley, Forrest, and Raynor,
smoke-blackened and unrecognisable, escaped into the country
outside the walls, and set off for Meerut, the nearest British
cantonment.
Forrest and Buckley, both badly wounded, arrived safely there with
Raynor, to tell the story of their deed; but Willoughby, who had
separated from them, was less fortunate. His companions learned of
their brave leader’s fate some time after, when a native brought
news of how some five British officers had been waylaid and cut to
pieces near Koomhera. Willoughby formed one of the doomed party.
 It was a sad ending to a fine career, and throughout India and
England the keenest regret was felt that he had not lived to receive
the V.C. with which, in due course, each of his three comrades was
decorated.
 CHAPTER IX.
INDIA.—WITH SABRE AND GUN AGAINST
SEPOY.

The siege of Delhi, which was begun a month after the rebellion
had broken out, ranks with the most historic sieges of modern times.
In its course it yielded many notable Crosses.
Defended by high bastions and walls of solid masonry, the city
proved a hard nut to crack, and Generals Barnard and Wilson, who
conducted the operations with an army of British, Afghan, Sikh, and
Ghurka troops, spent several months before reducing the stronghold.
Even then its capture was only made possible by the arrival of a
siege train under Brigadier-General John Nicholson.
To Nicholson belongs a great share of the credit for the fall of
Delhi. By a series of remarkable forced marches he brought a strong
force of artillery and British and Sikh soldiers from the Punjab to the
Ridge at Delhi, which added greatly to the strength of the army
there encamped. And by his impetuosity in council he compelled the
wavering General Wilson to decide on the final assault in September.
Before I come to this point, however, I have to tell of some gallant
deeds that were performed in the fighting round Delhi. While the
army lay on the Ridge preparing for its leap upon the rebel city, a
number of engagements with the enemy took place. These were
mostly of a very desperate character, and the individual deeds of
some who distinguished themselves therein were fittingly rewarded
with the Cross for Valour.
In one of the sorties made by the sepoys at Delhi in July of that
year, 1857, Lieutenant Hills and Major Tombs, of the Bengal Horse
Artillery, had a fierce encounter with the rebels, which gained the
V.C. for each of them.
With a cavalry picket and two guns, Hills was on outpost duty on
the trunk road, near a piece of high ground called the Mound, when
a large body of sepoy sowars from the city charged upon him. The
picket, taken by surprise, took to flight and left the guns
undefended, but Hills remained at his post. To save his guns and
give the gunners a chance of opening fire was the plucky
lieutenant’s first thought, so clapping spurs to his horse he bore
down alone on the enemy.
In narrating the incident himself he says: “I thought that by
charging them I might make a commotion, and give the guns time
to load, so in I went at the front rank, cut down the first fellow,
slashed the next across the face as hard as I could, when two
sowars charged me. Both their horses crashed into mine at the same
moment, and, of course, both horse and myself were sent flying. We
went down at such a pace that I escaped the cuts made at me, one
of them giving my jacket an awful slice just below the left arm—it
only, however, cut the jacket.
“Well, I lay quite snug until all had passed over me, and then got
up and looked about for my sword. I found it full ten yards off. I had
hardly got hold of it when these fellows returned, two on horseback.
The first I wounded, and dropped him from his horse. The second
charged me with his lance. I put it aside, and caught him an awful
gash on the head and face. I thought I had killed him. Apparently he
must have clung to his horse, for he disappeared. The wounded man
then came up, but got his skull split. Then came on the third man—a
young, active fellow.
“I found myself getting very weak from want of breath, the fall
from my horse having pumped me considerably, and my cloak,
somehow or other, had got tightly fixed round my throat, and was
actually choking me. I went, however, at the fellow and cut him on
the shoulder, but some ‘kupra’ (cloth) on it apparently turned the
blow. He managed to seize the hilt of my sword and twisted it out of
my hand, and then we had a hand-to-hand fight, I punching his
head with my fists, and he trying to cut me, but I was too close to
him.”
