Beatson’s Mutiny: The Turbulent Career of a Victorian Soldier 9780755621668, 9780755628247

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To all my family and friends, who must be heartily sick of Beatson yarns by now: here is his full story.

ILLUSTRATIONS

Maps Map 1 Map 2 Map 3 Map 4 Map 5 Map 6 Map 7

India 1820–72 Northern Spain 1835–6 Bundelkhand 1838–47 Sind 1845–6 Deccan and Central India 1847–59 Ottoman Empire 1853–5 Battle of Balaklava

18 52 74 118 140 163 190

Tables Table 1 Table 2 Table 3

Descent of the Surname of Beatson The Beatsons of Kilrie William Beatson’s Family

4 11 84

Plates Plate A

Plate B Plate C Plate D Plate E

Plate F Plate G Plate H

D.J. Pound, General Beatson. Beatson as he appeared in London in 1856, wearing his ‘gold coat’ that ‘stood up by force of embroidery alone’, with the Turkish Contingent helmet at his side. Author’s collection Captain Francis Bellew, Griffin on Landing besieged by Baboos. Author’s collection Captain Francis Bellew, Griffin Marching to Join. Author’s collection Ackermann’s print of a British officer (probably James Verner) of the Bundlecund Legion Cavalry in review order. National Army Museum Ackermann’s print (after a drawing by Capt F. Ainslie) of the native officers’ uniform of the Hyderabad Contingent Cavalry, also adopted by the British officers. National Army Museum Rossend Castle. Author’s collection Sir George de Lacy Evans. Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University Library The British Auxiliary Legion. Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University Library

x Plate I Plate J Plate K Plate L Plate M Plate N Plate O Plate P Plate Q Plate R Plate S

Plate T Plate U Plate V Plate W Plate X Plate Y Plate Z Plate AA

Beatson’s Mutiny Brig-Gen the Hon James Scarlett, wearing his heavy cavalry helmet. Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University Library ‘Satan’s Brother’: Sir Charles Napier, with the hills of Baluchistan behind. Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University Library Camel Gunner of the Hyderabad Contingent Cavalry (Ackermann print after Capt. F. Ainslie). National Army Museum Sowars of the Hyderabad Contingent Cavalry (Ackermann print after Capt. F. Ainslie). National Army Museum D.J. Pound, Omar Pasha. Author’s collection Sir Robert Vivian. National Army Museum Arab and Kurdish Bashi-Bazouks, sketched by 2/Lt Markham at Varna. National Army Museum A Circassian (front) and other Bashi-Bazouks, sketched by 2/Lt Markham at Varna. National Army Museum G.D. Giles, The Charge of the Heavy Brigade. Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University Library Charles Lane Fox as ‘Bimbashi Yussuf Bey’, sketched by 2/Lt Markham at Varna. National Army Museum Albert Letchford, Captain Sir Richard F. Burton, KCMG, FRGS, Maître d’Armes France 1852. Richmond upon Thames Borough Art Collection, Orleans House Gallery William Stewart Watson, Portrait of Sir John Dick-Lauder. Lauder wears the cavalry uniform of the Bundlecund Legion. Collection of Lady Dick-Lauder Bashi-Bazouks in country resembling the Dobrudja. National Army Museum Officer and trooper of the British Bashi-Bazouks. National Army Museum Lord Raglan, commanding the British ‘Army of the East’. Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University Library ‘The Misses Beatson’ photographed in the 1860s. India Office Records, British Library Beatson photographed in the 1860s in his trademark uniform. India Office Records, British Library Sir Colin Campbell (right) and Sir William Mansfield. Author’s collection Major Clarence Taylor’s photograph of the Ambala Durbar. Seated centre is Lord Mayo, on his right hand (left as viewed) is Amir Sher Ali, on his left Prince Abdullah Jan. Beatson, with beard and medals, stands behind the prince, holding his feathered cocked hat. The Maharaja of Patiala is seated next to the Amir. India Office Records, British Library

GLOSSARY

Table of Ranks European commissioned ranks Field Marshal (FM) General (Gen) Lieutenant-General (Lt-Gen) Major-General (Maj-Gen) Brigadier-General (Brig-Gen) Colonel (Col) Lieutenant-Colonel (Lt-Col) Major (Maj) Captain (Capt) Lieutenant (Lt) Ensign (Ens) (infantry) = Cornet (cavalry) = 2nd Lieutenant (artillery, engineers and rifles) European non-commissioned ranks Serjeant-Major (Sjt-Maj) Troop Serjeant-Major (TSM) Quartermaster-Serjeant (QMS) Serjeant (Sjt) Corporal (Cpl) Private (infantry) = Trooper (cavalry) = Gunner (artillery) Indian commissioned ranks Cavalry: Rissaldar-Major (Senior Native officer) Rissaldar (Senior Troop commander/Squadron commander) Ressaidar (Junior Troop commander) Naib Rissaldar (Troop 2i/c) Jemadar (Lieutenant) Infantry: Subadar-Major (Senior Native officer) Subadar (Company commander) Jemadar (Lieutenant) Indian non-commissioned ranks Cavalry: Kote Duffadar (Troop Serjeant-Major) Duffadar (Serjeant)

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Infantry: Havildar-Major (Serjeant-Major) Havildar (Serjeant) Naick (Corporal) Sepoy (Private) The Nizam’s army was anomalous in that its native ranks were one step higher than their equivalents in the HEIC’s Presidency armies: thus the Rissaldar was equivalent to a Rissaldar-Major. Turkish ranks Ferik Pasha (Lieutenant-General) Liva Pasha (Major-General) Miralai (Colonel) Bimbashi (Major) Colassi (2i/c) Yuzbashi (Captain) Mulazim (Lieutenant) Choase (Serjeant) Onbashi (Corporal) Hakim (Medical Officer) Imam (Chaplain) Buluk Emin (Writer) Turkish honorifics Pasha (General officer) Bey (Field officer) Aga (Company officer) Effendi (Junior or non-combatant officer) Appointments Brigadier (Brig) Brigade Major Commandant Adjutant Quartermaster and Interpreter Woordie Major (native adjutant) Nishanburdar (standard-bearer)

Abbreviations 2i/c Second-in-Command A/ Acting AAG Assistant AG ADC Aide-de-Camp AG Adjutant-General AQMG Assistant QMG Asst-Surg Assistant Surgeon BAL British Auxiliary Legion BHA Bengal Horse Artillery



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BIC Bengal Irregular Cavalry BLC Bengal Light Cavalry BMP Bundlecund Military Police BNI Bengal Native Infantry BO Board of Ordnance Bttn Battalion CB Companion of the Order of the Bath CIH Central India Horse CinC Commander-in-Chief CO Commanding Officer DAG Deputy AG DAQMG Deputy Assistant QMG DG Dragoon Guards DJAG Deputy JAG FO Foreign Office Ft Regiment of Foot GOC General Officer Commanding HEIC The Honourable East India Company or, even more formally, The United Company of Merchants of England Trading to the East Indies HM’s His/Her Majesty’s; usually applied to officers or regiments of the British service, as opposed to HEIC service HMG His/Her Majesty’s Government HQ Headquarters JAG Judge Advocate General JFF Jalna Field Force KCB Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath KSF Knight of the National and Military Order of San Fernando (Spain) LI Light Infantry LLD Doctor of Laws LTC Land Transport Corps MAG Military Auditor General MLC Madras Light Cavalry MNI Madras Native Infantry MO Medical Officer MP Member of Parliament NCO Non-Commissioned Officer NWP North-West Provinces OAF Oude Auxiliary Force OIC Osmanli Irregular Cavalry P&O Peninsular & Oriental Steamship Company QC Queen’s Counsel QM Quartermaster QMG Quartermaster-General RFF Rajputana Field Force RHA Royal Horse Artillery SRC Sindia’s Reformed Contingent, otherwise known as the Sipri or Gwalior Contingent Surg-Gen Surgeon-General TC Turkish Contingent VC Victoria Cross WD War Department, later War Office (WO)

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Words and Phrases Unless otherwise specified, these are words and phrases used in India; spellings could vary widely.1 aga Turkish leader of irregular cavalry alai Turkish band of irregular cavalry alkhalakh long riding coat characteristic of Indian irregular cavalry amir Muslim ruler (for example, Afghanistan) Arnaut ethnic Albanian living elsewhere in the Ottoman Empire asami ownership of a trooper’s mount in a sillidar regiment ashraf noble askeri Turkish troops ayah lady’s maid or nursemaid babu clerk backalum ‘wait and see’ (Turkish) bahadur ‘hero’, honorific title; bahuduri ‘gallantry’, often used sarcastically as ‘pompous’ (see ‘the gallant officer’ for a stereotype British cavalry officer) bai (or baee) lady or mistress; respectful title for a woman, applied to the widow of a Rao in Bundelkhand bandi term used in Madras for light ox-cart; roughly equivalent to hackery bargir an irregular cavalry trooper who does not own his horse barwallah sword sharpener Bashi-Bazouk ‘headless (or leaderless) man’; freelance Turkish irregular cavalry batta money allowances additional to the basic pay of both officers and sepoys; increased on campaign or in hardship areas; sometimes given as a reward for a successful campaign. A frequent source of discontent bazar Persian term commonly used throughout the Middle East and South Asia for a permanent street of shops, but in Indian Army usage denoting the official regimental market in cantonments and on the march bearer manservant benoker a sillidar (owner of asamis) who does not himself serve in the regiment bhisti (literally ‘man of heaven’); water-carrier bhumiawat (from bhum, earth); war fought by Bundelas over landed inheritance bildar pioneer Brahmin the highest castes of Hindus budgerow (from barge) 12- to 18-oared cabin boat; larger examples also known as pinnaces Bundelas Rajput ruling class in Bundelkhand bungalow single-storied house, usually chuppered, surrounded by a wide veranda burkundazes armed police cali Turkish judge cantonment permanent military station, comprising ‘Native Lines’ (of huts) and ‘British Lines’ (of bungalows occupied by officers and their families, and possibly barracks for European troops), parade ground, hospital, etc., and sometimes ‘Civil Lines’ as well Carlist supporter of the Spanish pretender Don Carlos cattle term applied to all draught animals, including horses, camels and elephants as well as oxen and bullocks cavass Turkish police orderly chapelgorri (literally ‘redcap’); Basque light infantryman fighting on the Cristino



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side charpoy (literally ‘four feet’); wooden-framed, string-laced bed chibouk (or chibouque) Turkish tobacco pipe, hence chibouque-jee, pipe-bearer chota small, as in chota haziree (light breakfast) chowki police lock-up (from which we derive ‘chokey’) chowkidar watchman chummery accommodation shared by bachelor officers chundra fund to replace horses in a sillidar regiment chupper thatch chuprassi an orderly circar state government in southern India coss popular measure of distance; like a country mile it was variable – in Bundelkhand it could mean 3 or even 4 miles, elsewhere as little as 2 miles Cristino supporter of the Spanish Regent, Queen Maria Cristina dacoit armed bandit dâk (or dawk) postal service; hence dâk-bungalow: post-house; travelling by dâk: travelling by relays of doolie-bearers or gharri-horses between dâk stations Deccan plateau of south-central India derzi tailor dewan gatekeeper; also an honorific title dhobi washerman or washerwoman dinghy small skiff or canoe doab land between two rivers; ‘The Doab’ specifically referred to Upper India between the Ganges and Jumna doolie box-like conveyance with curtained sides, carried by relays of bearers, also called a palanquin or palankeen dour cavalry raid or patrol dragoman Turkish interpreter durbar council of chiefs durgah Muslim burial place elchi ambassador (Turkish) firman Ottoman Imperial decree flat shallow-draught accommodation boat towed by river steamer forlorn hope a picked body of men selected for a dangerous enterprise such as leading an assault on a fortified place gabion earth-filled basket used to shelter besiegers gharri light, two-wheeled, horse-drawn dâk cart ghat (or ghaut) stairs leading to a riverside landing-stage; also an escarpment ghazi Muslim champion giaur infidel (Turkish) gingal light, wall-mounted gun golundaze (literally ‘cannon-ball thrower’); native gunner gomasta native commissariat agent griffin young European newly arrived in India gurhi (or gurry) a small fort hackery ox-drawn cart with crude (sometimes solid) wheels Holkar title of the Mahratta maharajas of Indore Horse Guards London HQ of the British Army CinC hurkaru messenger jagir (or jaghir) grant of land; hence jagirdar: one holding an estate jezail long matchlock musket jheel ox-bow lake, popular for wildfowling

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kajawa frame slung across a camel to carry sick men Khalsa the Sikh army khan (1) Lord or Prince (Muslim title or surname); (2) a Turkish inn khansama (also bobaji) cook khitmagar butler killadar commandant of a fort lakh 100,000, usually applied to rupees lascar (1) an inferior class of artilleryman (‘gun-lascar’); (2) a tent-pitcher, also doing other work around the camp (‘tent-lascar’); (3) a sailor – the most common Anglo-Indian usage legion in Victorian usage, an all-arms force of regimental or larger size Line-wallahs Nizam of Hyderabad’s soldiers maharaja (or maharajah) Great King Mahratta (or Maratha) Hindu warrior and peasant peoples who dominated Central India after the decline of the Moguls Mahratta Ditchers derogatory term for Europeans residing within the old fortification of Calcutta, the ‘Mahratta Ditch’ mali gardener memsahib lady (from ‘madam-Sahib’) mir Muslim title of nobility (e.g., in Sind) mistry master artificer, as in Mistry-smith Mofussil the country stations of Bengal, outside the Presidency, hence ‘Mofussilites’ for Europeans living ‘up-country’ Mogul (or Mughal) Muslim dynasty that ruled most of India from 1526 to 1707 mukhtar an Indian ruler’s agent, representative or attorney mukhtasar deputy mukhtar, a commissioner munshi language tutor mussalchi scullery-boy mutsaddi clerk nulband farrier or horse-doctor nawab regional governor nizam viceroy; title of the Muslim rulers of Hyderabad nulla steep, dry riverbed pagai group of sowars riding one sillidar’s horses pajamas loose, cotton trousers pakka (or pukkah) masonry (a ‘proper’ wall) palanquin or palankeen Portuguese-derived word for a dhoolie palki term used in Madras for a palanquin or doolie paltan (literally ‘platoon’); infantry regiment panchayat court of arbitration pargana tract of land or district pasha Ottoman general or provincial governor Peshwa title of the former Mahratta rulers of Central India pettah fortified suburb picquet outlying sentry post Pindaris bands of mercenary soldiers turned to brigandage in the Mahratta territories Presidencies the three original provinces of British India; ‘The Presidency’ referred to the area of Bengal centred upon Calcutta puckaul large water-skin purbiya ‘easterner’, term applied by Sikhs and British to mainly Brahmin recruits from Bihar and Oude purdah ‘curtain’, meaning seclusion raja (or rajah) king



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Rajput Hindu warrior class that provided many of the ruling families raki Turkish alcoholic drink Rani queen rao chief or prince; amongst the Mahrattas it was given as a title of distinction as well as to rulers rissala irregular cavalry troop Rohillas Afghan and Pathan mercenaries rupee Indian monetary unit, divided into 16 annas; value varied from one jurisdiction to another, hence ‘Sicca Rupees’ in Bengal, ‘Hyderabad Rupees’, or ‘Company Rupees’ (used for accounting); generally reckoned at Rs 10 = £1 (or about £55 today) sahib lord; title of respect accorded by sepoys to European officers, and servants to their masters sarach Turkish saddler sati (or suttee) ritual widow-burning sapper military engineer sebundy (or sibandi) irregular militia maintained for garrison duty or revenue and police duties sepoy (or sipahi) Indian footsoldier seraskier Ottoman minister of war shikar sport, usually taken to mean pig-sticking or tiger shooting; a hunting trip silladar an irregular cavalry trooper holding an asami, who provides his own horse and arms; could also be a benoker (middleman), providing horses to bargirs Sindhia title of the Mahratta maharajas of Gwalior sirdar commander; also sirdar-bearer (head bearer or valet) sowar Indian cavalry trooper, mounted policeman or orderly spahi French North African irregular cavalryman (see sepoy/sipahi) suvari Turkish horsemen (see sowar), as in Beatson Suvari (Beatson’s Horse) sweeper latrine-cleaner; the lowest class of untouchables syce groom talukdar revenue officer tat (or tattoo) pack pony thagi (or thuggee) ritual murder by highway robbers thakur (or thakoor) idol or deity; title of respect given to the leaders of village communities in Bundelkhand thannah police station, the chief of which is the thannahdar tiffin lunch tindal foreman of lascars tope grove or orchard, especially a mango-grove tukka blackmail tulwar curved Indian sword vakil ruler’s secretary vedette mounted picquet wallah person engaged in a trade or activity, for example, bazar-wallah; dhobi-wallah; Line-wallah writer HEIC clerk yataghan short, wavy-bladed sword of North Africa and the Middle East, with a large pommel but without quillions or knuckleguard

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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would like to record my thanks to the staffs of the following reading rooms, archives and libraries for all their help and for their cheerfulness in the face of sometimes odd requests: the Templer Study Centre at the National Army Museum, Chelsea; the National Archives, Kew; the British Library, St Pancras and Colindale (with particular thanks to the staff of the Asia Pacific and Africa Collections (APAC)); the Royal Geographical Society, South Kensington; the City of Westminster Archives, Victoria, and Westminster Reference Library, Leicester Square; Richmond Reference Library, Richmond upon Thames; the Wiltshire and Swindon Records Office, Trowbridge (now relocated to Chippenham); the Old Bodleian Library and Oxford University Library Services; the Record Office for Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland, Wigston Magna; University of Nottingham, Department of Manuscripts and Special Collections, King’s Meadow Campus; and the Rare Materials Room, Archives and Manuscripts, Wellcome Library, Euston Road. For answering specific queries my thanks go to Vicki Hammond, Archive Officer at the Royal Society of Edinburgh; Lt-Col David Eliot, Regimental Secretary (Somerset) at the Light Infantry Office and Somerset Military Museum, Taunton; Dr Alistair Massie, Department of Archives, Photographs, Film and Sound, and Mrs Lesley Smurthwaite, Department of Uniform, Badges and Medals, both of the National Army Museum; and Dr Edward Brett, author of The British Auxiliary Legion in the First Carlist War in Spain, 1835–1836. For assistance with picture research I would like to thank Juliet McConnell of the National Army Museum Picture Library; Helen George of the British Library APAC Prints, Drawings and Photographs Section; Imogen Gibbon of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery; Peter Harrington of the Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island; and Mark De Novellis, Curator of the Richmond upon Thames Borough Art Collection, Orleans House Gallery. Finally, I sincerely thank Lester Crook of I.B.Tauris for showing faith in this project.

PREFACE

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illiam Ferguson Beatson is an enigmatic figure in Victorian military history. Over the past century and a half writers have often mentioned him or his exploits in passing, but with little understanding of his achievements, his influence, or the richness of his varied experience. He has been badly served by normally reliable reference books, which routinely misspell his name, mix him up with his kinsmen, confuse the different regiments that he created, and accept uncritically the verdict of his enemies. Attempting to right these wrongs has been a fascinating process, involving much detective work in archives. Luckily, Victorian military bureaucrats – especially in India – generated thousands of documents (The Times remarked of Beatson’s court case that ‘a flock of geese, a hogshead of ink, and a papermill should form part of a general’s outfit’). Apart from these official letters and reports, and a few letters to his patrons, the only written material that Beatson has left us is an account of the action at Trukki and his privately published polemic against General Vivian. So we might have known little of his experiences on campaign, travelling around or simply living, in India, Spain and Turkey, had not a number of literary memoirs come down to us from his contemporaries. A surprising number of these were written by explorers and diarists closely associated with him, such as Sir Richard Burton, ‘Thuggee’ Sleeman, Dr Humphry Sandwith, Fanny Duberly and Honoria Lawrence. Many of his subordinates also left military memoirs. The few private letters from Beatson that do survive are enough to give us a feel for his sense of humour (a little heavy) and his thinking on military matters (surprisingly iconoclastic). And if a number of his officers (usually the lazy ones) disliked him, there are plenty of military memoirs by former subordinates who went on to sparkling careers and who could look back with pleasure and gratitude on his training and the example he set them. Even his nemesis, James Skene, had a few kind things to say of him in his memoirs.1 Beatson’s career tells us a lot about army life in India, and answers some questions that we perhaps forget to ask. For example, when a historian writes

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‘he raised an irregular cavalry regiment’, or ‘they marched to Sind’, what did these really entail? A prodigious amount of effort and problem-solving is hidden behind those simple phrases. Even moving a family to and across India was a major enterprise, taking months to achieve. To a modern reader, able to jet around the world in hours, it is difficult to grasp the distances, time and effort involved in travel and communication in those days – though steam power and the electric telegraph had made a big difference by the end of Beatson’s life. Travel, whether it is the long sea voyages, journeys up and down the Indian rivers, or the ubiquitous dâk routes, takes up a significant amount of space in contemporary memoirs, demonstrating how large a part it played in every European’s life in India. I have deliberately not entered into any debate over the rights or wrongs of imperialism. I have treated British rule in India exactly as Beatson and his contemporaries would have regarded it – as a fact of life, and as a career opportunity. Only when it comes to the Indian ‘Mutiny’ (or at least, the mutinous aspects of that complex series of conflicts) have I deviated from this line, and there only because misjudgements by some individuals associated with Beatson directly contributed to the outbreaks. Also, I have not adopted modern forms of place names: it would simply be anachronistic to refer to Madras as Chennai, or Constantinople as Istanbul in a nineteenth-century context, especially when the time-honoured old names appear in so many of the documents. For the same reasons I have eschewed more modern orthography, such as Kolkata for Calcutta, Kanpur for Cawnpore, etc. These are less simple decisions, since nineteenth-century spelling varied enormously, but as far as possible I have either followed reputable sources such as the Imperial Gazetteer of India, or adopted what appears to be the most common spelling at the time. (Even the gazetteers are maddeningly inconsistent: Ghazipore became Ghazipur by 1909, but Barrackpore did not become Barakpur until modern times.) Where necessary I have inserted interpretations of some of the more bizarre phonetic spellings that appear in written sources. Even in Beatson’s time, military documents were disfigured by forests of acronyms and abbreviations, but many of them are useful space savers, and almost all of those I have adopted are sanctioned by contemporary usage. I have tried to ensure that each is fully introduced the first time it appears, and they are also covered in the glossary, as are the many words of foreign origin and British, Indian and Turkish military ranks. Where I have given modern values for contemporary money, I have used the Measuring Worth calculator (www.measuringworth.com). The Beatsons suffer particularly badly from misidentification by authors. Not only did the usually reliable Dictionary of National Biography manage to merge three Robert Beatsons into one composite person, and its modern successor the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography mix up our subject’s mother and grandmother, but William Beatson himself often gets confused with his kinsmen. For example, two authors writing on the Bugti Hills campaign separately identify



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him as Assistant-Surgeon George Beatson2 and as his cousin Theodore Beatson3 – neither of whom was present! And indexers and cataloguers (not unreasonably) cannot distinguish between ‘Beatson’s Horse’ composed of Bashi-Bazouks and ‘Beatson’s Horse’ raised in India a couple of years later. If I have made similar errors of identification among the many characters and places mentioned in the text, I crave the reader’s understanding.

PROLOGUE Friday the Thirteenth: An Action for Slander

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estminster Hall, Friday 13 January 1860. An expectant hush would have fallen over the Court of Exchequer as the Plaintiff’s lead counsel rose to begin the case of Beatson versus Skene. Mr Edwin James, QC, MP, was one of the star barristers practising in London at that time. A one-time actor who looked like a prize-fighter, he had a reputation for showmanship and for appealing to a jury’s prejudices; he could be relied upon to provide entertainment for the public and press galleries. And public interest was high, for the case looked certain to embarrass past and present members of the Government as well as senior military figures. Plaintiff and Defendant had assembled some of the best advocates of the day for their legal teams, and the list of witnesses included a famous explorer, a clutch of distinguished generals, and a cabinet minister. James’s client, Brevet-Colonel William Ferguson Beatson of the Bengal Army, Lieutenant-Colonel in Her Catholic Majesty’s Spanish Army, Major-General in Her Britannic Majesty’s forces in Turkey, Lieutenant-General in the Ottoman Army, veteran of Balaklava and famous cavalry leader, had waited four years for this chance for public redemption. A prickly Scot, Beatson believed that his career had been ruined by meddling diplomats and a jealous Establishment. The Defendant, James Henry Skene, Her Britannic Majesty’s Consul at Aleppo, was an equally combative Scot, but had chosen not to appear in person. No matter: his advocates could be relied upon to defend him with skill and panache. James began by explaining that the action had been brought in order to vindicate the Plaintiff’s character, as an officer and gentleman, from the aspersions which Skene had cast upon it. The Plaintiff was an officer of 39 years’ standing in the army, and the charge that had been preferred against him was that he had excited the troops under his command to mutinous conduct. No charges more serious could be made, James declared. He was not exaggerating: if true, the words attributed to Skene should have led to Beatson’s appearance before a court martial, and under the Articles of War

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the penalty for incitement to mutiny was death. If untrue – and a military court of inquiry had already found no grounds for a court martial – then the words must be defamatory, and Beatson intended to exact revenge upon Skene. There was more: Beatson’s case hinged upon the production of certain documents which he knew would show the War Office in a very poor light if they were made public. No wonder all London was agog. Yet Beatson had brought almost all his troubles upon his own head. His family motto was Cum prudentia sedulis (‘Diligence with prudence’)1 but in the confused events five years before, he had shown anything but prudence. In attempting to discipline and train some of the most intractable soldiers in the world, he had picked fights with ambassadors, generals and ministers. Everything had been done with the best of intentions, but his behaviour had left the authorities no choice but to dismiss him from his command. The manner of his going, and the dark rumours surrounding these events, had led to a succession of military tribunals and inquiries that culminated here in Sir John Soane’s magnificent courtroom adjoining Westminster Hall. How had such a distinguished soldier got himself into this position, and why was he being so vindictive in his attempt to clear his name? Why had an apparent pillar of propriety become a campaigner against the Establishment, and the darling of the Radical Opposition? To find answers we need to examine Beatson’s upbringing and long military service. In doing so we will explore some lesserknown aspects of British rule in India and the mid-Victorian army, and we will observe a number of famous personalities in unfamiliar circumstances. Indeed, through Beatson’s career we glimpse some disturbing undercurrents hidden beneath the conventional image of soldiering in the nineteenth century.

Table 1: Descent of the Surname of Beatson (simplified)

1 THE BEATSONS OF KILRIE The High Road to India

There are few more impressive sights in the world than a Scotsman on the make J.M. Barrie

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illiam Beatson had the ideal background for a soldier of the Honourable East India Company (the HEIC, or the Company): he was a Scot (the Company was dominated by Scots at that time); he was an orphaned younger son (and so had to make his own way in life); and, in an age of patronage, his relatives had excellent connections with the Company. The fact that he grew up in a castle may have reinforced his leanings towards a military career, but it is the former circumstances that mark him out as a typical Indian Army officer of his day. His family derived its position from James Beatson (1598–1674), originally from the Borders, who became the first laird of Kilrie, an agricultural estate in Fifeshire, near Burntisland and Kinghorn on the north shore of the Firth of Forth. This James had three sons, who each founded a separate line of Fifeshire Beatsons, those of Kilrie, Vicarsgrange and Glassmount, and succeeding generations of younger sons founded other branches (see Table 1).1 The Beatsons seem largely to have kept out of the turbulent politics of the time, though Dr William Beatson, the heir of Glassmount, was exiled to the Continent after the failed Jacobite uprising of 1715. Instead, they farmed their estates and raised large families, becoming socially and economically prominent in Fifeshire. Their crest was a bee – both alliterative of their name and a symbol of industriousness – and most of them lived up to their family motto Cum prudentia sedulis – ‘Diligence with prudence’.2 The different branches of the ‘surname’ were near neighbours and regularly intermarried. For example, all four of the grandparents of Robert Beatson of Vicarsgrange (1742–1816) were Beatsons from one branch or another; his grandmothers were half-sisters. This Robert was the first member of the family to achieve national distinction. Like many young Scottish gentlemen in the eighteenth century he joined the army. He served during the Seven Years’ War, but

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at the peace his regiment was disbanded and he was placed on half pay. He failed to gain re-employment during the American War of Independence, though he later obtained the sinecure of Barrack-Master at Aberdeen with the rank of captain.3

Literary confusions While unemployed, this Robert Beatson took up a literary career, compiling massive reference books that readers found dull but useful. His three-volume Political Index to the Histories of Great Britain & Ireland: or, A Complete Register of the Hereditary Honours, Public Offices, and Persons in Office, from the Earliest of Periods to the Present Time (three editions between 1788 and 1806) became a standard work of reference, regularly revised up to the 1890s. Another production was A Chronological Register of both Houses of Parliament from the Union in 1706 to the Third Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in 1807 (three volumes, 1807). With his army background, and a brother and brothers-in-law in the navy, he took a keen interest in military affairs, publishing Naval and Military Memoirs of Great Britain from 1727 to 1783 (six volumes) in 1790, and in 1791 a pamphlet on Admiral Keppel’s indecisive battle off Ushant entitled A New and Distinctive View of the Memorable Actions of the 27th July 1778, in which the Aspersions Cast on the Flag Officers are Shown to be Totally Unfounded (even his titles were long-winded). He was a friend of the economist and writer Adam Smith, and received a doctorate from Aberdeen University.4 So prolific was ‘Beatson the Compiler’ that it was natural for people to assume that any publication bearing the name Robert Beatson must have come from his pen. Thus the New Catalogue of Living English Authors of 1799 credited him not only with his LLD from Aberdeen, but Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) and membership of the Board of Agriculture, all on the basis of a series of publications on agricultural improvements that appeared in 1794–8 under the name of Robert Beatson. In fact the Robert Beatson elected by the RSE at its meeting on 26 June 1797 was Robert Beatson of Kilrie (1757–1805), the seventh laird, who stated in his publications that he was ‘late of his Majesty’s Corps of Royal Engineers’.5 Even the later family historian, Beatson of Rossend, fell into the trap of conflating the two men’s publication lists. It would have helped if ‘Beatson the Compiler’ had signed his work as ‘Beatson of Vicarsgrange’, but he had sold the estate in 1787, soon after he inherited it. The confusion remains to this day. Generations of reference books copied uncritically from each other until the Dictionary of National Biography (DNB) enshrined it in Victorian tablets of stone, stating categorically that the Robert Beatson born in 1742 was both the compiler of indexes and the agricultural engineer. The DNB even suggested that he had resigned his half-pay commission in the 76th Foot to join the Royal Engineers – an impossibility, since RE officers were drawn exclusively from cadets trained at the Royal Military Academy at



The Beatsons of Kilrie

7

Woolwich. This unfounded speculation became established ‘fact’ in the 2004 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Just to confuse matters further, the Board of Agriculture’s 1794 report on Fifeshire was drawn up not by Beatson of Kilrie – even though he was an honorary member of the Board – but by another kinsman and neighbour, Robert Beatson of Pitteadie (1732–1813).6 All three Beatsons participated in the literary and scientific life of Edinburgh during this period when it became known as ‘the Athens of the North’. Cutting through this thicket of similarly named gentlemen, it is the laird of Kilrie on whom we must concentrate. He served in the Royal Engineers from 1776 and designed new fortifications on the island of Gorée, off the African coast. Robert resigned his commission in April 1789 and a year later married Jean Campbell, the most eligible heiress in Burntisland.7

Castles and windmills Jean was the only daughter of Murdoch Campbell from Caithness, who made his fortune as a merchant in Jamaica. On his return to Scotland, Murdoch bought Burntisland Castle and renamed it Rossend. After Jean inherited the castle, her husband was known as ‘Beatson of Rossend’ or ‘Beatson of Kilrie’ fairly indiscriminately, while she, following Scottish fashion of the time, retained her maiden name.8 Rossend Castle is a prominent landmark perched above Burntisland harbour. It began as a small, square tower when a medieval residence of the Abbots of Dunfermline was fortified to defend the town against the English in the 1540s – yet they still burned both Kinghorn and Burntisland. The tower was later enlarged and heightened, with a gun platform and hall, and the present building was substantially complete by 1554. It is a typical Scottish tower house, more residence than serious fortification, but impressively tall, and ‘harled’, that is, weatherproofed with gravel and lime dashed (hurled) onto its rubble stone walls, which today are gleaming white. Mary Queen of Scots was said to have stayed there. The little castle was taken by Cromwell’s men in 1651 and was held briefly by the Jacobites in 1715.9 With the Kilrie and Rossend estates, Robert Beatson was now a prominent member of the local community, serving as a magistrate.10 He threw his energies and money into the new fashion of agricultural improvement. Using his engineering training, he patented a horizontal windmill, with vanes rotating around a vertical axis, rather than the conventional sails on a horizontal axis. Because it required no tower, the horizontal windmill was inherently more compact and could even be portable. The proud inventor exhibited his device in London, suggesting a huge range of uses for it, from grain milling and water pumping, to drilling boreholes and powering manufacturing processes.11

8

Beatson’s Mutiny

Sadly for Beatson’s invention, most of its applications could be better met by the improved steam engines that other Scottish engineers were developing at the same time; these were more powerful and could operate whatever the weather. It is likely that he lost a lot of money on the enterprise. Thanks to the industry of the Beatsons we have a clear picture of Fifeshire at the end of the eighteenth century, on the cusp of the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions. In 1775, in imitation of Samuel Johnson, Robert Beatson the Compiler began a projected journal of a journey through Scotland. This fragment describes the depressed towns, but says that the countryside of the northern shore of the Forth was ‘tolerably well improved’, and near Rossend Castle the land was ‘beautifully diversified into gentle ascents and descents, and the Forth in view the whole way, the ride afforded the most agreeable prospects of the Lothian and Fife shores’.12 A generation later, Beatson of Pitteadie’s report and The Statistical Account of Scotland confirm the depressed nature of the towns, but note that things were picking up. Robert Beatson of Kilrie and his neighbours, men like William Ferguson of Raith, the owner of Cluny Colliery, were doing their best to develop the area.13

India Despite these improvements, there were few opportunities at home for younger sons and daughters of the Scottish gentry. While Robert had been able to give up his army career after inheriting the Kilrie estate, his younger brother Alexander became a career soldier with the HEIC, entering the Madras Army in 1776. Their sister Helena joined him, and the following year she married Charles Oakeley, a Madras civil servant.14 If the family history is to be trusted, Helena was born on 23 March 1762, which would make her only 15 when she and Oakeley married on 19 October 1777.15 European wives were rare commodities in India – most Company officials and officers took up unofficially with native women and several distinguished founders of British India were products of mixed marriages. Opportunities to marry European women usually came only when an officer reached prosperous midcareer or retirement. As the nineteenth century progressed, a ‘fishing fleet’ of young women looking for husbands began to descend on India each year in the cold season, and ‘going native’ was increasingly condemned by polite society. But in the 1770s the rare British girls in India had the marriage field to themselves, and Charles Oakeley turned out to be quite a catch for Helena. The 26-year-old had just been appointed secretary to the Military and Political Department in Madras, which he combined with the jobs of Judge Advocate General and translator. Helena, described as ‘a woman of great energy and artistic talent’, presented him with six sons and five daughters.16



The Beatsons of Kilrie

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Alexander Beatson had ambitions to join the engineers like his elder brother, and was disappointed to be assigned to the infantry. It made little difference, because after service at the siege of the French colony of Pondicherry in 1778 he was appointed a supernumerary engineer to replace casualties. The pattern of his career was set, and he spent three years surveying routes into Mysore. War against Tipu Sultan of Mysore in 1790 saw Beatson guiding the Marquis of Cornwallis’s army by a route that Tipu considered impassable. Beatson then planned the successful sieges of Bangalore and Savandroog.17 The administration of Madras had been appallingly corrupt and the governor was arrested. His successor was none other than Beatson’s brother-inlaw, Charles Oakeley, now created a baronet.18 Despite Oakeley’s best efforts, lack of transport and supplies obliged Cornwallis to give up his first attempt to take Tipu’s capital at Seringapatam in 1791. During a second attempt the following year, Beatson guided the assaulting column to its jumping-off point, but the attack failed with heavy losses and the war ended by negotiation.19 On the outbreak of war with Revolutionary France in 1793, Oakeley, on his own initiative, prepared a new attack on Pondicherry, which Beatson planned. Thanks to the efficiency of the brothers-in-law, the place was captured after a siege of just 12 days.20 Sir Charles Oakeley retired in 1794, having declined the offer to succeed Cornwallis as Governor General. He and Helena settled in Shropshire, where he occupied himself in classical studies, educating their numerous children, and commanding a Volunteer Regiment of Foot in Shrewsbury when Bonaparte threatened invasion.21 In 1799 war broke out once more with Tipu, who had allied himself with France. Lord Mornington, the new Governor General, was determined to crush Tipu and requested an officer who could brief him on the military situation. Alexander Beatson was the obvious choice, and he sketched the plan of operations that Mornington adopted.22 This time the attack on Seringapatam was successful. Beatson suffered sunstroke during the campaign, and went home on sick leave, but the Governor General entrusted him with the formal despatches and encouraged him to write an account of the campaign. With this semi-official history, Alexander Beatson became yet another literary member of the family.23 More important for his future comfort was the prize money he gained from the capture of Seringapatam. Prize money was a system whereby the proceeds from a captured city were divided amongst the officers and men according to a graduated scale. This was bureaucratised looting instead of the free-for-all that traditionally accompanied the sack of a city (even the English word loot is derived from the Hindi lut). Alexander Beatson made a tidy amount from his share of the fabulous treasure of Seringapatam.24 With his prize money, and a special pension from a grateful HEIC Court of Directors, Alexander Beatson bought a group of farms near Tunbridge

10

Beatson’s Mutiny

Wells, married, and settled down to follow the family tradition of agricultural improvement. Finding the textbooks contradictory, he turned his engineer’s mind to scientific experiments to find the best way of fertilising and tilling his land, and then published his results.25

The Beatson boys While Alexander and Helena had been seeking their fortunes in the East, their elder brother Robert and his wife Jean had been raising a family (see Table 2). It was traditional among the Beatsons to name their children after family or friends. For example, Robert Beatson and Jean Campbell named their first son Robert Campbell. This child died young. Then two daughters, Margaret Helena and Harriet Oakeley, acknowledged Robert’s sister Helena, Lady Oakeley. The second (eldest surviving) son was baptised Alexander Campbell, and the next boy was named Robert Wedderburn (father Robert’s maternal grandmother was a Wedderburn). The youngest son – our subject – was baptised William Ferguson, and it seems clear that this was to honour their rich neighbour William Ferguson of Raith who may have been his godfather.26 Contemporary army lists sometimes spell William Ferguson Beatson’s middle name ‘Fergusson’, and this has been adopted by some reference books, but it is clear from family records, his cadet papers and service record that he and his relations always spelled it with a single ‘s’. His bold, scrawly signature was ‘W.F. Beatson’, or ‘WFB’. As the youngest of Robert and Jean’s eight children, born on 25 June 1804, William was just over a year old when his father died.27 His elder brother Alexander, not yet six, inherited Kilrie, while the widowed Jean Campbell remained lady of Rossend in her own right. She lived in moderate state, if a little old-fashioned in style. On her own death, the inventory of the castle lists a considerable amount of furniture – much of it described as ‘old’ (we might call it antique) or ‘broke’ – and enough cutlery, plate and green edged stoneware (not fine china) for around a dozen people to dine together.28 The Beatson boys were educated in nearby Edinburgh – a ferry ran from Burntisland to Leith, the port of Edinburgh – in the subjects of classics and mathematics.29 But when not in school they probably rode in the Fifeshire countryside; we know William became a vigorous horseman. Even today it is not difficult to imagine him riding over the ‘gentle ascents and descents’ south of Kilrie.30 Breasting the last rise, the panorama of the great Firth of Forth, busy with shipping, is laid out before you. At the height of his career William Beatson would enjoy a similar vista of the Narrows of the Dardanelles from the camp of the Bashi-Bazouks.



The Beatsons of Kilrie Table 2: The Beatsons of Kilrie

11

12

Beatson’s Mutiny

Mutiny at St Helena Following Robert Beatson’s death, Colonel Alexander Beatson became head of the family. He married in 1806, the first of what would be a numerous family was born the following year, and he started his agricultural researches. The sunstroke he had suffered at Seringapatam continued to trouble him. He had intended to retire, but in 1807 the Court of Directors appointed him governor of St Helena. This island in the South Atlantic was a valuable staging post for convoys returning from India and China during the wars with France. However, it was badly administered, expensive to maintain, and the garrison was ill-disciplined. The Directors chose Beatson to reform it, and he reluctantly agreed.31 As well as financial reform, Beatson tried to improve the island’s self-sufficiency, exterminating the damaging herds of feral goats, reversing deforestation and encouraging arable farming. In modern times he has been hailed as a ‘green imperialist’ and a pioneer of global environmentalism.32 He also returned to his role as family marriage broker. His lieutenant-governor was a fellow Scot, Lt-Col Edward Broughton of the Bengal Army. The two men became close friends, and in 1809 the governor’s 16-year-old niece, William’s sister Barbara, married the 51-year-old Broughton at St Helena.33 Governor Beatson’s biggest challenge was to restore discipline amongst the 700-strong British garrison. He stopped the import of spirits, trying to replace them with healthier alternatives such as Cape wine or locally brewed beer, but at Christmas 1811 a mutiny broke out. Bread had run short, the men did not want Beatson’s potatoes, and they demanded liquor, accusing him of ‘oppression and tyranny’ in not providing it. Two hundred mutineers planned to seize Beatson and his staff, and did succeed in capturing Broughton and the guard of his residence, Longwood House. Beatson prepared his own residence, Plantation House, for all-round defence, with loyal troops and volunteers, while ‘Mrs Beatson and my children were placed in security against musketry in one of the upper rooms’.34 William Beatson would later face a similar situation at the Dardanelles. Daylight revealed that most of the mutineers had slipped back to barracks, and loyal troops soon rounded up the remainder. The Court of Directors thanked Beatson and arranged his promotion to Major-General. He retired in 1813 and returned to farming. Broughton was also promoted to Major-General on his retirement the following year.35

Orphaned Jean Campbell of Rossend died in 1816, leaving the boys as orphans. The eldest, Alexander Campbell, was still only in his 17th year. It was their sister Barbara, and her husband Maj-Gen Broughton, who moved into Rossend Castle. Broughton now described himself as ‘of Rossend’,36 and immediately stamped his identity on



The Beatsons of Kilrie

13

the estate: a building adjacent to the castle bears the inscription ‘ESB [for Edward Swift Broughton] 1816’. We do not know how much time the boys spent with their sister and General Broughton, with General Alexander Beatson in Sussex, or Sir Charles and Lady Oakeley in Shropshire, but all these relatives were associated with India. In addition, Edinburgh was a garrison town and Leith a naval base with a welldrilled force of Volunteer Riflemen, and the Beatson boys like everyone else must have avidly followed the news of the Peninsular War in which their neighbour and MP, Sir Ronald Ferguson, had been one of Wellington’s most trusted generals.37 If the boys dreamed of military glory, their relatives’ stories of adventures in the East would have inclined them to seek careers in the HEIC service. The Company, which until 1813 held a monopoly over trade with the Indian subcontinent, China and South East Asia, represented a major part of the British economy, with plenty of opportunities for adventurous young gentlemen. These careers were particularly attractive to Scots, whose homeland was relatively underdeveloped and overpopulated. Historians of the empire have noted that around half the HEIC’s European employees at this period were Scots – five times as many as might be expected in proportion to the population of Great Britain.38 Although the British Army was more fashionable, it was greatly reduced in the aftermath of Waterloo, and thousands of officers were placed on half pay. Talented men found their careers frozen awaiting a vacancy; many others never served again. Even the Royal Military College at Sandhurst, whose cadets were drawn largely from the sons of officers, was scaled down.39 Without a cadetship the only way to gain a commission was by purchase, and buying an ensigncy – the first step on the ladder – for one son, let alone three like the Beatsons, was hugely expensive. Conversely, the HEIC forbade any payment for a military commission or promotion. Furthermore, while there was scant chance of seeing active service in the peacetime British Army, the HEIC service offered great opportunities: at this time all of the Company’s armies were engaged in a war with the Mahrattas. There was also the lure of prize money – though the Company’s freebooting days were over and there were few great windfalls after Seringapatam.

A career So it was that William Beatson and his elder brothers joined the military service of the HEIC, followed by their cousins (General Alexander Beatson’s sons) as they became old enough. In 1820 this was a life commitment. An HEIC officer was only allowed a ‘long furlough’ at home after 10 years’ service, and although it could last up to three years, around a year of that would be spent sailing to Britain and back. After 25 years’ service, an officer was entitled to retire on full pay; if his health broke down beforehand, he could retire on half pay if he had reached middle rank. The odds were stacked against him: between 1796 and 1820 only

14

Beatson’s Mutiny

201 out of 3,633 officers of the Bengal Army retired on full pension, while the remainder died in service, or retired early.40 There was no single Indian Army at this time. The HEIC operated in three ‘Presidencies’ based on the originally separate trading stations or ‘factories’ of Fort George (Madras; modern Chennai), Fort William (Calcutta, the capital of Bengal; now Kolkata) and Bombay Castle (now Mumbai). Each had its own government and its own army composed both of Europeans and of native soldiers or sepoys. Madras, where uncles Alexander and Sir Charles had made their names, was becoming a backwater. The Bengal Army was the largest of the three and considered the elite; its commander was Commander-in-Chief of all three armies, in the same way that the Governor of Bengal was also Governor General of India. All three Beatson boys joined the infantry of the Bengal Army. Alexander Campbell went out in 1818, Robert Wedderburn in 1819. The following year it was William Ferguson’s turn. They did not follow the engineering careers of their father and uncle. A cadetship in the ‘scientific corps’, the artillery or engineers, required two years’ training between the ages of 14 and 18 at the HEIC’s Military Seminary at Addiscombe in Surrey, followed by a specialist course at Woolwich. This level of intellectual rigour was not demanded of the cavalry or infantry, most of whose cadets were direct entrants, aged 16–22.41 While Addiscombe required ‘a perfect knowledge of the fundamental rules of arithmetic … a good hand, and … a competent knowledge of English grammar’, the Directors inquired less closely into the attainments of direct entrants.42 William Beatson may have been ‘educated … in classics and mathematics’ and had a smattering of Shakespeare, but his handwriting throughout his life was truly appalling. The main requirement for a cadet was to be nominated by an HEIC director. Recommended by such a distinguished sponsor as Maj-Gen Alexander Beatson, young William accordingly received his nomination from Alexander Allen, MP. General Beatson was listed as the boy’s next of kin, but the guardian’s certificate was actually signed by Lt-Col Robert Broughton – Edward’s brother – presumably because he lived in London and his signature could be conveniently obtained, whereas Generals Broughton and Beatson resided in Fifeshire and Sussex respectively.43 Armed with these papers, a copy of his baptismal certificate and a medical certificate, William Beatson presented himself at East India House, in Leadenhall Street in the City of London, on 5 July 1820, just 10 days after his 16th birthday. There, he and two other candidates were examined by the Court of Directors, who sat in magnificently carved and upholstered chairs behind an impressive table covered with a green cloth.* The interview was short and formal, the questions * Thomas Shepherd’s painting of the Courtroom and some of the walnut chairs, covered in crimson velvet and embroidered with the arms of the HEIC, are in the British Library’s Asia, Pacific and African Collection.



The Beatsons of Kilrie

15

not particularly searching. Then the oath of allegiance to the Company was administered, the Chairman gave a short homily on duty and responsibility, the cadets bowed, and it was all over.44 William Beatson was now a cadet of the 1819 Season, which actually meant 1819–20; the phrase originated when there was only one sailing season to India each year. His future seniority would date from when he left England,45 so without wasting any time he booked a passage in the Honourable Company’s ship Waterloo, due to sail from Gravesend on 10 July. At the age of 16, he had embarked on his life’s career. Even if he survived the climate and the rigours of the service, he was not due to see his native land again for at least 10 years.

2 THE PASSAGE TO INDIA

One voyage to India is enough Winston Churchill

B

eatson’s ship sailed from Gravesend on 13 July 1820. Although listed as ‘HC [Honourable Company’s ship] Waterloo’, she was actually an ‘Extra’ ship, chartered by the company for the sailing season. At 596 tons, she was a lot smaller than the Company’s own stately ‘Indiamen’, but was still large enough to carry cargoes and a few passengers between Britain and India without the need for intermediate ports of call.1 Beatson was joined on board by the two other cadets who had been passed by the Directors on the same day as himself: Christopher Naylor and Herbert Compton. Naylor had been recommended for his cadetship by an uncle, a majorgeneral in the Madras Artillery. Like Beatson, he had only just passed his 16th birthday.2 Compton was about a year older. His father had served with HM’s 74th Foot in the war against Tipu Sultan before becoming a lawyer and was now Sheriff of Calcutta.3 The only other passengers were Captain William Kelso, a fellow-Scot in the Madras Army, returning to India after furlough, and Mr H. Herbert, a licensed trader.4 For the regulated passage money of £110 – equivalent to over £6,000 today – the commander of an HEIC ship provided the cadet with accommodation in steerage and a seat at his dining table. In steerage the cadet would hardly have had room to sling his cot, unless he joined with another passenger to share a tiny cabin. The Company had strict regulations to prevent cadets or their families bribing the commander or his officers in the hope of gaining extra comforts. A Cadet’s Guide to India, published in the year of Beatson’s journey, advised the parent or guardian of every young man proceeding to India in the capacity of Cadet, to take passage for him in one of the Honourable Company’s ships;

18

Beatson’s Mutiny

as on board these vessels all cadets are considered to be under the controul [sic] of the commanders, who will oblige the Cadet, in the event of his misbehaviour during the voyage, to meliorate [sic] his conduct. For example, he will be prevented from taking more than two or three glasses of wine after dinner, and be forbid gambling5

Because the Waterloo was chartered by the Company, her commander, Captain R.H. Wilkinson, presumably had the same authority over the young cadets in his care. The dominant influence, however, may well have been Captain Kelso, who, as an ‘old hand’ (the phrase was used at that time), probably whiled away the long days with stories of military life in India, and advice on how to get on.6 The Cadet’s Guide recommended a formidable list of articles for the journey, beginning with ‘4 dozen frilled Calico Shirts, 11/2 ditto Night-shirts, 4 pair White Cotton Half-Hose, 8 pair Web Pantaloon Drawers’, and including items such as a sea-cot with hair mattress, bedding, pewter washbasin, shoe-brushes and blacking, clothes brush, etc. All this had to be squeezed into two regulation trunks. The young man was assumed to be in possession of ‘such a stock of clothes as will enable him to appear like a gentleman upon the quarter-deck of the vessel’. He was warned that ‘as part of the voyage will be found too warm for cloth, it is advisable for the Cadet to include in this stock an entire suit of Blue Camlet’. Cadets faced with obtaining all this kit in a matter of days after the interview at East India House needed only to walk across Leadenhall Street to the premises of Mr A.D. Welch, whose advertisement begged leave ‘to inform Gentlemen

Map 1: India 1820–72



The Passage to India

19

proceeding to India, either in the Civil, Military or Naval service, that at his warehouse they may be fully equipped, at the shortest Notice, with every Article of Bedding, wearing Apparel, &c necessary for the Voyage and for their Use in the Country, also Military Accoutrements’, and that he would undertake to forward all baggage ‘in the most expeditious and regular manner’. His advertised list of ‘necessaries’ is very similar to the Cadet’s Guide.7 The reason for the large stock of shirts, bedding and so on was simply that ‘Washing of linen is not permitted at sea, as the fresh water cannot be spared for it. Hence it will be proper for the Cadet not to change his linen oftener than is absolutely necessary to his own comfort and decent appearance before other persons, more particularly if the ship be not chartered to touch at any port during the voyage.’8 Since the wars with the French were over, there was no requirement for merchant ships to proceed in convoy and thus no longer any need to rendezvous at Madeira, so ships kept west of the island to avoid the calms and to gain the advantage of the constant southerly current. After another week or so, a ship bound for the south lost the north-east trade wind and entered Equatorial calms (the Doldrums). There was usually a delay of about ten days before the ship could pick up the south-east trade wind. In the meantime, for first-time voyagers beyond the Equator there was the important ceremony of ‘crossing the line’ to endure. The Cadet’s Guide advised the traveller to submit quietly to the crew’s antics in this ceremony, otherwise he would find himself roughly handled by ‘Neptune and his Tritons’, who would ‘shave’ him with a piece of rusty barrel hoop amid copious soapsuds and much ribaldry. The usual procedure was to buy the crew off with a bottle or two of spirits with which to celebrate.9

From Occident to Orient Once the ship had picked up the wind again, the next land sighted was usually the Isle of Trinidad, a speck of rock a few hundred miles out from the Brazilian coast. Unlike ships returning from the East, which sailed closer to the African coast, the Waterloo would not have sighted St Helena. Young Beatson might have regretted not having the opportunity to visit the island of his uncle’s tales, especially now it had an even more distinguished resident. The former Emperor Napoleon was exiled there, a prisoner under house arrest at Longwood, formerly the Lieutenant-Governor’s home where Barbara and her husband had lived. Doubtless Captain Kelso entertained the cadets with his story of trying to catch a glimpse of the ex-Emperor when he (Kelso) had sailed to England in 1817. Failing to obtain a pass, he and three other high-spirited officers tried to slip past the guards and see the great man. They were charged with ‘passing the Guard without authority’, and bundled off the island in disgrace, without catching sight of the fallen dictator.10

20

Beatson’s Mutiny

There wasn’t much to do on these voyages except talk. One handbook admitted that ‘the prospect of an imprisonment on board a ship for three or four months, with no more agreeable view, externally, than a vast expanse of sea and sky, is to many minds perfectly appalling’. But it wasn’t that bad, the guide continued soothingly: passengers could watch ‘the excitement and bustle ever attendant upon the business of a ship’, and there were opportunities for fishing, or shooting seabirds. ‘Meals, on board ship, are also more a matter of entertainment than of business, and are prolonged beyond the ordinary duration, because they contribute to the exhaustion of leisure.’11 As they sailed south, temperatures dropped, until the Cape of Good Hope was reached. Rounding the Cape could be a cold and rough experience, to be followed by the enervating heat of the Indian Ocean. Once Ceylon was sighted, the run up the east coast of India took about another week, and then the landmarks began to indicate that the voyage was ending: sailors looked out for Ganjan Island or the Black Pagodas and knew they were just a day out from Calcutta. In the period 1818–33, the average journey time from England to Calcutta was 105 days 7 hours, logging over 14,400 nautical miles.12 However, even when the Waterloo dropped anchor at the mouth of the River Hugli, one of the distributaries of the Ganges, the journey was not over, for Calcutta lay another 90 miles upriver. Passengers were advised that ‘The ship is usually surrounded with boats, long before coming to anchor; and the most reasonable mode of proceeding is, for two or more passengers to take a boat and go up the Hooghly, which water-party will occupy from twelve to eighteen hours.’13

The City of Palaces The first sight of the city of Calcutta, with its low, ugly shores, was usually a disappointment to the new arrival, but once the boat rounded Hangman’s Point and entered the magnificent bend of Garden Reach, the view was never to be forgotten. It struck well-travelled visitors as having something of the air of St Petersburg about it, with its painted palaces along the river, except that these villas had lawns and pleasure-grounds running down to the Hugli. Beside the looming bulk of Fort William, new public buildings were rising along the riverbank, turning the ad hoc trading station into a capital fit for an empire. After months of relative tranquillity on the voyage, broken only by the organised bustle of a ship’s company at work, the pandemonium that greeted passengers at the ghat (landing stage) was a considerable shock. There were the strident colours, sounds and smells of India to take in. The place was heaving with people – hawkers, dandies (boatmen), coolies (porters) and doolie (palanquin) bearers hustling noisily for trade, and children running everywhere. The riverside itself exerted a horrified fascination for many Europeans: women and bhisties



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(water-carriers) filled their pots and leather water-bags from the turbid river, which was ‘well seasoned with coco-nut husks, defunct brahmins, dead dogs &c’. The floating corpses were no accident: the funeral rites for many high-caste Hindus involved setting the body adrift on the Holy Ganges aboard a little raft with flower garlands and candles; others were cremated there; the poor were simply consigned to the waters. Highborn or low, the gharials (Ganges alligators) and carrion birds did the job of cleansing. The terminally ill were often left on the banks to die, or be torn apart by pariah dogs, in full view of the appalled European arrivals.14 For the newcomer, the immediate dangers lay on shore. One cadet remembered being warned by the ship’s captain as he disembarked, ‘Take care of the landsharks, Sir,’ referring to the crowds of babus (clerks) and sircars (head servants) clutching grubby testimonials and clamouring to offer their services – in return for a hefty commission – in assisting the new arrival to secure a full complement of allegedly trustworthy servants. ‘The aim of such Native servants is to clip the wings of the griffin’ (the term applied to all newcomers in their first year or so in India). All Beatson required at this stage was coolies to carry his luggage the short distance to the Custom House, and then on to his first destination of Fort William, the Bengal Army’s Headquarters. Unless they arrived ‘at an unseasonable hour’ and needed to change their clothes and have breakfast, cadets were advised to avoid the seedy Calcutta hotels. Because of the exorbitant prices charged by these taverns, the Governor General had recently appointed Capt Edmund Higgins as superintendent of cadets ‘to supply Cadets with servants; to see that they are settled in quarters; and generally to protect them from the extortion and impositions of Native agents’.15 The Superintendent was in charge of all cadets until they proceeded to join a regiment. His immediate superior was the Fort Major, and ‘as the Cadet begins to receive pay from the date of his delivering his credentials to the fort-major, he must lose no time in paying his respects to that officer’. Beatson and his fellow cadets did so on 11 December 1820, recorded as their date of arrival from which pensionable service was calculated. Higgins’s sircar would help them to obtain furniture and engage suitable servants, and there was a mess at Fort William for up to 20 cadets. However, cadets were not obliged to mess at Fort William if they had friends in Calcutta – the European community was notably hospitable, and many travellers arriving with nothing more than a letter of introduction to a friend of a friend found themselves welcomed. Compton doubtless stayed with his father, the Sheriff of Calcutta. It is quite likely that Beatson lodged with his kinsman, Lt William Stuart Beatson of the Glassmount branch of the family, who held the important post of Assistant Adjutant General (AAG) at Fort William. He would have met Stuart Beatson’s new wife, Emma Humfrays, whose family were later to play an intimate part in William’s life.16

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First impressions It was a good time to arrive in Calcutta, since November saw the beginning of the ‘cold season’ for which all Europeans yearned. December ‘is one of the most agreeable months of the year,’ the local almanac declared; ‘the weather continues fair, cool and brilliant and extremely fine throughout the month, with light northerly winds. The days and nights are cold and clear; and the mornings and evenings foggy at the latter half of the month.’ ‘Cold’ is a relative term: the December temperatures range from 54ºF in the morning to 70ºF in the afternoon (12–21ºC). To a boy brought up on the shores of the Forth, Calcutta’s foggy mornings must have seemed trifling indeed.17 For any new arrival, it was time for sightseeing. The usual means of transport around the city was by doolie, a roofed and curtained box suspended from a long pole and carried by a team of bearers, a slow and cumbrous conveyance in crowded streets. The rickshaw so familiar to later visitors was not introduced until the late nineteenth century. A European resident would maintain a buggy, a horse-drawn gig with a hood to keep off the sun. He would drive with his syce or groom perched on the back or running beside the horse’s head with a fly-whisk. In the evening the wealthier officials and merchants paraded their fine carriages on the vast semicircle of Chowringee as if it were Rotten Row in Hyde Park. As the lamps were lit, the scene reminded one imaginative traveller of the Champs Élysées, but a poorer cadet remembered the city as ‘wretchedly lighted by smoky oil-lamps set at very rare intervals’.18 Daytime entertainments, especially for those preparing for their journey up-country, included Tulloh’s auction rooms, where you could buy just about anything you needed second-hand, and the China Bazaar, an enclosed area of shops situated at the back of Tank Square. Barrackpore Park, some 20 miles up the river, where the Governor General had a country residence, was a popular picnic spot for boating parties.19 Fort William itself was an impressive spectacle, with its great grass-topped bastions surrounded by the wide lawns of the Maidan (providing a clear field of fire in the event of attack). Begun immediately after the disaster of 1756, when the city was captured by the Nawab of Bengal and the Europeans thrown into the infamous ‘Black Hole’, Fort William was the concrete expression of British fear of their turbulent subjects. The batteries were heavily armed with guns, while the fortress contained the Arsenal and Grand Magazine. Fort William was also the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief (CinC) of India and the staff of the Bengal Army. It was garrisoned by the Calcutta Native Militia and detachments of artillery, but more importantly by one or more battalions of the Royal Army, referred to as ‘HM’s Service’.20 These were the ultimate guarantors of British hegemony, their role not only to stiffen the native regiments in battle, but also to overawe them when – as all too often happened – they broke out in mutiny.