At this critical moment Hills slipped on the wet ground and fell. He
lay at the sowar’s mercy, and nothing could have saved him from
death had not Major Tombs come within sight of the scene. The
major was some thirty yards away, and had only his revolver and
sword with him. There was no time to be lost, so resting the former
weapon on his arm he took a quick steady aim and fired. The shot
caught the sepoy in the breast, and as his uplifted arm fell limply to
his side he tumbled dead to the ground.
Thanking Heaven that his aim had been true, Major Tombs
hastened to assist Hills to his feet and help him back to camp. But as
they stood together a rebel sowar rode by with the lieutenant’s pistol
in his hand. In a moment Hills, who had regained his sword, dashed
after the man, who proved no mean adversary.
They went at it cut and slash for some time; then a smashing
blow from the sowar’s tulwar broke down the lieutenant’s guard and
cut him on the head. Tombs now received the sepoy’s attack, but
the major was among the best swordsmen in the army, and closing
with his opponent he speedily ran him through.
Both the officers had had their fill of fighting for the day, and
fortunately, perhaps, for them, no more rebels appeared to molest
them on their return to the camp. The lieutenant, I may note in
passing, is now the well-known Lieut.-General Sir J. Hills-Johnes,
G.C.B.; his fellow-hero of the fight died some years ago, a Major-
General and a K.C.B.
Another veteran of the Indian Mutiny still alive, who also won his
V.C. at Delhi, is Colonel Thomas Cadell. A lieutenant in the Bengal
European Fusiliers at the time, Cadell figured in a hot affray between
a picket and an overwhelmingly large body of rebels. In the face of a
very severe fire he gallantly went to the aid of a wounded bugler of
his own regiment and brought him safely in. On the same day,
hearing that another wounded man had been left behind, he made a
dash into the open, accompanied by three men of his regiment, and
succeeded in making a second rescue.
The heroes of Delhi are so many that it is difficult to choose
among them. Place must be found, however, for brief mention of the
dashing exploit of Colour-Sergeant Stephen Garvin of the 60th Rifles.
The Rifles, by the way, now the King’s Royal Rifle Corps, have the
goodly number of thirteen V.C.’s to their credit.
In June 1857 the British army on the Ridge was greatly harassed
by rebel sharpshooters who took up their position in a building
known as the “Sammy House.” It was essential that this hornet’s
nest should be destroyed, and volunteers were called for. For this
service Colour-Sergeant Garvin promptly stepped forward and, with
a small party of daring spirits, set out on what looked to most like a
forlorn hope.
What the rebels thought of this impudent attempt to oust them
from their stronghold we cannot tell, for but one or two of them
escaped to the city with their lives. Such an onslaught as they
received at the “Sammy House,” when Garvin and his valiant dozen
rushed the place, quite surpassed anything in their experience. The
colour-sergeant is described as hewing and hacking like a paladin of
romance, and for his bravery and the example he set to his followers
he well deserved the Cross that later adorned his breast.
At Bulandshahr, a little to the south of Delhi, in September of the
same year, there was a gallant action fought by a body of the Bengal
Horse Artillery, which resulted in no fewer than seven V.C.’s being
awarded; but there is, I think, no more heroic act recorded in the
annals of this famous corps than that of brave Gunner Connolly at
Jhelum, two months previously.
While working his gun early in the action he was wounded in the
left thigh, but he said nothing about his wound, mounting his horse
in the team when the battery limbered up to another position. After
some hours’ hot work at this new post, Connolly was again hit, and
so badly that his superior officer ordered him to the rear.
“I gave instructions for his removal out of action,” says Lieutenant
Cookes in his report, “but this brave man, hearing the order,
staggered to his feet and said, ‘No, sir, I’ll not go there whilst I can
work here,’ and shortly afterwards he again resumed his post as a
spongeman.”
Throughout the fighting that day Connolly stuck to his gun,
though his wounds caused him great suffering and loss of blood, and
it was not until a third bullet had ploughed its way through his leg
that he gave up. Then he was carried from the field unconscious.