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Fort William was no holiday resort; even 30 years later, The men were crowded into small badly-ventilated buildings, and the sanitary arrangements were as deplorable as the state of the water supply. The only efficient scavengers were the huge birds of prey called adjutants, and so great was the dependency placed upon the exertions of these unclean creatures, that the young cadets were warned that any injury done to them would be treated as gross misconduct. The inevitable result of this state of affairs was endemic sickness, and a death-rate of over ten per cent per annum.

The same observer noted that between 1800 and 1857 the average annual mortality rate amongst European troops in India was 6.9 per cent, ‘and in some stations it was even more appalling’. Old hands derived sour amusement from the observation that cadets suffered badly from mosquitoes, ‘that vermin being particularly fond of newly imported British blood’.21 The army aimed to leave them little time for sightseeing, socialising or getting into scrapes: Seldom more than a week elapses from the landing of the Cadet until the time of his being appointed an Ensign, either to do duty with, or permanently in, some corps. Upon this promotion, he will be allowed three weeks or a month to procure his uniform, preparatorily to joining his regiment. But as Calcutta is not a good school for young strangers … it is advisable for the cadet to make his stay in the capital as short as he can.22

A commissioned officer On 15 December 1820 a general order announced that ‘the undermentioned Gentlemen having respectively produced Certificates of their Appointments as cadets of Infantry on this Establishment, are admitted to the Service accordingly, and promoted to the rank of Ensign’. The four names were Mr Kenneth Francis McKenzie, Mr William Ferguson Beatson, Mr Christopher Henry Naylor and Mr Herbert Compton. The commissions of Beatson, Naylor and Compton were dated 13 July 1820, the date on which the Waterloo had sailed. McKenzie outranked them by five days, his ship having left Gravesend on 8 July. McKenzie was another Scot, a member of a prominent Ross-shire family with several military relations. A further general order appointed all four young men ‘to do duty with the Honorable Company’s European Regiment at Ghazeepore’.23 Now the sircar would bring a derzi (native tailor) to the officers’ quarters, where he would measure the ensign, and then sitting cross-legged in the middle of the floor would rapidly sew the necessary two uniform coats. The Cadet’s Guide advised the young man to bring the red cloth for his uniform from Britain,

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together with a regulation cap, sword, silk sash and white leather shoulder belt, but to buy the all-important metallic lace and epaulettes locally, because they would tarnish during the long sea voyage. The estimated cost of a full outfit for an ensign was £100 (over £5,500 in today’s money).24 A cadet for the artillery or cavalry could have his uniform made in Britain because it was standardised. But in the infantry the facings and officers’ lace on the red coat were regimental distinctions, and a cadet would not know these until he was assigned to a regiment (probably he wore a plain red coat until then). For example, Alexander Beatson’s regiment, the 1st Bengal Native Infantry (BNI), wore yellow facings with silver lace, while Robert Beatson in the 11th BNI sported buff facings and gold lace. The Bengal European Regiment, in which the new ensigns were to do duty, was resplendent in ‘pompadour’ (purple) and silver. Two years later they adopted sky blue; frequent changes in regimental facing colours meant that there was plenty of work for the derzies. We can be sure that Beatson took a close interest in this, for he later developed a reputation for wearing and designing gaudy uniforms.25 It was time to make farewells and prepare for the journey up-country. Even a century later, when transport and communications across the huge subcontinent were considerably easier, young officers often found that once they had gone their separate ways, they never met their closest friends of cadet days again.26 Captain Kelso, of course, was making the short journey back down the coast to Madras. Compton had been given two months’ leave to stay with his father before travelling to Ghazipore. They never saw poor Compton again, for he drowned in a well on the line of march less than a year later; this may have been a tragic accident, but it was also a common method of suicide at the time.27

Travelling up-country Ghazipore was 450 miles up the Ganges. The journey would be leisurely – or interminably slow, depending on the traveller’s temperament. Railways did not yet exist. A military road had been cut from Calcutta to Benares in 1781 for troop movements, but the Mogul Emperors’ Grand Trunk Road to Upper India was not upgraded until 1833. For individual travellers, the Ganges itself was the highway, linking most important civil and military stations with the seat of power at Calcutta. Until a steamer service was established in 1835, the journey was accomplished in the traditional way: by manpower, assisted occasionally by sails.28 The craft employed was a budgerow, a corruption of ‘barge’, and indeed they resembled state barges used by dignitaries in Europe, with oarsmen in the bow and a covered cabin at the stern. The budgerow had a mast and sails in addition. The size varied from 12 to 18 oars, and two or three officers travelling up-country usually clubbed together to hire a larger boat both for company and to save some money from their travel allowance – we may presume that Beatson, McKenzie and



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Naylor did this. A subaltern’s boat allowance was Rs 100 a month (colonels got a lavish Rs 930 a month), and the time allowed from ‘The Presidency’ (Calcutta and its environs) to Ghazipore was two and a quarter months. An 18-oared budgerow and its dandies cost 6 rupees 4 annas a day (16 annas to the rupee). The authorities assumed that a boat could cover 5 coss per day against the current, and 7 coss with it. As a popular measurement of distance, the coss was a bit like a country mile: it varied from place to place, but was generally reckoned to be a little over 2 miles. It was quite an expedition. The boat would be accompanied by a covered dinghy (one of many Indian terms to enter the English language) to act as a floating kitchen, but as with all accommodation in India, the budgerow was unfurnished. A travel guide advised the young officer to buy furniture that he could use after the journey: a camp-table, a camp-stool or folding-chair, a charpoy or bedstead, the bottom of which consists of broad tape or sacking … a copper basin (a chillunchee in Bengal), and a folding tripod for its support, a narrow carpet, or rug; a hanging lamp … a canteen; bullock or camel trunks … and one or two morahs or stools.

He also needed to lay in comestibles: A good head-servant, or khitmutghar, will take care to provide poultry, eggs, milk, rice, spices and vegetables, as the boat reaches towns and villages on the river’s bank; but everything else must be procured at the starting place; and it should be borne in mind, by persons going upwards from Calcutta, that it is good economy to lay in stores for the entire voyage, inasmuch as all articles, the produce of Europe, augment in price in proportion to the distance from the metropolis whence they are carried. Wines, malt and spirituous liquors, preserves, cheeses, pickles, &c., sealed meats, hams, tongues, pickles &c., cost at Benares, double the price paid at the presidency, treble when they are sold at Cawnpore, and so on.

He was also recommended to take a fowling-piece, drawing equipment, chess and backgammon sets, books and so on to while away the time, and to take the opportunity to study the boatmen’s vernacular – more useful to the officer in everyday use than what he would learn from the munshis or language tutors.29 As well as the dandies and the khitmutghar, the roster of servants considered essential included a sirdar-bearer (head bearer or valet), a dhobi (washerman), a mussalchi (scullery-boy), a bhisti, and – if the young men had acquired some dogs, as most did – a matar to look after them. Any of these servants might have their family with them, travelling on the boat’s roof. One young wife travelling upriver with her husband counted 40 people on their boat.30 Servants could be the most troublesome aspect of the journey:

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in the treatment of native servants on the river voyage, it is advisable to combine the greatest strictness with the most perfect forbearance. Look well into the khitmutghar’s accounts; trust him with no more money than is really wanted at the different halting-places; insist upon the most deferential and respectful demeanour, neither permitting familiar speech nor a disregard of cleanliness and propriety of costume; require a correct return every evening of your plate, table-linen, and dusters, and exact payment for every piece of crockery or glass carelessly broken, and every article or other fabric alleged to be lost. The neglect of these matters at the commencement renders servants dirty, impertinent, and dishonest, and involves more serious loss than would at first thought be conceived.

But the guide warned travellers not to strike their servants – not only was assault ‘severely punished by the Company’s courts’, but the servants would probably desert in the night anyway, and leave you helpless!31 The journey was not without its compensations: The sitting-room in a good-sized budgerow is as large as a small parlour, seven or eight feet in height, and, when fitted up with table, chairs, couch, book-shelves, &c, is as comfortable as an apartment on shore. The venetians open inwards, and may be raised and hooked to the ceiling along both sides of the rooms or cabins, of which there are usually two, one a dormitory, affording, as you glide along, a pleasant view of bathers, boats, temples, ghauts, and the other various picturesque objects which generally adorn the banks of Indian rivers.

When the time came to depart, the dandies threw water over the figurehead, touched their foreheads, shouted ‘Gunga-gee kejy’ – ‘Success, or victory to the Holy Ganges’ – and they were away. Normally the dandies did not row or sail, but rather towed the budgerow from the bank, each dressed in nothing more than a dhoti or loincloth, the manji or commander steering the boat and chanting the orders. The oars only came out to cross the river to a market on the other side, or when passing a line of boats moored along the towpath, ‘when they are sometimes deemed preferable to passing the towing line over each separate masthead, which is a troublesome operation, and productive of infinite squabbling and abuse between the crews’.32 In this fashion, generations of British officers, officials, merchants and their families travelled up and down the great highway of India. There was plenty to see when travelling in the Ganges delta: ‘Gardens of plantain, mango, and jack-trees lined the banks, intermixed with clumps of the tapering bamboo; clusters of neat huts, with arched roofs, appeared halfburied beneath their umbrageous foliage, through openings in which, in the dim, chequered light, village-girls, with water-pots on their heads might be seen gliding along.’ Cows and goats were picketed in the shade, fishermen cast their nets



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from canoes, and cultivators worked in the green rice-fields. There were indigo works, sugar and rum refineries. Heavily laden trading barges passed by, taking these products downstream to the port. ‘Occasionally we came suddenly upon a market, with its congregated fleet of boats, and its busy, squabbling assemblage of villagers, fish, grain, and vegetable venders, &c, or a thannah or police station … its picturesque burkundazes lounging about in front, armed with spears or tulwars (curved swords), and the portly, bearded thannahdar’ smoking in the shade.33 As evening drew on, the crew would moor up, and the servants began chopping firewood, lighting cooking fires and preparing food. Most young officers took the opportunity to stretch their legs, going out to a nearby jheel or oxbow lake, with dogs and gun to bag a few wildfowl while the crew tried to net some fish to supplement their diet. And so the seemingly endless days rolled by, broken occasionally by excitement such as a collapsing sandbank, which would set off a mini-tsumani and threaten to upset boats, or a spectacular thunderstorm. Otherwise, there might be interesting temples or ruins to view, perhaps a halt at the celebrated battlefield of Plassey, or a major town with a European community to visit. Berhampore, the first major station they would come to after a month on the river, was a fine-looking place, with gigantic flowering trees, and grand cantonments for the troops stationed there, with a great barrack square. But the low-lying city was ill-drained, containing many ditches and stagnant pools in which malarial mosquitoes bred. The consequence was an appalling incidence of sickness, and the traveller could not help noticing that the European cemetery was very large and well stocked with monuments.34 Above Berhampore, the Hugli joins the broad main channel of the Ganges and the manji would demand a bugis or monetary gift for Gunga-gee. Here the travellers passed from the province of Bengal into Bihar. The old frontier town of Monghyr, with its citadel on a rocky promontory, was a regular calling place. There was time for sightseeing, because boats were often delayed by adverse winds and the strong current. Young officers probably found Monghyr a bit dull. It was the station for some of the men on the HEIC Invalid Establishment, unfit for field service, and retired officers often settled there to take advantage of the attractive scenery and pleasant climate.35 Some days later the budgerow would reach Patna, the first native city of wealth and importance that the young men would have encountered. After Patna the verdant scenery was replaced by the more arid soils of Hindustan: occasional camels would now be seen. A traveller commented that ‘Hindustan is … exceedingly ugly in the dry season, and very beautiful in the rains’.36 The military cantonment of Dinapore was a few miles further upriver – ‘I was never in duller and more stupid place than Dinapore’, complained one military wife – and next came Buxar, scene of the battle in 1764 that confirmed the HEIC as the greatest power in Bengal. Now it was the site of the HEIC stud, where the best cavalry and artillery horses were bred. Finally, Beatson and his fellows would

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reach Ghazipore. The town was an important military station, with barracks for a European battalion, often a regiment of HM’s service, but currently occupied by the Bengal European Regiment, to which Beatson and his fellows were to report.37

Basic training The Bengal European Regiment was organised and recruited exactly like the British Army’s infantry regiments. Many of its career NCOs had served in British regiments and elected to take their discharge and join the HEIC service when their regiment was ordered home. The other ranks were the usual urban offscourings of Industrial Revolution Britain, or rural poor driven off the land by the economics of agricultural improvement. During the Napoleonic Wars the Company had struggled to attract good recruits in competition with regiments fighting in the Peninsula, but since Waterloo there were many disbanded soldiers in Britain, and the HEIC was able to enlist adventurous or desperate men from this pool, many choosing virtual exile in order to forget or be forgotten: ‘the Company’s European Regiments were very much, in their day, what the French Foreign Legion was to a later generation,’ wrote one historian of the Indian Army, adding that they produced much the same sort of tough, hard-bitten soldiers.38 The Bengal Europeans regularly received new ensigns for initial training – a batch of nine had arrived just three weeks before Beatson and his companions39 – so the Adjutant and the drill serjeants were well practised at turning young gentlemen (remember, Beatson was not yet 17 years old) into the semblance of officers. After the lazy routine of their long sea voyage and river journey, the change must have been a shock for them. Parades were held before dawn, so that they could be completed and the men sent to their breakfast before the sun got too high: ‘Better to be comfortable in darkness than to grill in broad day,’ the old hands said. Beatson had arrived in India at the start of the ‘cold’ season, but the temperature begins to rise in March. This was the traditional date for European civilians to abandon their broadcloth and take to light linen suits. Soldiers on duty, however, remained buttoned up in their red coats, and it was a relief after parade to return to one’s room, dress in pajamas (loose cotton trousers), lie on the charpoy and try to read or sleep. They learned to ignore the cries of crows and kites, the screech of ungreased cartwheels, and the hubbub of natives going about their business that formed the aural backdrop to the Indian day. Breakfast (rice, fish and eggs – the origin of what we call kedgeree – jam or marmalade, tea, coffee, etc.) was taken at about 10.00. Duties began again in the late afternoon as the heat became less fierce, and the relative cool of the evening was the time for dinner and socialising. Everyone went to bed early, often outside on the veranda, so as to snatch some sleep before next day’s early start.40 In this environment Beatson and his fellows had to sweat through their ‘manual and platoon’ (the drill manual and platoon drill) before they took their place on



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parade. ‘We had hard work of it at the drill, morning and evening, though it did not last long. We were dismissed in about three weeks as fit for duty,’ recalled one veteran. To modern eyes, this emphasis on parade-ground drill is ridiculous, but close-order drill and musketry had been the basis of the Company’s victories over less disciplined native armies. And ensigns might shortly have to put it into practice under fire at the head of native soldiers whom they themselves were responsible for training.41

First posting After a short period with the Bengal Europeans, Beatson was assigned for further training to a native unit, the 2nd Battalion of the 25th Bengal Native Infantry (2/25th BNI), stationed in Rajputana, in western India – about as far away as a Bengal officer could be expected to serve at this date. This posting may not have been a coincidence, for his brother Alexander’s battalion, the 2/1st BNI, was under orders to move to Rajputana in the next cold weather rotation of battalions. Furthermore, the officer in temporary command of the 2/25th, Captain James Drysdale, was the son of the town clerk of Kirkcaldy and thus a neighbour of the Beatsons in Fife. We can probably detect strings being pulled here, and as the Adjutant General’s Department was responsible for such postings, William Stuart Beatson may have had a hand in it.42 McKenzie was also assigned to the 25th, but to the 1st Battalion, stationed at Ludhiana on the Punjab frontier, while Naylor was sent to the 1/22nd BNI in Oude. The derzi would have been called in to alter uniforms, since the 25th BNI wore buff facings and gold lace, the 22nd pea green with gold lace.43 (It is possible that ensigns under training wore plain facings until their regiments were confirmed.) We do not know exactly when Beatson received his regimental assignment, but Naylor got his in April 1821, and it is reasonable to assume that all three ensigns left on this second stage of their journey up-country about the same time, if not actually travelling together.44 Once again they would have to endure the slow budgerow. Many, perhaps most, griffins became terribly homesick after a while in India. The future Lord Roberts, for example, felt this keenly: ‘the climate adds its depressing influence; there was no going to the hills then, and as the weary months dragged on, the young stranger became more and more dispirited and hopeless.’ He recalled that for young officers, cut off from friends and family, ‘the feeling of loneliness and home-sickness was apt to become almost insupportable’.45 These feelings may have affected Beatson less than some young cadets, since he was an orphan and his brothers were already in India. Indeed, as his budgerow approached Benares he would be looking forward to the chance to see one of them for the first time in almost two years. Benares (modern Varanasi) is an important Hindu holy city, and pilgrims come from all over India. In 1821 the garrison included the 1/11th BNI in which Robert

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Beatson was serving. It was only bad luck that had prevented all three brothers being reunited at Calcutta when William arrived, because in the autumn of 1820 Alexander had been sent down to the Presidency on sick leave. Robert had taken leave at the same time on ‘urgent private affairs’ – obviously to be with his sick brother. Unfortunately, they had returned to their regiments and cancelled their outstanding leave by the end of November 1820, and thus missed their youngest brother by just a couple of weeks. Had they known of his imminent arrival they might have stayed to welcome him, but news of his admission to the service could travel to India no faster than the ship that brought him.46 Under the circumstances of slow communications with and within India, it is impressive that families managed to arrange their affairs as well as they did. After at most a short stay with his brother, Beatson had to continue his journey. A couple of days beyond Benares lay Chunar, with its fort perched on a rock above the river. A young Scot who travelled this way a few years before had delightedly likened it to Edinburgh Castle.47 Chunar had defied the British in 1764; now it housed an invalid battalion and the Company’s political prisoners. But by now the long journey must have become wearisome for lively young men. Guidebooks warned travellers of the tedium of these meandering reaches up to Allahabad, some 80 miles from Benares. Allahabad – ‘the abode of God’ – was a Mogul city, but situated at the confluence of the Ganges and its biggest tributary the Jumna (modern Yamuna) it is also a Hindu place of pilgrimage. The Company’s engineers had converted the Mogul fort into a modern fortress and magazine for the Bengal Army in the Upper Provinces. Allahabad was considered a healthy station. There were large and picturesque cantonments for two or three regiments of native infantry and some artillery; one day Beatson would command all this.48 A strip of land between two rivers is known in India as a doab; when generations of Anglo-Indians referred to ‘The Doab’ without qualification, they meant the area between the Jumna and the Ganges, stretching from Allahabad to Delhi and beyond, the heart of Upper India. South of the Jumna lay Bundelkhand, where much of Beatson’s future career would be spent. North of the Ganges lay the Kingdom of Oude (modern Awadh), one of the greatest native states, from which a high proportion of the Bengal Army’s sepoys was recruited. Naylor’s regiment was in Oude and his onward journey from Allahabad would take him up the Ganges, whereas Beatson and McKenzie would continue up the Jumna.49 Naylor served for a number of years before his career almost came to an ignominious end: he was court-martialled for ‘breach of arrest’. Naylor and the young officer guarding him were both found guilty and ordered to be cashiered. At the urging of the court, however, the CinC remitted the sentences and the chastened officers returned to duty. As the court’s plea for clemency referred to ‘circumstances of a delicate nature’ that had caused Naylor to leave his place of arrest, one wonders whether there was a lady involved. Naylor, McKenzie and Beatson were to serve together many years later in the parched hills of Sind.50



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Overland Passing by the town of Kalpi, where one day he would marry, Beatson continued his journey to Agra, former capital of the Mogul emperors, whose greatest monuments were the Red Fort and the spectacular Taj Mahal. Now their descendant was reduced to the status of King of Delhi, and the HEIC’s administrators ruled in Agra, soon to be the capital of the North West Provinces (NWP). McKenzie would carry on for many more weary miles up the Jumna before heading across the plains of Punjab to join his regiment at Ludhiana. Beatson on the other hand had to leave the river at Agra and change his mode of transport after 839 miles by river (the route was precisely surveyed). He had two choices for overland travel: he could purchase horses in Agra and ride (confusingly called ‘marching’), or he could buy a doolie, similar to those used as taxis in Calcutta, but equipped for long days on the road. This was known as travelling by dâk because it made use of the dâk (post) houses. Surprisingly, perhaps, the methods were equally slow and tedious: a European could ride safely and comfortably only early in the morning or in the cool of the evening and camp the rest of the day, whereas with relays of doolie-bearers one could travel day and night – even when prostrated by fever, as Europeans so often were in India. As a keen horseman Beatson may have been tempted to ride. However, as well as horses he would need a tent and camp equipment, and to engage additional servants, including a tent-lascar, a syce for the horses, and a driver. Officers’ belongings usually went in a hackery, a native bullock cart, or on a couple of camels or sturdy pack ponies (tats or tattoos), or even slung on a bamboo pole carried on the shoulders of coolies. Officers were usually accompanied by a couple of sepoys as an escort. The amount of baggage increased with an officer’s seniority and the size of his family. As Beatson was a new subaltern, his baggage would have been light, even if he had fallen victim to the hawkers and bazaar vendors who preyed on griffins. Normally, when marching, the traveller sent his servants and baggage on ahead. Then, after riding through the cool of the morning, he would reach the camping ground where the servants had the tent pitched, perhaps in the shade of a mango-grove, and had breakfast prepared, having purchased chickens, eggs, milk, vegetables and so on from the villages on the way, supplemented with any game the European might shoot. Unless the traveller had relays of horses laid on, the day’s journey was limited to 12–20 miles. A popular variant when a couple of officers travelled together was to use a horse-drawn buggy, but this was only possible where the roads were good.51 There were virtually no roads where Beatson was going. If travelling by dâk, travellers were advised that ‘A good strong palanquin may be procured for less than 100 rupees (£10) and can always be disposed of at the end of the journey, if the owner have no further occasion for it.’ The doolie was then fitted up ‘to enable its tenant to have a few books, his shaving and

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washing apparatus, a canister of biscuits, a bottle and glass, a drinking-cup, a little additional night clothing – a few books and his writing materials always at hand’. Officers usually carried their shotguns and rifles with them, to do a bit of shooting during the halts. Dogs travelled in the doolie with their masters, or ran alongside when it was cool enough. The rest of the luggage was carried in trunks and wicker baskets by coolies who ran alongside or ahead of the doolie. The traveller was advised to have a good supply of silver coins to pay the doolie-bearers and coolies (8 annas covered a set of bearers for one stage), and for incidentals such as ferrymen.52 Just like riding a camel or elephant, it took time to get used to the swaying movement of a doolie, but once mastered, it was possible to sleep on the journey. Nevertheless, many Europeans disliked the whole experience: This manner of travelling was tedious in the extreme. Starting after dinner, the victim was carried throughout the night by eight men, divided into reliefs of four. The whole of the eight were changed at stages averaging from ten to twelve miles apart. The baggage was also conveyed by coolies, who kept up an incessant chatter, and the procession was lighted on its way by a torch-bearer, whose torch consisted of bits of rag tied round the end of a stick, upon which he continually poured the most malodorous of oils. If the palankin-bearers were very good, they shuffled along at the rate of about three miles an hour, and if there were no delays, forty or forty-five miles could be accomplished before it became necessary to seek shelter from the sun in one of the dâk-bungalows, or rest-houses, erected by the Government at continuous intervals along all the principal routes. In these bungalows a bath could be obtained, and sorely was it needed after a journey of thirteen or fourteen hours at a level of only a few inches above an exceedingly dusty road. As to food, the khansamah, like ‘mine host’ in the old country, declared himself at the outset prepared to provide everything the heart of man could desire; when, however, the traveller was safely cornered for the rest of the day, the menu invariably dwindled down to the elementary and universal ‘sudden death’, which meant a wretchedly thin chicken, caught, decapitated, grilled, and served up within twenty minutes of the meal being ordered. At dinner a variety was made by the chicken being curried, accompanied by an unlimited supply of rice and chutney.53

The final destination of Beatson’s gruelling journey was Nasirabad in the state of Ajmer, some 200 miles south-west of Agra across the semi-desert of Rajputana. The military authorities assessed the journey from Calcutta to Nasirabad (1,030 miles) at six and a half months: allowing for the weeks spent at Ghazipore, Beatson would have arrived around August 1821 – over a year having elapsed since he stood before the Court of Directors in London.54



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Rajputana Field Force When the Beatson brothers arrived in India, it was their luck – they may have said ill luck – that the Company’s dominions were entering an extended period of peace for almost the first time in 80 years. In 1817–18 the Marquis of Hastings had fought the last great war against the Mahratta Confederacy and stamped out the bands of brigands known as Pindaris who had terrorised central India. The result was a massive extension to British power, the Mahratta principalities coming under direct or indirect control while the smaller states in Rajputana and Bundelkhand – now freed from Mahratta aggression – became British protectorates.55 Beatson arrived too late to share in this glory. Although his battalion formed part of the Rajputana Field Force (RFF), its role was simply to garrison the newly won territory. Ajmer had been ceded to the British in 1818 and now formed a pink island in the map of the vast Rajputana Protectorate (modern Rajasthan). It was not an appealing place. Ajmer is a sandy upland region, on the edge of the great desert of north-west India, and outside the area reached by the annual monsoon. The military cantonment laid out at Nasirabad in 1818 was over a mile in length, housing three infantry battalions, a cavalry regiment and two batteries of artillery, with the native town on the outskirts. The site was bleak, the water supply insufficient, and as a newly established station the facilities would have been limited. Unlike the European stations at Barrackpore or Ghazipore, there would be no barracks, but ‘native lines’, originally of tents, then more permanent huts, built by the sepoys themselves from available local materials. The officers lived in bungalows that were not much more substantial. At least the climate was considered healthy: hot and dry in summer; cold and bracing in winter, when hoar frost is common.56 The RFF’s duties were few. There was not even much call for internal security duty – a local battalion was raised in 1822 to deal with the local predilection for dacoity (banditry) and cattle-lifting. Still, after several years’ hard service the 2/25th probably felt that it deserved a rest. It seems to have been a fairly representative BNI battalion, one of a number originally raised as local levies and then taken onto the permanent establishment during an expansion of the army in 1804. It was known to the sepoys as Cristeen-ki-Paltan (‘Christie’s Platoon’) from Captain Christie who had raised the original levy.57 Beatson’s first duty was to don full uniform and report his arrival to the adjutant, and then pay a formal call on his commanding officer. The commandant had been away on leave for several months and was soon to transfer to another battalion, and the next three officers in seniority were also absent, holding staff or political appointments. So the acting CO at that time was the battalion’s junior captain, James Drysdale from Kirkcaldy, who may have met young William Beatson during his last home furlough.58 The most important influence on Ensign Beatson, however, would have been the battalion Adjutant, Lt James Parsons. The Adjutant was the CO’s chief of

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staff and general factotum, with special responsibility for administration, parades and training, including that of newly joined officers. Parsons enjoyed a modestly successful career, typical of many officers of the generation before Beatson, with active service in Mauritius, the Nepal War and against the Pindaris. Later, Parsons would be seconded to the Commissariat, which had the important but unglamorous task of procuring and supplying all kinds of provisions and stores for the army in garrison and on campaign, in which guise we will meet him again. Parsons died in 1868 as a lieutenant-general, with the distinction of having served 62 years in India without ever going home.59 Beatson had already learned a great deal about Indian life in the past year. Now it was time to become a soldier and it was men like Drysdale and Parsons who would teach him.

3 THE YOUNG SAHIB

Some of the officers were very young, mere boys Subadar Sita Ram

B

eatson arrived to find India relatively peaceful – which was exactly the way the East India Company preferred it. Despite the great wars and territorial annexations, and notwithstanding partial nationalisation by the British Government, the Company still saw trade as its primary role. There had always been mutual tolerance between HEIC servants and the peoples they ruled. As a recent historian of the Empire puts it, ‘the old India hands in Calcutta, Madras and Bombay had no interest whatsoever in challenging traditional Indian culture. On the contrary, they believed that any such challenge would destabilise AngloIndian relations, and that would be bad for business’. For example, the Company had forbidden Christian missionaries from operating within its domains, and local religions were left strictly alone. Things were changing, however. After successfully campaigning against British participation in the slave trade, Evangelical Christians had turned their attention to India, with their sights on the practices of female infanticide, sati (or suttee: widow-burning) and thagi (or thuggee: ritual murder by highway robbers), which the Company’s officials had previously ignored. Over the coming decades, sustained campaigns to stamp out these practices would be waged by men like William Sleeman (whom we shall meet later). While abolition of these particular rituals was generally welcomed by Indians, the ultimate goal for the Missionary Societies was to Christianise the whole of India. When the HEIC charter came up for renewal in 1813, pressure from the Clapham Sect led to the removal of the ban on missionary activity. Over the next 40 years the activities of the missionaries and officials of the evangelical persuasion would help to erode the culture of toleration. In its place, distrust and fanaticism slowly developed on both sides, until the boil burst with appalling savagery in the Great Mutiny of 1857.1

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After the Mutiny, an old sepoy, Sita Ram, looked back wistfully to his days as a young soldier (he enlisted about seven years before Beatson’s arrival). He recalled that ‘Most of our officers had Indian women living with them, and these had great influence in the regiment … in those days the sahibs could speak our language much better than they do now, and they mixed more with us.’2 Francis Bellew, who arrived in India in 1815 and later wrote a semi-fictional memoir of his early days, remembered seeing a finely dressed Indian woman around the cantonments of his first regiment. She was known as ‘the native commandant’ because ‘the colonel commands the regiment, and she commands the colonel … she makes half the promotions in the regiment … But by all accounts these are the men who square best with Jack Sepoy’s notion of a proper commander; these are the men whom they would go to the devil to serve; who know how to treat them in their own way, and not your pipe-clay rigid disciplinarians.’3 These comfortable practices were disappearing even as Beatson began to find his feet. Not only did the missionaries exert increasing moral sway, but the number and influence of European women at the civil and military stations were growing: the days of the ‘sleeping dictionary’ were passing. New arrivals from Britain were introducing more rigid nineteenth-century, rather than tolerant eighteenthcentury attitudes; some took exception to social contact between sepoys and white officers, and followed a separate lifestyle. Sita Ram complains that ‘Some of the officers were very young, mere boys, and when they were not on duty they were always hunting and shooting.’4 It is fair to assume that these political and social trends would have passed unnoticed by the average young subaltern. He would have been too overwhelmed by the vibrant new sights, sounds, tastes and smells of the subcontinent. As well as the not-so-simple task of learning how to make life bearable in the heat, dust and ever-present threat of disease, there was complex social and military etiquette to understand and new languages to pick up (not least the mongrel words and phrases that peppered English conversation in India). There were military duties and drill in which to acquire proficiency, and there was the crucial art of manmanagement to master: how to deal with and gain respect from servants, native soldiers and – perhaps most difficult of all – the native officers, those grizzled veterans who might be old enough to be the young officer’s grandfather. First, however, Ensign Beatson would have had to brush up his ‘manual and drill’ under the instruction of the (British) Serjeant-Major. Only when passed could he take his place with his company on parades. As for learning other duties, one ensign at this period recalled that his company commander put him in charge of the accounts, so he got to know the men well. ‘In addition to writing the books and keeping the accounts, I used to pay the men, visit their barracks, and huts in the lines, as well as the sick in hospital; hear their complaints, and investigate their quarrels and disagreements.’ The new ensign was also expected to study oral and written Hindustani under a munshi, in order to communicate with the men and qualify for posts of greater responsibility. Officers who couldn’t be bothered



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simply responded ‘Achha!’ (Very good!) to everything the men said to them – even if they were being told the cantonments were burning down!5

A native regiment At this period each native infantry regiment was organised into two battalions, usually serving in different places. These were essentially separate entities, and this was recognised in 1824 when they became regiments in their own right. A battalion comprised 10 companies, each with two Indian commissioned officers, a subadar and a jemadar, and with five havildars (serjeants) and five naicks (corporals). The senior Indian officer in a battalion bore the rank of subadarmajor, the senior havildar that of havildar-major. The number of sepoys (privates) varied according to the establishment laid down by the Government in Calcutta, which was always under pressure to economise; usually there were 80–100 per company. The Right Flank company was composed of picked men – usually the biggest physical specimens – and designated the grenadiers, while the Left Flank company was trained as light infantry. These two companies were regarded as the elite of the battalion, and were sometimes detached for special service.6 A battalion’s British officers comprised two field officers (a lieutenant-colonel in command and a major), five captains and 15 subalterns (10 lieutenants and five ensigns).7 One lieutenant held the appointment of adjutant, another that of interpreter and quartermaster. In theory, each company was commanded by a captain or a lieutenant, but frequently there were too few present, and companies were commanded by the subadars. Although subadars and jemadars held commissions from the Governor General, their position was firmly below that of the most junior British officer, so these ranks did not equate to captain and lieutenant – although those were the roles they frequently filled. In addition, each battalion had a serjeant-major and a quartermaster-serjeant seconded from the European Foot or Artillery. Often they had transferred from the British Army in search of greater opportunities. It was said of quartermasterserjeants that they had the opportunity to retire rich men – if they didn’t drink themselves to death first.8 There was one other group in the battalion, who occupied a rather sad hinterland. These were the Christians of mixed race. Although many were sons and grandsons of European soldiers, they were generally debarred from joining European regiments and gravitated to the posts of drummers/buglers, bandsmen and clerks in NI regiments, where they were equally despised by brash young British officers and by caste-conscious sepoys.9 There were few genuine Bengalis in the Bengal Army; most recruits came from Bihar or Oude and were known as purbiyas (Easterners). Oude was a treaty state outside the HEIC’s control, so the Army had few disciplinary sanctions against these men except dismissal from the service. They were pure mercenaries, and took a trade union view of disputes with their employers. Recruitment, however,

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was easy because soldiering was an honourable profession: many recruits were brought in by soldiers returning from their home villages after leave. One governor general declared that there was no other country in the world in which men could be recruited ‘with such facility and at such trifling expense’. They were mainly sons of yeoman farmers, so the Bengal Army had a completely different social make-up to the British Army and HEIC European regiments (something that commanders from HM’s service often misjudged). Most of the recruits were high-caste Hindus but about 10 per cent were Muslims. Their insistence on strict religious observance in matters of diet, hygiene and equipment caused many headaches for the military authorities.10 Sepoy regiments were armed, clothed and equipped exactly like European troops of the period. Old hands considered this to be one of the reasons why the Company’s forces had consistently defeated the often much larger armies of native rulers. Forward-thinking officers, however, painted a dismal picture of a Sepoy of the Line, dressed in a tight coat, trowsers in which he can scarcely walk, and cannot stoop at all, bound to an immense and totally useless knapsack so that he can scarcely breathe, strapped, belted, and pipe-clayed within a hairsbreadth of his life, with a rigid basket chacko on his head, which it requires the skill of a juggler to balance there, and which cuts deep into his brow if worn for an hour, and with a leather stock round his neck to complete his absurd costume.11

Beatson of course was too junior to form an opinion on this parade-ground mentality, and we know that he had a fondness for showy uniforms. Yet later, he too castigated the idiocies of the ‘pipe-clay school’, and was one of the first COs to get rid of the shako.

An ensign’s life The position of an Ensign in the Hon. E.I. Company’s Service is a very pleasant one. He has a horse or two, part of a house, a pleasant Mess, plenty of pale ale, as much shooting as he can manage, and an occasional invitation to a dance, where there are thirty-four cavaliers to three dames, or to a dinner-party when a chair unexpectedly falls vacant.12

So, at least, thought Richard Burton, an officer in the Bombay Army whose later career was entwined with Beatson’s. The young officer’s chief problem at this stage of his career was balancing his pay against the many opportunities for spending money. The Cadet’s Guide considered that ‘The cost of living in India is not so great as has been represented; that is, if a young man does not plunge headlong into superfluous expenses – such as keeping more than one horse, smoking the



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hookha [which required a servant of its own], and overburdening himself with household servants.’ A European’s biggest expense was his servants. Because of language and social difficulties, the energy-sapping climate and frequent bouts of illness, it was quite impossible for Europeans to fend for themselves and at the same time fulfil their military or commercial duties and keep up the social appearance expected of them. Even private soldiers in European regiments had the benefit of servants attached to their companies. The minimum establishment for a bachelor officer in cantonments was considered to be:

Khitmutghar (butler and waiter) Bearer (valet) Dhobi (washerman/woman) Khansama (cook) Mussalchi (scullery boy or punkah puller) Bhisti (water boy or link boy) Sweeper (latrine cleaner)

Rs 8 per month Rs 6 “ “ Rs 6 “ “ Rs 6 “ “ Rs 4 “ “ Rs 3 “ “ Rs 3 “ “

Basic pay for an ensign in garrison was Rs 48 per month, but he was also entitled to a gratuity of Rs 12, a tent allowance of Rs 50 if he was under canvas, and ‘half batta’ of Rs 45. Batta was defined as ‘an extraordinary allowance to the Army when abroad in the field or in any country where garrison provisions are scarce’, but half batta had become a regular part of the emoluments of officers and sepoys alike since the days of Clive. Full batta was paid when in the field or serving outside the borders of the Bengal presidency (in Rajputana, for example).13 Mess bills could be high, but often there were too few unmarried officers present to warrant a mess, so two or three junior officers would set up a chummery – a shared bungalow. They could economise by sharing a khansama, bhisti and sweeper, but most other servants would not serve two masters, and caste prevented them from undertaking two jobs. An optimistic guide suggested that ‘two officers chumming it … may get on very comfortably at a monthly expense of forty rupees, a pint of wine daily included’, compared with mess bills of around Rs 60 a month. To this was added the upkeep of a horse and pay for a groom or syce – say another Rs 16 a month. The frugal Ensign Cary, pontificating after a bare year’s experience in India, considered that the ensign ‘may live very well for a hundred rupees a month; and as his pay and allowances are nearly two hundred, he will have an abundance left for providing himself with clothes’, and he expressed surprise that any young officer should run into debt.14 Against this optimistic view many junior officers were indeed deeply in debt and the Government was worried enough to appoint a committee to study the problem. It reported in 1831 that a subaltern in a half-batta garrison had expenses of Rs 181 against a monthly income of (by then) Rs 168. A new officer’s uniform

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and equipment cost him from Rs 1,500 to Rs 1,800 on arrival in India, and unless his family had provided for him, he had to borrow that sum before he had even begun to receive pay. Credit was easily obtained, but interest, at the standard rate in India of 12 per cent per annum, and life insurance (as security for the debt) increased an officer’s outgoings. Once acquired, the debt habit is hard to break, and young men in any culture often live well beyond their means. Many subalterns had debts of Rs 6,000–7,000, and although they could probably stabilise their finances after promotion to captain, it was not until they had achieved the rank of major that most could hope to pay off the principal. Even a century later ‘a young British officer of the Indian Cavalry [the most expensive arm] was in debt for the first half of his service and spent the second half getting out of debt just in time to retire’.15

Getting ahead Unlike the British Army, where officers could purchase promotion, advancement in the HEIC service was purely by seniority. Thus an officer had to wait for years until his seniors in the regiment died or retired. No wonder junior officers drank the ironic toast ‘Here’s to a bloody war and a sickly season’. In the late eighteenth century the HEIC had fought many wars against rich and powerful Indian rulers, and survivors like General Alexander Beatson could make fortunes from prize money. By the 1820s, however, there was little likelihood of gaining promotion or riches through the chance of battle. The other means whereby an officer could supplement his meagre pay was by secondment to the army staff, the political service or the irregular military forces. On top of basic regimental pay, these posts attracted additional allowances and provided opportunities for independence. So many of these posts existed that the regular regiments became seriously depleted and the Court of Directors constantly revised the rules on how many officers could be absent on staff duties – usually limited to five per battalion.16 Add to this drainage the fact that one or two middle-ranking officers were probably on home furlough, others might be away on sick leave (which was commonly given for periods of a year or more), and some would be taking leave within India for ‘Private Affairs’, and it is easy to see how few officers would actually be present for duty with their battalion during times of peace. The dayto-day running would be left to the Adjutant, the European NCOs and the native officers. The 2/25th BNI was no different from any other, many of its officers being listed as: ‘political officer’, ‘commanding a provincial battalion’, ‘barrackmaster’, ‘brigade major’, etc.17 Thus battalions were often stripped of their best officers, the remainder (‘the refuse’, according to John Jacob’s damning phrase) being the less talented, or



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the juniors, who were left to cope as best they could. Poor morale amongst the passed-over officers often led to them taking solace in alcohol, gambling or other delights of Anglo-Indian society, and it communicated itself to the sepoys. And, despite what the young officers thought of their god-like COs, command of a NI regiment at this period was ‘not much sought after’. It was not as well paid as a second-class staff post, and too much power had been concentrated at Fort William, leaving the CO little more than an administrator.18

On the march If Beatson joined his battalion around August 1821, it would not have been long before he was involved in his first regimental move. Battalions were regularly rotated between different stations, sometimes every year, and these ‘Reliefs’ took place in the cold season. In the winter of 1821–2 the 2/25th moved from Nasirabad to Nimach. It still formed part of the RFF, but now it was part of the ‘Advanced Corps’.19 Before a body of troops moved from one station to another, the Quartermaster General’s (QMG’s) department would have issued the ‘route’ – a word carrying much more than its simple modern meaning. A route laid down camps at appropriate intervals, with access to water and forage. On well-used routes the villages would each have a camping ground set aside, but in newly established administrations such as Rajputana, finding suitable sites involved much work for the QMG’s department. Route documents included a report to the civil authorities of the districts through which the force would pass, telling them the number of fighting men and probable number of accompanying camp-followers. The civil officials then made supply arrangements, which in India meant summoning market traders to set up a bazar at each halting-place so that the soldiers and servants could purchase fresh provisions. Even in the cold season an early start was necessary to reach the next camping ground as soon as possible after sunrise. As early as 02.00 or 03.00 the families and baggage attendants stirred, trying to get away ahead of the regiment – ignoring standing orders that no one should move before the first drumbeat. Tents were struck, cooking fires lit and hackeries loaded, ‘men, women and children talking, shouting, wrangling and crying’, all by the light of flaming torches. Officers’ servants had a smart routine, with one man attending their master, another making tea or coffee, the tent-lascar packing, the syce saddling the horse, and doolie-bearers preparing to carry the ladies. European families on the march had two sets of tents, one being sent on ahead the evening before with some of the servants, accompanied by the battalion QM and his men with the officers’ mess-tent. It would take the sepoys about half an hour to dress, put on their equipment and strike their tents, and when the assembly was sounded they fell in as a

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column. ‘All move off at the sound of the “quick march” from the orderly bugler; upon which the men generally give a shout and a huzzah.’ The last group off the camping ground would be the quarter-guard, ‘which stands fast to protect the baggage and followers, and does not quit the old ground until every soul is off it’. In the dark, with the road ahead cluttered with hackeries and doolies, the march began slowly and irritably. Once off the old camping ground the men were allowed to march ‘at ease’, with unfixed bayonets, while the officers sheathed their swords and mounted their horses, and the rate of march would speed up after sunrise. ‘A line of march in India is a sight replete with interest and novelty,’ wrote Capt Albert Hervey. ‘The enormous number of living souls in motion, the train of baggage, the quantity of cattle of all descriptions, the body of troops, small in comparison to that of the followers, the proportion being of three or four to each individual fighting man, this vast concourse of living beings moving together, and everything connected with them, renders the whole an exciting scene.’ The band marched at the head of the column, the boys (sons of old soldiers) at the rear. Behind each company was the bhisti driving a bullock carrying large, leather water-bags. The CO might throw out flanking parties and a rearguard, more for practice than for security. He would ride ‘in stately grandeur at the head of his regiment, followed by his retinue of orderlies and horsekeeper, who watch him as closely as a cat does a mouse. A commanding officer of a regiment is a very great man on a line of march!’ A halt was usually made half-way through the day’s march, to allow the men to take a rest, have something to eat and a drink from the water-bags. Officers might go off wild-fowling in a nearby jheel – Hervey commented that ‘Married men become great sportsmen, because the game they shoot supplies their table, and consequently saves them the expense of purchasing meat from the market’ – while practical jokes were played on the griffins. When they were within a quarter of a mile of the next camping-ground, there would be another brief halt to smarten up. Officers dismounted and marched in with their companies. Once in camp, there were sentries to post and guards to inspect before the married officers rushed off to help their families and the bachelor officers gathered in their mess-tent for breakfast. Mess furniture was not unpacked on the march, so each officer supplied his own, the servants having carried a folding chair and their master’s crockery and cutlery wrapped in tablecloths on their backs. ‘Breakfast after a march is a very delightful meal,’ recalled the veteran. To a griffin, however, there were many novel sights to take in: The whole ground is covered with living beings; cattle and baggage; men, women, and children; servants busily engaged in pitching tents, and wrangling with each other; horses and ponies neighing; officers and soldiers running to and from;



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coolies coming in with their loads; palankeens and doolies; sick carts and bandies; stragglers arriving one after another; unruly bullocks kicking off their loads, and running helter-skelter; timid women and children screeching, and men bellowing; such a bustle and confusion that, to the stranger the whole sight would appear as if there was a great want of arrangement, and give him an idea of a sad state of discipline.

Years later, Hervey could remember well ‘my utter astonishment the first time that I myself witnessed the scene … I thought the people would never have done arriving, that the tents would never cease pitching, and that we should be in the same confused state the whole day. But … in less than an hour’s time the whole camp was as quiet and still as if we had been stationary for months! And this is indeed the case always.’ There was a marked difference between the regular tent lines of the soldiers, and the total chaos of temporary shelters put up by their families, the servants and followers, and the stall-keepers of the bazar. Every third day was a rest day, and this was a chance for inspections, for shooting parties and for grand dinners in the mess tent.20 In this way Indian regiments and their hordes of followers moved about the country, in peace or war, as they had under Clive and Cornwallis and indeed under their Mahratta and Mogul predecessors. It was clearly a ludicrous system for a modern army, and the Government periodically tried to clamp down on the superfluous baggage. Yet the evil continued, and Beatson would later cause consternation by forcing his officers to cut their baggage.21

Nimach Beatson’s first relief in the cold weather of 1821 did not involve a long march by the standards of the day. The 2/25th’s destination of Nimach lay something like 140 miles away in the territory of Gwalior, otherwise known as ‘Sindhia’s Dominions’ after the family name of the Mahratta grandee who ruled it. British territory here was limited to the site of the cantonment bought from Sindhia in 1817 to accommodate the Advanced Corps of the RFF, with a small fort to shelter families if the regiment was called away. The troops at Nimach included Alexander Beatson’s battalion, the 2/1st BNI, which arrived after a much longer march from Oude.22 The two brothers would have much to catch up on after four years apart, and there were opportunities for exploring the countryside and for sport. ‘Pigsticking’ was usually a favourite pursuit of British officers stationed in places like Rajputana. Wild pigs can do considerable damage to crops and the cultivators welcomed any sahibs mad enough to hunt them. Pursuing wild pigs across country required good horsemanship, skill with a boar-spear and nerve, not only to ride flat-out through scrub jungle interspersed with steep, dry riverbeds (nullas), but to face

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a big boar, which could turn on his pursuers and use his tusks to disembowel a horse – or a fallen rider.23 But it was excellent training for the kind of campaigning that Beatson would later see in Central India. Another officer at Nimach was Lt Samuel Humfrays on the commissariat staff, who arrived in February 1822. As we have seen, Humfrays’s sister Emma had recently married the Beatsons’ kinsman William Stuart Beatson at Fort William. It would be fascinating to know whether this was when William Beatson first met Humfrays’s youngest sister, the 17-year-old Margaret Marian, who will play an important role in this story. Unmarried sisters often kept house for their bachelor brothers when they had attained a better-paid staff position.24 Alexander Beatson, who had already been promoted to lieutenant, must have done well with his munshi (or perhaps he maintained a sleeping dictionary), because he had acted for a while as interpreter and quartermaster of the 2/1st. In September we see William getting his own first taste of responsibility. He was sent away with a detachment under Capt George Engleheart of the 2/1st, who made the 18-year-old ensign his acting adjutant. It was only a short assignment, but the position of adjutant was considered so important that even this temporary appointment required confirmation from Fort William.25 Both the 2/1st and 2/25th stayed at Nimach through the summer, and were not moved again when the next cold weather came. However, there were changes in personnel. William’s mentor Lt Parsons left the battalion to join Humfrays in the Commissary-General’s Department. Then, on 11 July 1823 – shortly after his 19th birthday and almost exactly three years after he set sail for India – William Beatson was promoted to lieutenant and transferred to the 2/27th BNI.26 No longer a griffin, he was now ‘entitled to associate on pretty equal terms with those sun-dried specimens of the genus homus, familiarly called the “old hands” – subs of fifteen years’ standing, grey-headed captains, and superannuated majors, critics profound in the merits of a curry, of the quality of a batch of Hodgson’s pale ale. He ceases to be the butt of his regiment, and persecutes in his turn, with the zeal of a convert, all novices not blessed with his modicum of local experience.’27 All the bustle of a move began again. A derzi altered his uniforms to the yellow facings and silver lace worn by the 27th BNI. The 2/27th, which was known to the sepoys as Mapert-ki-Paltan (from Lt-Col R. Mabert who commanded it in 1805) was stationed at Allahabad.28 So Beatson would have to sell his furniture and surplus kit and buy a hackery or a doolie, depending on whether he planned to ‘march’ or ‘post’ across country to pick up the river route to Allahabad. It was the worst time of the year for travel: after the extreme heat of April and May the monsoon rains set in about the middle of June. Beatson would not have seen much rain during his two years with the RFF, but now he had to travel during its full onslaught.



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A regimental home In September 1823, in preparation for the battalions of native infantry regiments becoming regiments in their own right, officers were shuffled between battalions to give each an equal amount of experience. Beatson was at first assigned to the 1/27th, but quickly reverted to the 2/27th which thenceforward became the 54th BNI.29 This became his professional ‘family’ for the next three decades, even if he spent little time with the regiment in later years. Once again, there was a strong Scottish flavour to the officers’ mess. Of 21 officers listed, no fewer than 11 were Scots-born, sons of ministers, lawyers, merchants, officers and minor aristocracy. Beatson would have fitted well into this group.30 Allahabad was a much bigger civil and military station than Nimach, with a better social life and access to luxuries from Calcutta. But Beatson and the 54th were not to enjoy these fleshpots for long. Trouble on Bengal’s eastern frontier would give Beatson his first taste – albeit brief and unsatisfactory – of campaigning.

A frontier campaign In recent years Burma had gobbled up Bengal’s buffer states and in 1824 Burmese incursions into British territory led to open war. It began badly for the British, with a serious reverse in Chittagong.31 Calcutta fell into a panic similar to that in 1942, when the Japanese advance through Burma seemed certain to reach the delta. Like the Japanese, the Burmese had a fearsome reputation for brutality and their advance was preceded by hordes of desperate refugees. The panic died down when it became apparent that the rains had made the roads impassable and halted the Burmese advance. Meanwhile, the British used naval power to strike in the enemy’s rear, causing the army to be recalled to protect the heart of the Burmese kingdom. The British follow-up included the 54th BNI being ordered to Dinajpur in northern Bengal, where it would be well placed to support advances into Assam and Arakan.32 Many sepoys were unhappy about the idea of serving in Arakan. Described as ‘a sort of wild and jungly Holland’, the place was notorious for its deadly strain of malaria. Stories of the supernatural powers of the Burmese were also unsettling. As the historian Sir John Kaye put it, ‘the Sepoy, though not unwilling to fight, was somewhat dainty and capricious about his fighting-ground. A battle-field in Hindostan or the Deccan was to his taste; but he was disquieted at the thought of serving in strange regions of which he had heard only vague fables.’33 While the assembling regiments awaited cooler weather before entering Arakan, bazar rumours eroded their morale. When the 47th BNI prepared to march from Barrackpore, there were insufficient baggage animals or followers. The country had been stripped to supply the troops already on the frontier, and few Bengalis were willing to follow the army into Arakan. A rumour circulated

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that if the regiment could not move by land, it would be taken by ship. Although this would have been the best military option, Brahmins considered that crossing the sea broke the rules of their caste and was not in their terms of service. To be fair, the army knew this and only a few specific ‘general service’ units from Bengal were ever transported by ship. The damage was done, however, and mutinous sepoys declared that they would not march unless they were given double batta to cover the higher costs. Their CO offered to advance money for bullocks from his own pocket, but it was too late. After parade on 1 November 1824 the 47th, joined by some men from two other regiments, refused to march off. They stayed on the parade ground all night while a petition was sent to the commander-inchief, General Sir Edward Paget. To sepoys from Oude this was a trade dispute. Paget, however, was an oldschool martinet from the Royal Service, who treated the refusal of orders as if it were armed rebellion. Arriving with loyal troops, he opened fire on the mutineers with artillery. They broke and fled in panic. Some were shot down; others drowned as they tried to escape by the river, while those captured were executed or sentenced to hard labour. It was afterwards found that the sepoys’ muskets were not loaded: no violence had been intended.34 This brutal outcome shocked British officers as much as their men. An inquiry concluded that the sepoys had justifiable grievances, and Bengal units designated for ‘general service’ were later given all the concessions the mutineers had demanded. But the Barrackpore Mutiny irrevocably harmed relations between officers and men.35 Although Beatson did not witness the events at first hand, the echoes would resonate several times in his future career.

Arakan fever The war in Burma still had to be prosecuted. In addition to regular battalions, the Government sent so-called Flank Battalions, made up from the elite Grenadier and Light Companies drawn from different regiments. The Grenadiers of the 54th, under Capt William Hayes and Ens Hamilton Vetch, went to the 2nd Grenadier Battalion, the Light Company to the 2nd Light Battalion, both of which were at Dacca. For the moment, Beatson remained with the main body of the 54th, which was being used as a feeder battalion, providing experienced drafts for new ‘Extra Regiments’ being raised for the war – his brother Alexander Beatson was seconded to one of these as adjutant.36 The campaign got moving again at New Year, but after their leader was killed by a rocket the Burmese lost heart – which was just as well, for this was a war fought with staggering administrative incompetence. Forty thousand British and Indian troops were involved, of whom 15,000 died. For every death from enemy action, there were 24 deaths from scurvy, dysentery and malaria. They endured weather such as the sepoys from the plains of Hindustan had never experienced.



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Ordered to build thatched huts, the British soldiers and Madrasi sepoys set to with a will, but the high-caste Bengal sepoys (already unsettled by news of Barrackpore) complained that they were treated as coolies. Firm leadership avoided another mutiny and the shelters were built, just in time for the rains. Then sickness set in, taking hundreds of men. One of the dead was Capt Hayes, who had commanded the Grenadiers of the 54th.37 When the depleted units were brought up to strength in September for the next cold-weather campaign, Beatson was sent up to replace Hayes. ‘In consequence of the season of the Year’, he was ‘to proceed by water, without delay, to Chittagong’. This stipulation was because land travel across the ‘grain’ of the Ganges delta was considered possible only between November and January, whereas boats ran on the Brahmaputra River and down the coast to Chittagong throughout the year. On joining the Grenadiers, Beatson would have found among them his old friend from Nimach, Capt George Engleheart.38 But no sooner had the 2nd Grenadiers marched into Arakan than Beatson too was struck down: on 3 November he was granted seven weeks’ sick leave to the Presidency, later extended by a month. His period of active service had been all too short, though in a sense it mattered little, for the war was almost over and the Flank Battalions returned to Bengal and were broken up. The Government was generous to these troops, the native officers and men being granted a medal, six months’ extra batta, and six months’ furlough before they had to rejoin their regiments. For the British officers who had served with the 2nd Grenadiers throughout, like Vetch of the 54th, there was the campaign medal and a share of the prize money – though Vetch had to wait until 1848 before his money was finally paid. But Beatson had not served long enough to share in these rewards. In later years he didn’t bother to include the Arakan campaign in his record of service. All Beatson seems to have got from his first brief campaign was a bad dose of fever.39

Disenchantment? Professionally, however, he made progress. Even before the Grenadiers were broken up, Beatson had been appointed adjutant of the Bareilly Provincial Battalion. Provincial battalions were ‘irregular’ forces: they were not on the permanent establishment of the army and borrowed their officers from the regular regiments. They each served in a particular province to support the civil administration. With large forces drawn off for the operations in Burma these provincial battalions had assumed greater significance.40 To reach Bareilly from Calcutta, Beatson would have to make the long river journey up the Ganges to Cawnpore, and then take the overland dâk route for the final 13 stages (150 miles). First, however, he took some more sick leave – this time for a seven-month trip to Bombay. Presumably this was a recuperative sea voyage,

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for the direct overland route to Bombay was immensely long and arduous (1,320 miles). He eventually joined the Bareilly battalion at the end of August 1826. After just a few months learning how to run a battalion, he was appointed to the adjutancy of his own regiment. This showed that he was considered a promising officer, but again he took his time getting there, taking over two months’ leave at Bareilly and then being allowed five months to join the 54th.41 After the expensive Burma War had come retrenchment: all the Extra and Provincial Battalions were disbanded and many stations reduced to half-batta. With few opportunities for active service and reduced allowances there was dissatisfaction among Bengal officers. Beatson himself took a great deal of sick leave, which may have been due to recurrences of Arakan fever, but which a modern manager might also identify as a sign of a demotivated employee. He appears to have carried out the responsibilities of regimental adjutant for less than a year before he once more went downriver on sick leave.42 On his arrival in Calcutta in August 1828, the local papers were carrying an advertisement from the shipping agents Mackintosh and Co: ‘New South Wales: The fine brig MIDAS, 300 Tons, Captain Watson, will be despatched in the first week of September’. According to the agents, the Midas still had room for a few tons of freight or passengers. At 24, Beatson was of an age when many modern young Britons take a gap year in Australia before their career settles down. This is precisely what he did. He had his sick leave extended from 3 months to 12, and sailed to New South Wales.*43 It may even have crossed his mind to stay on and settle in Australia. Certainly the talking point of the moment was the grand estates being established by wealthy officers (while simultaneously ordering brutal punishments to dissuade their soldiers from deserting to settle in this promising young colony).44 But as far as we know, Beatson had no money besides his pay, and at no time in his life does he show any sign of following his father and uncle into agriculture. On the expiry of his leave he returned to duty in India. He arrived back at Calcutta in October 1829 and spent a month there before travelling upriver to rejoin the 54th, which had moved to Benares.45

Rejuvenation Given his absenteeism, it is surprising that Beatson was allowed to retain the adjutancy of the 54th. However, the sea journey and visit to Australia seem to have restored his health and enthusiasm, and we see no more long leaves for sickness or * The Midas was the only direct passage from Calcutta to New South Wales during the relevant period, sailing on 14 September and arriving at Sydney on 7 December. Beatson was not recorded as a passenger, so it is possible that he did not travel direct but went via one of the busy trade ports such as Batavia, whence there were more frequent sailings.



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‘private affairs’. For the next three years he knuckled down to make a success of his military career. It was probably now that he discovered his knack for training raw recruits – an important part of the Adjutant’s job – and he learned to deal with the voluminous paperwork of the Indian army. His staff work must have been competent, because he acted as ‘station staff’ at Benares during the absence of the Assistant Adjutant-General (AAG).46 On the other hand, he is unlikely to have let either drill or paperwork consume him: often in his later career he complained about the ‘pipe-clay school’ of soldiering, which he considered stifling to initiative and fighting spirit. The adjectives most commonly used about him by both admirers and enemies include ‘zealous’, ‘stern’ and ‘determined’. We know he could be a hard taskmaster, expecting high standards of officers and NCOs, while treating private soldiers relatively indulgently, reducing the number of parades in hot weather, for example. We are lucky enough to have a surviving report of an inspection of the 54th carried out just a few weeks after Beatson left, so we can gauge what kind of regiment it was, and how successful he had been. The inspecting officer considered the sepoys to be ‘a good Body of Men, & of the proper standard, with exception of a few received from the late provincial Corps’. They were well drilled and instructed in field duties, and also ‘well drill’d in the Use of their Arms & have been properly instructed in firing with Ball’, which was a good mark for Beatson. The native officers and NCOs were generally good and fit for service, with the exception of the Subadar-Major – ‘a good deal crippled by the Gout’ – and one of the subadars and several NCOs who were old and worn out. In these respects the 54th suffered from the common malaise of the Bengal Army. When it came to the junior European officers, another of the adjutant’s special responsibilities, ‘The System prescribed in Standing Orders for the Native Infantry, for training and Instruction of young Officers on their first joining is regularly pursued’. The adjutant’s right-hand men, the Serjeant-Major and Quartermaster-Serjeant, were respectively ‘sober, smart, & well qualified’ and ‘generally a sober, steady, willing man’. Lieutenant Robert Burnett, who had just replaced Beatson, got a good report, and ‘the Regimental Books are properly and neatly kept’.47 Given Beatson’s dreadful handwriting, one wonders what this last report would have said had the inspection been carried out earlier!

Family business Family affairs now intruded as one generation began to succeed another. Beatson’s brother-in-law, Maj-Gen Edward Swift Broughton, had died in 1827, as had a young cousin, General Beatson’s son Alexander David, who was under training at Chatham preparatory to joining the Bengal Engineers. The following year Beatson’s older sister, Barbara Broughton, also died.

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His brother Robert, who had been in charge of the 2nd Battalion of Native Invalids at Chunar, took sick leave early in 1829. He was beginning to suffer from the rheumatism that would blight his career, and on the advice of the Calcutta doctors he took a furlough and sailed to Europe in May 1829. Their elder brother Alexander followed him in August. While at home in Scotland, both brothers took the opportunity to get married to Scots girls, Robert in January 1831 to Helen Raitt of Carphin, Alexander in December 1831 to Eliza Baird of Camelon. They both then returned to duty in India. Robert arrived in June 1831 and was sent to Berhampore, where he became adjutant of the 72nd BNI and station staff officer. Alexander, whose promotion to captain had come through during his furlough, arrived with his new wife in May 1832. Sadly, he died at Dinapore in August the same year, leaving Eliza pregnant and suddenly widowed in a strange country.48 Robert rushed up from Berhampore to settle his brother’s affairs, and then Eliza went to live with him and Helen. Alexander’s posthumous child, a son named Alexander John, was born at Berhampore the following January.49 From the moment of his birth, this boy was the laird of Rossend. William too came downriver via Dinapore and Berhampore at this time, presumably to join the family and help see Alexander’s affairs put in order. But then he carried on down to Calcutta. After 12 years’ service, he was overdue for home furlough and there were probably family affairs to settle in Scotland. He set sail for ‘home’ – the Britain he had not seen for so many years – on board the Fergusson in September 1832.50

4 SPANISH INTERLUDE With the British Auxiliary Legion

Above ten thousand Englishmen have been uselessly sacrificed in the mountains of Spain, in the defence of a disgraceful cause, for a set of cowardly and treacherous Spaniards, who were not worthy of the least countenance or assistance Anon, Concise Account

W

e do not know how Beatson spent his leave, though he was probably involved in settling his late brother’s affairs. His uncle Alexander also died in 1833. The old general was buried at Frant, near Tunbridge Wells, where he had farmed for so many years. There were new members of the family for Beatson to meet as well: his sister Harriet had married the Edinburgh lawyer William Laurie and named their son William Ferguson Beatson Laurie. The boy followed his uncle and namesake into the Indian Army and eventually wrote a short biography of him. But such family business could not have taken up all Beatson’s time, and later events suggest that he may have been pursuing affairs of the heart. Under HEIC furlough regulations he was due to report back to Bengal no later than September 1835, so on 8 April of that year the Court of Directors in London issued orders permitting Lt W.F. Beatson to return to his duty. In July, however, they gave him six months’ extension of leave. This was explained a couple of days later when the Edinburgh newspapers reported that ‘Major Beatson has arrived in Edinburgh, for the purpose of raising a regiment for the service of the Queen of Spain’.1 To understand Beatson’s sudden change of plan – and elevation in rank – we have to look at the political situation in Continental Europe at this time. Revolutionary and liberal fervour had swept Europe while Beatson was in India. In Portugal the accession of the infant Queen Maria was opposed by her uncle Dom Miguel, who declared himself king, backed by the clerical and reactionary elements in the country. But the new liberal governments in Britain and France aided the constitutionalists headed by Dom Pedro – Donna Maria’s

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Map 2: Northern Spain 1835–6

father and Miguel’s elder brother. After an epic siege at Oporto, Pedro’s Britishled navy crushed that of his brother, and Dom Pedro entered Lisbon in triumph in July 1833.2 Just two months later the king of Spain died, leaving an almost identical succession crisis. Ferdinand VII of Spain left a three-year-old daughter, Isabella, who was proclaimed queen, with her mother Queen Maria Cristina as regent. In a repeat of the Portuguese situation, Ferdinand’s younger brother Don Carlos claimed the throne. As in Portugal this dynastic squabble led to bloodshed because the Regent and the Pretender were supported by opposing political factions. On the side of Don Carlos (the ‘Carlists’) were ranged conservative elements, with a strong rural and clerical colouring, even to the extent of wanting to restore the Inquisition. Backing the Regent were the ‘Cristinos’, who supported Isabella’s hereditary rights, joined by liberal constitutionalists whose agenda was best served by preventing Don Carlos from gaining the throne.3 After a series of Carlist victories in early 1835, the Cristino Government appealed to the British Minister in Madrid, George Villiers, for help. With his deep knowledge of Spain the Duke of Wellington opposed British intervention, but the ministry in which he served as Foreign Secretary fell in April 1835, and he was replaced by the Liberal Lord Palmerston. The Radical wing of the Liberal Party wanted to support the Cristinos by any means. The most Radical constituency of all was Westminster, represented in Parliament by Lt-Col George de Lacy Evans, a veteran of the Peninsular War who was personally known to the Spanish Ambassador in London, General de Álava, and the leading Cristino politician



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Juan Mendizábal, who had returned to Madrid from exile in London and was soon to be Prime Minister of Spain. Between them, Mendizábal, Álava, Villiers and Palmerston devised a plan to recruit a force of British volunteers to fight in Spain under Evans’s command.4 This was illegal under the Foreign Enlistment Act, but Palmerston circumvented this by an Order in Council to suspend the act for two years. As soon as this was signed on 10 June 1835, Spanish agents began recruiting the force, which became known as the British Auxiliary Legion or BAL,* comprising 10 line battalions, a rifle battalion, two lancer regiments, an artillery regiment and supporting troops – a theoretical total of some 10,000 men.5 Evans’s task was to find the officers. At first this looked easy, because there were 13,000–14,000 officers on the Army List, far more than the peacetime British Army required, and the Legion offered excitement and professional experience. But Evans noted that ‘an opinion gained circulation that certain high military personages were decidedly adverse to the measure’, which deterred officers from joining him.6 The ‘high military personages’ were King William IV, the CinC, Lord Hill, and his mentor Wellington. Hill ordered officers applying for long leave to sign an assurance that they were not going to Spain. Those who joined the BAL, therefore, either gave up their commissions to do so (as did Evans’s friend and second-in-command, the Peninsular War veteran Duncan MacDougall), or were already on half pay with little hope of being re-employed. Other arms of government were more amenable: the Board of Admiralty provided a small Royal Navy squadron and Royal Marine detachment, while the Board of Ordnance sold Álava arms and equipment from the Tower Armouries, and later provided a Royal Artillery detachment. The Board of Control for India raised no objection to HEIC officers on furlough volunteering for the Legion, and the Directors willingly extended leave for Beatson and around 10 others who chose to do so.7

Raising the Legion The Regular British and HEIC officers received a step in rank; hence Beatson was gazetted on 5 July 1835 as a major in the 6th Scotch (sic) Grenadiers. This was a double step for a lieutenant, but Beatson would have known – and doubtless emphasised to Evans – that he was about to become a brevet captain. Brevet rank was a system by which an officer could be promoted for meritorious service before he achieved the rank by regimental seniority. An HEIC officer could expect to become a brevet captain 15 years after joining the service – Beatson’s was dated 13 July 1835, the 15th anniversary of his first sailing to India.8 * The force was often referred to at the time as the ‘British Legion’, but today this would cause confusion with the charity of the same name.

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Immediately after his BAL commission was signed, Beatson travelled to Edinburgh and issued what we would today call a press release, to announce that he was recruiting. The Scotsman alluded to his local family connections, and reported that the regiment was ‘to be composed entirely of Scotchmen. From the number of enterprising young men in Scotland we have no doubt this opportunity of seeing service will be eagerly embraced.’ The CO was William Le Mesurier Tupper, one of a number of officers of the 23rd Royal Welch Fusiliers who defied Hill and went on half pay for the chance of seeing service with the BAL.9 A serjeant of the BAL’s 8th Highlanders described Tupper as ‘a clever and efficient officer; but one who mixed more severity in his discipline than Colonel Godfrey [of the 8th] generally did. I heard Colonel Tupper designated once, by one of his own officers, as a clever tyrant.’10 The 6th and 8th, together with the 5th Highland Light Infantry, were to form a ‘Scotch Brigade’ under Colonel Charles Shaw. The red-bearded Shaw had served with the British army at Antwerp in 1814, but in the postwar reductions he had retired to Edinburgh and a business career, while commanding the part-timers of the Leith Volunteer Rifles. As an Edinburgh schoolboy, Beatson may have watched Shaw drilling the Volunteers. Shaw still saw himself as a soldier, and threw up his business career to volunteer for the Liberating Army of Portugal. By the time the Portuguese war ended in 1834 he had risen to command the whole British Brigade.11 He reached Britain on 12 July 1835 with some of his veterans from the Scotch Fusiliers of the Portuguese war, including his staff officer Edward St John Neale, but he and Beatson had to find the rest of their recruits in Edinburgh and Glasgow.12 The peacetime British Army found recruiting difficult, yet the number of men it rejected as unfit was very high – in Glasgow in 1837, it was 34.5 per cent.13 Evans and his officers could not afford to be so choosy, but their problem was compounded by the ‘bringers’, subcontractors who actually found the recruits. In their haste and greed, they delivered men who had no chance of being accepted as physically fit. It was only when these volunteers had been shipped to Spain that the BAL’s medical officers got to inspect them. The English regiments were full of sickly men from the slums of London, Liverpool and Bristol, and most of the Scottish recruits came from similar urban backgrounds. Even the ‘Highland’ Regiment had fewer than 150 true Highlanders. The Edinburgh men came from trades such as printing and baking, while most of the Glaswegians were weavers. Dr Rutherford Alcock, the deputy inspector-general of hospitals, commented that ‘The change of existence from a weaver to a soldier on active service is as violent as can be conceived.’ An average of 100 men in each regiment was found unfit for service and had to be left at the depot or sent home. The BAL’s Irish regiments did contain a better physical class of men.14 Pay and allowances were as in the British Army and the force was governed by the British Articles of War. At the end of their one- or two-year tour of duty the officers were promised a bonus equal to half their pay. These terms proved too generous for the cash-strapped Cristino government to fulfil. As one embittered volunteer recalled, ‘From the great promises held forth on this occasion, men of all



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denominations flocked to the standard of her Catholic majesty to join the novel expedition, with the expectation of its proving a golden harvest. However, in this our unfortunate and misled countrymen were greatly mistaken.’15 Beatson and the agents got to work quickly. Nearly 800 men enlisted in the Scotch Brigade in the first week, and by the end of September, Shaw, Beatson and their bringers had succeeded in recruiting and shipping to Spain some 2,100 Scots.16 Although the Order in Council permitted recruitment, it was still illegal to drill the men on British soil, so there was no training until the recruits reached Spain.17 They were sent aboard accommodation ships at the embarkation ports – Greenock on the Clyde for the Scotch Brigade – to await steamers to take them to Santander and San Sebastian, which were to be their bases on the coast of Northern Spain. During the wait the Scotch Brigade lost a number of men, deserters who went overboard, or debtors and runaway apprentices who were reclaimed by sheriff officers or their families. As for the rest, respectable folk were glad to see the back of them: Shaw’s banker told him that ‘we are much obliged to you in Glasgow, for taking so many blackguards away’.18 Evans wanted the men to arrive looking smart, but Shaw was unconvinced: ‘as to landing them with clothing and arms to give them a good military appearance! A mob of this sort, with money in their pockets, to make military appearance!! The thing is absolute folly. Far better to land them in their nakedness, and let them get drunk and spend their money, and when sober give them only a part of their clothing and necessaries.’ He disobeyed Evans, and the 600 Scottish recruits embarked on the Killarney at Greenock were only paid their £2 bounty just before they steamed away. ‘Each man got a slop dress and a worsted rug, so that we might have some uniformity of appearance on landing in Spain’ – where, as Shaw had predicted, the men got horribly drunk.19 The BAL’s uniforms were based on British Army patterns, then at their zenith of gaudiness. The Times reported the officers’ dress of the 1st Regiment as scarlet coatee, gold trimmed, yellow facings [the 6th had blue facings], white turnbacks, gold lace on cuffs and collars, gold epaulettes, Spanish arms on button; Oxford mixed trousers, with scarlet cord, patent leather waist belt; steel scabbard sword, with Spanish arms on hilt; beaver chaco with scarlet feather, Spanish arms in front; crimson sash, shoulder-belt, with breast plate, on which are the Spanish arms. Undress, blue frock coat with gilt scales, Oxford mixture trousers; oil-skin chaco, crimson waist sash. The cost of the whole of this fit-out is 32 l.20

The 5th Highland Light Infantry and 6th Scotch Grenadiers wore tartan plaids, described as ‘sashes’ or ‘scarves’.* This is the only time in his career that the Scots-born Beatson wore any form of Scottish uniform. No contemporary * Formally, the belted plaid worn by officers of Regular Highland regiments was termed a ‘scarf’, the smaller version worn by other ranks was a ‘fly’.21

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mentions tartan trews, so it seems likely that the Scots regiments wore ordinary dark blue (‘Oxford mix’) trousers. A blue peaked cap or Kilmarnock bonnet was worn in ‘undress’, and the Scots regiments may have worn this with a diced capband. Although the 8th Highlanders were intended to wear full Highland dress, it seems that in practice this was restricted to the pipers – certainly the piper of the 6th did so.22 Shaw considered the officers’ uniform and equipment ‘ridiculously expensive. How they are to carry their baggage I know not; in short this trip of pleasure to Spain will astonish some of the gentlemen.’ Having come from India, where servants were plentiful and immense baggage trains were the norm, Beatson may have been as guilty as the greenest junior officer in taking too much kit. ‘The more experienced officers who had served before in Spain, contented themselves with bringing those things alone indispensable … Two months afterwards all finery was selling cheap enough,’ one recalled later.23 Colonel Tupper set out with the advance party of the 6th on board the Cumberland at the end of July. The Cumberland made a second run with Scots recruits in August, and Shaw went out with a further party in the Fingall in early September. In all, between 29 July and the end of September, 21 officers, one cadet and 686 men of the Scotch Grenadiers (together with 11 women and five children) were transported to Spain.24 Having been engaged in recruiting, Beatson probably sailed with one of the later drafts, but he arrived in time to take part in the 6th’s first actions.

At the seat of war Ferdinand VII once said that Spain was like a bottle of beer, and he was the stopper: after his death it would not be beer but a ‘froth of blood’ that spilled out.25 Events had shown him to be a true prophet, and the war was marked by a viciousness unparalleled in Western Europe in the nineteenth century, far worse than the recent conflict in Portugal. As Sir Charles Oman drily remarked, ‘Portuguese civil wars stand to Spanish civil wars much as Portuguese stand to Spanish bullfights – they are infinitely less distressing to the humanitarian observer.’26 Before Wellington left the Foreign Office, he sent Lord Eliot to negotiate a convention to safeguard and exchange prisoners of war. Previously, both sides had routinely shot or tortured to death any prisoners that fell into their hands. But as soon as he heard of the creation of the BAL, Don Carlos issued the ‘Durango decree’, which suspended the Eliot Convention for foreign nationals serving the Cristinos, who were to be shot if captured. This depressing news greeted the men on their arrival, and soon captured BAL stragglers were facing Carlist firing squads, or were simply murdered by guerrillas.27 Although the Regent’s forces quickly suppressed organised rebellion in most of the country, the Basque regionalists made common cause with the Carlists.



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Together they were able to establish a stronghold in the mountains of Northern Spain, where only the coastal towns held out against them. Carlos was poised to take Vitoria and block the Cristinos from entering the Basque country, but his advisers insisted on first capturing the northern seaport of Bilbao, to gain access to foreign aid. The small Carlist siege train breached Bilbao’s walls, but ran out of ammunition; the defenders repaired the damage and the siege descended into a blockade.28 San Sebastian, too, was hemmed in by the Carlists, and the commander of the BAL’s advance guard had ‘scarcely enough room to teach his men the balance step’. The Spanish garrison commander was Brig-Gen Gaspar de Jauregui, an illiterate former shepherd who had risen to prominence in the war against Napoleon as a guerrilla leader under the nom de guerre of ‘El Pastor’. On 30 August he organised an operation to push the Carlists back and reconnoitre the town of Hernani. Evans led his troops in support, but after the combined force had cleared the advanced Carlist entrenchments, they found that Hernani was too strong, and so returned to San Sebastian. The BAL lost only five men killed, but the Tory press at home blew the affair up into an embarrassing defeat, the ‘Hernani Races’.29 Henceforward the Legion usually had attached to it Jauregui’s Volontarios de Guipúzcoa, a force of light infantry known as the ‘Chapelgorris’ or ‘Redcaps’ from the large, red berets or boinas they wore. Predominantly Basques, with a few foreign volunteers, they were hated by the Carlist Basques with whom they gave and received no quarter. BAL memoirs speak admiringly of these intrepid light infantrymen. The red-coated men of the Legion, in their turn, were known by their Carlist opponents as the ‘Cascagorris’ or ‘Redskins’ (in the sense of the rind or skin of a fruit).30

Bilbao and first actions Beatson and the 6th Scotch Grenadiers had not taken part in the Hernani operation because they had landed at Santander, but were now re-embarked to relieve Bilbao. This was the first of many times that Evans employed the strategic advantage conferred by the availability of British steamers to move troops quickly up and down the coast. On 6 September the troops from Santander and San Sebastian disembarked at the little harbour of Portugalete, at the mouth of the River Nervión below Bilbao, while a Cristino force under Gen Baldomero Espartero approached by land. The relief of Bilbao was an anticlimax, the Carlists abandoning their positions and the relieving columns entering the town without resistance.31 The BAL went straight into action, skirmishing with the Carlist rearguards. For all his years of service in India, this was Beatson’s first time in action, so the experience of hearing the buzz and whine of spent musket balls was as novel to

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him as to the recruits he was leading. Being equipped with small-calibre, longrange muskets, the Carlists tended to shoot at excessive range from behind cover, so casualties were low on both sides. Although the 6th apparently suffered no casualties, Beatson later included these insignificant skirmishes in his record of service.32 Shaw’s Scotch Brigade had been broken up on arrival, and the 6th was temporarily brigaded with the Londoners of the 1st Regiment and the 9th Irish Grenadiers; later it would form part of the so-called Light Brigade, though none of the regiments – even the Rifles – was trained in light infantry tactics.33 They were quartered in the dirty little town of Portugalete. Some of the Scots officers ‘complained bitterly of their miserable quarters in some huts standing on the low land on either side of the river, facing the town, and which were not unfrequently deluged with water from the high tides’.34 Their men occupied a group of convents between Portugalete and Bilbao. When they moaned about having to lie on damp flagstones in the cloisters while the horses had warm stables with straw for bedding, an Irish veteran told them the Queen of Spain had paid them only two pounds bounty and could get thousands more where they came from, but that she had paid £50 each for the horses!35 With Bilbao secure, Espartero’s army was released for operations elsewhere. On 11 September it marched out – straight into a Carlist ambush. The advance guard cleared the first ambush, so the covering detachment of the Legion returned to Bilbao. But as the Cristinos pushed on, they found the main Carlist force in a strong position at the village of Arrigorriaga, and retreated. The retirement was badly handled and by the time the Legion had countermarched from Bilbao, the wooded heights above the road had already been seized by the Carlists. The Legion remained spectators as Espartero’s defeated men thronged past the bridge of Puente Nueva. BAL skirmishers discouraged close pursuit, and when the last of the Cristinos were back within the Bilbao lines, the Legion retired unmolested. This had been a major action, the Carlists losing some 400 men, the Cristinos between 1,000 and 1,200, but the Legion’s only casualties were one killed and six wounded (despite wild Carlist claims that they had captured and shot Evans and 500 of his hated Cascagorris). Beatson considered it significant enough later to include it in his record of service.36 A few days later Espartero got away safely by a different route, accompanied for the first 10 miles by the Legion, which then returned to Bilbao.37 The BAL now settled down to garrison duty and training. The 6th was quartered in the ‘Market-Bridge house’ of the town of Bilbao. The regimental order book mostly records daily orders for parades, the officers of the day (Beatson was the Legion’s field officer of the day on 8 October), boards of officers for discharging invalids, and complaints about irregularities of uniforms on parade.38 The British Commissioner to the Spanish Army, Lt-Col William Wylde, acknowledged that ‘the men are making very rapid progress in their drill and



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the inhabitants are perfectly satisfied with their conduct in quarters’. It was now that the small number of professional officers and NCOs like Beatson really came into their own. Scarcely a day passed without Evans leading the Legion on training marches over the rugged hills between Portugalete and San Sebastian, occasionally losing men killed in falls or captured and shot by the ever-present Carlist guerrillas.39 Even without route marches, officers and men found the ordinary duty hard enough, what with drill and providing guard posts and night patrols in the town and fortifications. Discipline was strictly enforced: the order book of the 6th records frequent courts martial. Flogging was common, and one of the ‘Cork boys’ of the 10th Munster Light Infantry ruefully described it as the Legion’s ‘back pay’.40 The overuse of flogging in the Legion was remarkable because Evans, as a Radical MP, had been one of those campaigning for its abolition. All this must have seemed strange to Beatson and the other Indian officers, who were used to willing and obedient recruits. Indeed, flogging had already been abolished in the Indian Army.41 Lack of pay and provisions were the men’s biggest complaints, though MacDougall did his best, promising one regiment that ‘he would hang the Quartermaster, shoot the Commissary, and strangle the Contractors’ for neglect of duty.42

March to Vitoria In October the routine changed when Evans took his troops inland to co-operate with the Cristino CinC, Gen Luis Fernandez Córdoba, around Vitoria. The weather was fine and the Legion set off in good spirits. The training marches had built up the troops’ stamina, the sick had been left at Bilbao, and the column made fair progress of 15–20 miles a day through spectacular scenery.43 However, the marches demonstrated the sad inexperience of both officers and men. A British resident watched them march out with their monstrous baggage column, which he estimated at 500 draught cattle for the artillery and ordnance stores, and 3,000 mules.44 One Scottish ensign joked that some of his fellow officers ‘had more baggage than that possessed by the entire officers of a Spanish regiment’.45 An old India hand like Beatson would have found nothing strange in all this, but he learnt by experience, and later in his career insisted on officers and men travelling light. The rank and file were just as improvident as their officers. The Regimental Order Book of the 6th records the following Brigade Order for 3 November: The practice of men eating up their provisions within a shorter period than the issue is intended to last them must be immediately stopped by strong measures. The captains of companies are to inspect the haversacks every morning either in quarters or on the march as they do their ammunition and men who are

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found without their proper provisions are to be punished at the discretion of the colonel.46

The Legion reached its quarters at Briviesca on 9 November, shortly before snow fell and made the roads impassable. Alcock described Briviesca as ‘a miserable town’, and the troops were badly supplied with warm clothing or bedding. He felt that the seeds of later sickness germinated here.47 At Briviesca orders appeared for Beatson to transfer to the 10th Munster Light Infantry, with promotion to lieutenant-colonel. No explanation is given, but we know that Evans had begun to weed out inadequate officers and promote the more efficient to replace them.48 The 10th had a rather different character from the Scots that Beatson had recruited and trained for the 6th. For one thing, they were mostly strapping farm boys. Enlistment had been slow to begin with, the recruiting serjeants admitting that ‘the boys were not quite so raw as they were during Wellington’s time’. But once they went out to the country towns of Limerick and Kerry, recruitment picked up briskly. Most of the officers were Munstermen, though Ensigns Ball and Meller (both of whom left accounts of the campaign) were Scottish and English respectively, and there were even two Swedes. Evans himself was the regimental colonel and the CO was Maurice O’Connell, only a lieutenant in the British Army, but who bore a name to conjure with in Ireland, being related to the nationalist politician Daniel O’Connell. Though the men were good, O’Connell had shown too much favouritism in appointing officers, and it may well have been that Evans transferred Beatson in as 2i/c to offset the inexperience of O’Connell and his friends.49

Vitoria winter In early December the Legion moved up to Vitoria. Although one officer complained about the narrow streets and mean shops, another, who had been there with Wellington in 1813, reckoned it had been improved from the proceeds of the plunder left behind by Joseph Bonaparte’s retreating army. Following local custom, officers were billeted on private householders, who were supposed to provide their best bed, use of a sitting room, a brazier and condiments for their food. The officers of the Spanish garrison were already snug in the best billets, and so Beatson and the 10th found themselves packed in with resentful families, many of them Carlists.50 The men were assigned the usual draughty monasteries. They slept on stone floors, with no cover except their wet greatcoats, and fleas and lice abounded, leading to an outbreak of epidemic typhus (‘gaol fever’). It was typhus allied to hunger, rather than cold, that killed Napoleon’s Grand Army in Russia in 1812. Evans’s malnourished men were similarly hit by what they dubbed ‘Vitoria fever’.51



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The symptoms were horrific: head pains, dysentery, fever, then delirium; inflammation of the limbs and feet often resulted in gangrene, leading to many amputations. The death rate climbed until the Legion was forced to suspend proper military funerals – by then the town boys had learned the Dead March in Saul by heart and whistled it in the streets. The BAL lost 100 dead in December, over 800 in January–April. The officers were slightly better off, as they were treated in their billets rather than crammed into the infested hospitals, but few escaped without some sickness, and many died. The medical officers suffered the worst. Dr Alcock recalled colleagues being carried from the hospitals, delirious and raving about ‘blackened feet rotting from the living flesh, of the screams of the dying’.52 General fitness affected susceptibility, with one-third of the English Brigade, one-fifth of the Scotch Brigade, but only one-eighth of the Irish Brigade confined to hospital. Eventually the 2nd (English) and 5th (Scottish) Regiments were ‘so nearly annihilated that they were broken up, and the miserable residue drafted into other regiments’, whereas the Irish Brigade, although no better off for provisions or quarters, maintained its strength.53

The Heights of Arlabán At the beginning of January the Legion was pushed out into the villages in front of Vitoria, in part to try to reduce the sickness, although food supplies became sketchier so little was gained. The Legion barricaded the villages and loopholed the houses, hard work which wore out their shoes and ragged clothes, and exhausted them still further.54 The occupation of these villages, pushing the Carlists back from the outskirts of Vitoria, was part of Córdoba’s strategy to surround the Carlist heartland with a noose of fortified posts. One end was anchored on the French frontier, from which it ran 150 miles through Pamplona, Logrono and Vitoria to Bilbao. The Carlists had to rely on arms smuggled across the French frontier or through the short stretch of coastline they still controlled, which was further constricted by the Cristino outpost of San Sebastian. But such a strategy is necessarily slow, and Córdoba was under political pressure to ‘do something’. He decided that he might be able to penetrate between the two Carlist divisions in his front.55 The move began at first light on 16 January, Espartero on the left, Córdoba in the centre, and Evans with the Legion on the right. The Legion’s first objective was the heights looking across to the castle of Guevara, standing on a steep hill with the Carlist black flag flying. The main Carlist forces were drawn up in the valley of the Zadorra between the castle and the heights. After about 5 miles the BAL occupied the heights unopposed while the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Regiments inclined off to the left to clear the village of Mendijur situated on a hilltop in the middle of the valley.56 Beatson claimed that he commanded the 1st Regiment in

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the subsequent action, which is not improbable if there was a shortage of field officers because of sickness.* The regiments advanced in close column of companies preceded by skirmishers from their light companies, and took the church and village. When some Carlists occupied an orchard to the flank they were smartly driven out by a bayonet charge. After this the action settled down to desultory skirmishing until nightfall; neither side was inclined to attack the other across the valley. That night the Legion evacuated Mendijur (to the disappointment of those who had captured it) and bivouacked on the heights behind. At home, the Tory press inflated this small withdrawal into a major defeat, but Wylde reported that ‘The Legion … behaved very well on the 16th … The men were remarkably steady under fire, and drove the Carlists out of a wood with such promptness that I am satisfied, and their subsequent conduct proves, that they have no desire to come to close quarters with the Legion again.’ The Legion’s casualties were no more than 22.58 Next day the Legion crossed the Zadorra and occupied the Arlabán Heights, the 1st holding a position between the 2nd in the village of Azua (today under the Ullibarri reservoir) and the Irish Brigade on the Marietta heights to their right. All through the short winter day they did nothing except stamp their feet and listen to firing off to the left where Córdoba was in action. That night they bivouacked on the bare, icy heights in driving snow with no blankets and little fuel for campfires. In the morning one of the HEIC officers (was this Beatson?) ‘discovered that this was not the climate of India’, and complained to Shaw ‘of rheumatism in his leg and shoulder, and seemed quite astonished at it’. On the 18th the daylight hours again passed with no fighting, no news of Córdoba and, worst of all, no food. During the second night the 1st Regiment withdrew into Azua, but the rest clung on to the heights. Only after a third night of this purgatory did Evans discover from some roving Chapelgorris that Córdoba had disappeared. He had simply closed down the operation and returned to Vitoria on the 18th, leaving the Legion isolated when a message failed to get through. Now the weather came to their rescue: snow and freezing fog brought visibility down to 10 yards, and the Carlists could not see the desperate situation of the Legion (nor did their scouts venture from their snug nests to find out). That night (20/21 January) the Legion banked up its campfires and slipped away. The Chapelgorris successfully guided Evans and his exhausted men by a roundabout route, clear of Carlist picquets, across the Zadorra and back to the lines at Vitoria. * Beatson says that he ‘commanded the 1st Regiment in the attack on Mendigar, on the 14th [sic] January 1836 – and in the subsequent operations between Guevara and Arbalan on the 17th and 18th’.57 Beatson’s handwriting is as usual terrible, but the note certainly appears to say ‘1st’ rather than ‘10th’, and the 10th was not engaged at Mendijur. Today, Mendijur’s hill is a promontory stuck out into the Ullibarri reservoir which has flooded the north-west end of the valley.



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The usually critical Shaw conceded that ‘the retreat was managed in a simple, sensible, soldier-like way’, for which Evans deserved great credit.59 The Legion now shifted to the vicinity of Trevino, about eight miles from Vitoria. With so many senior officers sick or absent, Beatson was left in command of the brigade garrisoning the town. The object was to put the place into a state of defence so that it could be safely left in the hands of a Cristino garrison. The town was nothing more than a single street, and the defences consisted of a barricade at each end, with a redoubt on a commanding hill behind. Half-way down the hill a two-gun battery was established in an old cemetery overlooking the approach to the town. In addition the church was fortified as a citadel, and a ‘covered way’ (communication trench) built between the church and cemetery. With a fastflowing river in front, the town was reasonably secure. But the work was arduous and the enfeebled Legion was not up to it, the actual labour being done by local peasant women and old men while a single harassed MO tried to treat all the sick in Trevino.60

Moving north Córdoba now realised the folly of bowing to political pressure and reverted to his strategy of slow strangulation. Villiers suggested that the best way the Legion could help was on the coast where, in conjunction with Lord John Hay’s Royal Navy squadron and Royal Marine landing parties, it could take and control the coastline from Bilbao to the French border. Another reason to move north was that the Carlists had brought San Sebastian under close siege. Without control of the sea, it was impossible for them to emulate Wellington’s successful storm of 1813, provided the garrison was in good heart and well supplied. Nevertheless they pushed siege lines to within 600 yards of the outer works of the fortress, and their guns caused some damage to the town.61 The move back to the coast and better weather lifted the men’s spirits. Even while the men of the other brigades were still huddled miserably in their greatcoats, the Irish were out in the spring sunshine, playing leapfrog and catch. ‘The three Irish regiments, decidedly the best brigade in the Legion, have been put under my command,’ wrote Shaw, ‘and if you had been like me for years accustomed to deal with Glasgow weavers in the shape of soldiers, you would enter into the delight I have, in commanding these light-hearted, willing, easily managed fellows.’ On the march to Santander the irrepressible Irish regiments competed to outmarch each other.62 From Santander the troops embarked for San Sebastian, which they found very different from the welcoming, bustling town of nine months earlier. Now it was crumbling and the streets were silent except ‘now and then a shrill cry accompanied by a pattering shot from the white-capped Carlists on the distant lines’. The quays were covered with turf breastworks, cannon pointing through

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embrasures across the marshy neck of land that divided the town from the mainland.63 Opposite, the Carlist front line stretched between two fortified monasteries, one on the sea cliffs in the west, the other on the east bank of the River Urumea. Behind, the slopes were studded with fortified and loopholed country houses and gardens. Breastworks of stone and earth linked these strongpoints into a second defence line. There was a third line further back, almost two miles from San Sebastian on the Ayete heights. It was a formidable position, made stronger by the constricted approach across the narrow neck of land, the only exit from the town since the bridge over the Urumea had been destroyed. Wellington’s army had forded the muddy river to storm the town, but the fords had moved since 1813, and it would be impossible to sally across them. Constrained to make a frontal attack across the neck and through the garden walls and ditches, Evans decided to do so sooner rather than later, before all his troops had arrived, because the town was already overcrowded and invited casualties from shellfire and sickness.64 Beatson was not involved in the attack of 5 May, known as the Battle of Ayete, though it is not clear why, since all the regiments with which he had been associated were heavily engaged. He may have been sick, or he may have been left in command of rear echelons. Another possibility is that he was with the rifle company of the 10th, which had for some days been posted at the broken bridge over the Urumea, keeping the opposite side clear of Carlist skirmishers.65 However, as he seems still to have been with the 1st Regiment a few weeks later, this may not have been the case. Whatever the reason, he missed the Legion’s biggest action. He was one of the lucky ones who were able to watch the events unfold. At first light, under covering fire from the artillery and a steam frigate, the columns swept forward into the teeth of heavy Carlist fire and succeeded in storming the first line of entrenchments. Pushing on to the second, stronger line, they became badly mixed, and were held up by a troublesome Carlist battery until naval shells blew a breach and the Carlists were bundled out at the point of the bayonet, retreating through their third position. The butcher’s bill was high: the BAL and Chapelgorris went into action some 6,000 strong and lost over 940 killed, wounded and missing. Shaw was slightly wounded at the head of his brigade, while Tupper was mortally wounded leading his Scotch Grenadiers. The Carlists, defending strong positions, had taken fewer casualties, perhaps 700, but these included their commander.66 The action relieved San Sebastian from bombardment and the threat of assault, secured the harbour and cured the overcrowding. Secondly it boosted the morale of the Legion and conversely depressed the Carlists, showing both sides that the BAL really could fight. Villiers described the Carlists as ‘running about the country like rats in a barn … upon finding the ferrets and terriers turned in’. The Spanish Government responded with a profuse distribution of medals to



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those engaged. Beatson, of course, received none, but like the other officers he would have got a bank draft (payable in London) for his arrears of pay – ‘the last and only payment ever made during the service’, according to one wounded and disgruntled officer.67

Trench warfare The next task was to fortify the Ayete heights, reversing the Carlist defences. This trend towards ‘digging in’ had been evident in the closing stages of the Peninsular War, when Marshal Soult’s overmatched army tried to halt Wellington. Now, Evans and the BAL were back in precisely the same area, and both sides now faced the tactical problem of storming each other’s entrenchments, which would bedevil Western armies throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.68 Evans planned to extend his position eastwards along the coast to complete the encirclement of the Carlists. His next objective was Pasajes, their last seaport, against which he moved on 28 May.69 As Beatson was decorated for his conduct in this action, and as the 10th was left guarding the river line and was hardly engaged, we must conclude that he was still attached to the 1st Regiment in Brig-Gen Charles Chichester’s Brigade. At daybreak, Chichester’s Brigade and El Pastor’s Spanish stepped out from cover and descended the glacis to the fords. Immediately the Carlists moved to oppose the crossing, but the Legion’s artillery opened up on them, joined by the batteries on the curtain wall of the fortress. The whole firmament was for a few moments in a quivering motion, then smoke, crack, one, two, three, the whole thirty shells bursting, some on a picquet, some in front, some in rear, and a good many in the centre of the enemy’s column. Slaughter, disaster, confusion, in a moment followed. Sponges in and out of the guns, charged again, elevated, fired, every cannon now going off as fast as it could be loaded, fired, and sponged. In the water, horses snorting, officers calling ‘close up there’, at the same time up to the middle in water themselves, holding on one by another; the little men in danger of being carried away by the stream, but by splashing, dashing, and swearing, they all got over, hurried to take advantage of the disorder the Carlists were thrown into by the tremendous cannonade, and, almost without firing a shot, clawed and took the position before them at the point of the bayonet.70

As soon as Chichester’s men had dislodged the Carlists, the rest of the Legion and the Marines splashed across and secured the position while sailors laid a pontoon bridge across the river. Meanwhile, a company of the 1st Regiment (was this where Beatson distinguished himself?) together with some of the Spanish, Rifles and Marines pushed on to seize Ametza Hill and the heights above Pasajes.

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‘The insurgents hurriedly fell back from one position to another evincing altogether much feebleness and discouragement,’ Evans reported. As the Carlists retired on Pasajes, they found to their horror that Royal Navy steamers had entered the harbour and were landing Marines under covering fire from the naval guns. Simultaneously, ‘A’ Troop of the Legion’s 1st Lancers charged into the town, led by Major James Raitt and Cornet Joseph Hely. Evans had taken Don Carlos’s last port, together with a large quantity of guns and stores. It was a fine victory, much appreciated in Madrid, and afterwards Beatson remembered it with pride.71 The Legion now dug in along the hills from San Sebastian to Pasajes, augmenting the naturally strong positions with breastworks, loopholed walls, earthwork forts and fortified houses. Defenders had to maintain alertness as the Carlists attacked repeatedly. On 6 June they made a serious attempt, and Beatson was in the thick of it. Soon after ‘Stand to’, a feint attack was made on the picquets round the Ametza; later that morning the Carlists assaulted the fortified village of Alza. Turning out, the 8th Highlanders realised that something major was afoot, with ‘volumes of smoke rising in the direction of Alza, and immediately in front of us in the direction of our picquets. There was a continual rattle of musketry that extended itself like a long thunder clap without intermission.’ The 1st Regiment at Alza took the brunt of the attack. Its picquet was driven back, the Carlists bayoneting the wounded. Artillery fire on the loopholed church caused further casualties. Brigadier Chichester ordered the 1st to line a wall and begin volley fire against the approaching Carlist columns, which were spearheaded by the elite Navarrese battalions. Despite heavy casualties, these troops forced the 1st out of their positions and down the hill. Chichester rallied them uncomfortably close to the water’s edge. On the left, the 10th were also hotly engaged, but as this attack died out, Evans was able to shift troops to the critical point around Alza. The Chapelgorris got into a vicious no-quarter fight with the Navarrese until two companies of the 6th came up to assist and the Carlists began to give way. The ‘Advance’ was sounded and as the 8th pressed in on the other side, Chichester’s Brigade pushed back up the hill. The Carlists rallied at Alza and renewed their advance, a couple of priests in full canonicals at their head. But volleys drove them back and with a final charge supported by naval shells and rockets the Legion succeeded in retaking the village. Alza was set on fire, either by the Carlists or the rockets, and the final stages of the battle were fought in thick, disorientating smoke. One of the priests, unhorsed and captured, was plundered but left unharmed by two Scots soldiers of the 6th; then a passing Chapelgorri summarily smashed the cleric’s skull with his musket butt. There were stories of Legion prisoners being tortured and then shot; the Carlists denied the torture but confirmed the executions. Beatson was later decorated for his gallantry in the actions of 28 May and 6 June, so it is frustrating that we have no detailed account of his part, but the fighting at Alza was clearly intense and bloody. Evans’s losses were about 500, those of the attacking Carlists about double that.72



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After another attack on 9 June the dismayed Carlists left the Legion alone. The Legion and its Spanish allies worked at turning the nine miles of heights between San Sebastian and Pasajes into a formidable defensive position, little knowing that they would be holding this line for a whole year.73 There was, however, one more significant engagement that summer, in which Beatson took a prominent part. It was also to be the end of his service to the Queen of Spain.

The fight at Fuenterrabía Evans wanted to use his maritime advantage to take the last strip of Carlistheld coastline, extending his position all the way to the River Bidassoa and the border with France, thus completing Córdoba’s planned encirclement. Hearing that Fuenterrabía (Hondarribia), at the mouth of the Bidassoa, was weakly held, Evans mounted a reconnaissance in force, hoping to seize it by coup de main. On 10 July old soldiers noted messengers moving about, and sensed something was coming. At dusk the men were turned out, and all lights forbidden. They stood under arms for about two hours, then after whispered orders the infantry followed the rocket brigade and mountain guns down the rough track into Pasajes. Here they found Lord John Hay’s sailors ferrying the troops across the inlet. The opposite hillside was so steep that officers had to dismount and lead their horses; this was known to the Legion as ‘Lord John’s Hill’ as the Commodore had previously established a battery and Marine outpost here. The men bivouacked until daybreak on the level ground at the top. As dawn broke on a fine day, the Carlists were unaware of what was happening. The Chapelgorris went ahead in skirmishing order, and the 10th Munster Light Infantry was given the honour of leading the column. Maurice O’Connell had gone on leave to Britain the previous day, and so the command devolved upon Beatson. It must have been a proud moment as he led the Legion out, with the band of the 10th playing the popular tune Take me while I’m in the humour. Proceeding along the high ridge of Monte Jaizkibel, they could see off to the left the squadron steaming parallel with them. In front, across the Bidassoa, rose the French Pyrenees. On the slopes to their right, they could see the peasants driving their animals to safety, and down in the dark valleys flashes showed where the Chapelgorris were skirmishing with Carlist patrols. The day became hotter, and the Legion’s poor-quality canteens leaked badly, so the troops soon became thirsty, but the officers kept them in close column to prevent stragglers slipping away to refill their bottles from mountain streams. After about six miles, the head of the column reached the convent of Nostra Señora de Guadalupe and came in sight of their objective.*

* The present fort on Mte Jaizkibel (Fuerte de Guadalupe) was not built until the 1890s.74

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At this point things began to break down. Locals informed the staff that they had been forced to labour on the town defences, repairing the breaches of 1813 with new loopholed walls. Hay’s squadron could get no closer than 2,000 yards from the town because of the bar at the mouth of the river, so his gunfire did not have its usual devastating effect. Perhaps worst of all, the Carlists had woken up and reacted with speed. Troops from Hernani and other places in front of San Sebastian could be seen marching parallel with Evans’s column, and other parties were rushing down from Irun towards Fuenterrabía. At the head of the column, Shaw saw that the key was the bridge between the latter towns, which the Carlist reinforcements had to cross.* He wanted to push on and seize it but was stopped by the staff. Sick with dysentery, Evans could barely sit his horse, and as MacDougall had returned to Britain the effective command rested with Brig-Gen William Reid, a cautious man, who needed time to assess the situation. Angrily, Shaw went forward with a patrol ‘in order not to have conversation with any one’. Here he could ‘see the sad effect of this unnecessary halt. The enemy below were still pushing on and making up the leeway, while we were gazing at them.’ Looking back, Shaw ‘was so astonished to see the other brigades halt in position at the tops of inaccessible rocks, and not hurrying forward, which was our only chance’. At last Reid came to confer with Shaw, who urged that they should either attack Fuenterrabía at once, or retire having made their reconnaissance. Undecided, Reid wanted to see what the steamers and gunboats could do; meanwhile, he agreed that Shaw might see if he could take the bridge. Irritated by the delays, Shaw gave his orders, and the 6th Scotch Grenadiers and 10th Munster Light Infantry moved off rapidly down the slope, aiming to reach the road half-way between Fuenterrabía and the bridge. Unaware of the urgency that Shaw had no doubt impressed upon his battalion commanders, Lt Ball of the 10th complained that Lieutenant-Colonel Beatson … ordered us to charge; much too soon. He could not have been at all aware of the nature of the ground or of the position of the enemy; we went through ravines almost impassable with brambles, over which we scrambled for about a quarter of an hour, until we reached more level ground; we then proceeded at a furious charge for at least fifteen minutes more.

Onlookers on the mountains above – both their comrades of the Legion behind them, and French border guards and civilians across the Bidassoa – watched a ‘truly magnificent’ scene unfold. As they approached the road some Carlists – reckoned at three battalions – opened fire from the cover of a wall on their side of the bridge. Both legion battalions then turned right towards the bridge – to Shaw’s fury, as he had intended the 10th to turn left towards the town. The

* The present bridge is at the end of the airport runway.



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reason for this mistake may have been a sudden loss of command, for Beatson had been hit at the head of his charging regiment. ‘He was a brave officer, but he appeared to me to be too romantic in action’ was Lt Ball’s verdict. We have no details of Beatson’s wound, which was officially described as ‘severe’, and he was carried to the rear. As Lt-Col Ross, commanding the 6th, was also wounded, the fight at the bridge was uncontrolled. After some vicious action, it subsided into a sniping contest. Shaw got to the walls of the town with a patrol and pleaded for reinforcements, believing that he could rush in while the garrison was keeping its head down under the naval bombardment. But he was sent none, and eventually was ordered to pull his brigade out, which he did, covered by the Marines, the rocket battery and ‘C’ Troop of the 1st Lancers (Hely again distinguishing himself). The Carlists were left waving the tartan scarves they had taken off the bodies of the 6th. Some stragglers caught while searching for water were taken into the town and shot. The whole thing had been a fiasco. ‘Never was anything so badly managed under the sun,’ wrote a Marine officer bitterly. Some observers felt that Shaw had been right, and that with adequate support Fuenterrabía would have fallen. Conversely, Evans considered that he needed more than a few mountain guns and rockets to take the unexpectedly strong town from the landward side. Later, a mildly critical letter of Shaw’s found its way into the London newspapers and he and Evans quarrelled, but at the time Evans was lavish in his praise of Shaw, and both of them praised Beatson and Ross in their reports.75 Now the most urgent matter was to evacuate the wounded: every man in the Legion was well aware of what happened to those who fell into Carlist hands.* It could take as many as 17 men to get one casualty to safety: four to carry the stretcher, plus four reliefs (it was hard going up the furze-covered hillsides), another eight men carrying the arms and equipment of the former group, and a corporal in charge. On a road, ‘Cherry’s carts’ used as ambulances could carry four men, but they were fragile and awkward. The sick Evans was taken off by boat and went back to San Sebastian by steamer, and it is possible that the more seriously wounded went by the same route. The force kept the heights overlooking Fuenterrabía that night, but withdrew under cover of a coastal fog the following day and marched back to Pasajes.77 Alcock had got a proper surgical hospital organised in San Sebastian, so Beatson would have received reasonable care.78 However, his wound was severe enough for him to be evacuated to England. It was the end of his service with the BAL, although it seems that he did not officially ‘retire’ from it until March the following year.79 Many others had already preceded him in disgust: MacDougall before Fuenterrabía, Shaw after he fell out with Evans, Hely and others when their first year’s service was up. Among the other ranks, many of the Scots

* The casualties were reported as 8 killed, 108 wounded and 20 missing.76

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recruited by Beatson also tried to take their discharge at the end of one year’s service – the 8th Highlanders even mutinied and formed a trade union – while the Irish cheerfully soldiered on. Back in Britain, Shaw and other leading figures campaigned for justice for their officers and men, but it was April 1844 before the Spanish Government paid the final instalment on the outstanding drafts. By then, most of the holders had sold them to brokers for a fraction of their face value.80

Return to India Beatson was awarded the First Class of the National and Military Order of San Fernando for his gallantry at the actions of 28 May and 6 June. This must have been small consolation for the lack of pay, as recipients were expected to buy the costly insignia (a star and a cross of four swords) themselves. The Spanish regarded this as an order of knighthood, and the British recipients placed the letters ‘KSF’ after their names. As a British subject, Beatson punctiliously applied to the Crown for permission to accept and wear the order, which was gazetted on 11 September 1837 – though the announcement sternly warned that ‘Her Majesty’s said licence and permission doth not authorise the assumption of any style, appellation, rank, precedence, or privilege appertaining unto a Knight Bachelor of these realms.’ Old William IV would doubtless have withheld this permission, since he refused to acknowledge the Legion, but he had recently been succeeded by Queen Victoria.81 What had Beatson gained from his year in Spain? Apart from his medal and his wound – which seems to have healed well enough as we hear no more of it – he had valuable experience of recruiting and training, of campaigning under severe conditions, of combat and of command. With India having been peaceful for so many years, there was hardly an officer of comparable seniority in the Bengal Army who could boast as much. He had also gained a valuable friend and patron in his fellow Scot MacDougall. Now, after his convalescence, it was time for Beatson to resume his career. His furlough had been extended, six months at a time, in February 1836 (when he was enduring the terrible winter at Vitoria) and in August the same year (soon after he was wounded). In the new year he must have reported to East India House that he would soon be fit for duty again, because he was ordered to travel back to India in March 1837.82

5 FIRST COMMAND The Bundlecund Legion

The work we had to perform was very arduous Subadar Sita Ram1

D

espite being ordered to travel by the new ‘overland’ route – by Peninsular & Oriental steamship to Alexandria, then by desert carriage to Suez, and thence by another P&O steamer to Bombay – Beatson actually went by the old route round the Cape of Good Hope to Calcutta. He took passage in the sailing ship Reliance, departing from London on 3 April 1837.2 We know a good deal about this voyage because one of his fellow passengers was the redoubtable Miss Honoria Marshall. She was travelling out to marry Capt Henry Lawrence, whom she had not seen for nine years since her father forbade their engagement. Now aged 31, with her father recently dead, she had thrown up her job as a teacher and coolly informed Lawrence that they would now be married. Luckily for us, she kept a journal on the voyage.3 Miss Marshall found that passages to India were scarce – which probably explains why Beatson also went by the slow route. Honoria did not enjoy the male conversation at the captain’s table, and fended off unwanted attention by talking about her forthcoming marriage. She took a particular dislike to Beatson. On 20 April she writes triumphantly, ‘I accomplished at dinner a manoeuvre that delighted me, namely getting away from Major Beatson’s neighbourhood. There was a leg of the table very much in my way, so I asked Mr. Wynyard to change places with me.’* She amused herself by finding likenesses between the people round the table and the dishes set upon it: ‘Mr. B., who sits near me, is exactly like a piece of crispy, brown roast pork’, which probably describes Beatson the weather-beaten ‘old India hand’ pretty well.4 * Miss Marshall is uncertain about military ranks: Beatson was a captain, not a major, and even if he had been boasting about his BAL service, he would have claimed to be a lieutenant-colonel; ‘Mr B’, presumably also refers to him – there was no-one else with the initial B among the passenger list.