That was the stuff that our gunners in India were made of, and we
may give Connolly and his fellows our unstinted admiration. For
sheer pluck and devotion to duty they had no peers.
A highly distinguished artilleryman, who won his Cross in a
different way, was a young lieutenant named Frederick Sleigh
Roberts, now known to fame as Field-Marshal Earl Roberts, K.G. The
scene of his valour was Khudaganj, near Fatehgarh, in the Agra
district, and the date the 2nd of January 1858.
Some five thousand rebels under the Nawab of Farukhabad being
in force in the neighbourhood, Sir Colin Campbell pushed on with his
troops to disperse the enemy. Lieutenant Roberts was attached to
Sir Hope Grant’s staff, and with his leader came into contact with the
rebels at the village of Khudaganj. Here a sharp engagement took
place, which resulted in the Nawab’s army being completely routed.
At the end of the fight, while the mounted men were following up
the fugitives, the young lieutenant saw a sowar of the Punjab
Cavalry (a loyal native regiment) in danger of being worsted by a
sepoy armed with fixed bayonet. Wheeling his horse in their
direction, he quickly thrust himself between the two and, with a
terrific sweep of his sword across the other’s face, laid the sepoy
low. A minute or two later he caught sight of a couple of rebels
making off with a standard. Roberts determined that this should be
captured, so setting spurs to his horse he galloped after them.
He overtook the pair just as they were about to seek refuge in a
village close by, and engaged them both at once. The one who
clutched the standard he cut down, wrenching the trophy out of the
other’s hands, but the second sepoy, ere he could turn, placed his
musket close to the young officer’s body and pulled the trigger.
Fortunately for him, the musket missed fire (it was in the days of the
old percussion caps), whereupon the sepoy made off, leaving
Roberts to return in triumph.
In other engagements like those at Bulandshahr and Khudaganj
many young cavalry officers who came to high honour in later years
distinguished themselves by personal bravery. Prominent among
these were Captain Dighton Probyn and Lieutenant John Watson,
both of the Punjab Cavalry. Their exploits are well worth narrating.
At the battle of Agra Probyn at the head of his squadron charged a
body of rebel infantry, and in the mêlée became separated from his
men. Beset as he was by a crowd of sepoys, he cut his way through
them and engaged in a series of single combats of an Homeric kind.
In one instance he rode down upon a cluster of sepoys, singled out
the standard-bearer, killed him on the spot, and dashed off again
with the colours. His gallantry on this and other occasions was, as
Sir Hope Grant said in his despatch, so marked that he was promptly
awarded the V.C.
Lieutenant Watson had a similar heroic encounter with a rebel on
November 14th, 1857, when just outside Lucknow he and his troop
of Punjabis came into contact with a force of rebel cavalry which far
outnumbered them.
As they approached the Ressaldar in command of the rebels rode
out in advance of his men with half a dozen followers. He is
described as having been “a fine specimen of the Hindustani
Mussulman,” a stalwart, black-bearded, fierce-looking man. Here was
a foeman worthy of one’s steel. With all the daring that had already
made him beloved by his sowars and feared by the enemy, Watson
accepted the challenge thus offered, and rode out to give the other
combat.
He had got within a yard or so of his opponent when the
Ressaldar fired his pistol point blank at him, but luckily the shot
failed to take effect. It can only be supposed that the bullet had
fallen out in the process of loading, for the two were too close
together for the rebel leader to have missed his mark. Without
hesitating, the lieutenant charged and dismounted the other, who
drew his tulwar and called his followers to his aid.
Watson now found himself engaged with seven opponents, and
against their onslaught he had to defend himself like a lion. It is not
recorded that he slew the Ressaldar, though it is to be hoped that he
did so, but he succeeded in keeping them all at bay until his own
sowars came to the rescue with some of Probyn’s Horse who had
witnessed the combat. And when the rebels were put to flight the
brave lieutenant’s wounds bore evidence of the fierce nature of the
combat. A hideous slash on the head, a cut on the left arm, another
on the right arm that disabled that limb for some time afterwards,
and a sabre cut on the leg which came near to permanently laming
him, were the chief hurts he had received, while a bullet hole in his
coat showed how nearly a shot had found him.