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Though incensed that there was insufficient fresh water for a bath, Honoria seems to have enjoyed the voyage, the ‘stately vessel with all her sails spread … the shouts of laughter now and then from the groups of young men on the other side of the deck, who were playing at leap frog and such like games’.5 The young men were HEIC cadets, among whom were 21-year-old Alexander Skene and 18-year-old Thomas Spankie. Probably mindful of his own first voyage with Captain Kelso, Beatson befriended young Spankie. Twenty years later, when Beatson faced the greatest crisis in his career, the by-then-retired Capt Spankie went into print to support his old friend, remembering being ‘cooped up with him on a round-the-Cape passage’.6 Most of the passengers suffered seasickness as the Reliance crossed the Bay of Biscay, then off Cape Town in May she met a heavy gale and lost a sail that was torn to shreds, while passengers were rolled out of their cots and thrown about with any unsecured luggage. There was a second gale on 3 June, but after clearing the Cape they entered the calmer Indian Ocean. On Sunday 18 June Waterloo Day was celebrated: ‘all our Militaries appeared in uniform. There was speech making and health drinking, which made us all late in going out,’ complained Miss Marshall.7 On 30 June the Reliance anchored at Madras and the passengers went sightseeing. For Honoria Marshall this was her first impression of India; even Beatson had been away almost five years, and had never visited Madras.8 Passengers continuing their journey reboarded after three days, and the Reliance reached Diamond Harbour on 6 July, where they took the usual boats to Calcutta. While Miss Marshall stayed at one of the new luxury hotels to await the arrival of her fiancé, Beatson and Spankie reported to Fort William. At his own request Spankie went to do duty at Meerut with Beatson’s regiment, the 54th BNI.9 They travelled up the familiar river route, but now there was a fortnightly steamboat service as far as Allahabad, and journeys that used to take months now only took weeks aboard a comfortable accommodation ‘flat’ towed behind the paddle steamer. The onward journey to Meerut, however, would still have employed the familiar budgerow and dâk.10 Back with his regiment, Beatson was given command of the Grenadier Company with Ensign Spankie as his subaltern.11 As well as exemplifying the role of mentor that any good officer should adopt towards his juniors, it is an early example of Beatson’s tendency to seize on and employ officers he met by chance. Time and again we see him offering posts to passing acquaintances (who presumably displayed some qualities he appreciated) rather than wait for unknown officers to be sent through the usual channels. Naturally, there had been changes in the 54th’s personnel while Beatson had been away, and he had become a regimental captain on 26 January 1837. He already held brevet rank, but now he could draw a captain’s pay and allowances. However, Beatson was not to serve with the regiment for much longer. After a spell as acting DJAG to the Meerut Division, he took leave at the hill resort of Mussorie during the summer of 1838.12 As this was not for his health (he went on ‘private affairs’ rather than ‘sick certificate’), he probably wanted to lobby the



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governor general, Lord Auckland, who was spending the ‘hot weather’ in nearby Simla. Beatson was by no means the only officer doing so, because Auckland had plenty of patronage to dispense: he was creating a complete new army.

Orders for Afghanistan Rivalry between Britain and Russia was growing and Afghanistan was seen as the key to India. Auckland aimed to install a friendly ruler to secure this vital area, providing his candidate, Shah Suja-ul-Mulk, with his own British-officered army. On 17 August 1838 Beatson was appointed commandant of Shah Suja’s 3rd Infantry Regiment. He was a junior captain, but his recent experience as a battalion commander in Spain counted in his favour – a glowing reference from MacDougall had just been added to his official service record. His salary was to be a welcome Rs 800 per month. Auckland wanted the force ready to march by October, and the officers were ordered to proceed to Ludhiana immediately. Beatson rushed up by dâk to join his command.13 Shah Suja’s levies were modelled on HEIC regiments, but Auckland did not want time wasted on drill, ‘rather … they should at once be taught the more useful duties of a soldier – such as standing in the ranks – to take ground to the right or left – to advance to the front as light infantry – to rally when dispersed – to prime and load quickly and correctly from the trail – precision in firing &c &c.’ This was sensible advice for a raw force intended for hill fighting. It agrees with Beatson’s later training methods, eschewing the ‘pipe-clay school’.14 But as the ‘Army of the Indus’ gathered, Beatson was not with it. He ceased to command the regiment under orders issued on 26 October, and then on 19 November he was ‘placed under the orders of the Agent to the Governor General in Bundlecund’. Although he would miss the expected excitement in Afghanistan, Beatson had been offered a better command: he was to be ‘Commandant of the Corps about to be raised in Jalaun’, and as this force was to have both infantry and cavalry, he was to draw the allowances of a cavalry commandant, Rs 1,000 per month.15 The change not only marked a crossroads in his career but quite possibly saved his life.

A lawless country Bundelkhand* forms the northern part of the central Indian plateau, divided from the Doab by the River Jumna. It was sparsely vegetated, with low hills capped with * Many variant spellings of the name were in use before it settled down to the commonly accepted ‘Bundelkhand’ in the later nineteenth century; contemporary official publications relating to the Legion almost always spell it ‘Bundlecund’.

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Map 3: Bundelkhand 1838–47

patches of scrub jungle, and thinly settled. Tributaries of the Jumna, including the Betwa, Chambal, Pahuj and Sind, cross the plateau roughly south-west to north-east through deep, jungly ravines, making communications difficult – and providing sanctuary for wolves and outlaws.16 During the last Mahratta War, Bundelkhand had been infested with plundering bands of Pindaris. Subadar Sita Ram, who fought in that campaign, recalled, We proceeded by forced marches into Bundelkhand … the work we had to perform was very arduous, marching and countermarching in a country where there were no roads. News came of a body of Pindaris being here one day, and here the next. Detachments were sent after them but seldom with any success … All the folk in Bundelkhand were on their side, but this is hardly surprising. If they had possessed horses, they would have been Pindaris as well, since an inhabitant of Bundelkhand is a greater villain and lover of plunder than a Mahratta, if that be possible.17

Although the Pindaris had been suppressed, Beatson and his new command would have to deal with similar gangs of dacoits who have continued to plague Bundelkhand and the Chambal Valley into modern times. Better armed than the burkundazes (police), dacoits often went around quite openly. Their leaders, sometimes outlawed landowners or thakurs, were half-feared, half-admired, and



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today can be the subjects of Bollywood films. In 1833 it was estimated that there were 72 major dacoit leaders operating south of the Jumna, with 1,025 followers.18 Another form of lawlessness in Central India had been practised by the Thagi cult, whose members preyed on travellers, ritually strangling them and seizing their goods. A vigorous police campaign, led by Maj William ‘Thuggee’ Sleeman, was completing the eradication of this menace.19 Lawlessness thrived because of chronic misgovernment by the hereditary chiefs or jagirdars of Bundelkhand. The land was full of armed men and every jagirdar had his force of sebundies (irregular foot soldiers) and sowars (mounted troopers). Auckland complained that each Bundelkhand state ‘has been led to enlist an excessive body of soldiery to protect itself from disturbances’, and these ‘disorderly bands’ were not only militarily useless but harmed the economy: the British employed some of these men as guards and in the burkundazes, but there were always more men than there was employment, so any disaffected chief who engaged in bhumiawat (war for landed inheritance) could raise a sizeable force on the promise of plunder.20 Under the 1817 treaties the HEIC became the supreme power in Bundelkhand. Two states adjacent to the Jumna, Banda and Hamirpur, came under direct control; the other 30 or so remained independent under their rajas and raos subject to the Governor General’s right to recognise a new ruler when – as was often the case – there was a disputed succession. Many of these rulers were impotent due to age and debauchery, and this, combined with the fashion for child brides, meant that there was rarely a direct male heir. Succession was commonly through an adopted heir – usually a child – which put the ruler’s widow (the bai) in a strong position. Far from retreating into purda or immolating themselves on their husbands’ funeral pyres in an act of sati, these widows seized political power, and at any time several Bundela states were governed by ambitious women regents.21

Failing states In 1838 the two north-westerly states of Bundelkhand, Jalaun and Jhansi were suffering succession crises. The Rao of Jalaun had died in 1832 and was succeeded by his adopted heir, the six-year-old brother of his widow Laxmi Bai, who became regent even though she was herself only 13 or 14 years old. She and her minister were unable to control the wilder elements in the district, the economy spiralled out of control, the army mutinied for want of pay and in 1838 she appealed for help from the governor general’s agent for Bundelkhand, Simon Fraser. Fraser drew up a plan that involved the British managing the jagir for three years, reducing the expenditure and paying off the debts.22 Simultaneously, Fraser was dealing with a succession dispute in neighbouring Jhansi. Here the Raja had died in 1835 and his widow Saku Bai tried to force the

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adoption of an heir from outside the ruling family. This was deemed invalid under the 1817 treaty and the government selected the late Raja’s uncle. When he in turn died in 1838, Auckland favoured his last surviving brother as successor, but Saku Bai and her adherents refused to accept him. As they still occupied Jhansi town and its powerful fortress, Fraser gathered a sizeable army to lay siege to them.23 Clearly, in such an unruly province, the Agent needed the support of a reliable military force available at short notice. There was a BNI detachment at Banda, but they were mainly confined to guarding key points in British Bundelkhand. Under their 1817 treaties, all the independent states were obliged to provide military support to the government in time of need, but their forces were generally useless and often themselves the cause of the trouble.24 Auckland had sanctioned an annual defence budget of Rs 229,000 for Jalaun, but Fraser proposed that a disciplined force under British officers could be maintained for very little more, and he took it upon himself to begin recruiting.25 When he marched from Banda through Jalaun towards Jhansi, he was accompanied by an escort of the 29th BNI under Lt William Forrest26 and a 100-strong rissala (troop) of local sowars under native officers who had previous service with the British. Fraser left Forrest to organise recruits from the disbanded Jalaun forces. Beatson arrived to take up his command at Christmas while the siege of Jhansi was being prepared. The camp was unpleasant: a newspaper correspondent wrote, ‘We’re now encamped on the banks of the Betwa about ten miles from Jhansee … The water is very bad and the environs of the Camp as you may imagine offensive.’ Food was dear, and ‘The weather is intensely hot for the time of the year, 80 deg inside the tents. In fact it is cheating us out of a cold weather almost.’ There was a great deal of sickness among the assembled troops due to ‘Jhansi Fever’. Beatson made himself useful by drilling the escalading party with its scaling ladders. No doubt he dreamed of glory in leading a forlorn hope (storming party) through a breach in Jhansi’s walls, but the preparations for bombardment and assault proved too much for the Rani’s resolution. Fraser took possession of town and fort without opposition on 5 January 1839.27 The 33rd BNI was left to garrison Jhansi until Fraser’s new troops were ready to take over the duties, for Fraser had decided that Jhansi as well as Jalaun should be taken under temporary British management and contribute to its own defence.28 Ensign Frederick Wardroper29 began drilling recruits at Jhansi.

Raising the legion Auckland sanctioned the planned force ‘for the preservation of tranquillity and good order within the territory of Jalaun’. Beatson was confirmed in command on 7 January 1839, Forrest was formally appointed adjutant, and Lt Thomas Quin of the 4th Bengal Light Cavalry (BLC) as 2i/c.30 The force would also have a serjeant-major, quartermaster-serjeant (QMS), gun serjeant and gun corporal



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seconded from the Bengal European Artillery. The establishment was four cavalry rissalas of 85 sowars each, eight 100-strong infantry companies, and a ‘brigade’ of two light bullock-drawn guns, to be manned by infantry sepoys. In contemporary terminology, such a mixed-arm force was termed a ‘legion’.31 The cavalry was raised under the sillidar system inherited from the Moguls and Mahrattas and used in the Bengal Irregular Cavalry. Sillidars were better paid than regular sowars, but were armed, clothed and horsed at their own expense, obtaining a loan from the regiment if necessary. Each sowar paid a rupee a month into the regimental chundra fund, which replaced horses if they died or were cast as unfit. The government simply paid a fixed monthly sum for each sillidar’s place or asami, and everything else was obtained by the regiment. This kind of regiment has been likened to a joint-stock company in which all the men had a financial stake.32 The native cavalry officers were men of experience and substance, who often brought a number of recruits with them. We know a little about one of them, thanks to a typical Beatson dispute. Nabi Bux Khan was a former jemadar in the Oude Auxiliary Force (OAF). He procured 50 recruits for the legion and Beatson recommended him as a naib rissaldar, a step up from his previous rank. Beatson then left for what proved to be a short absence. The acting commandant was Capt Allan Macdonald of the OAF,33 who knew Nabi Bux Khan of old and tried to have the appointment stopped. Macdonald accused Nabi Bux of being ‘a clever plausible man’, who had exerted undue influence over his former CO (who had been court-martialled for irregularities in the regiment) and was unpopular both in the OAF and the Legion. On his return Beatson discounted Macdonald’s reservations, stating that he had known Nabi Bux for two years, and quoting testimonials from officers of the OAF. Beatson brushed aside the alleged unpopularity, commenting that the irregular cavalry were ‘very fond of intriguing for their own benefit’. He concluded by claiming that Macdonald had tried instead to promote ‘two of the most useless men in the Legion’. Beatson got his way, with the Lt-Governor of the North West Provinces (NWP) approving Nabi Bux Khan’s appointment.34 This incident is the first sign of Beatson’s indulgence towards native officers, provided they were ‘active’ and ‘respectable’. But Beatson would not accept incompetence. When the Adjutant General’s department sought volunteers from the BNI to officer the Legion’s infantry, it recognised that because they were being asked to relinquish their pension rights, they needed to be offered two steps in rank. So havildars would be promoted to subadar, naicks to jemadar, and sepoys to havildar. The besetting problem of the Bengal Army was that too many native officers served long after they should have been pensioned off, and promotion became clogged. Naturally, COs seized the opportunity to offload their dead wood onto the new unit. Beatson complained that the volunteers sent to him were ‘generally old and worn out men, many of them totally useless, and quite unfit for active service’. He named

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five of the new subadars, one jemadar, eight havildars and three naicks who could ‘never be of the slightest use and would only be a burden on the Jaloun State as well as on the Jaloun Legion’ and whom he wanted to return to their regiments. As the stated intention had been ‘to select comparatively young soldiers’, the government agreed with Beatson, and the men were returned to their regiments.35 With vacancies to fill, Beatson now proposed passing over several of the remaining jemadars in favour of giving the best of the new havildars two further steps in rank. This lavish application of promotion by merit was more than the government would swallow. Auckland did not consider that being ‘naturally indolent and not well acquainted with drill’, as Beatson described them, was sufficient disqualification to pass over officers with an average of 23 years’ service.36 However, when QMS John Tracey died in June 1839, Beatson was allowed to promote Gun Cpl John Dee to the vacancy, on the grounds that he was better suited to the quartermaster’s job than Gun Sjt Reid, who, although ‘a particularly well behaved and steady Non Commissioned Officer’, was ‘not so active as Corporal Dee’, and moreover as a horse artilleryman was better fitted to cavalry than infantry work. The replacement gun corporal was soon returned to his regiment for persistent drunkenness, which frequently made him unfit for duty and ‘an example being very likely to be injurious to the other [European] Non Commissioned Officers & Christian Buglers’.37 To help the artillery NCOs train the sepoys who were to work the guns, Beatson borrowed a naick and four golundazes (native gunners – literally ‘cannonball throwers’) from the Bengal Artillery at Cawnpore. Afterwards he was unwilling to let them go, they were relieved by a second detachment and the detail became permanent.38

Working partnership In his task of recruiting, equipping and training the Legion, Beatson received considerable assistance from Fraser, whose brainchild it was. He was a Fraser of Balmain, another Scots family steeped in HEIC service. Indeed, Central India was something of a family fiefdom because Simon’s brother Charles held an identical appointment in the Saugor and Nerbudda territories south of Bundelkhand, with their cousin Hugh as his assistant. It seems that Beatson, unlike some, never had a serious falling-out with the Frasers. He also had a good working relationship with Fraser’s subordinate at Jhansi, Capt David Ross, yet another Scot, who had served many years in neighbouring Gwalior, in the Maharaja’s British-led force, ‘Sindhia’s Reformed Contingent’ (SRC).39 Shortly after raising, the Legion volunteered for ‘any services whether by land or sea’. This was an important concession, because many Hindus considered



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that crossing the sea meant loss of caste, which had been one of the concerns underlying the Barrackpore Mutiny of 1824. Later BNI regiments were raised for ‘general service’ but only a few of the old regiments bore the word ‘Volunteer’ in the Army List. Beatson used officers and NCOs transferred from general service corps to explain their experience to the young sepoys. After a few days to think it over, the whole Legion signed up for such service, except one havildar, who soon changed his mind and joined his comrades.40 There was little likelihood of the Legion being sent overseas – Fraser did not envisage it serving anywhere except Bundelkhand – but Beatson’s foresight paid off later. Throughout his career Beatson delighted in designing uniforms. Even while drilling the escalading parties at Jhansi he had sent in his proposals for the Legion’s dress: ‘The Artillery to be in every respect the same as in the Bengal Artillery. The Cavalry to be dressed in blue, armed and equipped, as in the Corps of Local Horse. The Infantry to be armed & equipped as Light Infantry, dressed in green with red facings and black lace.’ In other words, Beatson’s sepoys were to be dressed as if they were elite riflemen (green seems to have been his favourite colour). This was refused: they were to wear normal red coats with blue facings and white lace. Even when he tried to have the lace across the chest applied in triple rather than the usual double rows, this little touch of individuality was stamped upon by authority. And until new buttons could be manufactured in Britain with ‘Jaloun Legion’ on them, the men would have to make do with obsolete pattern buttons from the OAF. The native officers, too, had to accept old-pattern silver-plated buttons and silver lace in place of the gilt buttons and gold lace that were now standard in the BNI.41 The main items of clothing and equipment for the infantry were provided by the Military Board and charged to the Jalaun State. The Allahabad magazine supplied ‘arms, equipment, camp equipage and stores’ (including two 6-pounder guns) by August 1839. Even without the rifle green coats, the Legion was equipped with light infantry muskets: the Military Board considered these better suited to ‘the physical powers of the class of men of which many of the Local and Civil Irregular Corps are composed’, and inspection reports confirm the small stature of the Legion’s sepoys.42 Under the sillidar system, the military authorities played no part in clothing or equipping the cavalry. These and the items of ‘half mounting’ equipment for the sepoys – greatcoats, knapsacks and undress clothing such as turbans – were obtained through local contractors. The cavalry supplied their own arms in native style, with tulwars (curved swords), spears and jezails (long matchlock muskets). But the Legion’s most striking uniform was the ‘review order’ worn by the European cavalry officers. It included an odd combination of elements from native officers’ dress with European items reminiscent of Lord Cardigan’s fashionable 11th Hussars, which Beatson may have seen during his furlough. It comprised a dark blue alkhalak (long, collarless riding coat), lavishly laced and embroidered in gold. This was worn over scarlet trousers – loose pajamas rather than Cardigan’s

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tight ‘cherrybum’ overalls – bearing twin gold stripes, topped off with a Hussar busby. So striking was this uniform that the London print publisher Ackermann included it in a series on the Indian forces (Plate D) even though it was worn by just two (later three) European officers of the cavalry and the Legion’s MO.43 There is no evidence that Beatson wore this uniform, but he certainly approved it even if he did not actually design it.

A sickly season The Legion urgently required a medical officer. The cavalry recruits were riding vicious, barely broken horses, so accidents were bound to occur, while there were over a thousand men with no tents and Jalaun was an unhealthy spot. Forrest was sent down sick to Hamirpur, where he died in February 1839; QMS Tracey also died a few months later, and Quin was laid up with fever. There was only one native doctor, badly provided with medicines and with no instruments except a lancet (though Beatson doubted whether he had the knowledge to use any others). Eventually an MO was lent until Assistant Surgeon Thomas Ginders could be transferred from the SRC to the Legion.44 Ginders was a conscientious doctor, but he came trailing scandal as a wife-beater. Given the choice of retiring or facing court martial for ‘conduct unbecoming’ and insubordination (he brought his wife into the siege camp at Jhansi against orders: clearly he did not trust her out of his sight), Ginders had chosen court martial. A court could not be assembled and Auckland decided that it was inexpedient to drag Ginders’s domestic relations through a public tribunal, so to maintain harmony in the SRC he was transferred.45 With hot weather and then monsoon rains approaching, it was essential to get the men under shelter. Beatson chose a campsite near the Company’s town of Kalpi, convenient for supplies and the Jalaun road, though at the edge of the territory for which the Legion was responsible. Building materials were scarce, but the men began erecting rough huts, and it was agreed as a temporary base until the next cold weather. In the meantime, the hospital and stores could be accommodated in Kalpi Fort and the ancient mausoleum known as the Chaurasi Gumbaz or ‘84 Domes’.46 Summer here would still be unpleasant. A travel writer of the time complained that ‘I have heard fifty places picked out as the hottest in India, but Calpee, certainly, was always one of them … I have never felt any degree of heat that could for an instant bear comparison with that at the end of June at Calpee. On a cloudy, obscure day, it stood at 145o in the shade, even to an old stager like myself, the temperature was awfully sickening.’ Death from heatstroke was common even amongst the Indian inhabitants.47 Forrest having already succumbed, Beatson poached Ens Hastings Young who was passing through to join his regiment. This was highly unorthodox, but as Beatson



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otherwise had to deal with all the recruits on his own, both Fraser and the Governor General accepted the temporary measure. Young lasted only until September when he had to go on sick leave; his successor went sick within a month.48 Meanwhile, Wardroper had been drilling recruits at Jhansi since November. He was a married officer in his 30th year but still only a regimental ensign. Detachment to Jhansi offered him increased allowances and responsibilities, but permission to establish a second legion in that state had not yet been issued, though Ross was anxious to have a disciplined force.49 Fraser recommended that expenses could be reduced if the Jalaun and proposed Jhansi Legions were combined. He suggested adding two companies and two rissalas to Beatson’s force, which would be renamed ‘The Bundlecund Legion’. Beatson and Wardroper already had sufficient recruits between them, and Wardroper could act as staff officer for the whole Legion. The annual cost would be less than 4 lakhs (Rs 400,000), or about a quarter of the two states’ gross revenues, a saving on expenditure that would go some way to stabilising their finances. This proposal was accepted, and the Bundlecund Legion was born.50

Dissension Beatson made his task more difficult by falling out with Quin, who had been appointed to the Legion on Auckland’s direct recommendation. As a cavalryman, Beatson assigned him to drill the mounted recruits, but Quin misunderstood their relative positions and resented what he saw as Beatson’s interference, such as reducing the number of hot weather parades. Quin offered his resignation, citing Beatson’s ‘want of courtesy’ and ‘haughtiness’ towards him, but put himself in a false position by appealing directly to his patron Auckland over the heads of the military hierarchy. That left Auckland no alternative but to accept his resignation.51 At least there was now an adjutant for the cavalry. Lieutenant John Dick Lauder was son and heir of Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, the 7th Baronet of Fountainhall near Edinburgh, author of Lochandhu and other works of fiction emulating Sir Walter Scott. Beatson may have approved of the fact that Lauder had seen two years’ service with the Portuguese Liberating Army under Charles Shaw before entering the HEIC.52 Still short of officers, Beatson in his usual fashion poached Lt Henry Barry, who happened to be at Kalpi on his way back from leave, and soon became permanent CO of the Legion’s infantry. He was the son of Maj-Gen Henry Barry of Ballyclough in Ireland, who bore the hereditary title ‘McAdam Barry’. Barry was another man under a cloud, his early service having been marred by a court martial for borrowing money from his pay havildar (he was acquitted).53 Barry, Lauder and Wardroper were men with whom Beatson got on, and they served with the Legion for several years. But the rapid turnover of officers in the early months was a particular inconvenience, because the Legion required

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a great deal of training, and was split into several detachments. Jalaun was now quiet, and the town only needed a company to guard the treasury, with two companies and one troop at Orai, conveniently sited on the Jhansi–Kalpi road. The bulk of the Legion was required at Jhansi, whence it marched in October 1839, taking over the cantonments of the 33rd BNI on the south side of Jhansi. Beatson was delighted when the 33rd handed over its reserve ammunition to save transport, because he could then give his recruits plenty of firing practice.54 In January 1840 the Governor General passed through Bundelkhand on his annual ‘cold weather’ progress round India, and the Legion went through its paces before him in its new uniforms. Beatson always knew how to put on a good show, and Auckland was impressed: ‘Its appearance and efficiency do extreme credit to Captn Beatson,’ he noted. He had not expected that a Corps so lately raised and laboring [sic] under great disadvantages, especially from the sickness & absence of Officers could have performed steadily and correctly the manoeuvres of the morning, & his Lordship concurs in the opinion of the Military Officers on the ground, all of whom bear testimony to the very satisfactory advancement of the Legion in all its arms, and agree in according Captn Beatson & the officers of the Legion unqualified praise.55

Auckland also provided the officers Beatson urgently needed, confirming Barry in the local rank of captain, in charge of the infantry, and naming Lt James Verner in the same position with the cavalry and Lt John Johnston as infantry adjutant. He sent Acting Apothecary James Sheetz from his own staff as Ginders’s assistant. Such was the pressure on officers that at one point Beatson appointed Sheetz as acting interpreter, quartermaster and Legion staff officer with the local rank of lieutenant.56 Verner was a member of a leading Ulster family (his father was Gentleman of the Privy Chamber to Queen Victoria). He was the same age as Beatson but had attended Eton and Oxford, and did not join the HEIC until his twenties. Although an infantryman, he had spent two years as adjutant of the 5th (Bhopawar) Local Horse.57 He sometimes disagreed with Beatson, or disputed seniority with Barry, but they worked together harmoniously enough for seven years. The fact that Beatson, Verner, Barry and Lauder shared a Scots-Irish landowning background may have eased their relationships. Surviving records suggest that Beatson devoted all his considerable energies to organising his command. There was little else to distract him, for the European population of Jhansi was tiny, with few amusements. British officers of the period were addicted to field sports, and were sometimes entertained on tiger or other game shooting expeditions by the native aristocracy. Although pigsticking on horseback was popular elsewhere in India, it was not practised in Bundelkhand, where troublesome wild pigs were shot instead, nor had polo yet been adopted.



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Nevertheless, we can be sure that Beatson rode every day, as was his never-failing habit in later years.58 He also had family company. By 1838 his brother Robert’s rheumatism was so bad that he was incapacitated on the slightest exposure to cold or damp, and a medical board transferred him to the invalid establishment. (Invalided officers continued to draw their pay on light duties until they had served long enough to retire, without blocking others’ regimental promotion.) At the end of August 1839 Robert was given leave to visit Kalpi while the Legion was camped there. The hot, dry climate of Bundelkhand may have suited him, and he obtained permission to reside permanently in the province. He and his wife could support William in his isolated position as commandant.59

Marriage However, at this busy time, Beatson suddenly got married. We have no way of telling when he first met Margaret Marian Humfrays, but it is possible that they had known each other for a long time – maybe even since he first arrived in India. Marian was the youngest daughter of the late Lt-Col Richard Humfrays of the Bengal Engineers (see Table 3), and was born and brought up in India. Home for the Humfrays family was the Doab and towns like Dinapore and Allahabad. Marian’s sister Emma had been married to Beatson’s late kinsman, LtCol William Stuart Beatson of Glassmount, who had been at Fort William when young William Ferguson Beatson first set foot in the country. Her brother Samuel had worked in the commissary-general’s department at Nimach when Beatson did duty there. Another sister, Eliza, was married to Maj Gavin Young, JAG of the Bengal Army. It is quite possible that William and Marian first met through one of these connections.60 Marian seems to have accompanied her widowed mother to England, where Mrs Humfrays died in 1837. But in October 1839 we find among the passengers on the Seringapatam, just arrived at Calcutta from England, the ‘misses Humfrays and Young’, suggesting that Marian had journeyed back to India with one of her nieces. Eliza and Gavin Young sent their children (two surviving boys and five girls) ‘home’ to be brought up in a healthier climate, living with or close to the Young family in Aberdeen, for the boys attended Aberdeen Grammar School, but sadly the youngest daughter died there. The eldest daughter was already back in India, married to an officer, and two remaining sisters are not known to have travelled from Scotland to India until 1852, so it seems that it was the middle daughter, 13-year-old Maria, who went out with her aunt Marian in 1839.61 What were Marian’s plans? She may have simply been rejoining her family, perhaps to keep house for her recently widowed brother Alexander. But given the short time between her arrival at Calcutta and her marriage, most of which would have been spent on the journey up-country, it seems that she had followed Beatson.

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Like Honoria Marshall, the recently orphaned Marian may have decided to marry a man with whom she had had a long but geographically distant relationship. They probably met or renewed their acquaintance in England during Beatson’s long furlough, possibly through Alexander Humfrays, whose own furlough overlapped with Beatson’s convalescence – Indian officers tended to congregate at the same London clubs to meet friends and pick up gossip. Whether or not there was a formal engagement, it seems that after her mother’s death Marian took the opportunity of chaperoning her niece to go out and join him. As a maiden aunt approaching 35, Marian would have appeared a rather forlorn figure in Victorian England, but prospects in Anglo-Indian society were better. Aged 36, Beatson had reached the time of life when HEIC officers usually cleared their debts and could afford to marry, and he had a CO’s status and ample allowances. Had she waited all these years for him to achieve this position, or was it a comfortable arrangement between two mature people who seized the opportunity before it passed them by? Marian delivered her niece to her family in Calcutta and then travelled upriver to Kalpi – a journey logged at 699 miles.62 At least, unlike Honoria Marshall, Marian was familiar with India, its customs and travel arrangements. She and Beatson were married on 12 February 1840 at Kalpi by the Rev Henry Pratt, the chaplain from Allahabad, with Beatson’s brother Robert as ‘next friend’. The witnesses were Verner, Johnston and the Hamirpur magistrate; apparently no members of Marian’s family were present.63 We know frustratingly little about Marian Beatson the person: just occasionally a surviving record throws a shaft of light upon her. The only description we have is by Richard Burton, who knew her in the 1850s: ‘Mrs Beatson was a quietlooking little woman, who was reputed to rule her spouse with a rod of iron in a velvet case.’64 We know she was confident enough to go behind her husband’s back and lobby cabinet ministers to advance his career. Her crisply expressed letters in her own neat hand (so different from her husband’s scrawl) were signed with a soldierly ‘I have the honor to be, my Lord, your Lordship’s most obedt Servant’. As an army daughter, Marian would have been well acquainted with the memsahib’s life, putting up with frequent changes of station following her husband’s career, his lengthy absences on duty, and the everyday rigours of life in India before air-conditioning, refrigerated food, mechanised transport and modern medicine. It was a hard and often dangerous existence: HEIC officers tended to die young, and the same was true for their wives and children. The heat, dust and boredom of small up-country stations, with few other European women and few amenities, must have been extremely trying. At the time of Marian’s arrival, the only army wives in Jhansi were Robert Beatson’s wife Helen, Mrs Wardroper and the unfortunate Mrs Ginders. (If the European NCOs had wives – official or otherwise – they would not have mingled with the officers’ ladies.) As we will see, the arrival of just one more European woman in cantonments could disrupt the housing arrangements.

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There were compensations, however: Marian would assume the pivotal role of ‘CO’s wife’ in the military community and Beatson would have been able to maintain a reasonable establishment. Servants were cheap and plentiful, and the wife of even a junior officer would command a small regiment of them – the khansama (cook) and his assistants, the ayahs (nursemaids and lady’s maids), dewans (gatekeepers), chokidars (watchmen), malis (gardeners) and dhobis (washermen), down to the humble ‘sweepers’ (latrine cleaners). If the sahib was in residence, his ‘bearer’ (manservant) and syces (grooms) would also form part of the complement, otherwise they would attend to his needs on campaign, tours of inspection or shikar (hunting trips).65 Later, even without this lavish support structure, Marian Beatson was capable of transporting her family across Europe and setting up home among the most unruly soldiers imaginable.

Jhansi The couple’s first home was Jhansi. The fort was picturesquely sited on a rocky hill, and a city had grown up round it, inside a massive wall some four and a half miles in circumference. A European settlement of bungalows was emerging alongside the Legion’s ‘lines’ outside the city.66 Any honeymoon they managed was short, for Beatson had to prepare the Legion for a full-dress inspection a couple of weeks later. Brigadier-General Thomas Anquetil carried out a two-day scrutiny that involved interviewing the officers, inspecting the books, arms and equipment, and observing target practice by picked marksmen. It ended with a grand review, when the Legion marched past in slow and quick time, and then manoeuvred, the three arms of cavalry, infantry and artillery demonstrating their prowess in deploying, advancing, retiring and firing in mutual support. Anquetil’s only criticism of these evolutions was that they were carried out too rapidly, which suggests that Beatson had trained them to work at ‘Light Infantry pace’. Anquetil found that some of the sowars rode mares, which he considered could not be worked steadily or safely in the field, and should be discarded. On the contrary, Beatson planned to mount a rissala of matchlockmen on these mares to act as mounted infantry, instead of riding into close combat. Beatson was preparing the Legion to operate as a fast-moving combined arms force, ideal for the irregular skirmishing they could expect to face on service. Anquetil described Beatson as ‘an intelligent officer, & seems to discharge his important duties with zeal and ability, he is firm in the exercise of his authority … He appears to command the respect & esteem of the European and Native Commissioned Officers, as well as the cheerful obedience of the men.’ Anquetil reserved his biggest criticism for the Legion’s 6-pounder guns: I consider that ordnance of this calibre is almost entirely useless in the country where the services of the Legion are liable to be called for, where each petty



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Thakoor or feudatory has his little fort, generally perched upon a rocky elevation, weak, I may say defenceless, against any respectable ordnance, but quite impregnable from brass 6 pounders. On the 5th of March I brought this subject to [Fraser’s] notice and six days had not elapsed when the opinion this expressed received practical demonstration at a place called Jignee against the walls of which the 6 pr shot fell harmless.67

The Legion goes to war Military operations were not lightly undertaken in Bundelkhand, which is hotter and drier than the plains of Upper India, where the Bengal Army was accustomed to operate. The hot season begins in March and the monsoon rains arrive in mid-June. From then until the third week in September the bottom fell out of the flooded dirt roads, making it impossible to move troops. The post-monsoon period was notoriously sickly: we now understand that this is when mosquitoes hatch from the standing water left by the rains. Ideally, campaigning would take place in the ‘cold’ weather from November to February, but it was often impossible to assemble forces early in the season because of lingering sickness.68 When the Legion marched against Jigni in March 1840 it was already the start of the hot season, so there was a need to act quickly. The operation was against thakurs, who were plundering their neighbours and levying tukka or blackmail. The most troublesome families were those at Nonere, Bilheri and Jigni, who had no intention of letting the new British administrators cramp their style and were ‘kicking up the devil’s delight’.69 Beatson was ordered to move against them with all available men of the Legion. Ross expected Nonere to give up without a fight, but Jigni and Bilheri might resist. He provided Beatson with a military appreciation of these places (though it proved inaccurate): [T]hey are Native Gurhees of the description commonly met with in this part of Bundelkhund. Jignah is a place of little strength & situated on a rising ground but without ditch or outworks of any kind, it may contain from 2 to 300 men. Bilharee is a Gurhee of a better description … There are no guns in either Gurhee. The Thakoors are supposed at present to have about 800 followers, but they can on a very short notice collect between 2 or 3000 good matchlockmen from the Nourassee villages in the neighbourhood.70

Because of the anticipated opposition, Fraser requested assistance from Gwalior, where the SRC had heavier guns than the Legion (9-pounders and 24-pounder howitzers).71 The main body of the Legion (500 infantry, 250 cavalry and two 6-pounders) left Jhansi on the morning of 8 March and halted after a nine-mile march when it was joined by Fraser and Ross, with Fraser’s escort from the 44th BNI. Next day ‘we all proceeded to the village of Nonere, which place

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we found deserted’. Stationing a party of police in the garhi, the force moved on to Jigni next morning. ‘We had been led to understand [it] would be made over to us without opposition, but in this we were misinformed,’ Fraser complained. Jigni’s leading thakur, Dewan Duleep Singh, was determined to fight and had strengthened his defences.72 Beatson located the rebels behind breastworks on a hill about a quarter of a mile from the fort, the ridge between the two positions being covered by ‘a regular succession of defences, natural and artificial’. These layers of extra defence surprised Ross, but he immediately sent the rebels a message ‘pointing out the folly of their offering a fruitless resistance to our Artillery’. Duleep Singh ignored this bluff, so Ross ordered Beatson to attack.‘I immediately opened a fire of Grape on the flank of [the enemy’s] intrenchment, from which he kept up a sharp fire of Matchlocks,’ reported Beatson, who sent Wardroper to lead a frontal assault on the position with No 2 Company, supported by Barry with another company. It was a brisk little fight: we know from the casualty lists that at least six companies of the Legion were engaged, together with that of the 44th BNI. After ‘considerable resistance on the part of the enemy’, the infantry drove them from their advanced positions back to the fort. The fort’s walls were too high to escalade, so Beatson, advanced two Six Pounders to within musket shot of the walls, on which I found the shot fell harmless, the entrance being protected by large rocks flanked by breastworks of mud and loop-holed buildings. Finding that the 6 pounders made no impression on the outworks of the Fort, I withdrew them, and continued to occupy the position I had taken up in front with infantry and posted cavalry on the different roads in the neighbourhood to intercept the enemy in the event of his attempting to escape.

For the rest of the day Beatson kept Duleep Singh and his men shut in while he reconnoitred round the fort, ‘but from the Jungly and Hilly nature of the Country, I had not sufficient Force to prevent the enemy escaping during the night’. The Legion occupied the empty fort next morning.73 The day after the attack, a court of inquiry convened to examine the behaviour of Acting Subadar Sheikh Gholam Hussein. It comprised three of the accused’s fellow subadars, who heard evidence from Wardroper, QMS Dee and Sjt-Maj Jeremiah O’Sullivan of his cowardice during the fighting. The court did not accept the defendant’s story and Beatson reduced him to havildar for ‘most disgraceful conduct’ and recommended his dismissal from the service, which Fraser endorsed.74 Beatson must have felt particularly let down, because when Hussein had transferred to the Legion, Beatson regarded him as ‘a very smart soldier’ and had promoted him from havildar-major to subadar over the heads of several jemadars.75 Unfortunately this smart soldier had failed in action, thereby calling Beatson’s judgement into question, which may explain his swift and harsh



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punishment. However, it was an opportunity to promote a jemadar and havildar for gallant conduct at Jigni.76 Two sepoys had been killed and there were 26 wounded, of whom two died of their wounds, and a naick (corporal) and a sepoy were rendered incapable of earning a livelihood.77 The only European casualty was Gun Cpl George Giddings, who received a matchlock ball in the upper arm and was never again fit for field service. Giddings, an old soldier who had served in HM’s 14th Foot before transferring to the Bengal Artillery, was promoted to serjeant and saw out his days in a veterans company.78 Beatson’s first taste of independent command and the Legion’s first combat had been a neat little operation, overcoming obstinate resistance even if the rebel leader had escaped. Auckland expressed satisfaction with ‘the cool and gallant conduct’ of the officers and men of the Legion, ‘reflecting the greatest credit on Captain Beatson … in bringing the Legion to its present state of discipline’.79 The thakurs of Bilheri did not wait for similar treatment and gave up their garhi. By 14 March the Legion and the SRC (which had not been needed) had returned to cantonments for the hot season.80 Despite a reward being offered for his capture, Duleep Singh remained at large – in May he was suspected of involvement when Kunch was raided by some men from Chirgong (modern Chirgaon).81

On the road to Kabul? In October 1840 Beatson heard that the 54th BNI was going to Afghanistan and, as there was no immediate prospect of the Legion seeing service, Beatson asked to be allowed to join his regiment. Permission arrived on the night of 6 November, was acknowledged the next day and on the morning of 8 November he rushed off by dâk to the 54th’s station at Ludhiana.82 We have already seen that Macdonald of the OAF acted as Legion commandant at this time. He probably hoped to be confirmed as commandant, but Beatson was not absent for long. Finding that ‘there does not appear the same prospect of active service which existed when I applied to join my Regiment’, he obtained permission to resume command of the Legion and rushed back in his usual whirlwind fashion.83 This change of mind may well have saved Beatson’s life. The 54th did go to Kabul, but by the end of 1841 the country rose in revolt. Too late, the garrison attempted to retire to safety; those not killed in the defiles by the howling bands of Afghans died of cold and starvation beside the road. Only a handful of Europeans survived as prisoners, and Burnett was the only member of the 54th among them (and he died of wounds after his eventual release). Along with its entire frontline strength of sepoys, the regiment lost one major, five captains, two lieutenants and three ensigns. The Times’s casualty list even included Beatson’s name, though marked as ‘absent’ rather than ‘missing’.84 Considering the thin

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margin between Kipling’s twin impostors, Triumph and Disaster, we should note that the 3rd Regiment of Shah Suja’s Contingent, which Beatson first raised, was the only infantry regiment of that unhappy force to survive the debacle, gallantly defending Kelat-i-Ghilzai until relieved the following spring.85 Had Beatson not gone to Bundelkhand in 1838, he might have been the hero of Kelat, whereas if he had made a different decision in December 1840 he would have died in the disastrous retreat.

Chirgong During her husband’s short absence, Marian must have been left to her own devices at Jhansi, for Robert Beatson had gone to the Lower Provinces in May 1840, and later obtained permission to reside near Calcutta. No reason was given – maybe Bundelkhand’s climate did not agree with him after all, or perhaps it had proved uncomfortable for him and his wife to live so close to his brother and new sister-in-law.86 Meanwhile, harried by the Legion, the SRC and the burkundazes, Duleep Singh had finally submitted in November 1840, agreeing to live at Jhansi on a pension, while the jagir was restored to other members of his family. ‘We trust that these Thakoors are duly sensible of the lenity with which they have been treated,’ noted the Court of Directors.87 But Rao Bahadur Burkut Singh of Chirgong did not take the hint. A series of highway robberies occurred in his jagir and by March 1841 he was openly defying the government. Verner reported that Burkut Singh was strengthening the outworks of his fortified town and assembling large forces.88 The Rao was encouraged by the Raja of Oorcha, who paid for the fortifications and additional troops, supplying golundazes, rockets and other arms. The LtGovernor authorised Fraser to reduce Chirgong, provided he used sufficient force to preclude failure.89 Fraser borrowed a detachment of the SRC, and knowing that the Legion’s popgun 6-pounders were useless, he requested a siege train of two 18-pounders and two heavy mortars from Cawnpore.90 This required an enormous convoy: 797 three-bullock carts for shot, shell and powder, 542 more bullocks to haul the guns, store carts, etc. and almost 400 workmen, escorted by three companies of the 52nd BNI and a troop of the 8th BLC under Capt Barber.91 Fraser told Beatson that he could employ these escorts as well as Fraser’s own escort from the 13th BNI – which was news to Maj-Gen Joseph Thackwell at Cawnpore, who expected Barber to hand over the convoy and return immediately.92 Such highhanded action was typical of Fraser and Beatson. Fraser sent Beatson to blockade Chirgong while they waited for the convoy. The Legion and SRC detachment marched from Jhansi early on 9 April, reaching Myapore (Maipur), some three miles from Chirgong, that morning. However, finding that water was scarce and the jungle made it too easy for attackers to approach unseen, Beatson abandoned this camp and marched again in the



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afternoon to Nari on the banks of the Pahuj, where he had a clear line of sight to Chirgong. Burkut Singh’s principal supporters were his adopted son and his commander (the son’s father) Hindi Sar. As soon as the British appeared, the son executed Fraser’s messengers and the dâk runners. These ruthless men did not intend to wait quietly to be blown to pieces, and Burkut Singh had declared his intention of attacking the British. Beatson ‘determined to give him that opportunity as soon as the men were rested’, and ordered the men to parade on 11 April for a reconnaissance. ‘Just as my men were getting under arms at day break … a report was brought in that the enemy was advancing with Artillery, Cavalry and Infantry to attack us.’ Unsure of their strength (50 horse and 250 foot, according to newspapers) or what was on his flanks, Beatson advanced cautiously, ‘keeping the Artillery, Cavalry and Infantry in hand with parties out on each flank so that we might make the most of our ground if the enemy carried his threat into effect of attacking us’. On this, the enemy returned to the fort after burning the village of Cheruna (Chhairauna) to deny it to the British, but they missed the grain stores, and the ruins still made an excellent support position for working parties. Beatson was concerned, however: the town was bigger than he expected and he did not have enough men to invest it completely, while the field guns (of course) were ineffective against the walls. He would have to confine himself to reconnaissance until the battering train arrived. That afternoon he sent out scouting parties on both flanks, and ‘a heavy fire was immediately opened on them from the Fort Guns varying from 2 to 12 Pounders, at the same time a number of Rockets were thrown into the camp at Cheroona’. ‘This was a demonstration on the part of the enemy which of course could not be allowed to pass unnoticed,’ Beatson commented drily. ‘I therefore directed the Guns to be immediately got into position and the result was that in a short time the enemy’s fire was in great measure silenced excepting from his gingals.’ These light swivel guns were a nuisance: one 2-pounder gingal ball passed through three men and knocked down a fourth at a range of 800 yards. Although Beatson’s prompt action had quietened the fort’s batteries, he prudently had the tents struck and moved back out of range behind Cheruna. On the night of 12/13 April, he reported ‘a very spirited affair’ in which a havildar and eight sepoys of the Bundlecund Infantry distinguished themselves while defending a half-built battery. Next day a party of grasscutters went out to collect forage for the animals in camp, and about 100 enemy cavalry, infantry and rocket men tried to cut them off. Beatson ordered the two 6-pounders to open fire, and sent out a cavalry troop, which Verner volunteered to lead himself. He was about to charge when a shower of rockets put the horses into confusion. By the time the troop rallied, the enemy had regained the cover of their stockades and opened fire, while another party hidden in the village of Pahari fired into his flank. Verner was forced to retreat. Beatson was highly complimentary of Verner’s coolness in extricating the troop, with the loss of only a kote duffadar (troop serjeant major) and a sowar wounded.93

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The newspapers were impatient for action. The Agra Ukhbar reported that Beatson was encamped before the town with ‘a force sufficient to reduce all Bundlecund’, and blamed Fraser for restraining them until the siege train arrived. ‘Captain Beatson’s detachment are in the mean time obliged to endure the severe heat of the place, and the irritation of their own impatience at the Fabian-like strategy of the Commissioner.’ This is probably unfair, but time was important: sickness was breaking out as the temperature rose, and Fraser asked for the SRC’s surgeon to be sent by dâk to join the camp.94 The battering train arrived on 16 April, and mortar platforms were laid down the same night. Next day the mortars began firing occasional ranging shots into the town. They could not keep up a constant fire until the field magazine was ready, but the platforms for the 18-pounders were positioned and the guns were moved into their batteries the next night. By the morning of the 18th all was ready, and ‘a cannonade was commenced chiefly with a view to silencing the enemy’s Guns before advancing the Batteries to breaching distance’. The fire ‘was kept up without intermission until half past two o’clock. It recommenced at half past 3 PM and ceased at sunset.’ The pause was probably to let the guns cool and for the gunners to have tiffin. On the 19th ‘the fire was carried on the same as the day before, the mortars playing upon the Town and the Guns upon the Palace in the fort which was nearly destroyed’. Several fires broke out in the town, but each time the defenders put out the blaze. ‘The enemy returned our fire, but not with much effect, though tolerably well directed.’ Rumour had it that these guns were directed by a discharged HEIC golundaze. The defenders were ‘amusing themselves occasionally with a shot or two, from an eighteen pounder, at our Mess tents,’ a correspondent complained. The next phase of formal siegework was the capture of outworks. Beatson ‘determined to occupy a Garden on the left of our position within 100 yards of the Town Wall where I observed the enemy had been very busy throwing up entrenchments and to which they seemed to attach great importance which I afterwards discovered to be on account of the wells in it’. This position would be ideal for the breaching batteries. Although there is no sign of the town walls or the fort (which were razed after the siege), a small enclosed piece of woodland with a well is clearly shown adjacent to the town on the 1925 survey map and the enclosure can still be seen on Google Earth today. This must be the site of the decisive action of 20 April.95 Beatson formed a storming party under Capt James Jamieson of the 52nd BNI with one of his companies, the Grenadier Company of the SRC, a company of legion infantry under Johnston, and a squadron of legion cavalry under Lauder. The Bengal Hurkaru suggested that this party had first set out at 02.00 on the 19th but lost its way; Beatson’s report makes no mention of this. The attack went in an hour before dawn on the 20th. About 100 yards from the garden, four rounds of shrapnel were fired from the howitzer to clear the stockades of defenders, but none were to be seen. It was only when the stormers reached the entrenchment, and had



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rested their muskets to climb over or pull down the stockade, that the early dawn was torn apart by a shower of rockets and fire-pots, then by a volley from 200 matchlockmen. The latter must have been very well hidden and disciplined if their position was not given away by the glow from their matches. Luckily, most of the attackers had dived for cover when the rockets were fired, so the musketry went over their heads and there were few casualties. Observers were impressed by the way that the sepoys rallied and began to return fire. Lauder and his horsemen, finding the ground unsuitable, dismounted and joined in the attack. But the storming party could not penetrate the stockade until the Legion’s 6-pounders arrived with the supporting company of the 13th BNI under Ens Thomas Wilson.96 As they had at Jigni, the light guns provided close support, enfilading the trenches with grapeshot. Hand-to-hand combat followed, in which several of the enemy were bayoneted and the attackers also suffered heavily. The sepoys forced their way through a small gap in the western face, and ‘with a loud cheer rushed into the garden’. The enemy did not stay to receive them. With the garden in their hands, Jamieson’s party threw up defences of sandbags and cotton bales under heavy cannon and rocket fire from the town walls just 100 yards away. Beatson’s batteries raked the wall to try to suppress the defenders, though the garden remained under heavy fire all day. The gunners now prepared to establish a breaching battery of 18-pounders at the corner of the garden. However, at midnight, with everything ready to emplace the guns, Burkut Singh and his men evacuated the town and made off towards Oorcha. He could see that with these guns in place, following the loss of the wells, the town and fort were untenable. As Beatson feared, there were insufficient cavalry to prevent escape.97 The captured town ‘presented a sad picture of desolation – not a soul was to be seen in it, and the ravages of fire were every where visible. A large powder magazine was exploded, after our people had got into the Town,’ a newspaper reported. When wounded men of the Legion later appeared before an invaliding committee, they included two suffering ‘defective vision and other injuries occasioned by an explosion of gunpowder’.98 Total British losses in the actions of 11, 13 and 20 April were 98 killed and wounded. The casualties they inflicted were probably higher, but the enemy had taken many away. Beatson’s men found nine bodies in the garden and many wounded in the town, who said that the casualties in the bombardment and attack had been considerable. The captures included ‘four long heavy iron Guns and eight of smaller calibre’.99 Beatson followed convention by mentioning in his despatch every European officer who was present, but he praised others too. One was Subadar-Major Mir Amanant Ali of the SRC, noting his ‘coolness and gallantry’. Another was Gun Cpl Sweeney, who had just been posted to a healthier climate. Hearing that the Legion was about to go into action, ‘with a proper soldier-like spirit’, Sweeney rushed back to join in: he probably helped push up the 6-pounders to sweep

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the garden trenches. Beatson recommended him for promotion.100 Fraser also allowed Beatson to take Ens Wilson from his escort for the Legion’s proposed 2nd Battalion. This earned them a rebuke, and Wilson returned to his regimental duties,101 but Beatson did not forget the young officer: some 16 years later he would again ask for his services. Beatson and the Legion received fulsome thanks from the Lt-Governor of the NWP, the Governor General in Council, and the Court of Directors.102 The prize money from Chirgong hardly compared with the fortunes made from places like Seringapatam in former times. A year after the siege, a committee distributed the Rs 12,333 raised by sale of ‘prize property’ captured in the town. Beatson as CO received 1/16th of the total (836 Jhansi Rupees, or about £70), whereas a naick, sepoy or camp follower’s share was about 21/2 rupees (a sepoy’s monthly salary in the Legion was Rs 7).103

Fall from grace Beatson’s star was ascendant after Jigni and Chirgong, but now he nearly ruined everything. In December 1841, soon after he and Marian had returned from two months’ leave at Simla,104 they heard that one of Marian’s friends, a Miss De Bruyn, was coming to Jhansi. She was sick and accommodation was short in the European lines, so Beatson ordered Lauder to turn Lt Edward Hall out of Barry’s bungalow, which was conveniently close to the Beatsons’. Hall had taken over as infantry adjutant and was renting the bungalow while Barry was on sick leave; Lauder was acting as Barry’s agent. An argument ensued in which Hall refused to pay his rent and Lauder accused him of ungentlemanly conduct. Hall considered this tantamount to a challenge to a duel, and asked Dr Ginders to act as his ‘friend’ and seek clarification from Lauder. Unfortunately, Ginders waited until next day, by which time the matter had come to Beatson’s notice. Instead of advising the two officers not to be petty and ordering them to drop the matter, Beatson made things worse by placing Hall under arrest and persuading Fraser to convene a court of inquiry. Unfortunately, the only officers in Jhansi not involved as witnesses were Ross and Beatson himself. They sat as a court, took evidence, and concluded there were no grounds for a court martial. They warned Hall to be more careful and criticised Ginders for botching the reconciliation.105 Hall refused to let the matter drop. Beatson’s intervention had prevented him from taking ‘most summary notice’ of Lauder’s slight; clearly he had a duel or horsewhipping in mind. Now he appealed directly to the Governor General for satisfaction. He justifiably claimed that the court had been irregular, but he had committed the military sin of going outside the chain of command. As he refused reconciliation, he had to leave the Legion.106 The CinC criticised everyone concerned, characterising Beatson’s actions towards Hall as ‘very oppressive’, first for the heavy-handed way he evicted



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him and then for acting as both prosecutor and judge in an illegal trial. The new governor general, Lord Ellenborough, considered ‘Captain Beatson the least excusable’, and stated that he would have removed him from command had he not already been censured.107 These reprimands from the highest authorities might have stifled any hope Beatson had of advancement, but recognition of his military qualities by those same authorities would unexpectedly rescue his career.

6 FOLLOWING THE ELEPHANT

It is a noble corps Lord Ellenborough on the Bundlecund Legion1

I

ndia had a new governor general. Edward Law, 2nd Lord Ellenborough, wanted to be a soldier but followed his father (a former lord chief justice and cabinet minister) into politics. Ellenborough headed the India Board in the Wellington and Peel ministries of the 1820s and 1830s, then fulfilled an ambition when Peel named him to succeed Auckland as governor general. Irreverently known to subordinates as ‘The Elephant’, Ellenborough trampled on officialdom as he dragged in necessary reform. He favoured the army, working to restore its morale after the Afghan disasters, and it responded with enthusiasm.2 In some respects Ellenborough was a similar character to Beatson and became his most important patron, but initial impressions were unpromising. Ellenborough strongly endorsed Beatson’s censure over the Hall affair, which must have been one of the first files to cross his desk. Ellenborough reached India in February 1842 in time to hear of the disastrous retreat from Kabul and his first concern was to stabilise the situation in Afghanistan and extricate the HEIC from Auckland’s disastrous entanglement. He organised a powerful ‘Army of Retribution’ to march through Afghanistan, rescuing the garrisons and restoring British prestige before withdrawing from the country. Verner’s regiment served in this campaign, and he temporarily left the Bundlecund Legion to join it.3 The loss of prestige was felt severely in Bundelkhand, where mischief-makers thought that they could now defy the British with impunity.4 Trouble started in April 1842 in the dacoit-infested borderlands between Gwalior, Bundelkhand and Saugor. Local chuprassies and burkundazes could not cope, and soon bodies of up to 4,000 armed Bundelas were abroad as the situation descended into fullscale insurgency. Charles Fraser in Saugor called for help from the regulars, from Gwalior and from Bundelkhand. His assistant Manaton Ommaney wrote, ‘I hope Simon will send a party,’ adding, ‘Saugor is quite open and might be the prey of

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any determined chap.’ But Simon Fraser was concerned with the security of his own territory, and declined to send his brother more than a single squadron of the Legion. Within hours of getting the call, Beatson sent Rissaldar Lall Khan’s squadron by forced marches to the border town of Tehri.5 Simon Fraser was unwilling to do more because he feared an outbreak in Oorcha, where the Raja had died leaving a young heir and the usual anarchy surrounding the succession. Following the time-honoured script, the Rani had seized the forts – including Tehri – and the boy Raja’s minister had appealed for help. Fraser refused to intervene directly, but he deployed detachments of the Legion from Jhansi and the 13th BNI from Banda to garrison key British-held towns in case trouble spread, and hoped for the best.6 ‘There can I think be no doubt that the insurgents have risen in consequence of the reduced state of our forces in this territory and the disastrous intelligence from Affghanistan [sic],’ Charles Fraser concluded, and his brother concurred. None of the independent rulers had yet joined in – the Rani of Oorcha’s men were ‘particularly civil’ to Lall Khan and his sowars – but the insurgent leaders included the fugitive Burkut Singh of Chirgong and several thakurs with grievances against Ommaney’s court. They enjoyed local popularity and could raise large forces. One of the court warrants was for the arrest of Madhkur Shah, who had murdered some policemen in a row over a dancing-girl. When he was finally caught and hanged, the people erected a shrine to him.7 Apart from Lall Khan’s squadron, which had a few skirmishes, Beatson and the Legion saw no action during these operations.8 Unusually, there were none of Beatson’s characteristic messages urging instant action, and he seemed content to follow Simon Fraser’s cautious orders. Probably he had other things on his mind, having just become a father for the first time – Marian Jane was born on 28 March 1842.9

The end for the Frasers Ellenborough was unimpressed by the way his subordinates were dealing with the insurrection: ‘I do not at all like the Boondela outbreak, nor am I entirely satisfied with the course pursued by our authorities. The troops should move at once in search of the rebels, and hunt them down – not remain quietly in position to defend certain points.’ Later he complained, ‘These Political officers always err in endeavouring to cover all points. They disseminate their forces in every direction breaking them up into detachments … The old officers who command divisions are nearly as bad as the politicals.’10 Ellenborough’s instincts were sound: a twentieth-century textbook on Imperial Policing deprecated the dispersion of troops in small protective detachments, as opposed to a policy of greater concentration to enable counter measures to be taken. The former course



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often appeals to civilian officials who from their training hardly appreciate the ineffectiveness of passive defence or the crippling effect of undue dispersions of force on military plans.11

Ellenborough the thwarted soldier had a clearer appreciation of these matters than his political officers, and was closer to events than the high command. He was slogging through Upper India on his first tour of his new realm, while the CinC, Sir Jasper Nicholls, was avoiding the hot weather in Simla, where army HQ had taken to spending much of the year. Characteristically, Ellenborough chose to save time by travelling overland by dâk with, as he told his sister, fewer comforts ‘than a Cadet joining his Regiment’. At one point he travelled nine hours on relays of elephants in broiling sun through mud a foot and a half deep. Nicholls expressed sympathy: ‘I congratulate your Lordship upon your having passed thro’ so much of your weary and comfortless journey without injury. It may be called resting by day but there can be no great rest in a small oven for such a staging bungalow is at this season, even with all the usual appliances.’ As he charged through the countryside, the Elephant shook up lethargic officials along the way.12 Clearly, this was a man after Beatson’s own heart. Ellenborough overruled further troop deployments during the hot weather – it would be detrimental to their health and would cause undue alarm. He preferred to use only the troops already committed, to drive the insurgents into their fastnesses and let things die down naturally during the monsoon, when rebels and troops would be equally immobile. Meanwhile, he would deal with the more troublesome states, gather intelligence and assemble a strong force to destroy the rebels in the next campaigning season.13 He sent Sleeman to report on the reasons for the outbreak, and ‘Thuggee’ was sharply critical of his colleagues. The Governor General agreed with this evaluation: ‘Lord Ellenborough cannot but apprehend that in both districts there has been mismanagement and misgovernment, and that these are the real sources of the insurrection.’14 It was the end of Fraser rule in Central India. Simon was moved to a judicial position, Hugh was hit in a skirmish with the insurgents and died of lockjaw from the infected wound, and Charles resigned from the service, while Ommaney and the rest of his assistants were cleared out. Their replacement was Thuggee Sleeman himself, given jurisdiction over both Bundelkhand and Saugor, answering directly to Ellenborough. His assistants were younger military officers – Ellenborough contended that those working with native troops understood the population better than the lofty administrators.15 Thus Beatson found himself working for one of the great heroes of Victorian India. William Sleeman had seen hard campaigning in Nepal before being seconded as a political assistant. He remained in political employment thereafter, though he retained his military rank and eventually became a major-general. He had spent the past 20 years in Central India, latterly as Commissioner for the Suppression

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of Thuggee and Dacoity. His success against the Thugs was based on intelligence and he possessed a similarly encyclopedic knowledge of dacoits and their leaders. Importantly, he had built good relationships with the rulers of the independent states in his travels across the region.16 Sleeman was the ideal man to take over the troubled provinces, though his elevation was resented by civil administrators. A friend wrote to him: ‘the G.G. will have his hands full of all sorts of ditch politics when he gets to Calcutta.’* Sure enough, friends of the Frasers and Ommaney began a newspaper campaign that eventually wrecked Ellenborough’s governor generalship – but for the moment his elephantine methods were working well.18

Police operations Under Sleeman, operational decisions were based on sound intelligence, and his first reaction was always to pursue insurgents and harry them to destruction, rather than simply to strengthen garrisons. There was only one stand-up fight of any significance, at Panwari in June, when Burkut Singh was killed, but the Legion was not involved.19 The Bundelas had learned their lesson after Chirgong, and there were no more sieges – indeed it was the garhis and walled towns defended by police detachments that came under attack, while the insurgents trusted to jungly hills and ravines rather than fixed defences that the Legion was so adept at taking. Ironically, Sleeman considered the Legion to be one root of the trouble. He saw that Fraser’s interference in Jalaun and Jhansi had been met with suspicion by the other jagirdars, and abortive plans to expand the Legion into Datia and Oorcha had increased this anxiety. The direct cause of the outbreak, however, had been mismanagement both by the independent rulers and the British authorities, and Sleeman attributed the fact that it had been worse in Saugor to the Legion’s restraining presence in Bundelkhand.20 In August Ellenborough reported to the Queen that ‘In Bundelcund, all is tranquil.’21 It was only half true. He still planned to deploy large forces in the coming cold season and, meanwhile, Sleeman was pursuing the smaller fry through the rains. One typical operation lasted from August to November 1842. The quarry was a notorious leader named Kochukunju Kerashera, who was reputedly seven foot tall with strength to match and who had waged bhumiawat for his family’s estates, during which he murdered his older brother and other relations. On the night of 14 August his marauders burned down the mounted police post at Karera and stole several horses. Both the town’s burkundazes and the Legion detachment in the fort were too far away to help. Lauder led up reinforcements * To the ‘Mofussilite’ who lived up-country in the Mofussil, officials in Calcutta were known as ‘Mahratta Ditchers’ after the old defence line around the city.17



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of horse and foot from the Legion – starting at daybreak from Jhansi they made 34 miles in 24 hours, without a man falling out. But it was fruitless: the dacoits were long gone with their plunder. Eventually a posse led by the former insurgent Jowakir Singh, son of his murdered brother, tracked and killed Kochukunju and claimed the reward.22 This episode illustrates the limitations of a purely military force like the Legion: it was ideal for dealing with rebels and their strongholds, but hunting down dacoits was police work requiring different skills and, crucially, local intelligence. So the following year Sleeman and Ellenborough created a force of Bundlecund Military Police (BMP),* commanded by European officers and armed with rifles or at least good flintlocks in place of the burkundazes’ traditional matchlock jezails.23

The Raja enters his realm One of Sleeman’s first actions on taking over the Bundelkhand Agency was to restore the management of Jhansi to Raja Gangadhar Rao, subject to him ceding sufficient land to pay the Legion’s expenses. In the absence of a Jhansi army, it became a routine duty of the Legion (despite Beatson’s complaints) to provide an escort for the Raja whenever he visited a neighbouring state.24 The Raja politely asked if his ancestors’ fortress could be returned to him. Sleeman consulted Beatson on whether the fort’s guns (if they fell into the wrong hands) could harm the British lines, and where to house the siege train stored at the fort since the siege of Chirgong. Beatson replied that ‘although a few rolling shots might come into the cantonments they would not be at all formidable’. Indeed, he considered that the cantonment was more or less where a besieging force would camp if it had to capture the fort (which proved to be the case in 1858). As for housing the military stores, Beatson recommended the erection of a magazine next to the Company’s treasury in the cantonment, with a small fort to surround both. This could easily be held by recruits and convalescents if there was an emergency while the Legion was away on service.25 This was Beatson’s opportunity to emulate his father as a fortification engineer. Although he had no formal training, we know that he read widely about his profession – perhaps as a boy he had read his father’s old textbooks. He sketched a plan for a six-pointed star fort, each projecting triangle measuring 100 feet on either face. Alternate points were equipped with barbette platforms, allowing artillery to fire over the parapet. The walls were to be 10 feet high to the crest of the parapet, fronted by two feet of masonry, backed by an earth bank as a firestep. Inside were a well, the strongroom, a new magazine, guardroom and cookhouse, * Jowakir Singh (who may have been one of the thakurs driven to rebellion by Ommaney) was an early recruit to the BMP, along with his posse, while its CO, Major Joseph Ferris, brought the Afghan jezailchis he had commanded in Shah Suja’s army.

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and the Legion’s existing pakka (masonry) gun shed.26 Surprisingly, no engineer was sent to design the work or even supervise its construction, perhaps because Beatson and Sleeman misleadingly referred to it as a ‘fieldwork’. Sleeman reported that Beatson ‘has had much experience of buildings here’ and that his estimate of 10,000 Jhansi rupees, or 8,849 Company rupees, was probably accurate; he anticipated completion within a couple of months.27 We hear no more of the building of this fort, which must have been carried out by the men of the Legion and local contractors, but the work was well done: it was the first place seized when the garrison mutinied in June 1857, and it featured in the 1858 siege.28 On 17 September Gangadhar Rao entered his city to the cheers of a crowd estimated at 50,000. The delighted Raja, accompanied by Sleeman, Ross and Beatson, visited the fort and went to see his boyhood bedroom.29 Gangadhar Rao had recently married 15-year-old Lakshmi Bai, a horsy tomboy with a love of fencing, and his people and the British hoped that together they would refound a strong ruling dynasty. Alas for those hopes; their only son died young, and a later, harder, British administration overruled their adoption of an heir and Lakshmi Bai’s attempt to rule as regent after Ganghadar’s death. It was a mistake that cost the British dear in 1857 when the resentful Rani rebelled in support of the mutineers.30

Stamping out the embers Ellenborough was determined to put substantial forces into the field for the 1842–3 campaigning season, to snuff out the last flickers of the Bundela uprising. He earmarked 13,000 men, of which the Legion would provide almost 1750.31 Beatson and Sleeman destroyed the fortifications of Chirgong in order to free the two companies of the Legion in garrison, and Beatson was ordered ‘to institute a minute survey’ of the siege guns and stores at Jhansi and make arrangements to receive additional guns and stores from Cawnpore. The Legion was supplied with ammunition for its 6-pounders, including for the first time shrapnel shells, with some European gunners trained in their use.32 Beatson reported an impressively short sick list for the Legion, which he claimed was probably better than ‘any station in India at this season’. His men were ready and he was looking forward to the prospect of action. Sleeman’s particular bête noire was the Raja of Jaitpur, and he planned to open the campaign by sending the Legion’s cavalry to invest Jaitpur.33 But at the beginning of November something changed: ‘by a later arrangement the Legion is not to join the force assembled in the field, but is to remain at Head Quarters Jhansi,’ wrote the disappointed Wardroper as he requested leave.* * Ellenborough gave the vacancy to Lt Robert Sale as a mark of favour to his parents, Sir Robert and Lady Sale, heroes of the Afghan War. Governors general regularly exercised personal patronage in appointments to the Legion, which more than once led to confusion when he and the CinC appointed two different officers to the same vacancy.34



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It is not clear what caused the change of mind. Possibly the man appointed to command the troops in Bundelkhand, Brigadier Frederick Young, looked down upon irregulars, or perhaps did not want the argumentative Beatson in his team. Whatever the reason, the Legion’s role was reduced to watching for marauders from Saugor or Gwalior.35 Young’s regulars campaigned through the winter and took Jaitpur without resistance before going into cantonments for the hot weather. These were at a new station at Nowgong in British Bundelkhand, sited to overcome the shortage of troops that had encouraged defiance by men like Duleep Singh and Burkut Singh.36 With this presence, and the establishment of the BMP, the Legion’s role was sharply diminished. Not that Sleeman ignored the Legion. Indeed, he took a close interest in it, supporting Beatson’s campaign to get 9-pounders to replace the 6-pounder popguns – Young left two at Jhansi for the Legion.37 Sleeman also supported a scheme to make the Legion’s uniform more practical. Beatson had obtained Kilmarnock caps from Britain as undress wear for the men. These knitted caps, essentially the humble Scots ‘blue bonnet’, were coming into use in the British Army (and some BNI regiments) as an off-duty alternative to the unwieldy shako. They proved popular, and Beatson recommended adopting this cheap and serviceable cap as the uniform headdress for the Legion in place of the hated shako. Sleeman agreed that ‘the foraging caps are certainly an excellent headdress, and seem to be much approved of by the men themselves. They look well, fit well to the head, and are light and durable.’ The blue caps had a brass ‘B.L.’ badge, with a Light Infantry bugle for the infantry, and crossed lances and a red tuft (the ‘toorie’ of a Scots bonnet) on top for the cavalry.38 Beatson’s innovation was sanctioned and soon set a fashion that was followed by the regular sepoy regiments, with the cap becoming regulation headdress for the whole Bengal Army in 1847.39

A hot weather march Ellenborough had deposed Raja Parichhat of Jaitpur and invested his cousin Dewan Khet Singh with the jagir at a great durbar at Delhi.40 But Parichhat was still lurking in the jungle, and it was feared that he would try to intercept the new Raja on his way to Jaitpur. Rather than withdraw any of Young’s troops from their comfortable cantonments in the hot weather, Beatson was sent in May 1843 with 200 cavalry, 500 infantry and two guns to escort Khet Singh safely to his principality. The needy Raja even had to beg a couple of boxes of ammunition from Beatson to equip his bodyguard.41 This march occasioned more trouble between Beatson and his officers. Despite Ginders’s part in the Hall debacle, he and Beatson had remained on good terms – Beatson even presented the MO with a gold watch in token of his esteem42 – but a coolness had recently developed between them over winding up the officers’

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mess. Of the original mess, Wardroper, Lauder and several other officers had gone, leaving only Beatson and Ginders. Beatson ordered Ginders to clear the disordered accounts, and the MO resented this imposition. Then one of the newcomers, Lt Richard Herbert, arrived with a salacious story: Maj Charles Newbery of his regiment boasted of being ordered by a London court to pay Ginders £700 compensation for ‘criminal conversation’ (adultery) with the flighty Mrs Ginders on board a ship to England. Ginders was still living with her, which was dishonourable to the Victorian mind – a suit for ‘crim. con.’ usually ended in divorce, yet by Newbery’s account Ginders was living off immoral earnings from his wife’s adultery! As soon as he heard this story, Beatson declared that he would not sit at the same table with Ginders. The doctor was therefore excluded from the reconstituted officers’ mess – nobody told him why – yet the story was false. Newbery was a notorious liar, and Herbert was an embittered troublemaker. Herbert’s arm had been shattered while he was ‘sniping away like a common soldier’ as Charles Fraser’s assistant during the previous summer’s campaign, and he amused himself during his convalescence by writing anonymous newspaper articles criticising the treatment of the Saugor officials by Ellenborough and Sleeman.43 Beatson’s fault was in failing to observe a general order instructing COs to put any discreditable report to the officer concerned and invite him to refute it. Other than that, no one criticised Beatson and the others for the attitude they took towards Ginders, least of all Ellenborough, who had fought one of the most notorious ‘crim. con.’ suits of the century.44 Ellenborough had been unlucky in marriage. His first wife died young and he then married Jane Digby, a famous society beauty. Her adultery with Prince Von Schwartzenberg led Ellenborough to fight a duel with the prince and then successfully sue him for £25,000 damages for crim. con., which supplied him with grounds for divorcing her.* Ellenborough did not remarry; when he went to India he was accompanied by his mistress, who hosted his official functions, and no one thought the worse of him.45 Poor Ginders knew nothing of the reasons for his ostracism. On the return march from Jaitpur he had a bad attack of fever and suffered hallucinations: he was convinced that his tent was being struck and re-pitched on Beatson’s orders to annoy him. If anything, it seems that Beatson and the other officers were concerned to find a patch of shade for the sick man, and one of the European NCOs was appointed to look after him. Beatson attributed Ginders’s delusions to delirium tremens, and he may have had a point. Although Sleeman asserted that the doctor did not touch spirits and was never intoxicated, he admitted that Ginders drank beer ‘and may possibly take more of that than may be good for him, and with the cigars he smokes his hand is sometimes unsteady in the morning’. It seems that

* Jane Digby went on to have relationships with King Ludwig of Bavaria, his prime minister – who committed suicide when she left him – an Albanian general and an Arab sheikh.



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Ginders was in the habit of taking a ‘stiffener’ at breakfast and before attempting an operation.46 Although Ginders’s name was cleared when Newbery’s lies were uncovered, his career with the Legion was over, and he left on sick leave. He died on the ship to England, though whether the DTs or the fever – or despair – finished him is unknown.47 Sleeman and Ellenborough got rid of the egregious Herbert once their sources confirmed his authorship of the newspaper articles. Herbert never fully recovered from his wound at the hands of the Bundelas, and later committed suicide.48 Beatson comes out of this episode looking rather sanctimonious. His attitude towards drinking was straightforward – it would not be tolerated if it interfered with performance of duties (he had already removed two European NCOs for drunkenness on parade). But to modern eyes his conception of ‘honour’ appears exaggerated, and it would later contribute to his downfall. Nor did the Ginders affair improve his standing in official eyes, as we read: ‘The Governor General in Council very much regrets that dissensions between officers in the Bundlecund Legion should be again brought before him.’ And after Sale left at his own request, Ellenborough confirmed the acting adjutant, Lieutenant Bean, mainly because he ‘seems to get on well with his Commanding Officer Captain Beatson, which is a rare case’.49

Gwalior The end of 1843 found Marian and the baby in Calcutta. On 5 December she had little Marian Jane baptised by Henry Fisher, the presiding chaplain at Fort William. A few days later they boarded the Ellenborough, bound for London.50 Parents serving in India commonly sent their children ‘home’ to be raised in a kinder climate (as Marian’s nephews and nieces had been), but the child was less than two years old, which was young for such a journey. Maybe Marian had family business to attend to in England, or the doctors felt that she needed a sea voyage for her health. Or perhaps her husband felt it was better to send the family away before he plunged into a serious campaign, because he was preparing the Legion to take part in a full-scale invasion. The Punjab had become a military dictatorship ruled by a junta of sirdars (generals) of the Sikh army or khalsa.51 It was clear that they would soon provoke war with the British, but Ellenborough had to clear his flanks before trying conclusions with them. The problem was Gwalior, another failing state with a regency crisis. Gwalior City had a truly great fortress, perched on a perpendicular cliff,52 and the state possessed an army of 30,000 Mahrattas trained by European officers (many of them veterans of the Napoleonic Wars). These troops had close links with the Sikhs, and (like the khalsa) had come to dominate the Gwalior Durbar. Maharaja Jankoji Rao Sindhia died in February 1843, leaving a 13-year-

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old widow. She adopted an 8-year-old boy, who became Maharaja Jayaji Rao Sindhia. But while the British accepted the late Maharaja’s uncle and chief minister, the Mama Sahib, as regent, he was opposed by the Maharani. The army assembled at Gwalior City to exploit the political crisis, leaving the dacoit-infested border unguarded. ‘Sindhia’s Reformed Contingent’ remained loyal to its British officers and together with the Bundlecund Legion was alerted to intervene, but the orders were soon countermanded, as the Regent seemed to be holding his own. Then in June the Mama Sahib was driven out and the mutinous army expelled its European officers.53 Once again, Ellenborough turned to Sleeman, adding ‘Resident at Gwalior’ to his lengthening list of offices. While Sleeman gathered intelligence (one of Beatson’s rissaldars, returning through Gwalior from a horse fair, brought useful information),54 Ellenborough massed troops. The plan was for the new CinC, Sir Hugh Gough, to cross the Chambal into Gwalior from the north, accompanied by Ellenborough in person. Simultaneously Maj-Gen Sir John Grey would cross the Sind from the east. The Legion was to join Grey’s division, the infantry assigned to the 1st Brigade alongside the HM’s 3rd Foot (The Buffs) while the cavalry, along with the 8th BLC and 8th Bengal Irregular Cavalry (BIC), formed the 2nd Cavalry Brigade.55 Concerned that the rising rivers would make the fords impassable after Christmas, Ellenborough opened the campaign on 21 December.56 Grey pushed on towards Gwalior City, leaving Beatson and the Legion guarding the Sind crossings. This was not the kind of service that ambitious officers desired, though securing the lines of communication was important – Grey’s division was accompanied by a nine-mile column of 5,000 hackeries carrying 15 days’ provisions as well as the usual baggage. Afterwards, Ellenborough wrote to that old ‘Sepoy General’ the Duke of Wellington, ‘I do not know what may have been the Baggage of an Indian Army when you knew it – It is now awful, and I am satisfied that some day or other some terrible catastrophe will be the consequence. Officers seem to carry with them the whole furniture of their bungalows.’57 So the Legion sat at the fords while the campaign was brought to a brisk conclusion. Once again, the commanders may not have considered irregulars suitable for frontline service – Grey was a Queen’s rather than a Company officer – or maybe Beatson’s reputation for awkwardness preceded him. Later, Ellenborough tried to soften the disappointment by telling Beatson that the Legion had been left behind ‘by mistake’,58 but whatever the true reason, Beatson and the Legion (apart from a handful of sowars acting as Sleeman’s escort) missed out on the batta, medals, battle honours and promotions that Ellenborough showered on the army after his successful little war.59 Both columns had been confronted by superior numbers of Gwalior troops, and had fought tough, simultaneous battles at Maharajpore and Punniar on 29 December 1843. Ellenborough himself came under fire at Maharajpore, and relished the excitement. Marian’s brother Alexander Humfrays and two young



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Bengal Artillery subalterns, Billy Olpherts and Harry Tombs, distinguished themselves at Punniar with their slick handling of field guns when the baggage train came under attack. These defeats brought the Maharani and Durbar to terms, and the fortress was surrendered without the need for an extremely difficult siege.60

Change of fortune After a succession of snubs, Beatson must have thought his career was going nowhere. The minor glories of Jigni and Chirgong were forgotten among these greater events, and he had a poor reputation with the authorities. Yet at this point his fortunes suddenly changed for the better. After a farewell review of the army at Gwalior on 23 January 1844, Ellenborough marched across Bundelkhand on his return journey. On the way, he summoned the Legion to join him – it was the only part of the force he had not inspected.61 Until now, all Ellenborough had heard about the Legion and its commander had been negative, but when he reviewed them he was hugely impressed. He enthused to Gough, ‘I saw 300 Infantry and as many Cavalry and the 2 Guns of the Bundelcund Legion today. You would have been charmed with them. Captain Beatson appears to know how to handle them well – I never saw Native Infantry so steady – They must have seen the 40th.’62 (HM’s 40th Foot had fought at Maharajpore.) Once again, Beatson had shown that he could put on a good show. Ellenborough the thwarted soldier loved a show (‘Peacock’ was another of his nicknames) and Beatson knew how to pander to it. This was a turning point in Beatson’s career: he now had the enthusiastic patronage of the most powerful man in India. Ellenborough honoured the Legion by requesting a rissala to join the Buffs and the Body Guard in his escort, and to make up for missing the rewards of the recent campaign he gave Beatson and his men the task of securing some Gwalior garhis seized by the Bundela Pertab Singh: ‘We are going to take Kuchwargurh … So Pertab Singh must look around him.’* The Raja of Datia, too, was gathering men, as he objected to peremptory orders to demolish his fort at Seonda and other fortlets.64 To strengthen Beatson’s hand, Ellenborough called in the Legion’s detachments, together with the Jhansi siege train, released the rissala from escort duty, and ordered up two 24-pounder howitzers captured at Gwalior. With that force, he reckoned, Beatson could compel the forts to submit, and if some of the officers at Gwalior ‘should have a fancy for seeing your operations in Kuchwargurh … I see no objection to … giving them leave for 2 or 3 weeks that they may learn what will be of use to them hereafter’. Clearly, he regarded Beatson and his men as

* ‘Kuchwargurh’ apparently refers to Kawalpur (modern Pichhore).63

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experts in this work, who could teach younger officers. ‘Do all you can with shell and shot,’ Ellenborough urged.65 Beatson thanked the Governor General profusely and set to. There was an amusing misunderstanding when he apparently reported taking 5-pounders from Gwalior rather than the 24-pounders (51/2-inch howitzers). Puzzled, Ellenborough’s staff wrote that ‘The Governor General can hardly believe it to be possible that so strange and unmilitary a mistake can have been made.’ Although the original letter does not seem to have survived, it is clear that they simply could not decipher Beatson’s dreadful handwriting! It turned out that the Company’s ammunition did not fit the Gwalior guns, so for future operations Ellenborough sent the Legion two 24-pounder howitzers from Cawnpore.66 However, the Legion, its zealous commandant and the attached volunteer officers were robbed of glory once more. On 6 February they arrived at Laher, the first fort, only to find it deserted, the garrison having evacuated at news of their approach. Next day the same thing happened at Indurki. Beatson left part of his force there, and crossed the Sind to proceed against Amaila, which was also vacated, the Thakur having surrendered with his people. Datia also remained quiet. ‘No resistance has been attempted anywhere,’ a newspaper complained, ‘and the duty is described as dull and disagreeable in the extreme; no excitement, a miserable country in every respect, and to crown all, a heavy rain falling.’ The jagirdars and thakurs of Bundelkhand had learnt their lesson: it was pointless opposing Beatson and his Legion if he was determined to take your fort. Sleeman’s formal thanks for this bloodless little campaign were added to his service record.67 The first favour Beatson asked of his new patron was the grant of colours and standards to the Legion. Ellenborough not only consented but designed them himself: ‘Your Regimental Colour shall be Green with a Silver Star in the centre,’ and he instructed that ‘The green should be the green of Bundlecund, which is not dark.’ He authorised swallowtail cavalry standards of similar design, and agreed to issue formal commissions to the Legion’s native officers (they only held local commissions signed by the Agent in Bundelkhand). Ellenborough ended by wishing Beatson ‘all success in the Command of your fine Corps the appearance and movements of which do you and your officers great credit’.68

A trade dispute Beatson and his fine corps soon returned Ellenborough’s favour. As the Governor General continued his progress, he received disturbing news of Madras and Bengal regiments refusing to relieve Bombay troops on service in Sind.* This was not the * Or Scinde, or Sindh – Richard Burton used all three spellings in the titles of his books on the country.



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river border between Bundelkhand and Gwalior, but a recently annexed province of the same name in North West India, today part of Pakistan, which Sir Charles Napier was struggling to pacify. The so-called ‘Batta Mutiny’ began when a Madras regiment scheduled for foreign service in Burma was diverted to Sind. Learning that they would receive no foreign service batta there – the Bombay troops didn’t get any – the Madrassis refused to embark. Everyone agreed they had been misled and the government cancelled the deployment. More seriously, the 34th BNI refused to march overland to Sind for the same reason. ‘Extra batta’ for Bengal troops serving beyond the Indus had been withdrawn following the end of hostilities in Afghanistan and the annexation of Sind. Sepoys on service expected to live on batta alone, making over their pay to their families left behind in cantonments. Just because Sind had become British did not make it cheaper.69 But there was more to this crisis than pay. Sukkur, Bukkur and Rohri, the conurbation on the Indus that was the British base in Upper Sind, had an evil reputation for sickness. Richard Burton of the Bombay Army, serving on the staff there, later wrote: When the Sepoy from Hindostan wished to address his comrade with a jocose, friendly and polite curse, he cried, ‘Are Bhai! Sakhar, Bakar, Rohri-ko Jao!’ Which [means] ‘Go to Sakhar, Bakar, Rohri, O my brother!’ … warned for service in the Unhappy Valley, he would naively say to his commanding officer, ‘Yes, Sahib, we are Balantir (Volunteers), it is true, but to Sakhar, Bakar, Rohri, go we won’t!’70

These issues of allowances and fear of an unhealthy climate, together with evasive statements by the officers to their men, all recall the Barrackpore Mutiny of 1824, but in the case of the 34th BNI there was a further reason for unrest. The acting CO was Stephen Wheler, a well-known ‘Preaching Colonel’, tireless in seeking to convert Indians to Christianity. Ellenborough commented, ‘I hear Major Wheler is a very good man, that is a very righteous and pious man, but he has not the reputation of being as good with the Regt as he is in Church.’ Proselytising was absolutely contrary to HEIC military regulations but was supported by sections of Victorian society at home, so Ellenborough and Gough played down its significance in this case and concentrated on the batta dispute. The 34th was disbanded with dishonour, the European officers and Eurasian drummers sent to do duty with other regiments.71 We will encounter Wheler’s pernicious influence again. Meanwhile, the contagion of mutiny spread to other regiments ordered to Sind. It was even rumoured that the British soldiers in the force had declared that they would not act against men who were only seeking their rights.72 With all this happening almost on the Punjab frontier, the authorities feared the Sikhs might

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bribe the disaffected troops. Beatson stepped into this dangerous situation by offering to take the Legion to Sind in place of the mutineers. In 1839 it had been merely a gesture for the Legion to volunteer for general service, because it was never envisaged that it would serve outside Jalaun and Jhansi. Now Beatson converted that gesture into substance. As he had in 1839, he explained matters to the men, issuing a proclamation in English, Persian and Hindi, and asking a Bombay sepoy on leave from Sind to go through the men’s lines and answer their questions. Openness brought the desired result and every man on parade the following day ‘rushed forward with a shout’ when invited to volunteer.73 Sleeman immediately informed Ellenborough, adding ‘Capt Beatson is delighted at the prospect of serving under such a soldier as Sir Charles Napier; and I doubt not Sir Charles will be glad to have so zealous & able an officer and so compact a little body under him’. Ellenborough was equally delighted, telling Beatson that it reflected ‘high honour upon the corps and upon you as their commander’, and ‘Good soldiers could desire nothing better than to serve anywhere under Sir C. Napier.’74 Ellenborough the politician recognised a public relations opportunity when he saw one, and immediately instructed the CinC to ‘give every possible publicity’ to the news of the Legion volunteering. ‘It is an excellent corps well commanded & accustomed to be worked about together,’ Ellenborough promised Napier; ‘They are not very fierce looking men but you will find them very serviceable hardy soldiers who will move about well.’75 Beatson in his usual impetuous fashion wanted to set off at once, marching down the new direct road to Bombay to take ship to Sind. Ellenborough restrained him: they would arrive during the hottest season, ‘so we must postpone your march’, but he held out the possibility that the Legion might provide his escort when he went to the Indus in the next campaigning season. He also authorised additional gunners to bring the Legion’s artillery up to a full battery (4 x 9-pounders, 2 x 24-pounder howitzers).76 Ellenborough’s bounty went further: the general order publicly thanking the Legion announced that ‘The Governor General in Council directs that the Cavalry Infantry and Artillery of the Bundlekund Legion shall be permanently attached to the Bengal Army.’ This meant that for the first time the men of the Legion were entitled to long service and disability pensions. Henceforth, the Legion appeared in the Bengal Army List, ranking immediately behind the Regiment of Kelati-Ghilzai (formerly 3rd Shah Suja’s) after the 74 numbered regiments of BNI. The cavalry ranked after the 9th BIC (Christie’s Horse, formerly 1st Shah Suja’s Cavalry), and Beatson was ordered to raise two extra rissalas to bring it up to the full establishment of a regiment of irregular cavalry.77 Within days another GO appeared, authorising a second infantry battalion to take over routine duties in Bundelkhand while the rest of the Legion was in Sind. Its native officers and NCOs were to be found from the 1st Bttn, so there would



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be a lot of promotion.78 To command the 2nd Bttn Ellenborough appointed Lt John Waterfield, who had distinguished himself in the Afghan War.79 Although now regulars, the Legion’s regiments retained their irregular establishment with a very small number of European officers. This did not concern Beatson, who told Ellenborough that the cavalry regiment could be expanded ‘without any additional European officers, the Native Officers of that arm being of a class of men who may be trusted in any situation’.80 Nevertheless, each regiment was given an additional European officer as 2i/c, and its own assistant surgeon. Verner, Barry and Waterfield were each appointed commandant of their respective unit, and Beatson himself was described as ‘Commandant-inChief’, an appointment that appeared nowhere else in the Army List. (He took the opportunity to ask for the letters ‘KSF’ denoting his Spanish Order of San Fernando to be inserted at the same time.) His salary was increased to Rs 1,215-6 annas a month, of which Rs 800 was the command allowance of a brigadier 2nd class, and he was given a staff officer with a brigade major’s salary.81 The man appointed to the Legion Staff was Capt Francis Winter, an Irishman nearly as senior as Beatson, who sometimes acted as his 2i/c in the absence of Verner or Barry.82 Dr Kinloch Kirk, the Scot who had replaced Ginders, became the senior MO to the Legion.83 Several of the other posts were filled by young officers who had been attached to the Legion for the Kuchwargurh expedition. Beatson had been particularly impressed with Lt Henry Reid when he had rushed by forced marches to take part, even though he was sick at the time: he became adjutant of the 2nd Bttn.84 The new cavalry 2i/c was one of Sleeman’s assistants, Lt Fletcher Hayes who was so keen that he was prepared to accompany the Legion to Sind as a volunteer if no post was available.85 Hayes recommended his friend Billy Olpherts of the Bengal Artillery, who had distinguished himself at Punniar. Olpherts had seen the Legion’s amateur gunners at drill, and declared that they served their pieces better than did his own golundazes. So when Ellenborough offered him the opportunity to raise and command his own battery in the force, he seized it.86 William Olpherts was a brave, competent and wildly enthusiastic Ulsterman. In many ways he was a younger version of Beatson, and the two became lifelong friends. Like Beatson, Olpherts pestered superiors with streams of requests and suggestions, alternately imaginative and annoying. It must have been a tonic to Beatson, who did not like bureaucracy, to have a kindred spirit equally ready to cut through difficulties. Beatson raised no objections when Olpherts went direct to higher authority – in contrast to the way he had treated Quin and Hall when they did the same. Unofficially, Beatson probably approved anything that bypassed the cumbersome route of the ‘proper channels’.87 Many years later, Olpherts recalled that Beatson was an extraordinary man and I learnt a great deal with him. He certainly did not spare his officers with some of whom he was not very popular. I got on

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with him better than most as I worked hard, spared no expense on the Battery and was very independent – not troubling myself about my appointment which was exceedingly well paid – except for the professional credit to be gained by it. Beatson knew this and treated me accordingly!88

Olpherts faced a difficult task. So-called ‘Light Field Batteries’ in the Bengal Army were drawn by bullocks, occasionally camels, mules or even elephants. They were manned by companies of the Bengal Foot Artillery who, as the title implies, walked alongside the guns. Only the elite Bengal Horse Artillery, organised to operate at speed alongside cavalry, employed draught horses, and all the gunners rode as well. Experience in Afghanistan and Sind had demonstrated the superior mobility of horse traction, and the army had decided to convert its field batteries.89 Ellenborough and his Council decided that the Legion’s battery would be horsedrawn from the beginning, but complicated matters by decreeing that half would be horse artillery to support the cavalry.90 No organisation tables existed for such a hybrid and Olpherts – who admitted he had never even seen a horsed field battery – had to make it up as he went along. Olpherts had to get the latest-pattern guns, harness and equipment sent from distant magazines, obtain horses from remount depots, drill recruits, find practice ammunition and carry out field training – all ‘during the height of the rains when the Rivers were almost impassable’.91 He organised the men’s uniforms – sensible jackets in artillery blue instead of the sepoys’ red coatees – and weapons. On the latter he had clear ideas, telling Beatson, ‘I trust my men may never be troubled with muskets, weapons they are never intended to use, but that such arms as carbines are urgently desirable for artillery must be clear, when we consider that our Guns, in this country must never for a moment fall into the hands of our enemy.’ He recommended carbines strapped handily to the guns, with the gunners carrying sword bayonets or cavalry swords as appropriate.92 The Military Board accepted most of Olpherts’s suggestions, but the complexity of a hybrid establishment proved insuperable (horse gunners were paid extra, for example), and eventually it settled on a single ‘Horsed Light Field Battery’, with additional mounts for the gunners.93 Bengal was suffering a scarcity of horses – they were having to be imported from New South Wales – and, as usual, some of those sent were old and worn out. Beatson had to organise an emergency ‘casting committee’ to reject them and the officer responsible was reprimanded. After that Beatson was given authority to buy suitable remounts in Sind if he needed them.94 The Military Board apparently regarded the Bundlecund battery as a trial unit for modernising the Bengal Artillery, and the experiences of Beatson and Olpherts were carefully noted. It also decided to equip the Legion’s sepoys with the new percussion musket before they went on campaign. These revolutionary weapons employed a small copper cap containing mercury fulminate, which



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ignited the gunpowder charge when it was struck with a hammer. This was far more reliable than striking a spark from a fragile flint into a pan of powder at the mercy of wind or rain, and doubly so than the glowing piece of slowmatch still widely used in India. In fact, a third of the Legion’s sowars still had matchlocks,95 and Beatson obtained flint locks at the regiment’s expense to convert their weapons. (It was nearly three years before an auditor noticed that the regiment was still claiming ‘match money’, and decided that it would be cheaper for the government to supply flints and stop the allowance.)96 There had been reluctance to put percussion weapons into the hands of irregular and local units, but the Legion was now regular, and was to serve in a frontline province. The 1st Bttn handed its old flintlocks and ammunition pouches over to the recruits of the 2nd Bttn, and received new weapons and accoutrements. And in keeping with the Legion’s semi-official designation as Light Infantry, the Light Company was issued with percussion rifled muskets. However, Beatson’s renewed request for the men to be clothed in rifle green was turned down.97

Ellenborough removed But as Beatson, Olpherts and their colleagues prepared to march, their protector was taken from them. The Court of Directors had had enough of Ellenborough’s independence and barely concealed contempt for them. In April 1844 they recalled him despite the support he still enjoyed from Peel’s ministry. The news shocked Indian military society, which regarded Ellenborough as a welcome reformer. It seemed to mark the victory of the civilians and their jobbery and patronage over Ellenborough’s meritocracy. Peel had his revenge on the Directors, however, in appointing Lt-Gen Sir Henry Hardinge as Ellenborough’s successor. Hardinge was one of Wellington’s most trusted staff officers and had been a progressive secretary at war. Importantly, he was a friend of Ellenborough and could be relied upon to continue Ellenborough’s reforms, yet as a soldier himself, he might be less keen on military adventurism.98 Ellenborough was rewarded with an earldom. He kept in touch with Indian affairs and took a close interest in his protégés there. Soon after his recall, he wrote to Hardinge about Napier’s failure to take the troublesome town of Phuleji: I hope Sir C. Napier will wait for the Bundelcund Legion to do the work at Poolajee, which must absolutely be done & thoroughly. Captain Beatson and the Legion will do it well … It is a noble Corps. I hope before the end of the year they will be entitled to bear the word ‘Poolajee’ or what would be better ‘Scinde’ upon their new Colours, which now only display the silver star of India upon the green ground of Bundelcund99

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Signing himself ‘Commandant in Chief’ for the first time, Beatson thanked Ellenborough for all he had done for the Legion: ‘when the opportunity comes of unfurling our colours before an enemy, the Legion will not forget that it was from your Lordship we received them.’ As to Ellenborough’s recall, Beatson confided that ‘the whole army seems to feel deeply the loss they have sustained’.100

Preparing to march The Legion had never been involved in the regular round of cold season reliefs – indeed, it had never ventured more than a few miles from its familiar haunts – but now it had to prepare for an arduous march of 1,200 miles. Faced with this prospect, the scheming Naib Rissaldar Nabi Bux resigned (to Sleeman’s relief – he had never shared Beatson’s regard for the man) and Beatson and Barry took the opportunity to weed out the older and weaker sepoys to stay behind with the 2nd Bttn, whose new recruits were clamouring to go in their place.101 While all this was going on, and before Hardinge arrived, the civilian councillors fell into a panic about Sind and ordered Beatson to prepare to march immediately. Men were recalled from leave and Sleeman had to hire transport – difficult at short notice, as the Legion required 240 camels and 88 bullocks. He offered to borrow elephants from the rajas. These could haul the guns and heavier equipment through the inundated roads to Agra, and Beatson asked the Deputy Commissary General (his old friend Parsons from the 2/25th BNI days) if commissariat elephants could take over from there. Parsons agreed they could go as far as the edge of the desert, where the fodder ran out and extra camels would be hired.102 Gough quickly overruled the Council and the Legion stood down, to complete its re-equipment and organisation and prepare to march as planned on 10 October.103 Although elephants were no longer needed, transport was still the major preoccupation. Responsible as he was for the former gun bullocks, which were now to haul his store carts, Olpherts had already taken the initiative by hiring a gomasta (native transport agent) and staff.104 Given his experience with Grey’s supply column during the Gwalior campaign, Beatson banned private wheeled transport, warning officers against taking ‘a quantity of baggage quite superfluous to that wants of a soldier’. The only hackeries permitted would be Olpherts’s military carts. Verner objected to this order on the grounds that the march was a relief, not an advance on active service. He was concerned for his pregnant wife,* and he wanted to take all her home comforts with them (Beatson’s own family, of course, was not present).106

* The future Maj-Gen Thomas Verner was born in April 1845.105





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Beatson refused to rescind the order, on the grounds that: I have made it a rule never to permit an officer of the Force to use a kind of carriage for his Baggage which I would not allow the men to use, if therefore Captn Verner was allowed to use hackeries, I should not consider myself justified in forbidding Ram Singh Sepoy to use a hackery, & so it would go on throughout the Force. I consider hackeries the bane of the Indian Army. No force can be efficient which carries them along with it, & I do not see why Regts should not march in service order at a relief.

There was nothing that an officer, sepoy or camp follower might require on the march that could not be carried on the back of a camel, bullock or tattoo (pack pony), he concluded.107 Although this was harsh on Verner – Sleeman certainly thought so – Hardinge supported Beatson’s stance: ‘The Governor General in Council cannot but highly approve’ of a measure aimed at the efficiency of the Legion and the overall comfort of its men.108 No wonder Beatson’s officers often did not like him!

7 THE HEIGHTS OF TRUKKI

When God made the world he threw the rubbish here Sind hillmen1

T

he Legion marched on 15 October 1844, via Gwalior, Agra and Delhi to Sirsa, then across the northern fringes of the great Thar Desert to Bahawalpur on the River Sutlej (see Map 1).2 The gomasta, named Sewpersad, certainly earned his salary. Troops had never before traversed the country from Sirsa to Bahawalpur, so there was no established ‘route’ detailing the camping grounds, bazars, drinking water, fords, etc.3 Sewpersad would have acted like a wagon train captain in the American West, scouting ahead and arranging all these matters, on top of his normal duty of controlling the mass of baggage animals, hackeries and civilian drivers. Payments authorised by Beatson illustrate Sewpersad’s duties, which included hiring doolie-bearers and hackeries to carry the sick and their equipment, and paying ferrymen. When the column struck out over the desert, the local political officer advised Beatson to take large, copper water vessels and puckauls (20 gallon waterskins). Sewpersad purchased these and hired camels and oxen to carry them. At Bahawalpur he had to hire fresh bullocks to bring up the carts carrying the artillery stores and the arms of the sick, which had lagged behind the marching infantry (Beatson had been right about the problems of wheeled transport). The column reached Bahawalpur on 13 December, where it rested. The final stages over the desert had been particularly long because the water sources were widely separated. ‘The horses suffered considerably in coming through the desert from scarcity of forage and water, from long and protracted marches, and from sore backs,’ Verner complained, adding that the workmen (he seems to mean the civilian farriers and saddlers) had all deserted long before. A substantial number of men reported sick – no doubt many were footsore – but overall the Legion could be proud of this pioneering journey.4 It then continued down the Indus Valley to Subzulkote, where Beatson reported his arrival on 23 December. He was ordered to camp there because sickness was

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Map 4: Sind 1845–6

raging in Sukkur.5 The tripartite city of Sukkur–Bukkur–Rohri had become the main military station in Upper Sind, with European barracks, native lines and an arsenal established in the island fortress of Bukkur. But this unfortunate location was becoming known as ‘The Graveyard of Europeans’.6 The Indus floods each summer, and after it subsides the alluvial plain dries out slowly. The 1844 flood had been particularly high, and consequently there was more standing water than usual when the autumn reliefs occurred. HM’s 78th Highlanders, a fine, strong regiment, reached Sukkur in October, but within six weeks it had been devastated by a virulent strain of malaria, spread by mosquitoes hatched from the stagnant water. The governor, Sir Charles Napier, was ‘in a great funk about the sickness in the 78th’, according to a young Scottish doctor, Asst-Surg Patrick Laing, who accompanied him.7 By December over 200 Highlanders had died, and Napier stopped any further troops entering the town. Total deaths in the 78th eventually reached 535 officers and men, together with over 200 members of their families.8 Bombay newspapers were already criticising Napier’s administration, and now they blamed him for the disaster to the 78th. These stories were spread among the men’s relatives in Scotland by his and Ellenborough’s enemies among the Directors, but Napier remained popular with the army.9



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The Devil’s Brother Beatson had told Ellenborough that ‘to serve under so distinguished an officer as Sir Charles Napier I consider very desirable for any officer who wishes to improve himself’.10 Now he had the opportunity to learn practical lessons from one of the most distinctive characters in the British Army. Charles Napier was the eldest son of a large family. Their father, the impoverished younger son of a Scottish lord, raised them with notably liberal views. All three elder boys served with distinction in the Peninsular War and had gone on to become generals and colonial administrators. George, the second, was Governor of Cape Colony, where he was abolishing slavery. William, the third, was Lt-Governor of Guernsey, had written a great History of the War in the Peninsula and was about to publish his Conquest of Scinde, extolling his brother Charles’s recent service. After years on half pay, Charles had been given the Northern Command in England in 1838, where his sensitive handling of Chartist agitation in the Lancashire mill towns (in conjunction with Sir Charles Shaw of the BAL’s Scotch Brigade, now police commissioner in Manchester) marked him out as a humane and effective administrator, and secured him a command at Bombay.11 Sind was occupied almost by accident after Auckland forced a treaty upon the ruling amirs to obtain his invasion route to Afghanistan and to open up the Indus to trade. The amirs resented the British presence and tried to emulate the Afghans in ejecting them. Ellenborough reacted as he had in Bundelkhand by sacking the political officers and appointing a military man to bring it under proper administration. He chose Napier, who soon concluded, ‘We have no right to seize Scinde, yet we shall do, and a very advantageous, useful, humane piece of rascality it will be.’12 Napier beat the amirs in two sharp battles. Allegedly, he sent back a one-word despatch, ‘Peccavi’, which every classically educated schoolboy of the era could translate as ‘I have sinned’. Even if the story was invented by Punch, Napier enjoyed the pun and later used it himself. His appearance was striking, and his statue in London’s Trafalgar Square does not do justice to his enormous side-whiskers and spectacles. The awestruck locals called him Shaitan-ke-Bhai, ‘The Devil’s Brother’.13 For peace and security it was necessary to deal with the tribes of the Kachhi Hills, who habitually raided the settled parts of Upper Sind (Baluchistan). Mounted on wiry horses, armed with swords and matchlocks, they called themselves lutus (from the same root as ‘looter’). They included local tribesmen – Bugtis, Chandias, Domkis, Jakranis and Marris – and freelance swordsmen drawn by the fame of noted leaders. The dominant chief was Beja Khan of the Domkis, who veered between friendship and defiance towards the British and their ally, the Khan of Kalat, who was his nominal overlord. Beja Khan operated from the walled town of Phuleji, which had defied British attack the previous season, but he also had a secret hideout called Trukki (Taraki), deep in the Kachhi Hills.14

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Hardinge approved the proposed campaign against these ‘Parthians of the desert’, but Napier had no support in London, nor in intrigue-ridden Bombay.15 If anything went wrong, he would be on his own, with only his brother William’s public relations efforts to help. And there was every chance that things could go wrong in a tricky operation like this. Napier had two major-generals to assist him, both fellow Scots. His second-incommand was James ‘Jemmy’ Simpson, a former Grenadier Guardsman reputed to be the tallest officer in the British Army, who had fought in the Peninsula and been wounded at Quatre Bras.16 Commanding at Sukkur was George Hunter of the HEIC service,17 who had quelled the Batta Mutiny and brought the disgruntled Bengal reinforcements down the Indus. Napier did not regard either of them highly. He liked ‘old Hunter’ but found him ‘damned troublesome … never would obey orders, and has plagued me to death’.18 In contrast, Simpson was ‘an officer particularly exact in following his instructions’, according to William Napier, but he was pessimistic – at one critical point Charles Napier described him as being ‘in the dismals’. A decade later, when Simpson unexpectedly succeeded to the command in the Crimea, a cheery Scots admiral described him as having an ‘anxious, chirpit countenance’ (a ‘shilpit face’ is pinched or drawn).19 Furthermore, Napier complained that both Simpson and Hunter, in common with many European officers, underrated all natives, whether the enemy or their own sepoys.20 As for junior officers, Napier ranted against the lazy and thoughtless ‘herd’ of young gentlemen. ‘There are two essential qualities necessary to make a soldier – courage and zeal,’ he concluded, ‘and rather I would see a man without the first than the second. Position, discipline, a hundred things may remedy a failure of courage; but want of zeal is a floorer.’21 He preferred to employ small columns under thrusting younger officers like Capt John Jacob of the Sind Irregular Horse and Lt Robert Fitzgerald of the Sind Camel Corps, admired by Olpherts as ‘fiery Jacob’ and ‘terrible Fitzgerald’.22 Like many gunners, Jacob was both a thinker and a practical man. His writings on irregular cavalry were highly influential, and he experimented with new weaponry like double-barrelled, long-range rifles firing explosive ammunition. Despite the age difference (Jacob was eight years his junior), Beatson learned much from him about leading irregulars, including the value of displaying ‘a certain Oriental magnificence’ to impress the troops.23 After serving as Jacob’s adjutant, Fitzgerald had raised his volunteer corps from among regiments serving in Sind. Their mounts were sturdy, two-humped Bactrian camels, capable of carrying heavy loads of baggage or, in this case, two men. One acted as driver and was equipped with a cut-down musket, which he could fire over his recumbent camel when dismounted, while the other rider operated as a mounted infantryman.24



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The army assembles Given the distances and the number of potentially hostile tribesmen, Napier’s force was none too large. The 78th Highlanders were completely hors de combat, and the BNI were sickly and mutinous. Luckily, he had a detachment of HM’s 13th Light Infantry. This battalion had departed for home at the end of its tour of duty, but it was normal for volunteers to transfer to another regiment and continue serving in India. Almost 200 seasoned men of the 13th remained behind, veterans of the epic defence of Jellalabad during the Afghan War. Together with the Sind Horse and Camel Corps they formed the Left Wing at Larkana, while the Bundlecund Legion, the 2nd Bengal Europeans and two weak BNI battalions formed the Right Wing at Subzulkote under Simpson.25 By coincidence, all three cadets who had travelled up to Ghazipore in 1821 were serving in this small army. Christopher Naylor’s career had been blighted by his long-ago court martial, but he was now a captain in the crack 2nd Bengal Europeans. Kenneth McKenzie was in the 64th BNI; no longer just a few days senior to the other two, he was already a regimental major of three years’ standing, which must have rankled with the ambitious Beatson. Despite the destruction of the 54th BNI in Afghanistan, the casualties had mostly been Beatson’s juniors, and he remained a regimental captain.26 While William Beatson was serving in Sind, his brother Robert ended his career. After years of ill health, he retired on 1 June 1845 having completed exactly 22 years in India, and just over 25 years’ service all told – the minimum requirements for claiming full pension.27 The brothers were never to see each other again, as Robert died in December 1848. After a month’s rest, the Legion formed the rearguard of Simpson’s column as it crossed the Indus at Sukkur to march to Shikarpur. To reach that town they had to cross the Dasht-i-anwat, the ‘Desert of Death’, which Burton described as ‘not a sea of sand … here the wilderness is a dead flat, horizon-girt circle of dull, dry drab clay, resembling the tamped floor of a mud-house, in the atmosphere of a brick-kiln. It bears little beyond the bones of horses and cattle.’ The force made a double march of 26 miles to put this grim place behind it.28 Napier had declared war specifically against the Bugtis and their allies the Jakranis and Domkis, to induce other neighbouring tribes to join him. Accordingly, the Chandias from the west co-operated with his Left Wing in capturing Phuleji, while the Marris from the north blocked the exits from Trukki.29 Accompanying the Right Wing was Ali Murad of Khairpur, the only Sind amir who had accepted British rule. He was supposed to bring 5,000 men, but turned up with only around 2,000. Napier seems to have treated the Amir with a sort of amused tolerance, excusing one outburst thus: ‘I imagine he wrote his sorry letter when drunk; and is now in a fright at what he did.’ Afterwards, Napier complained that ‘His presence was a bore because he would not obey orders, and his camp was full of traitors,’30 but at least he had a reliable political

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officer with him in Capt George Malet, and his troops were commanded by ‘Captain’ Henry Curling, a civil engineer and distant relative of Napier’s.31

In the passes The Kachhi hill country is roughly triangular, 140 miles across the northern edge, about 120 miles on the western side but only 50 on the east. It is split by a number of long east–west valleys, linked by a few narrow north–south ravines. These easily defended defiles were the key to operations: forcing them would incur severe casualties. To avoid this, the classic tactic was (and is) to ‘crown the heights’, by inserting picquets on the peaks on either side to command the defiles you need to traverse. But this Napier could not do. Of the Gujru Pass, for example, he exclaimed: It is about twenty miles long, with perpendicular sides of rock – a long stone trough! Flanking parties could not move at the top because of the numerous narrow deep cross clefts, and for twelve miles no water could be sent up to them; yet without such parties the enemy would kill us with stones.32

Instead, Napier intended to shell the defenders out and thus reduce the risk to his own men. He had ‘little mountain guns … ready for running about the hills’, and some light 6-pounder field guns, but unusually for a hill campaign he also took a train of siege guns, mortars and howitzers.33 Napier aimed at a concentric advance by several columns from different directions to drive Beja Khan’s people into one place so that their supplies could be cut off and they would be compelled either to surrender or accept battle. Between 18 and 22 January, by his own admission, Napier missed three chances to destroy the rebels as they moved across his front. Beja Khan had all his women and children with him and Napier felt the non-combatants would be safer if he allowed them to take refuge in the hills. Anyway, his essential artillery and supplies were coming up slowly, and Ali Murad was nowhere near – he should have been in position by the 18th, but failed to arrive until the 31st.34 The Legion was at Shahpur, which was to be the supply base. Forage was almost non-existent, and the commander there was unable ‘to feed either man or horse’, so the bulk of Verner’s cavalry had to remain behind at Khanghur, with only a 100-sabre squadron going forward with the Legion’s HQ.35 Beyond Shahpur the country appeared totally unsuited to cavalry, so Beatson took only 16 sowars with him into the passes. Once sufficient stores had been accumulated, the Legion’s cavalry were relieved at Khanghur and moved in turn to Shahpur, joining the squadron left behind by Beatson. Based here, Verner was to keep open the army’s communications and escort supplies, dâks, etc. (Napier was particularly sensitive about the mails: he had lost the proof sheets of his brother’s



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book The Conquest of Scinde when one dâk was raided.)36 Verner described this arduous duty: Always 2 and frequently 3 and 4 parties daily of from 25 to 50 sabres each, had to proceed on escort duty, from Shahpore to Ooch [Uch], from Ooch to Soorookooshtuk [Zuri-Kushta], and from Soorookooshtuk to Camp. A large party daily was required to protect the grass cutters of the three detachments, and a still larger party the public cattle [government baggage animals] at graze. There were also pickets, patrols, parties in pursuit of cattle carried off, and various other duties.37

Such were the demands on Verner’s horsemen that they were told off for duty ‘by heel ropes’, a kind of ‘cab rank’ system, where detachments were selected by simply counting off the first available horses along the picket rope (to which they were secured by heel ropes). Afterwards they returned to the end of the rope. As well as escorts, there were dours, hasty expeditions chasing after reports of the enemy. Verner himself led one of these, leaving Shahpur at 11.00 and not returning until 02.00 the following morning. A detachment of 56 Legion cavalry under a native officer scoured the hills from 18 February until the end of the campaign, often going two or three days without food. An officer observed of this detachment’s horses that ‘their legs and feet were battered to pieces by climbing up and down sharp stony precipices, scarcely practicable for goats, and most of these were without shoes, which were not to be had’. William Napier claimed that a single horseshoe sold for 30 shillings (£1.50) during this campaign.38

The advance resumes Napier advanced to Uch, 10 miles east of Shahpur, to secure the defile into the Tonge Valley, then sent Simpson on a long left hook to Phuleji and Dera Bugti, while Napier himself traversed the Lalli and Jummuck passes in front. Napier told Jacob on 2 February that ‘Jummuck is nothing’, but the Lalli was ‘a different affair’ and he would fortify it to secure his communications before moving on. Four days later Napier was ‘still in this d––d pass’ because the hired camel drivers refused to go further and deserted with their animals. Instead, he employed Fitzgerald’s camel corps. Leaving the mounted infantrymen behind, the armed drivers got back to Shahpur in one march of 50 miles, ‘scouring’ the Tonge ravine as they went. They then loaded up with 20 tons of flour and rode straight back. This enterprise took only three days and two nights, instead of six days with a conventional camel train.39 Napier was engaged in a war of supplies: as long as he could bring up a trickle from Shahpur, he could outlast Beja Khan. ‘The gist of my operations is patience,’

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he wrote, ‘slow consuming time is my weapon, the robbers’ food is limited, mine is now inexhaustible. He lives on his capital, I on my interest.’ Thanks to Fitzgerald’s men he now had 12 days’ provisions in camp, with more coming up, and six weeks’ supplies back at Shahpur. In emergency he would bring these up by dismounting half the cavalry and the camel corps and using their mounts as pack animals.40 Hemmed in by the hills, his herds diminished by Jacob and Verner’s dours, Beja Khan offered to surrender, but would not accept Napier’s primary condition: that he and his people must reside in the plains and abandon their fastnesses. The temporary ceasefire allowed Napier to build up supplies while those of the tribesmen dwindled. Napier even extended the armistice to allow Beja Khan a period of mourning when his favourite wife died.41

The Legion marches in By 19 February Beja Khan had still not come in, so Napier resumed hostilities, hoping to catch the tribesmen by surprise. The Bundlecund Legion joined Napier’s camp at Shore, about two miles below the last great pass of Gujru.42 Olpherts never forgot their first meeting with the General, whom he described as the finest soldier he ever met: Sir Charles asked me if I could take two guns unto the Bhoogtie Hills. I said I could take all my Battery of 6 guns. ‘I did not ask you, sir, if you could take them all. I asked if you could take 2 guns!’ Anxious to take as many as possible I repeated what I first said. Then the Eagle Eye was fixed on me and in short sharp and decided words I was again asked if I could take two guns – to which I replied in the affirmative.