There were many tight corners that the young cavalry leader
found himself in before the Mutiny came to an end, and despatches
recorded his name more than once for distinguished services, but if
you were to ask General Sir John Watson (he is a G.C.B. now, like
his brother-officer, Sir Dighton Probyn) to-day, I doubt if he could
remember another fight that was so desperate as that hand-to-hand
combat with the mighty Ressaldar.
And if it should ever come to fade from his memory he has only to
look at a little bronze Maltese cross which hangs among his other
medals on his breast, to remind himself of a time when it was touch-
and-go with death.
 CHAPTER X.
INDIA.—THE BLOWING UP OF THE CASHMERE
GATE.

The final assault of Delhi, the leap of a little army of five thousand
British and native soldiers upon a strongly fortified city held by fifty
thousand rebels, forms one of the most exciting chapters in the
history of the Indian Mutiny, and the blowing up of the Cashmere
Gate one of its most heroic incidents. Once more did the gallant
“sappers and miners,” whom we last saw doing noble work in the
trenches at Sebastopol, here show themselves ready to face any
peril at duty’s call.
The decision to make the attack was come to at that historic
council on September 6th, 1857, to which Nicholson went fully
prepared to propose that General Wilson should be superseded did
he hesitate longer. On the following day the engineers under Baird-
Smith and his able lieutenants set to work to construct the trenching
batteries, and by the 13th enough had been done to warrant the
assault.
We have a very vivid picture drawn for us by several writers of
how, on the night of the 13th, four Engineer subalterns stole out of
the camp on the Ridge and crept cautiously up to the walls of the
enemy’s bastions to see what condition they were in. Greathed,
Home, Medley, and Lang were the names of the four; one of them,
Lieutenant Home, was to earn undying fame the next day at the
Cashmere Gate.
Armed with swords and revolvers, the party—divided into two
sections—slipped into the great ditch, sixteen feet deep, and made
for the top of the breach. But quiet as they were, the sepoy sentries
on the wall above had heard them. Men were heard running from
point to point. “They conversed in a low tone,” writes Medley, who
was with Lang under the Cashmere Bastion, “and presently we
heard the ring of their steel ramrods as they loaded.”
Huddled into the darkest corner of the ditch, the two officers
waited anxiously for the sepoys to go away, when another attempt
might be made; but the alarmed sentries held their ground. The
engineers, however, had seen that the breach was a good one, “the
slope being easy of ascent and no guns on the flank,” so the four of
them jumped up and made a bolt for home. Directly they were
discovered a volley rattled out from behind them, and the whizzing
of balls about their ears quickened their steps over the rough
ground. Luckily not one was hit.
There was one other man engaged in reconnoitring work that
same night of whom little mention is made in accounts of the siege.
This was Bugler William Sutton, of the 60th Rifles, a very brave
fellow, as had been proved some weeks previously during a sortie
from Delhi. On this occasion he dashed out from cover and threw
himself upon the sepoy bugler who was about to sound the
“advance” for the rebels. The call never rang out, for Bugler Sutton’s
aim was quick and true, and the rebels, in some disorder, were
driven back.
Volunteering for the dangerous service on which the four
engineers above-named had undertaken, Sutton ventured forth
alone to spy out the breach at which his regiment was to be hurled
next morning, and succeeded in obtaining some very valuable
information for his superiors. The 60th Rifles gained no fewer than
eight Victoria Crosses during the Mutiny, and one of them fell to
Bugler Sutton, who was elected unanimously for the honour by his
comrades.
But it is of the Cashmere Gate and what was done there that this
chapter is mainly to tell. According to the plans of the council, four
columns were to make the attack simultaneously at four different
points in the walls. The one under Nicholson was to carry the breach
near the Cashmere Bastion, while another column, under Colonel
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