Olpherts was afterwards glad of Napier’s insistence, for two guns were quite enough for his battery to manage in those hills – and even these were little 6-pounder Horse Artillery guns rather than the Legion’s 9-pounders.43 Over the next few days Beatson carried out reconnaissances, on the 21st with Ali Murad and Capt Malet to the Dera road, on the 23rd with Winter, Barry and Hayes and an escort of 50 sepoys into the hills to the north-west, where they found recent campfires but no sign of the tribesmen. Next day they went out to the top of the hills to the south-west and again found nothing, but after they returned to camp a party of Baluchi horsemen attempted to seize some grazing baggage camels. The raiders were driven off and escaped along hidden paths. ‘As yet I have not lost a single animal,’ Beatson noted proudly. He found the country extremely rough: On the 25th I went up the valley to the north of Goojroo, over a very rugged pass, and descended into the sandy bed of a river, the only apparent entrance for



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which is through a chasm about thirty feet wide, formed by perpendicular rocks on each side, of about two hundred feet in height; so regular is this chasm, that it looked as if a column of infantry had opened from its centre by subdivisions, closing fifteen paces outwards.

One shot was fired from a distant hill, but they saw nobody. Beatson was convinced that the enemy wanted to avoid fighting ‘or he would never have allowed Sir Charles’s force to go without opposition through passes where he might by rolling down rocks have destroyed the force without losing a man’.44 Napier feared that the tribesmen would break out westward past Simpson, so he went himself to reinforce Dera, sending Ali Murad south-east to Loti, and ‘leaving the Bundelcund Legion at Shore under a resolute soldier, Captain Beatson’. Shore was dangerously isolated if Beja Khan decided to come out to the south-east, so if he was attacked in force, Beatson was ordered to fall back to Loti while Hunter and Simpson marched to his assistance. On the other hand, if Beja Khan followed Napier towards Dera, Beatson and Ali Murad were to close in on his rear.45 Beatson’s men were on half rations of unground wheat, but even when down to their last half ration, ‘there was never a murmur from any man of the Legion’, as the sepoys were confident that ‘the general will not forget us’. ‘And true enough, he did not forget us: for as sure as the sun was about to disappear behind the Belooch hills in the evening, a string of camels with supplies was seen ascending the pass, thus justifying the confidence of the soldiers.’ Beatson was impressed with the hold Napier exerted over the army: ‘the whole secret is, they had confidence in their general, and where soldiers have that they will do anything.’ Beatson himself deserved credit for his men’s steadiness – William Napier called him ‘a stern determined soldier’.46 ‘We must find out where Trukkee is! We are in the dark,’ Napier confided as he struggled through the Gujru Pass. ‘The last day’s march was through a terrible country,’ he wrote. ‘[A]rmies have been destroyed here, and no wonder; but I have hold of the [Gujru] pass into the plain of Deyrah, and would not let it go for all India!’ He was informed that Trukki was just two marches distant.47 While the General was at dinner on the evening of 28 February, a trooper galloped in with news that the enemy had attacked a convoy within three miles of camp. Napier sallied out with his guard to assist the convoy escort, at which the hostile horsemen simply disappeared into a cleft in the rocks. ‘Trukki!’, exclaimed the guide – and indeed it was, not two marches away as the man had believed. Immediately, Napier blocked this entrance with a strong cavalry and infantry picquet. A spy said that Beja Khan with 3,000 men had already entered the refuge by another path.48 Napier sent off a swift camel courier with orders to Beatson and Ali Murad to swing round the other side of Trukki and block the northern exit. Beatson received these instructions on 2 March, but finding the intended route to Loti impassable

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for guns he descended the Gujru into the Dera valley and skirted the hills until he found another pass leading north. This route was also very difficult (‘climbing, not marching’ according to Napier) but the Legion dragged the 6-pounders through, and joined Ali Murad’s camp. They were also joined by a detachment of the Camel Corps, carrying the volunteers of HM’s 13th Light Infantry, together with orders for Beatson to act independently if Ali Murad would not co-operate.49 Finding that Beatson was determined to push on as soon as his rearguard cleared the pass, Ali Murad reluctantly marched off with Beatson following a few hours behind. It was an arduous journey, ‘the difficulties of the country frequently obliging me to dismount the Europeans from the camels to drag the guns up passes, while the horses were found quite unequal to it,’ Beatson reported. About dusk he was riding at the head of the column when three horsemen arrived wearing the red turbans of Ali Murad’s men (Beja Khan’s followers wore white or green). They told him that Beja Khan had surrendered and Napier had ordered a halt. ‘Their story was so plausibly told, that I must confess I thought there was truth in it,’ Beatson recalled; ‘but at the same time I was too old a soldier to halt without written instructions to do so, after I had received Sir Charles’s positive orders to blockade the rear of Trukkee as soon as possible.’ The men disappeared and Ali Murad declared that they must have been sent by the enemy. Beatson was amused by the incident: ‘the ruse was well planned and skilfully carried out. Tallyrand could not have kept his countenance better, or told his story more plausibly than the Beloochees did.’50 Once in position, Beatson was to send daily reports, but not to attack without orders. He dutifully wrote his reports but Ali Murad’s couriers let him down. Until Winter went back with an escort of Bundlecund cavalry on 7 March, no word got through, and Napier became anxious: ‘No news yet of Beatson and Ali Moorad being at the north entrance; until they are I cannot attack.’51 Waiting for news, Napier spent a few days reconnoitring the ‘famous hold’ of Trukki. He found that it was about 12 miles long by six broad, with precipitous sides. Inside was a basin of smaller rocky hillocks among which the tribesmen camped. ‘I am tired with ascending a high rock to examine the robbers’ position, and a devil of a one it is, yet I think to work them out. If we get in upon them there will be terrible slaughter. I hope to God their women and children are not there.’ The cleft through which the raiders had disappeared was the only entrance on the south side. ‘Examined the grand entrance, and see no better way of attacking them than by escalading the rock, and all the Europeans have volunteered; but I have selected Fitzgerald and 250 men; it will be a stiff job I fear,’ Napier concluded. He had observed that the enemy picquets were slack at night, and so prepared to assault the position in the dark. Surprise would be compounded by the noise: ‘No one unaccustomed to the reverberations of musketry against even a small sloping height can conceive how great it becomes against perpendicular rocks; it would have been deafening there, the valley would have been filled with smoke,’ Napier observed. A diversionary flank attack and a simultaneous attack from the



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rear by Beatson and Ali Murad, led by the 13th LI, completed Napier’s desperate plan. Luckily it was never attempted, as affairs elsewhere overtook it.52

Try Trukkee! Thanks to Ali Murad’s slackness, Beatson was as much in the dark as Napier. He admitted that, ‘After we had been some days in rear of Trukkee, I got impatient at seeing or hearing nothing of the enemy, and also at receiving no intelligence of what was going on with Sir Charles’s force in front of Trukkee – I therefore determined to go some distance into Trukkee to reconnoitre.’ He moved at daybreak on 6 March with the Legion and the 13th. ‘Got across by descending and ascending several places that a goat could easily climb but they were rather difficult for men,’ reported the ‘disgusted’ Dr Laing. However, the effort was worthwhile, because they could ‘see the whole of Truckie, a perfect bird’s eye view, immense herds of camels and goats’. It was probably during this reconnaissance that Beatson observed the tribesmen hauling camels up and down almost vertical slopes by means of ropes. Returning to camp he was astonished to find that while he had gone to the right, Ali Murad had moved some miles off to the left, leaving the vital mouth of the pass unguarded – ‘a strange kind of cooperation,’ Beatson noted drily. From then on, he was obliged to leave part of his own force to seal the exit.53 On 8 March Beatson again penetrated a short way into Trukki to investigate some men he had seen. He had, of course, sent picquets to crown the heights, which involved clambering in single file by goat-paths. One of these parties consisted of 16 ‘of those daring soldiers, the volunteers of Her Majesty’s 13th’, led by Sjt John Power, together with one sepoy of the Camel Corps. By mistake, this party got on the wrong side of a chasm; the rest of their company on the other side could see that they were climbing towards a large number of tribesmen concealed behind a breastwork of rocks. Urgent hand signals were misinterpreted, and Power’s party continued to climb. As they hauled themselves up onto the plateau, out of breath from their exertion, they found themselves facing about 70 Baluchis in the breastwork 20 yards away, who fired a volley and then attacked, sword in hand.54 The British could have fled: instead they fired their muskets and charged desperately into the enemy mass. Of course they were overwhelmed and pushed back towards the edge. One man bayoneted two tribesmen and was then knocked down by a rock. Another – Pte John Maloney – thrust his bayonet into a Baluchi, who pulled it out and wounded Maloney himself with it. Their horrified comrades across the ravine opened fire in support, but the range was long. Assistant-Surgeon Laing seized a man’s musket to take a pot at a ruffian who was hopping around. I struck the ground close to his feet as my hand was in, I then got a rifle from a

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rifleman and as I was taking it out of his hand he was struck through the thigh. We continued firing until all retreated.

Afterwards, the splash marks of the musket balls could be seen on the rocks where they had fallen short. (The rifleman Laing refers to was probably a sepoy from the Legion’s Light Company; he records that the man needed to have his leg amputated.) 55 ‘The bravest of the brave could not have done more than these few men of Her Majesty’s volunteers,’ Beatson wrote of the action he had witnessed. Power’s party had six men killed and three wounded before the survivors tumbled back down the precipitous path. Apparently they had killed about 17 of the enemy. Afterwards, the tribesmen stripped the bodies of the dead soldiers and pitched them off the hill. It was their custom to tie a green or red thread round the wrists of their own fallen heroes to mark their prowess; when Beatson’s men recovered the bodies of the British volunteers, they found that each bore red threads on both wrists – a singular honour.56 Over the following days the curious British explored where the action had taken place. ‘I got up to the place where our men were killed and never had such a climb in my life,’ wrote Laing. Beatson noted that the veterans of the 13th ‘who had been through the campaigns in Affghanistan, declared they had never seen anything at all to compare it in that country – “My eye what a place” was the exclamation’. He excused the tactical failure that had occurred: The gentlemen of the pipeclay school will probably ask why was this flanking party so far separated from the main column, and where were the connecting files! My answer is, You were never in Trukkee or you would not ask: – it is there quite impossible to keep either distances or communication. I have seen an officer, whom I knew to be a gallant fellow under the enemy’s fire, lose his head on the ledge of a rock overhanging a precipice, so that several soldiers were obliged to help him across. I have seen others caught by the feet between two rocks, and several men required to extricate them, with the loss of their shoes: – if this will not explain to the martinet why distances and communications were not kept, I have nothing left for it but to recommend him to ‘try Trukkee’.57

It was a petty little fight, similar to thousands that would occur on India’s frontiers over the next century, but it caught the Victorian public’s imagination. Napier’s first despatch suggested that the men of the 13th had been ‘killed in consequence of their own imprudence’, but after he had spoken to Beatson and other eyewitnesses, and had met the survivors in hospital, hearing their stories of Power’s leadership and ‘the bold Sepoy of the Camel Corps’, he decided that he had been misled by Beatson’s initial report. He revised his despatch, listing each man of Power’s party, his previous medals, and his fate – remember, this was an era when only commissioned officers were normally mentioned by name.



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Even Wellington expressed his approbation and enquired whether Sjt Power was qualified to hold a commission. Presumably he was not, but just before Napier died Power asked him for a reference and the old General wrote a glowing testimonial for the man whose courage he had not forgotten.58 That was not the end of the affair. William Napier gave the episode a prominent place in his book on the campaign, for which Beatson supplied a detailed account. Charles Napier later told the story to the poet Sir Francis Hastings Doyle, who composed The Red Thread of Honour (see p. 133), which became popular both with the Victorian public and – translated into Pushtu – among the frontier tribes. The leading military artist of the day, David Cunliffe, painted The Heights of Trukkee, which is now in the Regimental Museum of the old 13th LI.59

Commanding the frontier The day after Power’s fight, Beatson received a note from Curling saying that Beja Khan had surrendered, and this was soon confirmed from HQ. ‘The old fox’ (Napier’s description) had recognised that the game was up, with Beatson and those indomitable soldiers in his rear and Satan’s Brother obviously preparing to blow down the front door of Trukki with huge guns. He was wise to surrender at discretion rather than try to run: ‘the camel corps owes Beja a grudge and if Fitzgerald overtakes him he is a dead man,’ Napier observed. After the surrender, Fitzgerald and his men went to secure the hill they were to have stormed. That night on the hilltop their bayonet-points danced with bright flames of ‘St Elmo’s fire’, a result of electricity in the hot, dry atmosphere – Caesar’s legionaries had once seen a similar phenomenon on their javelins. With this fitting omen of good fortune, the campaign ended.60 Beatson was deservedly mentioned in Napier’s despatch after the campaign. Writing to Hardinge to congratulate him on Napier’s success, Ellenborough commented: ‘He has given a fine instruction to the officers with him in one of the most difficult of Military operations and one of them at least, Beatson, is capable of profiting by it.’ At the other end of the hierarchy, Sjt Todd, 2i/c of the Legion’s artillery, attracted Hunter’s attention as ‘a most active and zealous soldier’, and was recommended for a salary increase commensurate with his responsibilities.61 That Beatson stood in high favour with Napier was demonstrated when the General put him in command of the whole Upper Sind Frontier, from Larkana to Shahpur, with his HQ at Shikarpur and with the 7th BLC under his command in addition to the Legion. The area was under martial law, and Beatson was made president of the military commission to try serious criminal cases. He may have presided over the trial of Dera Khan of the Jakranis for beating one of his followers to death; although the man was found guilty only of manslaughter, the Baluchis were aghast at the idea of a chief being punished for such a trivial occurrence.62

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Although Beatson felt honoured by the command, Shikarpur was not an enviable posting. Once an important town on the caravan routes from Central Asia, it was just a dusty place of sun-dried brick, surrounded by an ancient, crumbling, mud wall with two forts. The military station, as usual, was about two miles distant, across mosquito-ridden ground that was inundated during the annual Indus flood. The hot weather was beginning as the Legion took up residence, and (as recalled by an officer of the regiment that relieved them a year later) ‘The appearance of this cantonment certainly did not look very inviting, being situated in the midst of a sandy plain, while the officers’ houses – being merely of plastered mud, whitewashed, with flat roofs and no gardens, had a gloomy aspect.’ ‘The hot season lasts nearly six months,’ the same officer observed, ‘there is no monsoon in this country, the heat increasing in intensity up to August, when it is almost unbearable, and extremely trying to the constitution. In fact, notwithstanding punkahs and other cooling appliances, we deemed ourselves fortunate if the thermometer was within 100o!’ A Sindi proverb ran: ‘O God, when thou hadst created Sibi and Dadhar [two towns in the area], what object was there in conceiving hell?’63 In this country all military activity ceased during the hot weather. The battles now were with army bureaucracy. One was over compensation to the Bundlecund cavalry for the horses that died or were cast (discarded or sold) during the previous tough campaign. To take one example: when Beatson was behind Trukki and communications broke down, he sent Winter back to report to Napier, accompanied by an escort of 13 sowars under Rissaldar Kullundur Khan. The round trip took 40 hours and seven of the horses broke down on the road that Winter described as ‘the worst for horses I ever saw’.64 Beatson was responsible for a number of outposts in his district. Where three full cavalry regiments could not keep the frontier quiet before the hill campaign, these patrol outposts now sufficed, though there were occasional robberies by Bugti lutus. However, the frontier commander’s freedom of action was curtailed by army bureaucracy: to move as little as an escort required referral to headquarters.65 Dealing with such idiocies must have driven Beatson to distraction in the heat and dust of Shikarpur.

Quest for promotion The Legion’s officers amused themselves as best they could in their out-of-theway posting. Dr Kirk wrote a book on the medical geography of Sind.66 Beatson also took up his pen, as he often (and often unwisely) did when he was bored and frustrated. Taking advantage of Ellenborough’s polite expression of interest in the Legion and his own career, he wrote privately to the former Governor General. Although stressing his pride in being entrusted with an important detachment at Trukki, he lamented that – as with the Kuchwargurh command that Ellenborough



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had given him – no real action had ensued, and as a result he was still a captain where he might have been a brevet lieutenant-colonel by now. He was resentful that the Court of Directors had not taken ‘the slightest notice’ of the Legion’s volunteering and subsequent service (although we can see that this neglect was probably due to the Directors’ antipathy towards Ellenborough and Napier). Now Napier had given him command of the frontier – a brigadier’s command, Beatson implied – but still no promotion came.67 Whereas regimental rank in the HEIC service was a matter for the Company, brevet rank was conferred by a Queen’s commission, and was in the gift of the CinC at Horse Guards, at that time the Duke of Wellington. What Beatson did not know was that Ellenborough had already written to Wellington on his behalf. On receiving Beatson’s news-letter from India, he wrote to the Duke again, though neither application secured anything more than polite acknowledgement of Beatson’s worth. Ellenborough forwarded these to Beatson, and congratulated him on the ‘distinction’ shown him by Napier, but was unable to do more.68 Now Marian Beatson, who was residing at Ryde on the Isle of Wight, also approached Ellenborough. She would, she wrote, ‘feel exceedingly obliged’ if Ellenborough would ask Hardinge to support her husband’s claim. She got a rather curt reply from Ellenborough: formal applications for brevet promotion had to come from India, and had he received such a request when he was governor general, ‘I should have disregarded it, and have acted altogether upon my own view.’ Furthermore, he pointed out that once Wellington reached a decision he never changed it. Marian apologised for the breach of protocol, and admitted that her action ‘might be disapproved by Capt Beatson himself’, but she signed off with a brisk and soldierly, ‘I remain, My Lord, Your Obedient Servant’. Beatson’s letter thanking Ellenborough for his intervention did not arrive until much later.69 Slow communications sometimes left Beatson looking foolish when his pen got the better of him. At the beginning of 1846 he sent an ill-judged letter to Napier begging to be included in the field force that was to march against the Sikhs. Unfortunately, Napier was besieged with similar requests from almost every officer in Sind. Beatson’s letter crossed with a general order issued to stop the annoyance, so Napier was understandably angry to receive another request and sent a terse reply. Mortified, Beatson apologised for his ‘gross impropriety’ and blamed the postal delay. This gaffe does not seem to have harmed his relations with Napier, who later wrote of Beatson as ‘one who did right good service when under my command, which I have neither forgotten, nor have I any disposition to forget’.70 It made little difference. For all Napier’s detailed strategic planning, the Sikh War ended swiftly and the Sind field force was not employed, though it might have secured a more decisive victory. Beatson wrote, ‘there never would have been a second [Sikh War] had Sir Charles Napier’s plan of operations been carried out’.71 His cousin Lt Douglas Charles Turing Beatson (son of Maj-Gen Alexander Beatson) was one of the casualties of this short campaign. Wounded at Ferozeshah

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on 21 December 1845 and at Sobraon on 19 February 1846, he died from the effects of the second wound, aged 24. The officers of his regiment erected a monument to him at Ferozepore.72 About this time Beatson may have met a trio of younger Bombay officers who were important in his later career. One was Lt Henry Green, adjutant of Jacob’s Sind Horse,73 another was Lt Forbes Bruce, adjutant of Fitzgerald’s Camel Corps.74 A third could have been Lt Richard Francis Burton, an interpreter on Napier’s staff whose writings we have already encountered. He missed the hill campaign while working on the Sind Survey, and had become notorious because of his undercover report on male brothels in Karachi. His delight in passing himself off as a native, and in accurate surveying, were pointers to his future exploits as an anthropologist and explorer.75

Return to India With only small forces required in Sind, the homesick Bengal troops could be returned. This process began in March 1846, when Bombay regulars relieved the Legion’s outposts.76 The Legion was under orders to return to Bundelkhand and occupy the new cantonments at Nowgong. The infantry and artillery went first, followed a few weeks later by the cavalry. Undertaking such a journey in March was unusual, but doubtless everyone was pleased to escape the oven of Upper Sind before the onset of the hottest weather and the floods. The return march was almost as hard as the journey out. Just four stages beyond Sukkur some of the hospital doolie-bearers deserted and Beatson had to authorise the gomasta to hire new men. There were sick and weakly men with fever or boils on their feet who had to be helped along, and Dr Kirk complained that the kajawas were falling to pieces. (A pair of these frames slung across a camel could carry two sick men.) The gomasta had to get them repaired and hire additional camels with kajawas to carry men and their weapons. By the time the column reached Khanpur on 31 March the number of men being carried had reached 82, some of them injured by falling into drainage ditches while marching during the cool of the night. From Bahawalpur the sick and injured were conveyed by boat along the Sutlej, while the Legion marched by the parallel road.77 While this march was in progress, the Legion’s orders were changed. It was now to go into cantonments at Ferozepore and Ludhiana on the Punjab Frontier, but at least there were opportunities for overdue leave – in 1844 men had been recalled early for the aborted early march to Sind. Beatson himself probably took some leave now, because Winter was left in charge of the Legion during June 1846. Billy Olpherts had already gone, having volunteered to command the artillery in a little mopping-up expedition in the Punjab.78



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End of the Legion Barely a month after settling into its new cantonments, while many of its officers and men were still absent, Hardinge issued a general order that signalled the end of the Bundlecund Legion – though he presented it as a great honour. The Legion’s infantry would replace the 34th BNI in the Army List, as they had already replaced that disgraced regiment on campaign. The blow for Beatson and his officers was that they would lose their positions and return to their parent regiments, while the cadre of European officers from the old 34th would take over. This must have been especially galling because these were the same officers who had so completely lost control of their previous regiment.79 Beatson’s sepoys undoubtedly viewed the situation differently. Many had come from the disbanded state armies, others had probably failed to gain entry to the regular BNI on grounds of physique or lack of connections. Now they would obtain the full status, pay and pension of a Company sepoy. Even better off were those native officers from the BNI who had relinquished those rights to qualify for accelerated advancement in the Legion. Having benefited from Beatson’s generous promotions and the expansion of the Legion, they had leapt over the heads of many contemporaries, and now regained their pension rights as well. It is hardly surprising that all the native officers, NCOs and men of the 1st Bttn of the Legion, except two sepoys, volunteered for transfer to the reconstituted 34th BNI.80 Lieutenant-Colonel William Marshall of the 34th assumed command on 19 July. In a generous gesture towards his new soldiers he asked for the regiment to be designated the ‘Scinde Volunteers’, but this was rejected on the grounds that it would only draw attention to the old 34th’s refusal to march to Sind. The men kept the blue facings of the Legion – their 1846 clothing issue had already been manufactured and it was too expensive to reinstate the red facings of the old 34th. They also kept the colours given to them by Ellenborough, though the ‘Bundelkhand Green’ seems to have faded to blue in the Sind sun. Other than that, any connection to the Legion was scrubbed out: the Army List even reinstated the disbanded regiment’s lineage – ‘Late 1st Bn 17th NI’ – and its sepoy name of Brudshaw-ka-Paltan.81 Shortly afterwards, the Legion’s gunners were also given the opportunity to transfer to regular companies of the Bengal Artillery, while the drivers, horses and the modern guns and equipment were designated No 17 Light Field Battery, replacing a disbanded bullock battery.82 Next it was the turn of the 2nd Bttn of the Legion and of the ‘service battalion’ of the BMP to be disbanded, with the men given the opportunity to transfer to the BNI.83 Only the Legion’s cavalry regiment retained its separate existence; it was simply redesignated the 10th Bengal Irregular Cavalry (BIC) and went back to Bundelkhand to replace the disbanded rissalas of mounted police. Verner was confirmed as captain commandant.84 The Court of Directors approved these arrangements, finally acknowledging (as Beatson had so ardently desired) the loyalty of the Legion in having volunteered for Sind, but at the same time welcoming the cost reductions achieved by its

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disbandment.85 On disbandment, the Legion presented Beatson with a sword bearing the inscription: ‘To Major W.F. Beatson, late Commandant-in-Chief of the Bundelkund Legion, from his friends of the Legion, in token of their admiration of him as a soldier, and their esteem for him as an individual.’ This may be the nativestyle senior officer’s ‘Mameluke sword’ he is seen wearing in later portraits.86 Winter, Olpherts and some junior officers from the Legion found posts in a new Frontier Brigade being raised to control the Punjab. Barry was given command of the 1st Arakan Bttn in Burma and was killed at its head in the Burma War of 1852, while Waterfield returned to Europe on sick leave.87 Beatson was hardest hit by the disbandment, losing his generous command allowance. At the beginning of the year he had written to Napier that ‘I am perfectly independent of the service and remain in it only with the hope of obtaining military rank and distinction’. He seems to have been alluding to the fact that he had just passed the requisite length of service (25 years, of which 22 had to be in India) to take his pension if he chose. When ‘Captain Gregory’ (the fictional character created by Maj George Vetch of the 54th BNI in his novel The Gong) reached this point, he was ‘entitled to a captain’s pension of £180 – the summit of his ambition; and he resolved … to apply for permission to retire on this magnificent remuneration from all his battles with muskets and musquitoes [sic]’, just as Vetch himself had done in 1835. Beatson’s ambition was clearly stronger than his old comrade’s, and he sought further employment.88 At least he had his family with him while he waited. The Prince of Wales from London arrived at Calcutta in October 1846, bearing ‘Mrs Beatson and child’ on its passenger list. In November Beatson finally received his brevet majority. Unfortunately, this was not the personal promotion for distinguished service for which he had lobbied, but merely the result of a mass brevet affecting hundreds of HM and HEIC officers whose promotion was considered to have fallen behind. Beatson ranked 133rd out of almost 250 HEIC captains with seniority between 1829 and 1837 who became majors on this list. And of course his salary and allowances remained those of a regimental captain.89

New challenge Beatson was now in his 43rd year, his character was fully developed and his style of command and man-management had crystallised. We know he could be argumentative – that was nothing unusual among Europeans in India, where sun and boredom exacerbated the tensions of a small, closed community. He could be harsh on his European officers; still, the better ones thrived under his leadership, and he could spot a talented young man. Provided they did their jobs, he was supportive of his European NCOs and native officers. Ambitious for promotion himself, he was willing to promote good men quickly. Beatson knew how to put on a good parade-ground show to impress visiting dignitaries, but he had also



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gained a reputation for training combat-ready troops. In Bundelkhand the Legion had prided itself on the speed with which it could respond to a request for help, while in Sind it had shown itself capable of long marches and arduous service. He was a driver, holding his men to their tasks: ‘resolute’, ‘determined’ and ‘stern’ were the adjectives applied to him by the Napiers. He could be a demanding subordinate, always requesting some new piece of kit or concession for his men, and his ideas were liable to run ahead of administrative practicalities, but he seems to have co-operated well with Fraser and Sleeman. He completely overcame Ellenborough’s initial prejudice against him, such that the Governor General became his greatest supporter. Now he had to hope that this ‘interest’ and his recognised skills would recommend him for a new posting. Luckily, although Hardinge had brusquely disbanded the Legion, he too had been impressed not only by ‘the very energetic and able manner’ in which Beatson had commanded it in Sind, but also the way in which he had loyally carried out the disbandment. The Governor General now used his powers of patronage to obtain an even better appointment for this useful officer. On 25 January 1847 he appointed Beatson acting brigadier in the Nizam of Hyderabad’s Army.90

The Red Thread of Honour Sir Francis Doyle91 ‘Told to the author by the late Sir Charles Napier’ Eleven men of England A breast-work charged in vain, Eleven men of England Lie stripp’d and gashed, and slain. Slain; but of foes that guarded Their rock-built fortress well, Some twenty had been mastered When the last soldier fell. Whilst Napier piloted his wondrous way Across the sand-waves of the desert sea, Then flashed at once, on each fierce clan, dismay, Lord of their wild Truckee These missed the glen to which their steps were bent, Mistook a mandate from afar half-heard, And, in that glorious error, calmly went, To death, without a word.

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The robber chief mused deeply, Above those daring dead; ‘Bring here’, at length he shouted, ‘Bring quick, the battle thread. Let Eblis blast for ever Their souls if Allah will, But we must keep unbroken The old rules of the Hill’. ‘Before the Ghiznee tiger Leapt forth to burn and slay; Before the holy Prophet Taught our grim tribes to pray; Before Secunder’s lances Pierced through each Indian glen; The mountain laws of honour Were framed for fearless men’. ‘Still, when a chief dies bravely, We bind with green one wrist – Green for the brave – for heroes One crimson thread we twist, Say ye, oh gallant Hillmen, For these, whose life has fled, Which is the fitting colour, The green one, or the red?’ ‘Our brethren laid in honoured graves, may wear Their green reward’, each noble savage said; ‘To those whom hawks and hungry wolves shall tear Who dares deny the red?’ Thus conquering hate, and steadfast to the right, Fresh from the heart that haughty verdict came; Beneath a waning moon, each spectral height Roll’d back its loud acclaim. Once more the chief gazed keenly Down on those daring dead; From his good sword their heart’s blood Crept to that crimson thread. Once more he cried, ‘The judgement, Good friends, is wise and true,



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But though the red be given, Have we not more to do?’ ‘These were not stirr’d by anger, Nor yet by lust made bold; Renown they thought above them, Nor did they look for gold. To them their leader’s signal Was as the voice of God: Unmoved and uncomplaining, The path it showed they trod’. ‘As without sound or struggle The stars unhurrying march, Where Allah’s finger guides them, Through yonder purple arch, These Franks, sublimely silent, Without a quickened breath, Went in the strength of duty, Straight to their goal of death’. ‘If I were now to ask you, To name our bravest man, Ye all at once would answer, They call’d him Mehrab Khan. He sleeps among his fathers, Dear to our native land, With the bright mark he bled for Firm round his faithful hand’. ‘The songs they sing of Roostum Fill all the past with light; If truth be in their music, He was a noble knight. But were these heroes living, And strong for battle still, Would Mehrab Khan or Roostum Have climb’d, like these, the hill?’ And they replied, ‘Though Mehrab Khan was brave, As chief, he chose himself what risks to run; Prince Roostum lied, his forfeit life to save, Which these had never done’.

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‘Enough!’ he shouted fiercely; ‘Doom’d though they be to hell, Bind fast the crimson trophy Round both wrists – bind it well. Who knows but that great Allah May grudge such matchless men, With none so decked in Heaven, To the fiends’ flaming den?’ Then all these gallant robbers Shouted a stern ‘Amen!’ They raised the slaughtered sergeant, They raised his mangled ten. And when we found their bodies Left bleaching in the wind, Around both wrists in glory That crimson thread was twined. Then Napier’s knightly heart, touched to the core, Rung, like an echo, to that knightly deed: He bade its memory live for evermore, That those who run may read.

8 IN THE NIZAM’S DOMINIONS

The finest body of irregular cavalry in India Lord Dalhousie on the Nizam’s Cavalry1

H

yderabad, or ‘the Nizam’s Dominions’, was a large state in south central India, the region known as the Deccan. Once again, Beatson was under the jurisdiction of the HEIC Foreign Department because his command was considered part of the Nizam’s army, not that of the Company. The Nizam maintained his own Line regiments or ‘Line-wallahs’, but under his treaty with the Company, like the Raja of Jhansi or Maharaja Sindhia of Gwalior, he also paid for a more disciplined force commanded by British officers and responsible to the British Resident at his court. This was known as the Hyderabad Contingent. With five regiments of cavalry, eight of infantry, a battalion of ‘Hill Rangers’, five companies of artillery and one of sappers, it was the largest and best equipped of all the ‘contingents’ in India. The Resident could also call on a division of the Madras Army stationed at Secunderabad outside Hyderabad City, which was subsidised from the Nizam’s revenues and known as the Hyderabad Subsidiary Force, but it was the Contingent that dealt with most matters of internal security.2 Hyderabad had been in crisis for years: the Nizam was deeply in debt, and his largest expenses were military. The Line-wallahs numbered over 19,000, far more than he needed or could afford. Yet he could not afford to disband them either, because there was no money for their back pay. So the idle soldiers lived at free quarters and terrorised the populace, while their arrears mounted inexorably. Even the Contingent’s pay was usually a few months behindhand. The Resident’s most pressing problems were to raise loans for the Nizam and to persuade him to economise, especially to get rid of his mercenaries without provoking them into revolt.3 The Resident was Maj-Gen James Fraser of Ardachy, a distant kinsman of the Frasers who had ruled Bundelkhand and Saugor. Unlike them he was a military

Map 5: Deccan and Central India 1847–59



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officer, but like Sleeman he had spent most of his career on the political side. Beatson was foisted on him (Fraser had favoured the senior regimental commander for the appointment) but, once he had arrived the two Scots seem to have formed a reasonable working relationship. Although as a military man the Resident was more willing to criticise Beatson’s actions than Simon Fraser had been, he treated Beatson with respect and the residency clerks punctiliously placed the letters ‘KSF’ after his name in correspondence.4 The Contingent was divided into five ‘divisions’ of brigade size. Beatson was posted to the Hingoli Division (as a 2nd class brigadier) while its commander officiated for the senior brigadier.5 The Nizam’s Dominions were vast, almost twice the size of England and Wales, and, with the exception of HQ at Bolarum outside Hyderabad City, the Contingent’s divisions were distributed round the north and west edges of this area, so the brigadiers had great independence. Hingoli itself is about 190 miles north-north-west of Hyderabad City. Situated on the great Deccan Plateau, some 1,250 feet above sea level, Hyderabad enjoys a more salubrious climate than Bundelkhand or Sind. It was good riding and hunting country – paradise for British officers addicted to field sports, who could pursue antelope, jackals, foxes and hogs to their heart’s content.6 This was the kind of place where Beatson and Marian could settle down contentedly. He had a large salary, responsibility, status, and his family could enjoy the ‘AngloIndian’ lifestyle more comfortably than at hot, fever-ridden Jhansi. The couple’s second daughter, Margaret Maria, was born on 17 October 1847.7 Beatson’s nephew, William Ferguson Beatson Laurie, a lieutenant in the Madras Artillery, was also serving in Hyderabad with the Subsidiary Force. Postings to Hyderabad were greatly sought after and the Governor General used his powers of patronage to reward deserving officers. For example, Billy Olpherts was sent down from the Punjab – perhaps on Beatson’s recommendation – on attachment to the Nizam’s Artillery for a few months in 1847.8 But the Hingoli appointment was only a temporary expedient, as the Governor General’s staff noted: ‘It now appears that Col. Tompkyns has applied for an extension of leave only to the 29th February next, and that he is re-assuming his command. Major Beatson, who is officiating for him, will be deprived of his appointment. The G.G. considers the claims of this Officer on the Government are very strong.’ Conveniently, the commander of the Cavalry Division, Brigadier James Blair, went on sick leave and ‘Under these circumstances, the G.G., although he acknowledges that Major Ingles, having commanded a regiment of the Nizam’s Cavalry for 17 years, would be a very proper Officer to command the Cavalry Division, does not feel justified in passing over Major Beatson in favour of that Officer.’ Shortly afterwards Blair died at sea, so Beatson’s appointment was made permanent in January 1848, and Fraser was soon expressing satisfaction with his new brigadier.9

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A cavalryman The Hyderabad Cavalry was a plum command, much sought after by cavalrymen, and it completed Beatson’s transition from infantry officer to irregular cavalry leader, the role that would make him famous. The Beatsons set up home at Mominabad, the Division’s cantonment across the river from Amba Town (modern Ambejogai) about 175 miles north-west of Hyderabad City.10 One regiment of the division was always stationed there for training under the eye of the brigadier, who regularly inspected the other regiments attached to the divisions at Bolarum, Aurangabad, Ellichpur and Hingoli. Expenses were high – he would be expected to keep a stable of excellent horses – but if Beatson received the same salary and allowances as Blair (Rs 2,700 a month), he was very well off indeed. All in all, it was a wonderful billet.11 The four original regiments of the Nizam’s Cavalry were known as the Reformed Horse, having been reorganised from existing rissalas; the 5th (Ellichpur Horse) had been added later. Socially, the Reformed Horse was more exclusive than other irregular cavalry, being drawn from the gentry and small landed proprietors who for reasons of caste or sense of adventure sought a military career. The great majority were Muslims, the ruling class in Hyderabad where 90 per cent of the population was Hindu.12 The horsemen possessed a highly developed sense of military honour – bahaduri, or gallantry (in the same sometimes sarcastic sense that the phrase ‘gallant gentleman’ was applied to British cavalry officers). ‘No promises, no threats, will induce a high caste Mussulman of the Deccan to give up his arms. If compelled to do so he is disgraced for ever,’ explained one correspondent.13 There were 60 sowars to a troop, and eight troops (four squadrons) to a regiment, so the all-ranks strength was almost 600, and included a camelgunner for each squadron. Each regiment had four European officers: captaincommandant, second-in-command, adjutant and assistant surgeon. Coming from Bengal, Beatson was an outsider: most Europeans in the Contingent were seconded from the Madras Army, though some of the older officers had never been in the HEIC service and held only local commissions in the Nizam’s Army.14 The native rissaldar of such a regiment (equivalent of rissaldar-major in HEIC service) was a man of great substance, and his high salary reflected this. There was much in common between the Hyderabad cavalry and the Yeomanry regiments of Victorian England, where a prominent landowner commanded, and his officers and men were lesser landowners and yeomen farmers. The chief difference, of course, was that the Yeomanry played at soldiers in their spare time, whereas the Reformed Horse were full-time professionals. Many sowars were silladars riding their own horses, as in the Bengal Irregular Cavalry, but others were bargirs, suitable men riding horses supplied by others – in much the same way that a Yeomanry trooper might be mounted by his landlord. The ownership of such a horse – an asami – was an investment, changing hands



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for large sums, and might be held by a comrade or superior in the regiment, by a contractor, even by the heirs of a former silladar. Some well-to-do native officers owned numerous asamis and had significant financial interests in the regiment. The Government was concerned about the debts of the native officers and men of the Nizam’s Cavalry. Their salaries were higher than regular cavalry, but their initial outlay was large – only the best horses and weapons would do – and the Nizam was always late in paying them, so these gentleman-soldiers routinely lived beyond their means. By the end of 1848, Beatson reported, the authorised debts of the five regiments amounted to almost Rs 600,000, and Fraser reckoned that the unauthorised debts were much larger.15 The 5th Nizam’s Cavalry, by contrast, was organised like the regular cavalry of Madras, with the men riding government horses. It was not so exclusive as the Reformed Horse – some of its men were lowcaste Hindus – and was regarded by them as socially inferior. In such a horse-mad country, great attention was paid to the quality of the cavalry’s mounts. They were nearly all Deccan country-breds or Arabs, valued at Rs 300–500, compared with the sometimes broken-down nags of the Bundlecund Cavalry, for which the Government had offered Rs 25 compensation. Officers carefully inspected each horse produced by a silladar before it was accepted, and the men took immense pride in the condition and appearance of their mounts and equipment. The sowars rode light, and consequently the regiments were very mobile. Their proud boast was that they could start at a moment’s notice, ride 100 miles, fight an action and immediately return to cantonments. Shortly after Beatson’s time, a travelling gentleman rode up to a Hyderabad Cavalry cantonment in company with the new brigadier. Not a soul was in sight, but the brigadier had the ‘Assembly’ sounded, and six minutes later all the men in camp were on parade, with the baggage ponies loaded, ready to march.16

Braid and blades The striking uniform of the Nizam’s Cavalry was a popular subject for artists and print-sellers (Plate E). They wore a long, collarless alkalakh in dark green, the native officers’ being richly decorated with gold around the edge, on the cuffs and shoulders, and across the chest. White trousers disappeared into high jackboots. The small red and gold turban was worn rakishly to one side, secured with a length of the cloth for a chinstrap. Full dress for European officers was a goldbraided, green jacket and white trousers tucked into Wellington boots, topped off with a black japanned steel helmet with a red horsehair crest, the whole ensemble much like that of the Madras Light Cavalry. Soon after Beatson’s arrival, however, the European officers adopted the glorious gold-embroidered alkalakh, jackboots and turban of the native officers, a trend that was growing among the irregular cavalry throughout India.17 Beatson liked this uniform so much that he continued to wear it for much of his subsequent career.

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Half the sowars of the Nizam’s Cavalry carried lances and one-third flintlock or percussion carbines in addition to their swords and pistols. However, in February 1848 Beatson ordered that each man could choose for himself whether to carry lance or carbine. The men’s swords were legendary. During Beatson’s command, the cavalry theorist Capt Louis Nolan came to see them, intrigued by a surgeon’s after-action report that listed injuries to the enemy such as ‘Arm cut off from the shoulder. Head severed. Both hands cut off (apparently at one blow) above the wrists in holding up the arms to protect the head. Leg cut off above the knee &c, &c’. ‘I was astounded,’ wrote Nolan. ‘Were these men giants, to lop off limbs thus wholesale? or was the result to be attributed to the sharp edge of the native blade and the peculiar way of drawing it?’ (The curved sword was worn ‘backwards’ according to Western notions.) When Nolan examined the weapons, ‘… fancy my astonishment! The swordblades they had were chiefly old dragoon blades cast from our service. The men had mounted them after their own fashion. The hilt and handle, both in metal, small in the grip, rather flat, not round like ours where the edge seldom falls true; they had an edge like a razor.’ An old sowar told Nolan that the old broad English blades were in great favour: I said, ‘How do you strike with your swords to cut off men’s limbs?’ ‘Strike hard, Sir!’ said the old trooper. ‘Yes, of course; but how do you teach the men to use their swords in that particular way?’ … ‘We never teach them any way, sir: a sharp sword will cut in any man’s hand.’

Nolan and other visitors realised that the secret lay in the fact that these blades were kept in wooden scabbards, which did not dull the edge (and made no noise when the sowar was creeping round on patrol), and they were never drawn except in action.18 As Beatson would discover in the Crimea, British cavalry did not understand how to maintain their weapons, which were too frequently drawn for display rather than combat. Disciplinary offences were tried by a regimental commission of native assessors known as a panchayat. When new Articles of War were made applicable to the Contingent, the cavalry were exempted on Fraser’s recommendation (doubtless at Beatson’s urging) and retained the panchayat system.19 The elite cavalrymen of Hyderabad were rarely in trouble, but later we will find Beatson happy to accept this system of internal discipline when he commanded a considerably more anarchic body of men. Hyderabad cavalry had a proud reputation for horsemanship. Blair’s last inspection had criticised the riding skills of the European officers, and Beatson returned to this in his own first inspection report. In the 1st Nizam’s Cavalry, Lt Warre ‘cannot ride and in all probability never will’. In addition, the CO was ‘wanting in energy and decision’, the 2i/c (Capt Sullivan) ‘useless as an officer



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& recommended to be removed’, and the MO (Dr Stewart) was ‘unskilful & of disreputable habits, recommended to be transferred to infantry’. The other regiments were satisfactory, but the rissaldar of the 4th was apparently ‘wanting in energy and seems to prefer amassing money to doing duty’. Beatson was also dissatisfied with his Brigade Major, Lt Henry Abbott, describing him as ‘deficient in knowledge of Military duty and discipline’. Fraser was so impressed with Beatson’s uncompromising report that he took the unusual step of passing it up to the new governor general, the Marquis of Dalhousie. Dalhousie replaced Warre with another officer, ‘who is reported to be an excellent horseman’, got rid of Sullivan, and expressed the hope that the others’ performance would improve by the next inspection. He did point out drily that ‘If Dr Stewart is unskilful and disreputable as the Brigadier alleges, he is no more fit for infantry than for cavalry’.20 Beatson failed to get rid of Abbott, but the younger man must have rapidly learned ‘military duty and discipline’ under his tutelage because they managed to get along throughout Beatson’s service in Hyderabad. Abbott went on to a distinguished career with the Contingent.21 Beatson had made a rapid impact upon the Nizam’s Cavalry; but they in turn had an insidious effect on him. Along with his own touchy sense of honour, he seems to have imbued much of their bahaduri, which unfortunately revealed itself in later years.

Diplomacy at Rayamoh Trouble was constantly expected from the Nizam’s unpaid and frequently mutinous troops. Most were Rohillas, the name applied to Afghan, Baluchi and Pathan mercenaries from the North-West Frontier of India. Warren Hastings drove these adventurers out of Northern India in the 1770s, but the Nizam and his nobles continued to employ them. His other main source of troops was Yemen and Southern Arabia, where Indian princes traditionally recruited bodyguards (since they were outside local politics). The Nizam’s family was connected with the state of Qai’ti in Southern Arabia, and maintained an Arab bodyguard into the twentieth century. The Nizam used them to control the Rohillas and there were frequent clashes – but in truth the Arabs were as troublesome as the Afghans.22 One potential flashpoint was Rayamoh, a small fort about 60 miles west–northwest of Mominabad, lying between the Nizam’s Dominions and Bombay’s district of Ahmadnagar. It belonged to Kareem ud-din Hussein Khan, an official of the Gwalior government, who had taken possession after the usual succession dispute involving contending widows. He installed a garrison of about 300 Rohillas to secure the fort against his rival but now they were unpaid. Fraser wanted Gwalior to pay off the mercenaries’ arrears in order to disband them; but Sindhia’s Durbar was reluctant.23

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In April 1848 the garrison of Rayamoh went too far. Beatson was just about to travel down to Bolarum when a report from Bhir caused him to change his plans. The Rohillas were plundering villages in the Nizam’s Dominions and the Company’s territory, and had taken hostages (probably for ransom). Beatson immediately sought authority to call for infantry and guns from the Contingent, or from the Bombay Division at Ahmadnagar, in case he needed to move against the Rohillas in a position inaccessible to his cavalry. Colonel John Low, acting as resident during Fraser’s leave, ordered Beatson to take charge of Rayamoh and exercise his ‘well known discretion and judgement’. The troops at Aurangabad and Hingoli were put at his disposal.24 Beatson reached Bhir with the 1st Cavalry on 21 April and summoned the Rohillas’ rissaldar to meet him. The rissaldar replied that his officers and men would not allow him to do this. Beatson therefore issued a proclamation that ‘Such paltry subterfuges will no longer be received,’ offering them a last chance to have him as their friend or enemy. They were to release their hostages, vacate the fort by sunrise next day and send their mutsaddi (clerk) with their accounts. The Rohillas tried to persuade Beatson to let them keep the fort till they were paid, but he insisted on the terms of the ultimatum and, arriving on the morning of 25 April, he gave them one hour to release the hostages and four hours to clear out of the fort – ‘which by the bye is a very stiff little place, and could not have been taken without shelling & breaching too,’ Beatson reported. He seems to have got on well with the ruffians: ‘they are a good natured set of fellows, and after a personal interview in which I told them they should not get one rupee if they did not give in today – they consented.’25 A few days afterwards Beatson discovered that the rival claimant was plotting to keep some of the disbanded Rohillas in the neighbourhood and seize the fort as soon as the Contingent had left. Beatson spoiled that plan by calling up a wing of infantry from Aurangabad to garrison the fort. The Rohillas adhered to their agreement to return to their homes in the Peshawar district, receiving half their back pay before they set off and the remainder when they reached Ajmer. They were escorted as far as Indore by a party of Contingent Cavalry. The settlement could not have been better timed: the Rohillas were anxious to be away before the rains, and the farmers around Rayamoh were able to sow their crops unhindered. Low commended Beatson’s ‘excellent judgement and firmness’ in dealing with the situation without fighting, and his actions received the approval of the Governor General.26 After this bloodless success, Beatson took a month’s leave with his family in the Mahabaleshwar Hills, a favourite mountain retreat for Bombay officers. It enjoyed a ‘cool, salubrious climate, fine scenery, and good sport for big game’. They stayed at Malcolm Peit, a resort established by the former Bombay Governor Sir John Malcolm, with a hotel, a library, market gardens and a small church. The Beatsons took the opportunity to get their younger daughter Margaret Maria christened by the chaplain there.27



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Insurrection March was the usual start of the campaigning season, when the disaffected became frisky and peacekeepers had to bestir themselves. In March 1849 someone claiming to be ‘Appa Sahib’ made his appearance in the Nizam’s Dominions. Appa Sahib was a former regent of Nagpur (defeated by the British in 1818), who had escaped and disappeared. For decades there had been a succession of men who, like Perkin Warbeck, claimed to be the long-lost ruler and gathered armed supporters to seize the state. In this case the Rohillas of Hyderabad provided the manpower, rumoured to be up to 3,000 strong. Brigadiers Onslow and Hampton, commanding the Ellichpur and Hingoli Divisions, spent most of the month trying to catch the impostor. Each had a wing of the 2nd Cavalry, and Naib Duffadar Walid Ali Beg acted as their scoutmaster, following the insurgents, interrogating spies and sending detailed reports back by camel gunner. Meanwhile, Beatson was trying to deal with armed conflict between opposing Nawabs (governors) of Mominabad, ‘which dispute I could at once settle, if I knew which party to support’.28 That year’s campaign only began in earnest in May, with the hot season reaching its zenith, when Appa Sahib reappeared. Hampton, with the 2nd Cavalry, marched 100 miles in three days and attacked and defeated a body of insurgents at Gurri, killing large numbers and taking many prisoners. Assistant Surgeon William MacEgan rode in the charge and had his horse wounded before he dismounted to tend casualties – which was considered quite normal behaviour by the cavalry’s MOs. Meanwhile, Onslow defeated Appa Sahib’s main force and drove them into the hills. This was dangerous work: Hampton was severely wounded and Onslow was killed by a fall from his horse, having ignored Walid Ali Beg’s warnings about the dangerous terrain.29 After this demonstration of the dangers posed by unemployed soldiers and stung by criticism from Bombay, Fraser obtained agreement from the Nizam’s government to deal with them and ordered his brigadiers to apprehend any in their areas. Obviously, Beatson’s cavalry were best equipped for hunting down fast-moving freebooters, and Fraser instructed the other brigadiers to supply him with infantry and artillery. Beatson immediately requisitioned troops from Brig George Twemlow at Aurangabad to meet him at a dâk bungalow about 40 miles from Mominabad. He planned to deal with some Rohillas he had heard about at a town called Waruni, in the hilly country near Dharur.30 Twemlow, a dependable colleague, ordered artillery and infantry to march ‘fully equipped for service but free from unnecessary incumbrances’ at moonrise on 12 May, to be at the bungalow before sunrise on 15 May, while he took up a position from which his division could co-operate with Beatson, Hampton or the Subsidiary Force at Jalna.31 Fraser seems to have been surprised at his brigadiers’ enthusiastic reaction to his instructions, confessing himself ‘unable to form an opinion how far [Beatson’s] proceedings may be judicious or otherwise’, and chiding Twemlow

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that he should not move troops unless absolutely necessary, to avoid exciting the country people.32 But Beatson and Twemlow had already marched.

Rapid movement On the morning of 15 May, before the Aurangabad column arrived, Beatson learned from the Nawab of Bhir (who was out with his own troops) that the 200 Rohillas at Waruni had broken up into small parties. Beatson dashed off after them with the 1st Cavalry, pursuing for miles – at each village, he was told the fleeing Rohillas were just ahead. Eventually, he caught a group who laid down their arms.* By now the horses and men were knocked up by a march totalling 41 miles, much of it at a canter during the heat of the day; three horses died or had to be shot. On the morrow the remaining Rohillas had disappeared, which ‘deprived the men of the 1st Cavalry of the opportunity of distinguishing themselves in a fight which they were most anxious,’ complained Beatson.34 Leaving the exhausted 1st Cavalry to follow, Beatson returned to Mominabad and collected Capt Thomas Clagett’s newly arrived wing of the 5th Cavalry to move against another band of Rohillas at Arni, 30–40 miles away. He marched in the late afternoon of 20 May and had the place invested by morning, describing it as [O]ne of those irregular walled villages every house in which, most of them flat roofed and loopholed, is a fortification; the want of artillery in attacking which must be paid for in men; the outer walls also of the village had been put into a very good state of defence, logs of wood and loose stones having been laid on the top, and thorns laid below at all the weakest places, the wells also in the neighbourhood had all been destroyed.

Shortage of water could have been a serious matter for the investing force. Luckily, the Rohillas gave up when Beatson sent in his usual ultimatum giving them an hour to surrender. He admitted that had they held out, he would either have had to escalade the place with dismounted cavalrymen, accepting serious casualties, or wait for artillery to arrive. With his Bundelkhand experience of taking gurhis, Beatson recommended that at least two 6-pounder guns and a 12-pounder howitzer should be attached to his cavalry and kept at Mominabad, since the camel guns ‘are not much use for anything else but signals’.35 Beatson was obviously feeling pleased with himself, so he must have been shocked to receive criticism from Fraser. The Resident considered that he should * The clerk’s transcript of Beatson’s report seems to give ‘Gomgong’ as the name of the ‘miserable’ village where he caught up with the Rohillas; it is probably the place later referred to as ‘Kamgaon’ by Fraser.33



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have force-marched immediately to Waruni with the 1st Cavalry and invested it before the guns and infantry arrived from Aurangabad. That way, the Rohillas might not have escaped: ‘The Resident observes that our best chance for capturing the Rohillas is by the rapid movement of cavalry.’36 These words stung Beatson: ‘This is the first time in my military career that the imputation of slowness had been made in any of my movements,’ he complained. The route to Waruni was longer than Fraser imagined, and the Rohillas – already warned by the movements of the Bhir troops – would still have slipped away. ‘But suppose I had invested the place before the Rohillas got out, I question very much if I could have kept them there’ as they would have made their escape by twos and threes under cover of the broken ground on a dark night. He referred to his experience at Jigni and Chirgong, and commented that ‘Among European military writers too it is a generally received opinion that the Comdt of a garrison by taking advantage of the night, may bring off three fourths of his garrison in spite of the investing army.’ He cited an example from Lord Lake’s campaign against the Mahrattas in 1804, when picquets of the 8th Royal Irish Dragoons had failed to prevent the enemy leader’s escape. This provides an insight into Beatson’s professional reading: accounts of the 2nd Mahratta War contained valuable information, since the Duke of Wellington’s great victory at Assaye in 1803 had been fought just a few miles away.37 In fact, the criticism had already been deflected, because Beatson had done at Arni exactly what Fraser advised, even before the Resident’s orders arrived. Meanwhile, another column under Capt Humphrey Haworth pursued and captured a rebellious landowner and his Rohillas. But Haworth died the next day from heatstroke. The casualty rate among the Contingent’s small complement of European officers was becoming serious. The medical officers, however, were more than willing to play their part. Returning to Mominabad, Dr MacEgan fell in with three Rohillas, so he and the two sowars of his escort immediately disarmed them and turned them over to Beatson as prisoners.38 With casualties and sick leave there had been a rapid turnover of permanent and temporary officers, which brought arguments over seniority, just as in Bundelkhand. Beatson asked Fraser and the Government to deal with these quickly, ‘to prevent the numerous applications, and consequent disappointments to most applicants which generally take place on such occasions’. His main concern was to have enough efficient officers with each of his regiments – a constant refrain throughout his career. Fraser was less concerned, content to leave a rissaldar to move a whole wing of cavalry on a long-distance relief. (Contrast this with the regulars: Beatson and Simon Fraser had once been reprimanded for retaining Ensign Wilson and leaving his BNI company to march a couple of stages back to cantonments under its own subadar.)39 At the end of the year Beatson obtained a month’s leave to go to Bombay, where he put Marian and the girls with their European servant aboard ship for England. Although it was now common to take a steamer from Bombay to Suez

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and follow the quicker ‘overland route’ home via the Mediterranean, the Earl of Hardwicke sailed on 7 February 1850 by the old long route via the Cape, which suggests that speed was unimportant. Marian apparently enjoyed sea voyages, which were considered good for the health, though the Cape route could be rough and dangerous. Marian’s return to England may have been to deal with the affairs of her brother Alexander Humfrays, who had died in 1846, and whose estate was stuck in administrative limbo between India and London.40 Whatever the reason, Beatson faced another long separation from his family.

Clashes with a ‘saint’ Two characters who were destined to clash with Beatson joined the Contingent at this time. Lieutenant Henry Mayne had served previously with the Nizam’s Cavalry, had then been Dalhousie’s ADC and now the Governor General appointed him brigade major to the Ellichpur Division, where he teamed up with the new brigadier.41 To fill the vacancy caused by Onslow’s death, Dalhousie chose Capt Colin Mackenzie. Mackenzie was a popular hero, having survived Afghan captivity after the disaster at Kabul, but he proved an unhappy choice. Mackenzie was one of the Indian Army’s ‘Saints’, involved in Christian missionary work which – though carried on with the best of intentions – was helping to destroy trust between Europeans and their sepoys. To carry on such activities in Hyderabad was especially obtuse, since it was not only a nominally independent state but riven by religious conflicts.42 Mackenzie, Beatson and Fraser were all argumentative Scots, but Mackenzie was dangerous because of his powerful Evangelical friends at home. He immediately upset Beatson by using cavalry sowars to escort flocks of sheep. Beatson complained that this was against regulations, which aimed to prevent unnecessary wear and tear on the silladars’ valuable horses, ‘as riding after sheep for the Butchers in the swamps of Ellichpoor would be’. Beatson hinted that the butchers only wanted the escort to avoid paying customs when they returned to town, as army supply trains were exempt. Mackenzie accused Beatson of ‘lecturing’ him, and responded with a long and rambling sermon of his own. Fraser instructed Mackenzie to stop it.43 Mackenzie sarcastically asked ‘that I may be informed under what circumstances … I am permitted to issue orders to the cavalry stationed at Ellichpoor’. He regarded Beatson as simply Inspector General of Cavalry, and asserted that his interference would turn Mackenzie’s command into ‘a farce’. He also accused Beatson of writing ‘a peremptory discourteous’ letter. Mackenzie was correct in assuming that this was his colleague’s usual style, but for once Beatson’s correspondence had been merely formal. Expecting support from his patron, Mackenzie demanded that the matter be put before the Governor General. Dalhousie coldly instructed Mackenzie to conform to Fraser’s orders.44



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Yet Mackenzie was already involved in another dispute, after he and Mayne overturned a panchayat decision in the cantonment bazar. Once again Fraser overruled him, once again he appealed to Dalhousie, but eventually apologised to Fraser. Unfortunately, part of the correspondence appeared in the newspapers and Mackenzie suspected dirty tricks on Fraser’s behalf. Perhaps luckily for all concerned, Mackenzie now went on sick leave and did not return until after Beatson had left the Contingent. In 1855 Mackenzie resumed his feud with the cavalry, ordering the annual Muharram parade out of the cantonment on a Sunday. The effect was similar to re-routing an Apprentice Boys’ march in Northern Ireland – the men of the 3rd Cavalry (‘opium-eaters almost to a man,’ complained Mackenzie) defied him and followed their traditional route past his bungalow, with their costumed mummers and decorated floats. Mackenzie confronted the revellers and was seriously beaten up. What upset Mackenzie and his Evangelical friends was that the Government blamed him for interfering in a religious festival. He started a pamphlet campaign to clear his name (something that Beatson himself was doing by then), but his career never recovered.45

Return to Rayamoh But arguments over butchers and bazar-wallahs were trifling compared with the upheaval outside the cantonments. For one thing, civil war raged in Ellichpur, where a rebellious Nawab inflicted several reverses on the Line-wallahs. The Contingent kept out of this affair while Fraser tried to mediate. Meanwhile, unpaid Rohillas rioted in Hyderabad City and were bloodily put down by the Nizam’s Arabs while others plundered HEIC villages near Mominabad.46 Then on 29 September a banker named Umaid Mul forwarded to Beatson a report that one Sidi Nasirullah had again seized the fort at Rayamoh on behalf of Kareem ud-din Hussein Khan with a mixed force of Arabs, Rohillas and local men reported to be 200–300 strong. The attackers had also seized Dhana Bai, a relative of Umaid Mul, and her family implored the banker to ‘go to the Major Sahib’ and seek help. ‘I know the place well,’ Beatson informed Fraser, ‘and it cannot be taken without Artillery & Infantry, unless the Garrison are asleep which they appear to have been when the Nawab took it.’ He was prepared to march at once and invest the fort with cavalry until guns and infantry arrived.47 Yet it was weeks before Fraser received a formal request from the Nizam’s vakil (secretary): ‘you will be so good as to instruct the Officer commanding at Mominabad immediately to seize and punish … the usurper and his troops.’ The ‘express’ from Fraser reached Beatson on 20 November, and in his usual fashion he was on the march by midnight with the 2nd Cavalry, having ordered up a squadron of the 4th Cavalry from Gulbarga and requested a light field battery and four companies of infantry from Brig James Johnston at Hingoli.48

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Beatson arrived at Rayamoh on 23 November and summoned Sidi Nasirullah to surrender. He replied, ‘our lives are in the hands of God, and we have plenty of powder and ball’. Probably mindful of Fraser’s rebuke after Waruni, Beatson was determined that nobody would get in or out, and his vedettes were alert: a sowar challenged a man trying to sneak in, who fired at him. The sowar cut down the intruder, who turned out to have been a jemadar of Baluchis. ‘Here the matter rests at present,’ Beatson reported. ‘I can do nothing more till I get the Guns, and even then unless the moral effect of six pounders and a twelve pounder Howitzer make the Garrison surrender, the Guns themselves will not be much use against such a place as Ry Mhow.’ He now asked for two 18-pounders and two 8-inch mortars.49 With his Bundelkhand experience, Beatson should not have repeated the mistake of relying upon field guns to reduce a fort – perhaps he expected negotiation to succeed as it had on the previous occasion. Faced with this further request, Johnston had few gunners and draught animals left to send. Fraser instructed Twemlow at Aurangabad to supply the rest of the siege train and the brigadier complied immediately, sending off the guns with as much ammunition as the available draught animals could shift, while he tried to hire more.50 The Resident was exasperated, not only by Beatson’s error over the artillery, but by his repeated requests for reinforcements. ‘You have already the whole of the 2nd Nizam’s Cavalry and a squadron of the 4th with you,’ he complained. Yet Beatson had called up another squadron of the 4th Cavalry, leaving Gulbarga denuded against Fraser’s explicit orders, and now he was demanding more infantry from Hingoli. Fraser turned to his only available force, sending half the 6th Infantry from Bolarum. Perhaps concerned by his subordinate’s well-known penchant for speed and aggression, Fraser warned Beatson not to incur any unnecessary risk.51 For the first five days and nights of the siege the whole of the 2nd Cavalry were on duty at night, and two-thirds during the day while others snatched some rest. The vedettes’ alertness was rewarded one night when they fired on and drove back a party of matchlockmen trying to escape. On 28 November Clagett arrived with the first detachment of the 4th Cavalry to share the duty.52 Captain James Balmaine came ahead of his Hingoli battery to carry out an expert reconnaissance. He concurred on the need for a breaching battery: the walls were of great height and strength, commanding the whole country over a wide radius and rendering ‘nugatory’ anything he could do with his fieldpieces. The infantry could camp out of sight amongst a tope of mango trees west of the fort but would still be subject to random shots from the defenders, who seemed to have six guns ‘of rather heavy calibre’. Balmaine thought that the detached pettah (fortified suburb) to the north-west could be easily taken, but if done too soon this would merely alert the garrison, so he recommended occupying the village in front of the north gate, which with the mango tope would give two covered strongpoints and relieve some of the cavalry holding the ring.53



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Assault on the durgah Next day, 1 December, the 4th Infantry, supported by dismounted sowars, went in at daybreak and took possession of the village. Commanding the fort’s gateway was a durgah, a walled Muslim burial ground. This was seized when Frank Souter, a young volunteer, scaled the wall under fire and let down a rope by which the sepoys entered. Souter came from a courageous family: his father had commanded the last stand of the 44th Foot during the retreat from Kabul.* Although 19-year-old Frank had no official position, Beatson treated him as an acting cornet and put him in charge of the camel guns – he was always willing to help keen youngsters and reported that Souter ‘shewed that he has all the qualifications to make a good soldier’.55 The garrison replied with guns, gingals and matchlocks, to which Beatson’s artillery and infantry responded, ‘but I suspect without much effect as the enemy fired through the loop holes with their matchlocks, and disappeared behind their parapets as soon as they had fired their guns’. As the men in the durgah could enfilade any sortie from the gate, Beatson was able to pull the rest of the line back from in front of the village to increase the range for those firing from the fort, and Balmaine threw up defences along this position. Some Arabs sallied out in the afternoon; from interrogation of prisoners, it emerged that the garrison expected the sepoys to run. But the Contingent was not as easily cowed as the Line-wallahs and the attack was ‘gallantly met’ by the 4th Infantry firing from the village and durgah. The sortie withdrew under covering fire from the loopholes on top of the gateway. The garrison kept up a fire all night and next day until the evening, when they requested a truce in order to bury their dead, which Beatson granted. On the morning of 3 December the defenders made overtures about surrender terms: they wanted to keep their weapons, but Beatson refused this, so at sunset they marched out and laid down their arms before him, in front of his camp. He proudly sent an express to Hyderabad: ‘I have the honor to report for the information of the Resident that the Fort of Raee Mhow surrendered to me this evening and is now in my possession.’ It was a satisfying end to a smart little operation.56 Beatson was full of praise for his officers and men, especially the cavalry who had fought on foot alongside the sepoys, not forgetting Rissaldar Zulfikar Ali Beg of the 2nd Cavalry, who was ‘constantly in the saddle, and shared in every duty’, and Dr MacEgan who attended his duties while hobbling from a recent fall. Beatson’s men discovered that the defenders had prepared some nasty surprises if

* Souter afterwards joined the police and was recommended for the Victoria Cross for hunting down rebels during the Mutiny. He became the first Bombay Police Commissioner and today’s Mumbai Police still remember him as their founding father.54

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it had come to an assault. One wicket gate had a large gun packed with grapeshot placed behind it, with three other heavy guns, apparently without carriages, placed in the gate passage. There were also 3- and 4-pounders, a heavy gingal and large wall-pieces mounted on the ramparts. Beatson left a garrison and marched back to Mominabad with the prisoners.57 Having wrapped up the little campaign, Beatson visited Hyderabad City, apparently to begin his annual cold weather inspection tour of the cavalry regiments. But he may also have wanted to meet Sir George Berkeley, the CinC of the Madras Army, who had come to inspect the Subsidiary Force at Secunderabad and was greeted in lavish style by the Nizam, including a guard of honour of the Cavalry. It was during this visit that Berkeley’s ADC, Capt Louis Nolan, examined the Hyderabad Cavalry’s swords with such interest and it is probable that he and Beatson met at this time.58

Prison break The Nizam’s vakil wanted the prisoners from Rayamoh to be handed over to the killadar (commandant) of Dharur, a fortress some 20 miles from Mominabad that already housed numerous captured Rohillas. The newspapers reported that this had been done; but in fact Fraser ordered Beatson to keep them in his own custody until the Nizam’s judicial officials arrived. The Resident was concerned by reports from visiting British officers that the prisoners were being held at Dharur under ‘inhuman’ conditions. He did wring a promise of better treatment from the Nizam’s government, but it came too late.59 Just days later, Rissaldar Zulfikar Ali Beg was travelling through Dharur. He reported: ‘I arrived at Dharoor on the forenoon of the 9th [January 1851] between one and two o’clock in the afternoon. One of my guard came and reported to me that there was a large fire in the fort, shortly afterwards I heard firing and a great noise in the fort.’ The Rissaldar found that the Rohillas from Waruni had carried out a well-planned coup when most of the guards had gone outside the fort as usual to cook their midday meal. Routine is the enemy of security, and the prisoners took advantage of the guards’ slackness, overwhelming those inside the fort, setting fire to thatch as a diversion, and shutting the gate. The killadar got a message off to Mominabad before the prisoners stormed his HQ, killing four guards and wounding him. Then they forced him to release the other prisoners, the group of Rohillas captured at Gurri. But Capt Macintire, commanding at Mominabad in Beatson’s absence, would do nothing without authorisation from the Nizam’s government.60 Beatson had just reached Gulbarga to inspect the detachment there when the news arrived. Immediately he ordered Macintire to march with the 2nd Cavalry to invest Dharur, taking care ‘to prevent either ingress or egress of men and that neither grain nor ammunition be allowed to be taken into the fort’. Within half



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an hour of arriving, Beatson had sent his orders, informed Fraser of his intentions and was rushing off towards Mominabad, followed by two squadrons of the 4th Cavalry.61 This time Fraser did not wait for the Nizam’s officials: he had already sent instructions to recapture Dharur, preferably by negotiation. Beatson was to tell the prisoners of the Nizam’s agreement to improve their conditions. If they would not surrender, he was authorised to call for support from the other brigadiers.62 The fortress of Dharur, sited on a tongue of land west of the town, had masonry walls 100–125 feet high. The only entrance, flanked by bastions, faced the town. The walls on this east front were triple, with water storage tanks round the north and south sides providing a moat. To the west and south lay a steep ravine, but the back of the fort was still protected by a strong masonry wall with bastions. In front of the main gate was a zigzag wall, apparently to prevent attackers using charging elephants to break open the doors – similar to concrete blocks laid in front of a modern installation to guard against truck-bombers. (The bastions, tanks and remnants of walls can still be seen on Google Earth.) All in all, it was one of the strongest fortresses in the Deccan.63 Beatson reached Mominabad on 15 January – he must have ridden hard to get there in under 48 hours, for it is about 100 miles from Gulbarga as the crow flies. He was already considering how to tackle Dharur. Macintire’s cavalry invested three sides of the place, and the killidar’s Mogul guards covered the ravine where cavalry could not operate, though Beatson did not think they could be relied upon. He arrived next day to take personal charge. The Rohillas refused his summons, but at their request he went to talk to them in person. Standing on the bridge, Beatson addressed the crowd assembled on the bastion by the gate. He informed them of Fraser’s promise of better treatment and found them ‘very civil in every respect excepting in refusing to give up their arms or to come to me outside’. He concluded that further negotiation was useless, and he began a formal siege, requesting more cavalry, the siege train, a light field battery and at least one regiment of infantry. The siege guns that had only just been returned after their abortive march towards Rayamoh would have to be dragged back from Aurangabad, with Balmaine’s light field battery from Hingoli, even though the bullocks were near exhaustion.64 Luckily, the 6th Infantry was due to march from Bolarum to Aurangabad on a cold weather rotation, so Fraser was able to divert this regiment to Beatson’s assistance, warning him that he now had the whole of the disposable force of the Contingent (some 2,100 men) under his orders. Beatson was told that ‘the Resident anticipates with confidence that you will be able to give a good account of the result of your operations at Daroor at a very early period’, though he had no clear idea how many men were inside the fort.65 With this considerable force Beatson had only one MO. Luckily, the superintending surgeons of the Contingent and the Subsidiary Force were on their annual tour of inspection and came to offer their services, which Beatson gladly

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accepted. Given the Hyderabad doctors’ instinct for a fight, it was probably no accident that these two gentlemen arrived on the scene.66

The batteries open As senior gunner, Capt W.K. Loyd assumed the role of executive engineer, while Balmaine and Capt William Orr commanded the guns. They declared the fort ‘a very strong specimen of a native fortification’ and that to effect a breach they needed more heavy guns. In the meantime, Loyd selected a spot about 450 yards south-east of the fort for a battery of two 18-pounders to dismount the enemy guns on the walls, and a paddock hidden by houses about 250 yards from the fort, from which the two 8-inch mortars could lob shells to ‘distress and distract’ the garrison. Beatson accepted this plan and wrote for another 18-pounder and mortar, and more ammunition – 200 rounds per gun in addition to the 400 already sent. Twemlow, who was a gunner himself, foresaw that the 18-pounders’ vents would burn out if they really intended to fire over 600 rounds per gun, so he sent a smith with spares to effect repairs.67 The bombardment began on 27 January, the guns firing from noon to night ‘without doing any appreciable injury to the defences’. The defenders replied with guns of all calibres from 24-pounders to gingals. Next morning Loyd moved the 18-pounders into the pettah, one to breach the curtain wall left of the gate, the other to deal with two particularly troublesome guns on a tower, but 51 rounds at 300 yards’ range did little damage to them. Loyd decided that he needed even more force, and asked for two further 18-pounders.68 Although Fraser agreed to send them, he warned of the bad effect on the population and other Rohillas if the siege was protracted and ‘so large a force [was] held in check by … a mere handful of felons’. Yet Beatson must not rush things, because a repulse would be even worse. Beatson agreed that a failed escalade would be disastrous (he did not think native troops could do it anyway) and he would have to effect a breach. He did not think there were more than 200 men inside the fort, but that made it easier for them to shelter from the bombardment.69 On the night of 30 January Loyd, Orr and Balmaine crept forward to reconnoitre the fort once more. They decided to erect a battery about 350 yards north of the fort to breach the curtain wall between two bastions. This part of the ditch was dry, and troops entering here would outflank the double line of walls and moats at the front. Beatson could get no help from the civil officials, but he organised working parties of sepoys, together with the gun lascars and coolies, who cheerfully collected wicker baskets to make gabions, and sandbags of earth to fill them, as the ground was too rocky for entrenching tools. All the while, the mortars were searching the interior of the fort, attempting to blow up its magazine.70



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Impatience was growing: ‘the siege of Dharoor is progressing but slowly,’ reported the Bombay Telegraph & Courier, which could not hide its sneaking admiration for the Rohillas, whose ‘guns are said to be honey-combed [with rust] and their carriages defective, and yet they have replied to our fire Gun for Gun’.71 The new battery was ready before dawn on 3 February. The guns opened at sunrise and pounded the wall all day. That night, while another day’s allocation of ammunition was moved into the batteries, Loyd went forward to examine the damage. ‘A great portion of the exterior wall & Rampart at the Breach appeared to be destroyed,’ he reported, and announced that he would reopen fire the following morning to destroy the parapets of the bastion defending the flank of the breach. The assault could then go in.72 When Beatson called for 50 volunteers from each cavalry regiment to serve alongside the infantry of the storming party, all the officers and men stepped forward. This was in the best traditions of the Nizam’s Cavalry, but the intrepid horsemen were cheated of their excitement. At sunrise, as the gunners prepared to resume firing, the Rohillas surrendered unconditionally. Having walled up their only gate, they were forced to leave by means of the breach, first laying down their arms. Clearly, they agreed with Beatson and his gunners in assessing the breach as ‘practicable’. A newspaper correspondent grumbled that allowing them to surrender on the breach was too honourable for such miscreants, even though they had shown themselves to be brave soldiers. He criticised the gunners, pointing out that the breach had been made by two 18-pounders in one day ‘shewing that the place last selected should have been first’, but he acknowledged that ‘The Brigadier has managed the business well’.73 The prisoners numbered 150, described by a reporter as mostly ‘fine stout looking men, with two or three young ones not twenty years of age’. There were 18 brass and iron cannons in the fort ranging from 1-pounders up to a 42-pounder ‘elephant gun’, and nearly 70 gingals, with a ton of gunpowder. Two of the cannon had been broken by 18-pounder shot fired by the besiegers. The rest of the spoil included the usual collection of matchlocks, swords, spears and daggers.74 Beatson now broke up his force to return to cantonments. His final Field Force Order praised the officers of ‘that scientific and distinguished Corps, the Madras Artillery’, and his despatch to Fraser mentioned heroes from previous fights like Dr MacEgan and Frank Souter, as well as Rissaldars Zulfikar Ali Beg and Umer Khan.75 Fraser instructed Beatson to place garrisons in both Rayamoh and Dharur, which he and Dalhousie intended to blow up. There were too many strongholds, he complained – while Beatson was besieging Dharur, the Hill Rangers had to deal with 200 Rohillas holed up in another gurhi. Fraser was by now thoroughly fed up with the Nizam’s useless forces and the Contingent was not strong enough to hold the forts and still provide a field force. Given the growing financial and political crisis in Hyderabad it was obvious that the British would soon be forced

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to intervene. When they did, two years later, the Contingent became a Britishcontrolled formation.76

Resignation But Beatson would not be there when this upheaval occurred. As soon as the capture of Dharur was completed, he announced his resignation. His Field Force Order concluded, ‘This is probably the last opportunity which Brigadier Beatson may have of commanding the Troops of the Nizam’s Contingent on service.’ The news may have come as a surprise to his men, but Beatson’s impending departure had been common knowledge in government circles and the newspapers already knew the name of his successor.77 It is impossible to be sure of Beatson’s motives for giving up his splendid appointment. He may have been exhausted and dispirited after three years of rousting the same troublemakers out of the same forts. He may also have had an inkling that something distasteful was going to disrupt the harmony of the Nizam’s Cavalry. This began at Dharur, when an anonymous petition alleging oppressive behaviour by Capt Yates of the 5th Cavalry was thrown into Beatson’s tent.* After Beatson’s departure, Yates thought he had uncovered the culprits, and had Rissaldar Zulfikar Ali Beg court-martialled for not reporting them when he joined the regiment (Beatson appears to have transferred the Rissaldar from the 2nd to sort out the troubled 5th). The prosecution was discomfited to find the Hyderabad establishment, including Brigadiers Twemlow and Johnston, supporting the popular Rissaldar, who was acquitted and continued to serve with distinction.79 Appointing Beatson’s successor, Dalhousie observed that ‘The Nizam’s horse are said to be the finest body of Native cavalry in India’ and, as they would be seeing plenty of service while Hyderabad remained disorderly, he wanted a good man. He chose the CO of his own Body Guard, William Mayne (no relation of Henry Mayne), a relatively young officer who had earned his brevet majority during Sale’s epic defence of Jellalabad in 1842. This was no snap decision: the newspapers had already carried rumours of Mayne’s appointment. In three years of small operations against Rohillas and Arabs, Mayne added to the lustre of the Hyderabad Cavalry, and made a name for himself even greater than Beatson’s. The two might easily have ended up as rivals, but Mayne’s health broke down, and he died at the age of 37.80 Beatson was now in his 47th year and had served for 30 years, so he could retire and take a pension at any time, but this does not seem to have been in his mind * Yates had asked to dismiss over 100 lower-caste men of his regiment; Beatson was unwilling to dismiss good soldiers. He reported his low opinion of Yates’s judgement, and described him as ‘of a vindictive disposition’.78



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when he applied to take a second long furlough in Europe. His long separation from his family must have played a part in his decision, but whether he had always planned to follow them or whether Marian had summoned him we do not know. Fraser issued a congratulatory general order stating that ‘Brigadier Beatson has not only maintained but improved the interior economy and arrangements of the Cavalry Division; and the value of his active military services in the field has been amply attested and rendered subject of record in the several instances of Kamgaon, Arnee, Raee Mhow and Dharoor.’ The Governor General concurred in this encomium. The officers of the Nizam’s Cavalry presented him with a handsome piece of plate engraved: We have availed ourselves of this method of testifying our regard for you personally, and our admiration of your talents and abilities as a soldier, under whose command we have all served, and some of us have had the opportunities of witnessing your gallant conduct upon all occasions, when Brigadier in Command of the Nizam’s cavalry, both in quarters and in the field.81

Beatson could not leave India until the HEIC’s writers completed their bureaucratic quadrilles, so he extended his embarkation leave to three months, enjoying the hill resort of Mahabaleshwar. But as usual when he had nothing to do, Beatson’s imagination and pen ran away with him. Hearing of a rebellion in Cape Colony, he suggested that two regiments of the Nizam’s Cavalry might volunteer to serve there. He envisaged them disembarking at Cape Town under covering fire from warships (‘if Mr Cobden and such people have left us a squadron’ – a reference to peace campaigner Richard Cobden) and serving dismounted until Cape horses were obtained. Naturally, he would withdraw his resignation to command the brigade.82 Fraser forwarded Beatson’s ‘ambitious aspirations’ to Dalhousie while pouring cold water on the idea. Not only was such service outside the Hyderabad Contingent’s constitution but, he added drily, ‘I have as many Kaffirs to contend with here as Sir Harry Smith has at the Cape.’ Beatson persisted, telling Fraser that ‘it would puzzle his Lordship to find anywhere such cavalry as you could give him from the Nizam’s Contingent’. During his leave he was provided with an escort of four sowars under a naib duffadar, which he proudly showed off to Sir John Grey, CinC at Bombay, in the hope that he could persuade his kinsman Earl Grey, Secretary of State for the Colonies, to choose the Nizam’s men for South Africa.83 Dalhousie called Beatson’s proposal ‘a silly one. The Nizam’s regiments are wanted at home – not at the Cape’, adding that he had not wished for Beatson’s resignation – ‘he was welcome to have remained twenty years as Brigadier’ – but having given it he could not rescind it now that his successor was already on his way. Beatson’s imaginative proposal may have been a non-starter, but he was probably correct in believing that the Nizam’s Cavalry would have volunteered:

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three years later (after their constitution had changed) the 4th Cavalry did offer to serve in the Crimea; they were not accepted.84 Beatson departed from Bombay on 3 May aboard the Company’s steam packet Victoria to Suez via Aden, taking the quickest route home. From Suez the passengers continued in six-seater, mule-drawn stagecoaches, variously described as ‘resembling a bathing-machine’ (Fred Roberts) and ‘something like the inside of a Dublin car, mounted on very high wheels, the sides lifted up to admit light and air’ (Honoria Lawrence). They crossed 80 miles of hot, dusty desert in these conveyances, by night as much as possible, broken by an al fresco buffet breakfast in mid-desert. Arriving in Cairo, passengers usually put up at Shepheard’s Hotel, already famous among British officers and colonial administrators. They then took a steamer down the Nile and Mahmoudi Canal to Alexandria to board a P&O or French steamer, depending on whether they wished to travel through the Straits of Gibraltar or overland from Marseilles to Calais. About a fortnight later Beatson was back in Britain for the first time in 14 years.85

9 SHEMSHI PASHA ON THE DANUBE

The scum and offscourings of all nations Morning Herald on the Bashi-Bazouks1

B

ack in Europe, Beatson rejoined his family, whom he had not seen for over a year. Marian and the girls, now aged 8 and 3, were living in St Peter Port on Guernsey, in a house called ‘Oak Trees’, with a cook, housemaid and two children’s nurses.2 After Beatson rejoined them they resided in France for a time, mainly in Boulogne where there was a sizeable British community, and the family befriended Lt Richard Burton of the Bombay Army. Burton may have already met Beatson in Sind; certainly they would have known of each other by reputation. Burton would go on to become one of the greatest Victorian explorers but also, for a brief critical period, Beatson’s principal assistant – some would say evil genius. As well as languages and exploration, Burton took a lifelong interest in skillat-arms, and was in Boulogne to attend a famous fencing school (and ‘to pursue affairs of the heart’ – he met his future wife, the formidable Isabel Arundell, at this time). In 1853 he published A Complete System of Bayonet Exercises. Burton’s early attempts at travel writing were critical flops, but in autumn 1852 he left Boulogne on the first of his great journeys, to Mecca and Medina disguised as a pilgrim – the first European to penetrate the Islamic shrines.3 Burton’s niece describes him as tactless and impatient at this period, and not popular with the English clique at Boulogne – perhaps the argumentative Beatson recognised a kindred spirit. Beatson himself was displaying the peacock element in his character: in January 1852 he caused a stir at a grand ball at the Hôtel de Ville in Paris by wearing the striking uniform of the Nizam’s Cavalry. Someone (perhaps Beatson himself) made sure that this show was reported in the Indian newspapers, for he was planning his return to India, and hoped for a post commensurate with his experience.4 Beatson had reached that important career stage when, with a little luck or judicious exercise of patronage, he might be selected for a senior staff or command

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position. Yet he was still only a major in the Bengal Army. Rather than wait for ‘a bloody campaign and a sickly season’ to bring promotion by seniority, Beatson began a new offensive to obtain brevet promotion and a Companionship of the Order of the Bath for distinguished service. He applied to Hardinge (now living in virtual retirement in London) who sent an enthusiastic recommendation to Dalhousie. Dalhousie in turn obtained a positive reference from the new CinC India, Sir William Gomm, and forwarded the whole dossier to the Directors to make a recommendation to Wellington, who was CinC at Horse Guards. (Dalhousie also recommended Henry Abbott; after their bad start he and Beatson had ended up working well together.)5 It might be thought that with such distinguished supporters Beatson would have readily achieved promotion. The old Duke, however, though he had no doubt that ‘the services of Major Beatson are very meritorious, and fully deserve all the commendations that have been preferred upon him’, considered that ‘as they appear to have taken place in actions not specifically noticed by the Queen, I regret that I cannot now recommend him to Her Majesty’.6 In other words, because the little actions in which Beatson had commanded had not been marked by a battle honour on the Legion’s colours, or by a clasp on a medal, there could be no reward by brevet. This was especially harsh when only three months earlier Wellington had signed a brevet that promoted hundreds of superannuated officers simply to provide some younger men with appropriate rank for higher command, without disturbing the rules of seniority. Still, in October 1853, the CinC’s office at Simla recommended to Dalhousie ‘The introduction, under an Inspector, or other properly qualified Officer, of a well-considered and uniform system in the Cavalry so as to ensure effectually, for the future, the most perfect efficiency attainable’. In the British Army this appointment was held by the young and reforming Duke of Cambridge. Gomm knew who he wanted as his Inspector of Irregular Cavalry: his secretary wrote, ‘I am to observe that Major W. F. Beatson, late Brigadier in the Army of His Highness the Nizam, whose return from furlough is shortly expected, appears to His Excellency, from his long experience, a fit officer to investigate into the state of the Irregular Cavalry, and to prepare such rules and regulations as may conduce to its perfect organisation.’7

Rumours of wars Unknown to Simla, Beatson was scouting out a more exciting alternative. War had broken out between Russia and the Ottoman Empire (Turkey) in 1853 when Russian troops occupied ‘The Principalities’, the Turkish frontier dependencies of Wallachia and Moldavia (modern Romania). Britain and France sent their fleets to support Turkey. Reasoning that British officers might also be sent to assist the Turkish Army, Beatson offered his services in the hope of gaining ‘superior



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Map 6: Ottoman Empire 1853–5

rank’. Horse Guards directed him to apply to the Foreign Office (FO).8 The new Foreign Secretary was the Earl of Clarendon who, as George Villiers, had been British Minister to Spain during the Carlist War. So when Beatson wrote to him from Boulogne in July, he stressed his service with the BAL, and included glowing references from Sir Duncan MacDougall.9 Nothing resulted from this, but in October Beatson tried again. ‘As the chances of war seem now to be greater,’ he wrote, ‘I should like to proceed to Constantinople that I may be on the spot.’ The FO checked his credentials with Horse Guards and was told that ‘There are many documents in the Comr in Chiefs office commending Major Beatson’s service’, including Wellington’s letter about Beatson’s ‘highly meritorious’ service. Satisfied, Clarendon provided an introduction to the British ambassador.10 Beatson set off immediately via Paris to catch one of the regular French steamers from Marseilles to Constantinople, ‘with a view to making myself acquainted with the language and system of the Turkish Army, and to visiting the advanced posts’. He did, however, express the hope that doing so would not prejudice his chance of gaining rank if the Government sent its own officers later. This letter in the FO records is endorsed, ‘It shall not prejudice him’.11 At Constantinople, Beatson made his first acquaintance with Her Britannic Majesty’s Ambassador to the Sublime Porte (the Ottoman Government). Stratford Canning was a younger cousin of George Canning, Foreign Secretary during the Napoleonic Wars, who gave him his first diplomatic job. At the age of 24 Stratford Canning became acting ambassador in Constantinople, and he served there several times over the course of a distinguished career. By 1853 he was

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virtually retired and had been created Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe, but he was sent back to Constantinople to protect Britain’s interests in the emerging crisis. He was a physically impressive man with a filthy temper, the Sultan’s ministers were sorely afraid of him and the ‘Great Elchi’ (elchi means ambassador) usually got his way.12 Beatson presented his letters of introduction from Clarendon and Ellenborough. Stratford wrote to Ellenborough, ‘I am greatly obliged to you for Col Beatson and I hope to send him to the Danube today or tomorrow. I have always had an impression that officers from the East might render good service here.’ Stratford in turn gave Beatson an introduction to the Turkish commander on the Danube, Omer Pasha, who accorded him ‘a most gracious reception’.13 Beatson was too late to see any of that season’s fighting, but he had a good look at the Turkish Army and a long conversation with its commander. Omer Pasha, born Michael Lattas in Croatia, had left the Austrian Army and joined the Turks, distinguishing himself in several campaigns before being appointed commander of the army in European Turkey.14 Omer and other Western-trained officers had reformed the regular Turkish Army, and Beatson and other observers considered them excellent material – ‘I should think quite equal to fight the Russians’. Omer was short of regular cavalry and so could not operate in open country, but he had plenty of irregulars, the so-called Bashi-Bazouks, whom he regarded as useless. He quizzed Beatson closely about the organisation of Indian irregular cavalry. Beatson described Omer’s irregulars as ‘fine bold fellows, but have no discipline, are badly armed and worse mounted’. He went back to Constantinople with an invitation from Omer to return for the resumption of campaigning in the spring.15 While he was away, Beatson’s promotion finally came through. He was appointed lieutenant-colonel of the 3rd Bengal European Regiment on 15 November 1853, but the following month transferred to the 65th BNI.16 As he was on furlough, these were paper commands only. Beatson was signing letters with his new rank as early as 21 November, so he must have known of his promotion long before it was officially gazetted in India. As always when Beatson was idle, he made a nuisance of himself. He bombarded Stratford’s staff with requests to visit the Seraskier (war minister) and military installations, and complained when he was shown nothing but barracks. Letters about the proposed inspectorate-general demanded his presence in England, and ‘The Turkish authorities appear to be so slow in making up their minds in regard to anything which could require my presence, that I could go to England and come back again before they have decided.’ Stratford delayed him in the hope that the Turks would employ him, and it was not until 5 January 1854 that he took passage on the French steamer.17



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A Turkish command From Marseilles Beatson wrote ahead to arrange a meeting with Ellenborough in London. Stratford had told Ellenborough, ‘His military bearing and straitforward [sic] character please me, and I am glad to have made his acquaintance’, and sent Clarendon a memorandum of ideas that he and Beatson had discussed for improving the Turkish Army. In Stratford’s opinion the irregulars were ‘more service to the enemy than to their sovereign’, but suitable instructors could be obtained from the HEIC, especially Beatson, ‘who enjoys a considerable reputation on that score’.18 The Ottoman ambassador in London was already hiring unemployed British officers, including Robert Cannon, formerly of the BAL and the Madras Army, who was now leading a division under Omer.19 The ambassador promised Beatson general’s rank if he went out, but nothing happened until March, when Britain was about to enter the war on Turkey’s side and Ellenborough reminded Clarendon of Beatson’s availability. The HEIC Directors gave Beatson permission to place himself at HM Government’s disposal – formally, he was ‘permitted to return to his duty’ as if he were returning to India, an important point, since it meant he would receive his pay and be able to count the service towards his seniority.20 Writing from the Oriental Club in Hanover Square (which he had joined in 1851 and often used as his London base), Beatson thanked Ellenborough for his intervention: ‘I am quite ready, and will start as soon as I receive my instructions.’21 FO officials did question Beatson’s request for British pay and local rank, reasoning that he was getting his Indian pay and was to be in the Sultan’s rather than the Queen’s service, but Clarendon considered it appropriate, and asked Hardinge (who had succeeded Wellington as CinC) to confer the local rank of colonel on Beatson while employed ‘on a particular service’ in Turkey. This was granted – the first time that Beatson had appeared in the British Army List, all his previous commissions having been in the HEIC, Spanish or Nizam’s service.22 The first requirement was to gather suitable officers for the specialised task of training irregular cavalry. First on the list of names Beatson gave the FO was Lt Harry Green of the Sind Horse. Green had travelled to Constantinople on his own initiative in December 1853, where he probably renewed his acquaintance with Beatson. Stratford asked Green to report on the perilous state of the Turkish Asiatic army at Kars. Back in London, Beatson and Ellenborough sent Green to brief the Duke of Newcastle, the Secretary of State for War and the Colonies. Ellenborough, with his eyes on the North-West Frontier of India, was worried about Russia’s advance through the Caucasus and wanted to impress upon Newcastle the importance of bolstering Turkey’s forces there. Green was anxious to see some service in the coming war – his younger brother Malcolm, also in the Sind Horse, was already serving with Cannon – and Beatson offered him the opportunity.23 Beatson requested the allowances of a brigade major of cavalry for Green, with the local rank of major, commenting that in the Turkish Army ‘the subalterns,

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and even captains, are treated like servants’. Hardinge objected to this temporary promotion as unprecedented for a mere lieutenant, especially as he would have taken precedence over captains of the Queen’s service.24 This was the first of many instances where Beatson clashed with the authorities over rank for his officers. Several of the people on Beatson’s first list proved unsuitable or unavailable. Beatson might have added Billy Olpherts, but he was teaching at the HEIC college at Addiscombe and was unavailable for several months.25 However, Olpherts’s friend Harry Tombs, the hero of Punniar, was free. He too had visited Omer Pasha while on leave, and now volunteered to join Beatson’s mission if he was appointed major. Green warned him that Hardinge would not consent to two steps in rank, but Tombs was confident: his promotion to brevet major gazetted after the Sikh Wars became effective as soon as he attained the regimental rank of captain, which was imminent. Yet Hardinge would not budge. Beatson was furious: ‘Mere silly punctilios of the Horse Guards should be set aside at a time like this when it is of the greatest importance to secure the services of such men as Lieutenants Green and Tombs,’ he complained.26 But time was passing and Beatson was anxious to get to work. He would have to obtain officers as and where he and the FO could find them.

Expedition to the East London was buzzing as the ‘Expedition to the East’ was prepared. Fashionable society lionised the officers going out to parade their gloriously impracticable Hyde Park uniforms before the Sultan’s grateful subjects.27 Beatson attended the first levée of the season at St James’s Palace, where ‘The presentations were very numerous, exceeding in number 150, chiefly of noblemen, gentlemen, and military officers, many on their departure from England.’ Beatson was presented to the Queen by Ellenborough. The court circular reported that Her Majesty wore a blue and silver cloth train with gold stars, and a white satin petticoat, topped by a diamond diadem, calculated to stand out among the throng of officers and officials. We can infer that Beatson was conspicuous among this glittering array, because he was listed as ‘late Brigadier commanding the Nizam’s cavalry’ and probably wore his Hyderabad uniform.28 The Admiralty arranged passage* for Beatson, four horses and two servants, on the P&O steamer Simla from Southampton.30 Beatson spent the final days before embarkation with his family, who were at the seaside as usual – he told the FO that his instructions could reach him as easily at 9 Marine Terrace, Margate,

* Almost a year later the P&O was still trying to obtain payment of Beatson’s £21 fare to Malta from the WD.29



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as at his London club.* These instructions, in Clarendon’s Letter No 1 to Beatson, were based on Stratford’s memoranda. HMG considered that he could be most usefully employed in organizing the irregular bands who now encumber rather than assist the operation of the Turkish Army, and whose want of discipline, coupled with the excesses which they commit in the districts through which they move … renders them a very dangerous addition to the Sultan’s forces … This state of things is the more lamentable in as much as a cavalry force is that in which the Turkish Army itself is most deficient, and with which from the difficulty of transporting horses the English and French Armies are very inadequately provided. But it appears to Her Majesty’s Government that the experience you possess in regards to their organization, management and employment of the Irregular horse in the service of the East India Company may enable you, with the concurrence of the Turkish Government, to reduce to order the undisciplined bands which now attend the Turkish Armies.

As a colonel on the staff, Beatson would receive £1 2s 9d (£1.14) a day, with 10s (50p) a day ‘field allowance’, forage for three horses and three mules, and rations for himself and four servants. Provision was made for him to draw on the FO to pay for forage and rations if the Turkish Commissariat could not supply them – a ripe area for future confusion. The letter contained the seeds of other confusions too: it stated that being in the Turkish service Beatson would not be under the orders of Lord Raglan, CinC of the British expeditionary force, but was to communicate with Raglan ‘unreservedly’ and as far as possible follow his ‘suggestions or wishes’. Furthermore, Beatson was to report direct to Clarendon and to call on Stratford for any assistance he required.32 This was a fatal flaw: by directing Beatson to report to four superiors (and these did not even include Newcastle), these confused instructions invited outright failure of the mission if any superior chose to be obstructive. Beatson was simply delighted to start the adventure. Proudly signing himself ‘Colonel on Special Service’, he wrote to Clarendon that With the aid of an efficient staff, when arrangements should have been made for the regular payment of the Troops placed under my command, I see no reason to doubt that a body of Cavalry may be formed from the present disorganized mass of Irregulars, such as will be as formidable to their enemies as the Turkish cavalry have proved themselves in former wars.33

* The packet containing Beatson’s instructions was two minutes late reaching the post office, which delayed the whole South Eastern mail and resulted in changes in FO procedures – a typical side-effect of Beatson’s hasty methods.31

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What Beatson did not appreciate was that his mission was more political than military. This is betrayed by the paragraph about the irregulars ‘encumbering’ the Turkish Army. Stratford’s officials reported depredations by the irregulars on their way to the theatre of war, and the brutal suppression of pro-Russian Greeks by Albanian irregulars. British public opinion was sensitive to stories of Christians being persecuted, and Stratford was concerned that Britain’s interests could be harmed by association with Bashi atrocities. With typical ‘Great Elchi’ rhetoric – ‘Their measure of wickedness is now full. Justice must have its due. The Sultan’s allies have a right to demand it’ – Stratford obtained a firman (imperial decree) to enforce discipline. Omer Pasha made full use of these powers; William Russell of The Times reported that Omer had ‘done a great good by a little wholesome severity. He has seized on whole hordes of them, taken their horses and accoutrements, and sent them off to be enlisted by compulsory levy into the armies of the faithful as foot soldiers.’34

The Bashi-Bazouk tradition But if these troops were such ‘ruffians’ and ‘desperadoes’, why should the Western Allies consort with them? The answer lay in their history. In its eighteenthcentury wars, Russia’s armies countered Turkish irregular cavalry by employing Cossacks from the Steppes, whose lawlessness and savagery mirrored those of their opponents. Slowly, the Cossacks were turned into reliable light cavalry and became an integral part of the Russian army. Cossacks harried Napoleon’s defeated forces from Moscow to Paris, striking terror into their enemies and eliciting awe from their allies.35 Britain and France’s leaders in 1854 – whose concept of warfare was shaped by those events – were morbidly conscious of this threat. Knowing that their armies assembling in Turkey were short of cavalry, the two governments reckoned on reviving the Cossacks’ traditional enemies. There was a romantic element in wanting to employ these colourful warriors, but to officers experienced in commanding irregular cavalry in Algeria or India it seemed a practical solution. Bâshï-Bozûk, rendered by English writers as ‘Bashi-Bazouk’ or some variant thereon, translates as ‘headless man’,* implying both frenzied and ‘leaderless’, or free-lance. They were not an ethnic group – bands existed in all the wilder provinces of the Ottoman Empire. Some, particularly from the Arab lands (where they were known as Hayetas), were fanatical Muslims, others, especially from the Balkans, flouted Islamic teaching, and drunkenness was rife. In peacetime, provincial governors (pashas) employed these horsemen for security duties. In wartime, the Sultan’s government could gather large numbers of them, eager for

* Sandwith translates Bashi-Bazouk as ‘spoiled head’, Burton as ‘rotten head’.36



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adventure and plunder, though it could not arm, feed or discipline them. While Turkey had reorganised its regular forces on the Prussian model, it had done nothing with these irregulars. Indeed, the Bashi-Bazouks despised the regulars and rejected any form of uniform as a mark of slavery. Dr Humphry Sandwith’s description of the traditional way of raising an alai or band of these men recalls Shakespeare’s Sir John Falstaff and Justice Shallow recruiting in Gloucestershire:37 Suppose a certain district has to furnish 1,000 horsemen, to be paid and fed by Government; at once every kind of intrigue is set on foot by some three or four influential chiefs to be appointed the commander and ‘farmer’ of these men. The appointment rests generally with the civil Pasha, who, of course, makes the best bargain for himself. According to the amount of the present, the Pasha determines whether Khurshid Bey, Abdullah Bey, or Ahmed Bey is to have the power of raising the thousand men; and as Ahmed has given 50,000 piastres, besides a fine Arab horse, he is the lucky man; so he sets to work to raise the proposed number of horsemen. The pay promised by Government is far too small to allure good men with good horses, if even it were to be forthcoming regularly; and when part of the pittance is deducted by the dishonesty of their chiefs, none but the most miserable outcasts of society can serve on such terms. At last the thousand men are raised, and the Pasha reviews them prior to their departure. They are drawn up in two lines, the best armed, clothed and mounted in front; and these really make a very fair show. The number is complete; the Pasha, having pocketed the 50,000 piastres, winks hard at, and does not approach the most wretched of these warriors, and so, having been reviewed, they march for their destination. At the first station, and indeed, all along the road, the best mounted and armed drop off and disappear; these are men who have been hired for the day to complete the muster!38

Sandwith’s friend, Vice-Consul Christian Rassam at Mosul, confirmed the prevalence of these abuses: the local hayetas were under the control of the provincial pasha, who appointed the commander (the aga). ‘Hence it is in the power of the Pashas to gain a fictitious account of the number of men to their Governments i.e. they report that they have such a number of men employed, while in reality they have not more than two thirds of that number, and in some cases only half, most of whom are unfit for such service.’39 Clearly, the agas and pashas were as adept at working the games of ‘straw men’ and ‘dead pays’ as any sixteenth- or seventeenth-century European colonel. One can imagine Falstaff Yuzbashi and the Cali Shallow selecting men (Bullcalf and Mouldy) who can afford to slip Bardolph Ombashi a few piastres to be excused service, then replacing them with useless ones. This comparison with Elizabethan soldiers is not fanciful, for like Ancient Pistol the Bashi-Bazouks were noted swaggerers, fighting in the bazars and drinking shops, firing off their pistols and

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brandishing their swords. Their military usefulness was firmly marooned in the seventeenth century; they were fit only for frightening villagers and skirmishing with equally savage Cossacks. But something better could be achieved. Sandwith recorded that when a chief brought his own feudal following into the field, the result was a more effective unit, as ‘he naturally has a pride in producing the best mounted and most respectable of his clansmen and these look up to him as the father of their sept’.40 Furthermore, although plenty of the usual toughs answered the Sultan’s call for volunteers in 1853, other contingents were religiously motivated, eager to take a swipe at the Russian giaurs (infidels). They came from all over the Islamic world, not only the Ottoman Empire – just like today, where committed Islamic fighters move between Bosnia, Chechnya and Afghanistan. During Omer Pasha’s defence of the Danube in 1853–4, some Bashi-Bazouks gave useful service, particularly those commanded by Polish émigrés. Their normal mode of fighting was to skirmish, popping away at ridiculous ranges with their musketoons, and then galloping off when approached by superior forces. Nevertheless, they could be doughty fighters: small parties stole boats to cross the Danube, where they threw their lives away while killing as many Russians as possible.41 The British Government felt that if these wild men could be tamed, they might alleviate the Allies’ greatest weakness. One well-informed correspondent explained that ‘Upon the level plain of the Danube cavalry will be everything, and I believe that the whole English Force yet ordered will not exceed 1800 sabres. Unless the French come out more strongly than ourselves, the infantry will be sadly mauled in any general action upon the Plains.’42 In his initial instructions to Raglan, Newcastle wrote: As the force of Cavalry under your Command is necessarily limited it will be desirable that you should take early steps for enquiring whether you cannot add to that force, a Corps of Irregular Native Horse. In that case it will be necessary that it should be officered by Europeans, & upon receiving a report of your opinion on the subject, I shall be prepared to assist you in communication with the Genl Comding in Chief in procuring officers either here or in India.43

This implies that Raglan might establish a separate force to that which Beatson was going to command under Omer – another situation ripe for confusion.

Adventurers in uniform The Simla’s departure was delayed until Saturday 6 May, and Beatson spent the Friday at the Oriental Club where he was forwarded an offer of service from a fellow club member. Colonel Henry Steinbach was a German soldier of fortune



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who had served in the Pedroite War in Portugal, then commanded a battalion in the Sikh khalsa until the Punjab’s descent into anarchy. Latterly he had held a similar position under the Maharaja of Kashmir. He had written a bestseller on the Punjab that is still in print today. (It is interesting to note how many authors Beatson’s mission contained.)44 Beatson responded that ‘Colonel Steinbach is an excellent officer and I shall be glad to have him under my command’. The War Department (WD) informed the FO (but not, crucially, Beatson himself) that ‘From his standing and services, Coll Steinbach would expect to fill the post of second in command in the Forces about to be raised’. With this understanding, Steinbach arranged to follow Beatson by a later steamer.45 Beatson travelled down to Southampton on the evening of Friday 5 May. Among his fellow passengers he found a former BAL comrade travelling east at his own expense. Sandhurst-educated Jasper Byng Creagh had staff experience in Spain and in Canada, but after promotion to brevet major in 1848 he had been placed on half pay and not re-employed, probably ostracised because of his divorce. Now Creagh saw a chance to get back to active service. Before they sailed, Beatson dashed off a note to Clarendon that said, ‘Having served with Major Creagh in Spain I know him to be a gallant, zealous and active officer … [he] would be very useful to me as a staff officer.’ Horse Guards raised no objection, so the FO placed Creagh under Beatson’s orders. Clarendon even overruled his parsimonious officials and reimbursed Creagh’s passage money.46 Such was the casual way in which Beatson’s team was assembled. He always had a predilection for commandeering passing officers – Ensign Wilson at Chirgong, for instance, or making Apothecary Sheetz a temporary officer – but this was taking it to extremes. That things continued thus throughout his 18-month association with the Bashi-Bazouks was hardly Beatson’s fault: his list had only produced Green, the FO had no expertise in such matters, and the WD was working in an equally ad hoc fashion.

Slow boat to Turkey A steamer journey to the furthest end of the Mediterranean normally took just over a fortnight, yet by 12 May the Simla had only reached Gibraltar: ‘But for the misfortunate breaking of our screw propellor in the Bay of Biscay, we should now have been well on for Malta,’ complained Beatson,* but he was able to make a joke of it:

* Guards officers going out in the Simoom reported that she broke down several times on this voyage, taking nine days to Gibraltar and eight to Malta.47

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To draw some benefit even from bad luck, the delay has given me a better opportunity of brushing up my Turkish, so by the time I get to Constantinople I should be able to order a Bashi Bazook to be hanged in his own language; which I hope those who deserve hanging will fully appreciate.48

The delay allowed him to dash off a recommendation for another officer who had volunteered to join him. The Hon Frederick Walpole was a younger son of the Earl of Orford and had served in the Royal Navy during the China War. Now on half pay (and also a part-time officer in his father’s militia regiment in Norfolk), Walpole was building a reputation as a travel writer. In 1850 he joined Austen Layard’s British Museum excavations at Nineveh near Mosul, and Beatson felt this experience would be valuable: ‘he has been a long time in Asia Minor, speaks Arabic and Turkish, and being well acquainted with the chiefs in some of the districts where are the best horsemen would be very useful in getting a more respectable class of men to join our standards.’ The Admiralty granted permission to employ Walpole, and he became a valued member of Beatson’s team, even if he did sometimes forget himself and respond ‘Aye Aye Sir!’ to orders.49 Newspapers reported the arrival of Beatson and Creagh at Malta on 15 May. As the Simla was following the usual P&O route to Alexandria, Beatson and the military passengers transferred to the chartered Royal Mail steamer Trent for their onward voyage to Constantinople. This voyage gave Beatson, exhibiting his family’s fascination with technology, an opportunity to test the Admiralty’s preference for screw over paddle steamers for horse transports. He disagreed with the Admiralty: in his experience, the Simla was ‘a screw which rolled so much even in fine weather that the horses were almost always either on their noses or their tails: I came from Malta in the Trent, a paddle, which was as steady as a rock in weather that would have made the Simla roll.’50 They finally reached Constantinople on 24 May. Beatson was disappointed to find no orders to join Omer’s army awaiting him. Indeed, Stratford was not sure how his mission would be received: ‘I doubt whether Colonel Beatson made on the Turkish authorities by his personal bearing an impression equal to the reputation which he justly enjoys.’ Given the usual praise for Beatson’s military bearing when in uniform, this suggests that he wore travel-stained mufti on his previous visit. Omer privately expressed irritation at the stream of officers who arrived with letters of introduction from the British Embassy, expecting to be entertained as honoured guests and given plum appointments, so his gracious interview the previous November had probably been more noncommittal than Beatson realised. But the circumstances were now more favourable: a new seraskier was in post, and inter-Allied politics meant that the Turks were virtually obliged to accept Beatson’s mission.51 If it was going to succeed, the mission needed more personnel. The FO sent one promising candidate: Henry Loch, son of a Scottish MP, who had seen service during the Sikh Wars and as 2i/c of Skinner’s Horse.52 This was exactly the



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experience required, and Beatson gladly accepted him, at the same time adding ‘there is a gentleman here who I think will make an excellent officer, and I strongly recommend him to Lord Clarendon for appointment, Mr Charles Lane Fox, late of the Grenadier Guards, in which Regiment he served about five years … As Major Creagh is the only officer with me, I shall take Mr Lane Fox to Shumla.’ Charles Pierrepoint D’Arcy Lane Fox, grandson of the Duke of Leeds, was in Constantinople as one of the ‘travelling gentlemen’ swarming round the edges of this war.53 Beatson recruited another crucial member of his staff locally. Finding no congenial work in England, Dr Humphry Sandwith had tried his luck in Constantinople. Making friends at the British Embassy, he accompanied Stratford’s protégé Layard on his archaeological expedition, where he had met Walpole and Vice-Consul Rassam. Since then he had served with Omer on the Danube in 1853. Beatson took him as staff surgeon and principal interpreter.54 The team now comprised a diverse group of adventurous men, typical of those who served with the Bashi-Bazouks over the next two years.

Pen-pushers and chibouk-puffers Things moved at glacial speed in Constantinople. In June the Turkish Government finally decided that Beatson should go to Shumla to discuss with Omer how the Bashi-Bazouks were to be organised. ‘Why the Porte should not have let me do this at once I know not,’ he complained, ‘excepting that the ministers think their chibouks [tobacco pipes] of more importance than the defence of their country.’ He requested transport for his staff, their servants and horses, and for camp equipage to be issued, either from the British or Turkish stores – but nothing happened. The Royal Navy could provide sea passage to Varna, but could not accommodate their horses, while the exquisites on Raglan’s staff (most of whom were his aristocratic nephews) were courteous but unhelpful.55 Beatson always chafed at bureaucracy,* but to be fair the Ambassador and Seraskier had more important concerns than finding campaign tents – the Russians had begun a siege of the fortress of Silistria whose defence was inspired by Cannon and his young HEIC officers.56 In the end, Beatson’s staff and horses went to Varna, but Stratford kept Beatson himself back until everything was settled: ‘When this will be Lord only knows if it is allowed to depend on the Turkish government,’ raged Beatson.57 Loafing around the embassy, Beatson got to know two fellow Scots on the staff. With the first secretary, Lord Napier (kinsman of Sir Charles Napier),58

* From now on Beatson’s official letters are in a more legible hand and carefully numbered; presumably Creagh was now acting as his staff officer.

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he gossiped about politics. With Vice-Consul Skene he discussed local military affairs.59 James Skene had served in the 73rd (Perthshire) Regiment before entering the Diplomatic Service.60 He fancied himself a military expert, and floated a scheme to organise Turkish irregular infantry, including artillery. This prompted Beatson to suggest that ‘great confidence would be given to the men of the cavalry by having some light guns attached to them’. Taking advice from Royal Artillery officers, he proposed forming a battery of five light brass 6-pounders and a howitzer, drawn by the small local horses.61 Nothing came of this, but the seed thus planted bore fruit later. His friendship with Skene gave no hint of the terrible falling-out that would follow. With nothing to do, Beatson began one of his correspondence campaigns: he complained about his pay. In India he would have received £1,238 per annum in pay and batta, with a further £480 allowance if he commanded a cavalry regiment. The inspectorate-general would have been worth about £3,000 per annum. The FO was paying him only around £600 per annum on top of his basic Indian salary of £657, and Steinbach and Green were getting almost as much. Beatson concluded that he should have the rank and allowances of a brigadier-general. Horse Guards refused to give him a second step in local rank and considered the request ‘a little unreasonable’ as he had not objected when pay was first discussed. Beatson conceded ‘it was my own fault in not asking for it before I left England’, and expressed the hope that his local rank of colonel could at least be extended to India, but that did not happen either.62 As for the Porte, ‘It does seem very like a quiet means of shelving me altogether, to send me off to Shumla without either rank or position of any kind.’ He asked Stratford to remind them that ‘The Turkish Ambassador in London distinctly told me that I should be made a Ferik Pasha’ (lieutenant-general). Here he was on firmer ground because politics had intervened: the French had appointed a general in an identical role, and Stratford would never allow them to gain advantage over the British.63

Yusuf’s command While Raglan had studiously ignored Newcastle’s instructions to recruit irregular cavalry, his French opposite number, Marshal St Arnaud, had already done so. Indeed, St Arnaud was lobbying to have all the Turkish troops placed under his command and, although rebuffed, he regarded a force of French-paid BashiBazouks as a first step.64 To command them he appointed General Yusuf, born Joseph Valentini on Elba in 1808. During Napoleon’s exile on the island, the exemperor’s sister Pauline befriended the child who grew into a proud Bonapartist. Captured by Barbary pirates as a boy, he became a slave of the Bey of Tunis. There, ‘Yusuf’ got involved with a seraglio girl and to escape the Bey’s vengeance he fled to Algiers, offering his services as interpreter to the invading French.



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Soon commissioned, he built a reputation as leader of Spahis, the North African irregular light cavalry, rising to major-general by the age of 37.65 Colonel Hugh Rose, the British Commissioner at French HQ, reported that Omer Pasha has written to Marshal de St Arnaud that he will send to Varna for the purpose of being organized by General Youssouf 4000 Bozze Bozzucks, and Marshal de St Arnaud is willing to give these men a franc a day, as well as bread for themselves and rations for their horses. The Marshal proposes that Brigadier General Beatson, or any Englishman, whom your Lordship may choose to have, should form part of the officers of the Bozzi.66

To place Beatson under French command was unacceptable, and Stratford scotched that. He demanded equal treatment: 4,000 irregulars must be attached to each Allied army.67 The Porte agreed, but the FO and Stratford showed naivety about the details. Whereas St Arnaud was clear that the French owned the troops he was paying, it remained open whether the men assigned to Beatson would be Turkish troops under Omer, or British troops under Raglan. Beatson seized the opportunity to propose that, like the French, HMG ‘should make arrangements for the payment of whatever number of troops it may be proposed to place under my orders’. Then, he continued optimistically, ‘all difficulties will vanish, the men will become attached to their British officers, and in a short time a most efficient body of cavalry may be formed out of the present disorganized and consequently useless masses.’ Stratford endorsed the proposal.68 London and Paris had been wrongfooted by all this. Although the British Ambassador in Paris was assured that St Arnaud had acted unilaterally, Napoleon III backed his man and issued St Arnaud’s order as an imperial decree. Yusuf was to raise a force to be known as the ‘Spahis d’Orient’, with a large complement of officers, down to squadron serjeant-majors, seconded from the French cavalry.69 Yet at first Yusuf was sent only 150 boys and old men, as Omer claimed that he needed all his Bashis for operations. ‘General Youssouff does not like Omar Pasha,’ reported Rose. ‘He thinks that he did not give him a proper reception; and he states that Omar Pasha from motives of jealousy, will never allow him or Colonel Beatson to organize a considerable body of Bozzi Bozzuck.’ Nevertheless, Rose considered that the French offer of pay would allow Yusuf to recruit a formidable force even without transfers. Rose, who still thought like a soldier despite years of diplomatic service as Stratford’s deputy, maintained that ‘Irregular cavalry are indispensable for the purpose of performing the important duty of outposts; and they spare, also, our few and precious cavalry.’ He concluded that ‘it would be both politic and economical, that Her Majesty’s Government should pay, as the French Government do, the Irregular Cavalry about to be raised by Colonel Beatson.’70 The primitive weapons of the Bashis limited their combat effectiveness, so when Beatson heard that the French intended to arm as well as pay theirs, he

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fired off a similar proposal to London: ‘The carbines now in use with the Turkish Irregulars have old flint locks, not one in twenty of which would go off in dry weather, while in wet weather probably not one in a hundred would go off. This may be remedied by sending out from England percussion cavalry carbines with ammunition and stores complete in whatever number of men Her Majesty’s Government may agree to pay.’ He had seen the new light Minié rifled carbines issued to the Royal Artillery, ‘which are infinitely superior to any I have seen, so I hope they will send us them, and quickly’.71

Travel to Varna It would be at least a month before any response arrived from London and, as it was Ramadan, business in Turkey moved even more maddeningly slowly than usual. Beatson could stand waiting no longer: ‘I should feel it a slur on my character as a soldier were I to be left at Constantinople waiting for firmans while military operations were going on in Bulgaria.’72 At last, on 23 June, the Seraskier informed Omer that ‘General Beatson, a distinguished English [sic] officer is about to proceed to Your Excellency to command the Bashi-Bazouk troops of the Imperial Army, having some experience of that service’. A firman would be issued to commission him as a ferik, and although he would be paid by the British Government, Omer was to provide him with rations according to his rank, and ‘concert with him on the number of troops he is to command, the manner of his commanding them, and his movements’. Perhaps mindful of Omer’s prejudices, the Seraskier instructed him to ‘treat the distinguished officer with proper attention’.73 Beatson and Sandwith left in the fast steamer HMS Banshee.74 His firman followed soon after. From now on, as far as the British press and public were concerned, he was always ‘General Beatson’. To the Ottomans, who gave all their foreign officers a Turkish nom de guerre, he was ‘Shemshi Pasha’.75 ‘Strictly speaking,’ Stratford confided to Clarendon, ‘the Colonel was not entitled to more than the rank of Liva, or Major General. I obtained the superior rank for him, partly in consideration of General Youssouf’s position … and partly to increase his authority in undertaking so difficult a command’ or, as he put it to Beatson, to give him ‘greater weight with the Turkish soldiery’. Imperial firmans also commissioned Green (‘Daoud Bey’) and Steinbach (‘Naymi Bey’) as miralais (regimental commanders, equivalent to colonel) and Lane Fox (‘Yussuf Bey’), Loch (‘Munir Bey’) and Creagh (‘Kojalo Bey’) as bimbashis (heads of a thousand, equivalent to major). All except Loch were awaiting Beatson at Varna.76 The British Consul at Varna was a former BAL comrade of Beatson and Creagh. Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Neale (the FO used his Spanish rank as a courtesy) had served under Charles Shaw and therefore knew Beatson well. With his combination of military and local experience, ‘Colonel Neale Pasha’ gave



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excellent support to Raglan and Beatson.77 Their old BAL commander Sir George de Lacy Evans was also at Varna, dug out from the House of Commons to command 2nd Division because his Spanish exploits made him virtually the only senior British officer with experience of manoeuvring large bodies of troops.78

Meeting the Bashi-Bazouks The country around Varna was one vast camp. Thousands of British, French, Turkish and Egyptian troops were under canvas and the town was full of staff and stores. Here the British soldiers got their first sight of Bashi-Bazouks. One described them as a kind of irregular horse, or more correctly banditti, who prowl about the country. They are picturesque-looking vagabonds, armed to the teeth, their girdles stuck full of weapons, and look as if they would have no compunction in cutting any one’s throat. Their attire is very gaudy, with turbans of bright colours.79

Another watched about 500 Bashi-Bazouks ride through the camp, at full gallop whirling their lances about and making digs at imaginary ‘Mosco’s’ as they call the Russians. I suppose they think we are as bloodthirsty as they are. Most wild looking objects! armed to the teeth, riding on little rats of ponies with their legs nearly touching the ground.80

War correspondents and artists were fascinated by the Bashis’ outlandish costumes. They favoured richly embroidered waistcoats and jackets of greens and reds with striped sleeves, baggy trousers and decorated boots, enlivened with coloured shawls worn as waist sashes and turbans, though Bulgarians and Circassians adopted woollen caps, and the Kurds wore a white or yellow headcloth. Other variations included the Albanians’ pleated white ‘petticoats’ (similar to the uniform of Greek Evzones), the Arabs’ striped cloaks and the Circassians’ Cossack-style coats with cartridge-holders sewn on the breast. Their horses – ‘nearly all stallions – such neighing and kicking, and biting and fighting as goes on among them all day!’ – were richly caparisoned, the Arabs adopting red horsehair throat plumes, the Albanians a metal crescent suspended from the throat lash.81 Each man provided his own arms. Their characteristic weapon was the yataghan, a short, wavy-bladed sword, with a large pommel but without quillions or knuckleguard. Not much more than a long dagger, it was handy for a tavern brawl but useless as a cavalry weapon, though some Bashis possessed a scimitar as well. Most carried two or three inlaid flintlock pistols thrust through their waist sash and an old musketoon slung over their shoulder. The Arabs preferred a lance,

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usually decorated with a tuft of black feathers, but frequently had no firearms. The Bashi’s essential piece of kit was his chibouk, stuck into the leg of his boot when he was not smoking it. N.A. Woods of the Morning Herald, who described them as ‘the scum and offscourings of all nations’, reported that ‘almost every tenth man carried a banner or a flag, green, blue or white, on which was blazoned a scimitar surmounted with the crescent and star, and surrounded with sentences from the Koran, in all the various dialects of Turkey. These flags they flourished with threatening looks and vehement gestures, dashing and prancing their horses recklessly along the highway.’82 An alai was often accompanied by a mounted kettle-drummer wearing a costume that reminded Westerners of a jester.

Beatson’s command Varna was in uproar as the armies prepared to follow the retreating Russians, who had raised the siege of Silistria on 23 June.83 In the confusion, Beatson could get no one to change bills drawn on the FO. Without cash, he could not reimburse his officers with their passage money or any other expenses. He ended up paying out of his own pocket, and anticipated even higher costs when he had to hire interpreters, hospital assistants and the like.84 He tried three times to get an interview with Raglan, but the CinC was too busy. He did authorise camp equipment for Beatson’s team, but Beatson had another favour to ask. Around 40 of the Bashis assigned to Yusuf were Indian Muslims who had been on pilgrimage to Mecca when the Sultan called for volunteers. Beatson and his HEIC officers needed no interpreters with these men – indeed, Green discovered that one of them had a discharge certificate from the Sind Horse signed by Green himself. Raglan interceded to have them transferred to Beatson, and St Arnaud and Yusuf graciously agreed.85 Omer arrived in Varna on 5 July for a conference of Allied commanders. Beatson ‘waited upon him’ for his orders, and was ‘invited’ to go to the Danube, where the necessary arrangements would be made. He set off the following day,86 The Times reporting that General Beatson passed up on Monday, and pitched his tents about two miles beyond our outposts, on the road to Shumla … accompanied by Captain Green, so well known in India from his success in organising the Scinde Irregulars, and Mr. C. Fox acts as Aid-de-Camp, under the name Yusuf Bey … Dr Sandwith, gorgeously attired, has also gone up towards Shumla, to take charge of the medicine. He rejoices in the name and title of Achmet Effendi.87

Many years later a veteran of the British Heavy Cavalry Brigade remembered Beatson, Lane Fox and ‘other gaily dressed members of his staff’ camping nearby.



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The stolid ‘Heavies’ considered Beatson’s mission ‘quixotic’.88 Second Lieutenant W.T. Markham of the Rifle Brigade made a watercolour sketch of Lane Fox wearing a green alkalakh with red piping and a little gold embroidery around the ‘bib’ (Plate R). This is not particularly gaudy, but Beatson had apparently taken to wearing his richly embroidered Hyderabad uniform, which somewhat resembled a pasha’s dress coat. Intended to impress the men, this coat would explain the choice of his favourite green for his staff’s uniforms. A week after Beatson passed by, Russell reported another interesting party: Some five-and-twenty horsemen rode into the village attired in the most picturesque excesses of the Osmanli; fine, handsome, well-kempt men, with robes and turbans a blaze of gay colours, and with arms neat and shining from the care bestowed on them. They said that they came from Peshawur and other remote portions of the north-western provinces of the Indian Peninsula.

This was Walpole with the men transferred from Yusuf, and Russell understood that they were to form Beatson’s bodyguard. ‘Mr. Walpole seems quite delighted with his command, and as he has the power of life and death, he seems to think there will be no difficulty in repressing the irregularities of his men.’89

March to the Danube The route from Varna to Rustchuk on the Danube was 137 miles, and Beatson’s party covered it in just five marches. Steinbach, who expected to be second-incommand, was left in charge of the baggage. One dark night the guides mistook the route, and with the waggons ‘breaking down every half hour’, they were on the road for 23 hours. Beatson found Steinbach asleep in a cart by the roadside and reprimanded him. Steinbach resigned, complaining of Beatson’s ‘arbitrary and irritable manner’. Beatson commented that ‘from what I have seen of Colonel Steinbach on the march … I am of opinion that he would not be likely to be of any use in the force I am to organise and I am consequently glad of the opportunity to get rid of him.’ Steinbach retorted that the feeling was mutual. Beatson contrasted Steinbach’s performance with Creagh, whose health was not good yet ‘did not find it too hard work to remain on horseback when Colonel Steinbach was asleep in his cart’. Steinbach, used to the dilatory ways of Indian native states, did not measure up to Beatson’s exacting standards of ‘zeal’: he was not the first, nor would he be the last.90 Beatson asked for Steinbach’s commission as miralai to be transferred to the stalwart Creagh, whose promotion to lieutenant-colonel in the British army (on Beatson’s recommendation) had recently been gazetted.91 He also requested that Walpole should be commissioned as a miralai, and Sandwith as a hakim (medical officer).92 They were joined by Mehmet Aga, a retired Albanian officer who had

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enjoyed good relations with the British garrison of the Ionian Islands. Stratford wrote that the old boy wanted to join the British Bashis, and Beatson soon came to value his services as a factotum.93 At Rustchuk, Beatson reported again to Omer, who assigned to him the irregular cavalry at Tutrakan. These comprised the Anatolian 1st and 5th Regiments, together with the Arab 10th Regiment from Damascus. They totalled 2,181 men, of whom 220 of the 1st were dismounted, while 300 of the 10th were out on patrol and (in Omer’s ominous phrase) ‘draw rations from the villages’. Beatson’s instructions were to maintain strict observation of the enemy on the opposite bank of the Danube.94 ‘Altho’ I have not been lucky enough to have a fight yet, the force I am now in is always under fire,’ Beatson wrote to Ellenborough. ‘While I am writing a party of Russians are on an island in the Danube & are amusing themselves firing Minié Rifles at every person who shows himself in the open.’ They dined under fire, and ‘going out on horseback we are always fired at’. Beatson was clearly in his element. ‘I am now fairly in the midst of the Bashee Bozooks … I was advised everywhere to bring a Guard of regular troops with me to protect my own throat and to cut those of the Bashee Bozooks, who are represented as the greatest miscreants on the face of the earth’, but he ‘never saw men more tractable or grateful for the little I have been able to do for them’.95 In religion and outlook they resembled Rohillas, that ‘good natured set of fellows’ with whom Beatson had haggled in Hyderabad. He must have felt that he could handle these men the same way – firmly, but with respect, kindness and rough humour. The men had no food ‘except a very small quantity of bad bread, their clothes are in tatters, many of them without shoes, and their horses have nothing but the grass they pick up for themselves’. Omer airily assured him that the Bashis’ patriotism would support them against all enemies. Beatson concluded that ‘Patriotism is no doubt a very fine thing, but it could no more feed, clothe, and arm the Bashi Bozouks, nor supply the place of ammunition required to defend the passage of the Danube than Falstaff’s “Honor” could “set a leg” or “an arm”.’96 He and Sandwith visited the sick and established a hospital at Beatson’s expense. With few medical supplies, Sandwith gathered herbs in the meadows and leeches in the marshes.97 There had been reports that religiously motivated Bashis were refusing to be paid by the French giaurs for fear of losing their chance of Paradise, but Beatson informed Raglan that It is a mere bugbear to assume that the Turkish soldiers have any objection to serve under Christian Officers. I am now in the midst of thousands of Bashee-Bazouks without any regular troops near, and both officers and men seem to vie with each other as to who will pay the most attention to me and the four European Officers with me … We hear a great deal of the crimes of the Bashee-Bazouks – starving



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men commit crimes in all countries – feed and clothe the Bashee-Bazouks, and I will be responsible that they commit as few crimes as any other troops in the world.98

A party of British sappers and seamen arriving to lay a bridge over the Danube at Silistria found Beatson’s headquarters, and he ‘hospitably regaled them with English cheese and porter’. These supplies had allegedly been laid in by a trader who expected the Russians to take the town; deprived of this business, he must have been delighted with the providential arrival of these beer-drinking giaurs amidst the faithful. Lane Fox took the British officers (who included Queen Victoria’s nephew, Prince Ernest of Leiningen, serving on HMS Britannia) on a tour of the town, which was much knocked about, reflecting the staunchness of the defence.99

London’s view Now that Beatson had met his men, he did not want to relinquish them. ‘If H.M. Government do not consent to pay the Bashee Bozooks,’ he assured his friends, ‘I will at once resign the Command; but if they do consent to pay them, I will stake my reputation on forming as fine a body of irregular cavalry as there is in any country, and they will be as easily commanded too.’ Influential figures agreed with him. Brigadier-General William Fenwick Williams, Commissioner to the Turkish army in Asia, told Stratford that ‘Since General Beatson was ordered to form a Turkish Legion, I have always told the authorities they must be paid to be kept in order; then and not till then, will such fellows submit to severe disciplines.’100 Indeed, there was an organised campaign in London to support the proposition. A letter appeared in The Times headlined ‘An Appeal from the Bashi-Bazouks’, which began: ‘Sir,– I am a Bashi-Bazouk. Do not tremble at this dreaded name …’ and claimed that he had read ‘Our Own Correspondent’s’ letters abusing his fellows. Explaining that they were driven to robbing the villagers for food, the letter claimed that most of the atrocities were the work of the Albanian Bashis, not the Asiatics. The writer had learned that the English pasha had previously lived among the Hindustanis and was kind, but ‘kind words will not fill empty stomachs’. He claimed that the Indian Bashis were humiliated when the English did not pay them as the French had. The letter ends by quoting ‘a great English general in writing of a country called Ireland, “Feed, clothe, but don’t hang them”.’ Since this quotation comes verbatim from Beatson’s letter to Ellenborough of 22 July (attributed to their mutual friend Charles Napier), evidently Ellenborough or an associate had concocted The Times letter to support Beatson.101 Ellenborough was taking a close interest in his protégé’s activities, and his papers of this time include an example of his doggerel poetry. Headed ‘From

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our Poet at Varna’, it is in the satirical style of Punch, and it is possible that Ellenborough may have intended to submit it to that magazine. His effort includes the lines To be sure the late Duke did some things pretty well And I’ve heard old Peninsular Officers tell How he would all the hair from his face shave away And would dress like a gentleman every day But no doubt greater things would have come from the Duke Had he worn the coiffure of a Bashi Bazouk!102

This alludes to the widely ridiculed orders on shaving issued by Sir George Brown, commanding the Light Division. Meanwhile, Punch itself was having fun with a series of weekly articles bylined ‘From our own Bashi-Bozouk’ (see p. 185). The British public was fascinated by anything to do with the mysterious East – a couple of entrepreneurs set up an ‘Oriental and Turkish Museum’ at Hyde Park Corner – and the Bashis seemed most exciting of all.103

The Queen’s piastre Amid the penny-pinching that so harmed the British Army in this war it is surprising that ministers accepted without demur the proposal to pay Beatson’s men. Newcastle instructed Raglan to arrange with St Arnaud for uniform rates of pay for the two forces of irregulars, and then to meet all of Beatson’s expenditure. These orders contained the critical phrase: ‘The attachment of Col Beatson to the Army under Your Lordship’s command for the purposes of payment and subsistence, will carry with it the necessity that he should consider himself as directly under Your Lordship’s orders.’104 Newcastle also planned to rearm the men as Beatson recommended. He had already sent 1,000 old ‘scymeters’ for the Turkish cavalry (probably the curved 1796 pattern light cavalry sword – obsolete, but considered a fine weapon). Now he sent out 5,000 more swords for the Bashis (probably the recently superseded 1823 pattern, still carried by many of Raglan’s cavalry, but an inferior weapon) and asked the Board of Ordnance how many percussion carbines they could send. He was shocked to find that none of the modern Victoria carbines were in store – if Raglan’s cavalry had to be reinforced, the Ordnance would be obliged to take weapons from the regiments at home, replacing them from the store of fewer than 5,000 Yeomanry pattern carbines. Newcastle at once ordered 3,000 new carbines to be manufactured for Beatson.105 As far as Clarendon and Stratford were concerned, the FO’s responsibility for Beatson had ended. Stratford wished him well: ‘I shall follow your course with interest and consider a certain hand-writing as copperplate whenever it



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does me the honour to impart [news],’ he wrote, joking about Beatson’s terrible handwriting – a definite case of pot and kettle.106 What none of the politicians bargained for was opposition from Raglan. Beatson was already disillusioned with the British commander: ‘from Lord Raglan & all his party I have met with nothing but opposition, engendered, no doubt, by that liberal feeling which the Horse Guards has always shewn to Company’s officers, and by jealousy at my not being under his orders.’107 He was wrong in this respect – Raglan was not jealous: in fact he wanted nothing to do with the Bashi-Bazouks. When Stratford sounded Raglan out – ‘Clarendon is inclined to take Turkish troops into our pay, and to place them under British Officers. What say you? … The Bashee-Bazooks, for instance, under Beatson’ – the General had been horrified. He appealed to Newcastle, ‘Pray be so good as to refuse the Emperor’s offer of half of the Bashi Bazouks. I have no wish to have any of them and indeed would rather be without the assistance of such a force.’ In the meantime Raglan used the different relative positions of Yusuf and Beatson as an excuse to block the proposal. ‘The rank conferred by His Turkish Majesty upon Colonel Beatson would render his employment with Her Majesty’s Troops a serious inconvenience,’ he told Newcastle, and concluded, ‘I propose not to act upon Your Grace’s instructions until I should hear further.’108 Raglan’s insubordination is shocking in someone normally so punctilious; it can only be explained by his ‘almost superstitious horror’ of the Bashi-Bazouks, who apparently reminded him of the Spanish guerrillas of the Peninsular War. Even his admirer Kinglake commented, ‘In this respect Lord Raglan had no breadth of view.’ Almost all Raglan’s career had been as Wellington’s military secretary and he was ill-equipped to command an army in the field, but he deployed all his administrative expertise to delay Beatson’s mission until the unwelcome problem went away.109

Death march Meanwhile, cholera had broken out in the camps around Varna, and morale sagged. While the politicians debated whether the Allied armies should follow the Russians into the Principalities, or transfer to the Crimean peninsula in pursuit of their strategic objective of the Russian naval base at Sevastopol, the commanders on the spot wanted to be seen to be doing something. Hearing that there were ‘un million des cossaques’ in the marshy Danube delta known as the Dobrudja, St Arnaud sent Yusuf to expel them. Intended to boost morale – St Arnaud described it as ‘une promenade militaire’ – the operation was a disaster. Yusuf’s Spahis d’Orient did bump into some Cossacks, but dashing back in their usual fashion, they left an unfortunate French colonel to fight single-handed.

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After another skirmish the Bashis cut off the heads of the Russian dead, which profoundly upset Yusuf.110 That was the sum of the fighting. Cholera spread rapidly, the French tent lines filled with dead, but ‘the disease seemed to have a peculiar passion for the BashiBazouks, amongst whom it ran with appalling mortality’. The painter Horace Vernet, accompanying this expedition, declared that 5,000 French soldiers perished in a few days. The regulars reeled back to Varna, defeated by germs rather than bullets, while the Bashis simply disbanded in panic-stricken flight across the countryside. Some turned to highway robbery with their fine new French weapons.111 The mercurial Yusuf was now as pessimistic as he had previously been sanguine, complaining that the ‘irritability’ of the French rendered them unfit to command Muslims: ‘Moi même’, he said to Rose, ‘je suis trop vif’ (‘me, I’m too lively’). Threatened with immediate death if they committed outrages, the Bashis retorted that their French officers were ‘mad’ and that it was impossible to serve under them. ‘General Youssuf … repeated very energetically his conviction that neither himself, nor Colonel Beatson, nor anybody else, would ever make anything of Bachi Bozzucks; that “you might hold one of them, but that the other one would run away”.’112 Meanwhile, Omer was following the Russians into Wallachia, but he ordered Beatson not to cross the Danube with him. Instead Beatson’s force was to cover the gap left by Yusuf’s retreat and establish patrols across the neck of the Dobrudja. The pasha at Silistria was supposed to provide supplies but did nothing. In desperation, Beatson asked Maj John Simmons, the British Commissioner at Omer’s HQ, to arrange a commercial loan of 70,000 piastres, secured against the money expected from Raglan, while Green sped to Varna for instructions.113 On the road, Green crossed with a messenger from Raglan, who had finally heard from the WD. Newcastle’s intention could not have been clearer – ‘Col Beatson … should consider himself as directly under Lord Raglan’s command’ – but Raglan still chose not to regard these orders as definitive. Disingenuously, he told Beatson that ‘I find myself in a considerable difficulty. I understand that it is not the intention of Her Majesty’s Govt that I should pay any Turkish troops which are not attached to the Army I have the honor to command. You are serving not under my orders but under those of the Turkish Generalissimo with high rank in the Ottoman Army, the service of which would be incompatible with any position you might occupy with a British force.’114 Green found the atmosphere at Raglan’s HQ unwelcoming. One of Raglan’s staff-nephews wrote that Omer ‘has so bad an opinion of the Bashi-Bazouks, that he will not allow them to cross the Danube, as they would only bring disgrace on his army by the robberies and atrocities they would commit’. It was even hinted that Omer had sent Beatson into the pestilential Dobrudja in order to kill off his men.115 Raglan listened to Green’s report, and agreed to guarantee the 70,000 piastres, ‘Considering the encouragement that has been



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given to him, I thought I could not do less than rescue him from an apparent pressing difficulty, but I learn that he has not actually enrolled any men and consequently has made no engagement with them.’ In the meantime, Raglan requested yet more instructions from London. Green and the recently arrived Loch were left hanging around Varna, waiting to see what the next mailbag would bring.116 They were joined by Creagh, bearing fresh appeals from Beatson to Stratford and to the FO. Having announced to his men that the British government would pay them, ‘at which they were all much delighted’, he had to disappoint them – a curious echo of the purported Bashi-Bazouk letter that appeared in The Times that same week. He still hoped that orders would arrive that Raglan could not evade, adding, ‘I suppose it will all come right in the end.’117 He pleaded with Raglan to give his men a chance: ‘I have not the slightest doubt that the Bashi Bazouks could be made more efficient soldiers by proper treatment and regular payments; they have been heretofore treated like wild beasts and as a matter of consequence they have behaved as such. Since I have been in command of them I have not had a single crime brought to my notice.’ To Raglan’s observation that he continued to take orders from Omer, Beatson responded that he had felt it his duty to continue to do so until the pasha confirmed his transfer to Raglan. In carrying out the patrols, he had ‘ascertained positively that there is no enemy on this side of the river’. Now he would fall back to Silistria and communicate this news to Omer, and then ask Omer’s permission to go down to Varna in person to consult Stratford on future arrangements for the irregulars. He promised Raglan* that he would ‘bring into the field in the spring a corps that would belie the general impression, mentioned by your Lordship, and that will commit no atrocities’.119

Disappointment and disbandment By now it was too late. St Arnaud and Yusuf had disbanded the remaining Spahis d’Orient. Omer refused to take them back: he was about to enter Bucharest and the campaign was over. Raglan informed Beatson and Newcastle with evident satisfaction that Omer’s own Bashi-Bazouks were also to be disbanded, the fittest men drafted into the regulars, the unfit sent home. Beatson had lost his command.120 The suave Omer informed ‘His Excellency Shemshi Pasha’ that as there was nothing to detain Beatson at Silistria the pasha was ‘charmé’ with his * Lt-Col Laws recorded a pencil note, presumably by Raglan, that read, ‘Bah! I do not believe a word of this statement.’ Over succeeding years this note has disappeared or become too faint to show on the National Army Museum’s microfilm.118

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request to go to Varna. In fact, he seems glad to have got rid of Beatson. He had recently complained to the Seraskier about the British officers sent to him: ‘The fact is that they are unacquainted with the Turkish language, which is difficult of acquirement, and are of no use whatever here (so let it be). In the midst of the multifarious occupations of the army I am incessantly intruded upon with their visits; and I therefore beg it as a favour that no more of them, may be sent in future, in order that I may be relieved from their extreme importunities.’ Given Beatson’s frustrated correspondence with Raglan, Stratford and others, it is likely that Omer had been similarly bombarded with importunities from him, though no trace of them remains in the British archives.121 The failure of Beatson’s enterprise quickly became public knowledge. Russell reported that The Bashi-Bazouks may be taken as completely hors de combat. Yusuf has failed in drilling those disorderly scum into soldiers. Colonel Beatson was not more successful. The rascals ran whenever they could, and carried with them all they could lay their hands on. Captain Greene [sic] has returned to Varna, and gives striking anecdotes of his men, their morals, and demeanour. Colonel Beatson has not yet come down, but is expected.122

There was worse news. A young officer wrote to his mother from ‘Camp near Varna’: I think I have mentioned before the cool way in which the Bashi-Bozouks amuse themselves by shooting at officers, this has increased to an alarming extent, as you may judge, when I tell you that a French officer was actually shot whilst riding in a street in Varna. It is positively dangerous to ride out alone, and unarmed, for these men, who have lately been disbanded, lay in waiting to pick off any unfortunate individual who may happen to pass.

These were probably the ex-French Albanians who had deserted. But Beatson’s unfortunate Anatolians, Arabs and Indians, even if they evaded conscription, had to make their way home without any means of support. Stratford’s worst fears of unpaid Bashis loose in the countryside had been realised.123 Disappointed, the Ambassador expressed regret at ‘the repudiation of the Bashee Bozouks. Their payment by us, and control under our officers would have very good political and social effects. Even in a military sense I do not see why Beatson’s failure should be a consequence of Youssouf’s.’124 Stratford and Beatson, stubborn men both, would now try to pick up the pieces.



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‘Punch’s own Bashi-Bozouk’ Beatson’s mission to tame the Bashi-Bazouks attracted considerable public interest. The satirical magazine Punch ran a series of articles in the summer of 1854, signed ‘Bashi-Bozouk’ and purporting to come from ‘Mulligoon Ferik’, colonel of the 13th Bashi-Bazouks. Despite their humorous nature, these articles display knowledge of the Bashi-Bazouks and of Beatson’s mission, apparently gleaned from newspaper reports (the Times correspondent is mentioned) and genuine letters from the seat of war. We get a glimpse of how Beatson, Creagh and the others were perceived in London. Mulligoon’s tone is boastful and Falstaffian, as befits a commander of such men, and his love of finery is mentioned. His ‘faithful second in command’ was ‘O’Looney’, an ‘honest fellow, late an officer in the Nizam’s service’, and there are jokes about a war correspondent (probably Russell) and a couple of English officers (probably Cambridge and Evans) ‘who are making themselves very offensive by complaining about the plundering propensities of my Bashi-Bazouks’. The articles are an excuse to poke fun at the courts of St Petersburg, Constantinople, Paris and Berlin, as well as at the Irish, though much of the humour falls flat today. The fifth article125 purports to be Bashi-Bozouk’s journal of the siege of Silistria, news of which filled the London papers at the time. After faking his own death to escape the amorous clutches of the Sultan’s favourite daughter (one of the Sultan’s daughters married a son of foreign minister Reshid Pasha that summer), Mulligoon goes to Silistria and describes his new command: Having been just obliged to hang the colonel of a regiment of most refractory Bashi-Bozouks, the Pasha was pleased to offer me the vacant command, which I accepted … A more drunken and ferocious set of vagabonds eyes never lighted upon. In the centre of the place, they had stuck up a standard with a hideous Russian head, surmounted by its cocked hat on the top. The tom-toms, kettle-drums, jinjalls, and other music of the regiment were around this. The men were scattered here and there, some sleeping, some smoking, many intoxicated, and under a rude canopy sate a dozen of officers, of whom a gigantic woolly-haired mulatto seemed the chief; he had a skin of wine by his side as big as a portmanteau; and was gnawing a leg of lamb with his long fangs, holding it up with his huge fists, and glaring at me over the meat. ‘Are you the Bimbashi?’ says I – ‘Are you, gentlemen, the Captains and Lieutenants of this pretty regiment?’ ‘Yes,’ they replied, seasoning their answer with curses in a hundred dialects.

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‘Then stand up!’ I roared out, ‘whilst I read my commission’ – and accordingly taking that document from the aide-de-camp (who, I must say, trembled like a mould of jelly), I kissed the paper, held it to my forehead three times, then read it to the officers and men. ‘Ho! ho! ho! and so you are the Colonel are you?’ yelled the Bimbashi, laying his leg of lamb down and springing up, rubbing the gravy off his mouth with his great brawny arm. – ‘A stranger! and a Giaour, and you are come to be set over us, are you? Keep the gates you sentinels! Take that Russian’s head off the flag, Ensign!’ ‘Who sides with the Sultan, and who with the Major?’ says I. ‘We propose that the promotion goes with the regiment,’ roared out the officers. ‘Where are the non-commissioned officers?’ says I. Seven or eight of them were standing apart as I saw. ‘Let the men fall in!’ I roared, ‘Captains, go to your companies. Major!’ – What I was going to say to him does not matter; for the ruffian fired a shot at me, and then sent the pistol flying at my head. It knocked down the poor aide-de-camp who was with me – upon which, seeing I had to do with nine ruffians, of course I produced my Revolvers, one of COLT’s and one of HANDCOCK’s, regarding the respective merits of which, there has been some question. The practice, as I take it, is pretty equal. With the COLT I shot three captains, two lieutenants, missing No. 6, the ensign – with the HANDCOCK I potted two ensigns, a captain, a lieutenant, and finally my friend the major, sending a ball into his great mouth, and stopping his horrid language for the future towards his colonel and your BASHI-BOZOUK

10 ‘THE MOST GLORIOUS THING I EVER SAW’

Glory to each and to all, and the charge that they made! Glory to all the three hundred, and all the Brigade! Lord Tennyson, Charge of the Heavy Brigade1

B

eatson took immediate advantage of Omer’s permission to go down to Varna, where preparations were proceeding apace for the Allied expedition to capture Sevastopol, despite the lateness of the season. The Bashi-Bazouks were forgotten, except by those hunting down the deserters. Even the swords sent to arm the Bashis had been destroyed in a warehouse fire. The only man in Varna who retained faith in the project was Neale, who considered that Bashi-Bazouks might be valuable in ‘Asia’ (that is, Turkey’s Caucasus front). But Beatson was not giving up yet, and he deployed his network of aristocratic connections. He sent Walpole to London via Constantinople, furnished with letters of introduction to Lords Stratford de Redcliffe, Clarendon and Ellenborough, to plead the case for raising a new force of British-paid Bashi-Bazouks.2 Meanwhile, faced with unemployment while an exciting campaign was in prospect, the rest of Beatson’s team broke up as each officer pulled strings to find a billet in the invasion force.3 Green’s family tried to get him an irregular cavalry appointment with Williams in the Caucasus, but in the event he accompanied HMS Leander’s Marines to the Crimea and was wounded in the siege lines.4 Dr Sandwith, through his embassy connections, was appointed to Williams’s staff and took part in the stirring defence of Kars.5 Lane Fox, a former Guardee, joined the Guards Brigade as a volunteer, and was wounded at the Alma.6 Creagh got a staff attachment with his old BAL chief, de Lacy Evans, and saw action at Balaklava and Inkerman before being sent home on sick leave. Loch reached the Crimea, but was still sick and was immediately sent home.7 Only Mehmet Aga remained with Beatson.

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Map 7: Battle of Balaklava

Raglan initially offered Beatson command of two regiments of Turkish Regulars to be attached to the British Light Cavalry Brigade. The Light Brigade was numerically weak when it was sent out, and had already lost some men to cholera and many horses knocked up on a fruitless reconnaissance. The idea of attaching a Turkish regiment to it had been openly discussed in the (uncensored) British press. But even the greatest maritime power in the world had insufficient transport capacity to move the Cavalry Division across the Black Sea (the Euxine) in a single lift and there was no shipping for additional cavalry, Turkish or otherwise.8 Beatson next offered his services to the expedition in any capacity, and it has been asserted that he was refused in turn by the Earl of Lucan (commanding the Cavalry Division) and the Earl of Cardigan (commanding the Light Brigade). However, Brig-Gen Scarlett of the Heavy Brigade obtained Raglan’s permission to take Beatson on as an extra ADC – despite the opposition of Lucan, who declared that Beatson must not be considered as having any recognised position.9 In the hidebound home service army it was unacceptable to take orders from an HEIC officer,* though we should recall that Beatson had the volunteers of HM’s 13th LI under his command at Trukki. Through ignoring the ‘Indians’ the expedition compounded its grievous lack of expertise – virtually the only staff officer with Indian experience was Nolan, and he was disliked as an intellectual, having written a book on the proper use of cavalry * It was not until 1855 that this distinction was swept away by an order giving HEIC officers rank and precedence alongside officers of the Queen’s army.10



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in which he had praised the Hyderabad contingent.11 Beatson himself refers to the staff’s ill-feeling against ‘Lord Clarendon’s officers’, which suggests that his political brief (and perhaps his private channels to influential patrons) made him even more of a pariah.12

Cavalry divisions These prejudices were strongest in the Cavalry Division, yet it was this formation that had the weakest command structure. George Bingham, 3rd Earl of Lucan, was intelligent, but he adhered too rigidly to peacetime ways, and his only experience of war had been as a military observer during a previous Russo-Turkish War. He frequently criticised Raglan’s orders, yet insisted on carrying them out to the letter rather than using his own judgement.13 If Lucan was a liability, the commander of the Light Brigade was a disaster. James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, was quarrelsome, a roaring snob and totally devoid of any notion of responsibility towards his men. As Kinglake commented acidly, ‘I imagine that the first active Bishop or Doctor of Divinity whom the Commander-in-Chief at the Horse Guards might chance to have met on horseback would probably have been much more competent than Lord Cardigan (whose mind worked always in grooves) to discover and seize the right moment for undertaking a cavalry charge.’ Although Lucan was married to Cardigan’s sister, all of London Society knew that the two men loathed each other, and the Cavalry Division regarded the appointment of the noble brothers-in-law as a sour joke by Horse Guards.14 There were no such problems with the other cavalry commander. The Hon James Scarlett had made the 5th Dragoon Guards the most efficient heavy cavalry regiment in the army and as senior CO of the five heavy regiments sent out* was appointed brigadier. He certainly looked the part, being burly, red-faced and white-whiskered, in marked contrast with the waspwaisted light cavalryman Cardigan, but he had no more experience of war than either of his colleagues. Unlike them, however, Scarlett was popular, and was noted for his modesty and good sense. Acknowledging his lack of experience, Scarlett actively sought advice, appointing Lt Alexander Elliot of his own regiment as his ADC. Elliot had an unusual career for a Queen’s officer, having started out in the HEIC service. He had commanded a troop of the 8th BLC in the Gwalior campaign (where Beatson probably met him when his regiment was brigaded with the Bundlecund Legion) and had led a brilliant charge at Ferozeshah in the 1st Sikh War. Then Elliot’s promising career was cut short by illness. He resigned from * Scarlett’s brigade consisted of two regiments of Dragoon Guards (DG), the 4th (Royal Irish) and his own 5th (Princess Charlotte of Wales’s), and three of Dragoons, the 1st (Royals), 2nd (Royal Scots Greys) and 6th (Inniskillings).

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the HEIC, left India, and began anew as a humble subaltern in the Queen’s army. Scarlett already leant heavily on Elliot, and it was possibly on his ADC’s advice that he added Beatson to his staff.15 With hindsight, Kinglake posed a series of questions designed to test a man’s fitness for senior cavalry command: Has [he] done recent service in the field? Has his service been brilliant? Has he shown his prowess as a cavalry officer? Has he in any rank, however humble, taken part in cavalry fights? Is he of the age for a cavalry man? Is he either under thirtyfive, or else a man so fresh come from the performance of cavalry feats that the question of age may be waived?16

Kinglake specifically mentioned Elliot and Capt Morris of the 17th Lancers as younger men who fitted these criteria, and his proviso regarding age implied that he thought that Beatson, though roughly contemporary with Lucan, Cardigan and Scarlett, would have been a better choice than any of them. Given his command experience, it is hard to argue with that conclusion.

Hurrah for the Crimea After the main expedition sailed, the Heavies sat around at Varna for another three weeks before ships returned for them. Scarlett and his staff boarded the screw steamer Jason along with the 5th DG, while the 4th DG went on the Simla, aboard which Beatson and many of the others had travelled out from England. These steamers towed the sailing transports on which the Royals and Inniskillings were embarked (the Scots Greys sailed straight from England to the Crimea). There were complaints about the supply of wines on the Jason, but the officers were better off than most: ‘The stamping of horses over our heads is beyond anything. We have an awful crowd on board, and the place where the men live is pitch dark. Disease must break out if we are kept very long in this way,’ complained one aboard the Simla.17 Because of the shortage of shipping, field officers (majors and above) of cavalry were allowed just two horses – Beatson’s normal allowance as a staff colonel was three horses and three mules – but most senior officers managed to take a civilian cook or manservant with them. Beatson was accompanied by Creagh and his faithful factotum Mehmet Aga.18 Once the convoy got under way, ‘The sea rose during the night, and in the morning not a ship was to be seen, and a fog shut us in for two days. Everyone was seasick, from the General to the cow over the screw. At length a break in the fog, showed us to be out of our course, and making for the Circassian Coast.’ At least one officer was put in mind of Byron’s lines:



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There’s not a sea the passenger e’er pukes in, Turns up more dangerous breakers than the Euxine

Several horses fell and died aboard the Simla during the storm; the carnage on the sailing transports was worse. That night the Royals suffered more horse casualties than at Waterloo.19 In all, the Brigade lost 226 horses on its passage to the Crimea and when the remainder were put ashore they were, according to Lucan, ‘in such a condition that I should scarcely have recognized them’.20 For the coming campaign Scarlett’s five regiments were reduced to two mounted squadrons apiece, totalling around 800 sabres. Even before they left Varna there had been reports of a great battle at the River Alma. The Allied armies subsequently marched round Sevastopol and formed their siege encampments. The British established a base at the little harbour of Balaklava, and it was here that the bulk of the Heavy Brigade landed on 1 and 2 October, the convoy having passed close enough for passengers to see right into Sevastopol. The regiments moved out and camped on the southern side of an east– west ridge that became known as the Causeway Heights.21 Creagh joined Evans in the infantry camps, while Beatson settled down in the cavalry camp.

Crimea encampment To protect Balaklava the engineers had dug a line of earthen redoubts along the Causeway Heights. These mounted a few cannon and were garrisoned by Turkish troops. The Cavalry Division supported them, the Heavies settling down behind Redoubt No 6, their camp tucked into the angle between the Causeway Heights and the higher east-facing Sapounè Heights. Cornet Fisher wrote home, ‘This is a glorious life. We hear the great guns of Sebastopol every hour, but our batteries have not opened yet.’ However, the weather was already turning autumnal and soon the youngster was complaining that it was ‘Most awfully cold; out every morning at 5 o’clock, and under arms until it is quite light … Horses have got coats like sheep and are never groomed.’22 As well as the predawn stand-to, the cavalry were frequently turned out to oppose Russian probes across the River T chernaya. The rest of the army, busy digging trenches and dragging up siege guns, thought the cavalry were having it easy, and joked about Lucan’s ‘Look-ons’, but these continual alarms wore down men and horses. Even so, Lucan was complaining about the appearance of his men.23 Although Beatson had served alongside Queen’s regiments in India, this was his first exposure to the home service army and its obsession with outward show. A designer of spectacular uniforms himself, Beatson nevertheless took a relaxed view of clothing on campaign and despised what he called the ‘pipe-clay school’, so we can be sure that he took a dim view of Lucan’s fixation.

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Even the easy-going Scarlett was fussy about uniform. On the morning of 25 October Elliot turned out in a forage cap rather than his staff officer’s feathered cocked hat, which was permitted by orders. ‘Damn the order,’ Scarlett said. ‘My staff should be properly dressed’ (though Scarlett himself affected the brass helmet of his regiment). So Elliot returned to his tent, where he found that the chinstrap of his cocked hat needed repair. He set to with needle and thread, but Scarlett shouted for him. Elliot abandoned the sewing and cast around for some means to make the hat fit: ‘I thrust into the hat a large silk bandana handkerchief, lying on the bed, and remounted. This little circumstance most certainly saved my life.’24 One wonders what outfit Beatson adopted. Presumably it was not the Hyderabad uniform that he wore on the Danube, rather it is likely to have been the plain blue frockcoat of a colonel on the staff; whether he possessed a feathered cocked hat or made do with the peaked forage cap is unknown.

Dawn of battle The first Russian attempt to break the siege of Sevastopol came that morning of 25 October. Lieutenant-General Pavel Petrovich Liprandi crossed the Tchernaya to attack the Causeway Heights and Balaklava with his 12th Infantry Division and the 6th Hussar Brigade under the Napoleonic veteran Lt-Gen Ivan Ivanovich Ryzhov. As usual, the British cavalry paraded an hour before daybreak. Lucan and his staff then rode off with Maj-Gen Sir Colin Campbell, commander of the Balaklava garrison, to make their routine reconnaissance. Suddenly, as the sun came up and silhouetted the easternmost redoubt (No 1), they saw two flags flying, the prearranged signal that the enemy was advancing. Immediately afterwards, the first gun boomed out as the Russians began to bombard the redoubt. At once, Lucan despatched messengers to inform Raglan and to order the cavalry to mount and move forward to support the men in the redoubts.25 There was little that two small cavalry brigades and a single troop of Royal Horse Artillery (RHA) could do against a reinforced infantry division with 30 guns, and Lucan believed that his first duty was to protect Balaklava, so ‘[I] confined myself to cannonading the enemy so long as my ammunition lasted, and to threatening demonstrations’. He halted Scarlett’s brigade in the rear of No 1 Redoubt, with Cardigan further back alongside No 2. These were uncomfortable positions, as spent cannonballs came lobbing over the hills from the Russian guns.26 The Turks in Redoubts 1 to 4 fought well but were overwhelmed. Unfortunately, Raglan, his staff and the newspaper correspondents saw none of this, arriving on the Sapounè escarpment just in time to see the Turks finally break and run. In truth, the so-called redoubts were unimpressive – ‘little more than potato gardens’ and ‘so weak a Cossack could ride through them’.27



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Bird’s-eye view Raglan had a wonderful view over the battlefield – comparable with that enjoyed by participants in a staff training exercise on a sand table – but it did his army more harm than good. Not only did it take a quarter of an hour for a galloper to negotiate his way down the steep escarpment and deliver each order to the troops below,28 time enough for the situation to change radically, but the elevated staff had no conception of what the recipients could actually see from their more restricted viewpoints. Raglan sent four orders to the Cavalry Division that day, each one incomprehensible. The ‘1st Order’, issued on Raglan’s arrival at 08.30, had been to Lucan to ‘take ground to the left of the second line of redoubts occupied by the Turks’.29 What did that mean? There was only one line of redoubts as Lucan well knew, and his left depended on which way he was looking!* Between them, Lucan and the staff galloper worked out that Raglan intended the cavalry to fall back westward and take position between the end of the Causeway Heights and the Sapounè Heights. This put them out of danger of Russian fire, and usefully on the flank of any attack across the South Valley towards Balaklava, but it meant that Lucan and his officers had no clue as to what was going on. Unlike Raglan, they could not see the other side of the hill. Raglan had observed that the loss of the eastern redoubts had left a yawning gap between Balaklava and its nearest support. Hence he sent his ‘2nd Order’ to Lucan: ‘Eight squadrons of Heavy Dragoons to be detached towards Balaklava to support the Turks, who are wavering.’ Lucan passed the order to Scarlett, who obediently moved off with eight squadrons, leaving the Royals behind.30 The problem was that by the time the order reached Lucan the situation had changed. The Turks who might have been encouraged by Scarlett’s support had already decamped, and now the Heavy Brigade was moving into unexpected danger in the empty South Valley. Liprandi had begun Phase 2 of his attack, sending Ryzhov’s cavalry to capture and destroy the British camps.† Ryzhov’s squadrons advanced westwards up the North Valley at a fast trot until roughly alongside No 4 Redoubt, when they came under fire from the Sapounè Heights, so they turned south and crossed the Causeway Heights, bringing them onto Scarlett’s left flank.31 Their sudden appearance on the crest of the ridge took both forces by surprise. Ryzhov saw the whole South Valley open in front towards Balaklava and down to the British cavalry camp to his right, but he seems to have been struck by * Later historians of the battle are also prone to losing their bearings, while Russian reports use a different convention when referring to an enemy force’s right and left. One must remember that the British ‘front’ started off facing north, but the Battle of Balaklava was mainly fought east–west. † Ryzhov’s brigade consisted of eight squadrons each of the 11th Kiev Hussars and the 12th Ingermanland Hussars, and three sotnias (roughly, squadrons) of the 53rd Don Cossacks. In the course of the battle he was also given 1st Ural Cossack Regiment (six sotnias) from reserve.

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agoraphobia. He thought he was facing a large force of infantry in front of Balaklava – in fact Campbell had only a single small battalion (93rd Highlanders), some convalescents and the shaken Turks from the redoubts. Ryzhov also thought that he was heavily outnumbered by the British cavalry he could see around the camp, when the reverse was the case.32 Ryzhov sent four squadrons of the Ingermanland Hussars to attack Balaklava. On their approach, many of the Turks broke and ran again. To most veterans of the Napoleonic wars the only safe way for infantry to oppose charging cavalry in open country was to form a square. Campbell, however, understood the power of modern rifled muskets. He kept his men in a two-deep line on a little ridge. They fired their first effective volley at a range of several hundred yards – far further than the old smoothbore muskets could have reached. In combination with the guns at Balaklava, this emptied enough saddles to discourage the Russian Hussars and they sheered off. None got closer to Campbell’s line than 150 yards, but Russell’s description of the ‘thin red streak tipped with steel’ created the legend of the heroic defence by the Thin Red Line.33 While this was going on, the rest of Ryzhov’s brigade moved down to attack Scarlett’s column riding east in obedience to Raglan’s order. Thinking he was manoeuvring behind the line of battle, Scarlett had not posted any scouts on his flanks and was surprised by the irruption of the Russians. There is a probably apocryphal story that when the Cossacks’ lance tips appeared over the Causeway Ridge, the short-sighted general asked what were ‘those funny pointed things’, only to get the reply, ‘Thistles, sir’.34 It seems it was Elliot who first pointed out the lances. But although Scarlett was as surprised as Ryzhov, he reacted immediately and aggressively: he ordered a left wheel into line and prepared to attack.35 This was less easy than it appears on paper. Scarlett’s men were still clearing the cavalry camp, with tents, picket ropes and impedimenta, and there was a vineyard in the way of the following squadrons. Once the three leading squadrons – two of the Greys and one of the Inniskillings – had cleared these obstacles, they halted to adjust the dressing of their line, as they had trained to do at Wormwood Scrubs or Phoenix Park. Observers were amazed to see the regimental officers calmly sitting their horses with their backs to the enemy while completing these niceties. Scarlett’s staff – Elliot, Brigade-Major Connolly and, presumably, Beatson – were observed galloping around ‘as if they were going in for the Derby’ to bring up and arrange the following squadrons. In the face of these strange evolutions, the suspicious Russians came to a halt. Ryzhov recalled that ‘the enemy stood calmly and waited as by agreement. The silence on each side was surprising.’ The Russians’ halt was so sudden that the jingle of their accoutrements was heard up on the Sapounè.36 Ryzhov took no advantage of his opportunity to attack while Scarlett was still reforming. He seems to have thought that the British wanted to lure him onto the broken ground. Instead, he deployed his men on a wider front, ordering up the Kiev Hussars from behind the Ingermanland regiment to ‘bear to the left as much as required to be face to face with the red English Dragoon Guards … because



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of the extended line, I was obliged to use both hussar regiments together side by side’, though British observers noted that his regiments were still in two lines of squadrons each up to six ranks deep, and therefore constituted a massive column. Ryzhov had advanced with the Don Cossacks on his wings, and in their eagerness these had been slower to pull up and were now ahead of the Hussars, giving the whole line a crescent shape. Liprandi had also sent up the Ural Cossacks to join in. Ryzhov intended to keep these in reserve, but they came galloping up ‘with a frightful “Ura!”’, and gathered on the right of the brigade, moving ‘back and forth in a long row like some kind of flock or flight of birds’.37 All this complexity was lost on the British, whether looking up from the cavalry camp, or down from the Sapounè: to them the Russians looked like one vast block of grey-clad horsemen, three times as wide as Scarlett’s formation, and much deeper. Exactly how many Russians were there has been in dispute ever since, but Kinglake studied the figures closely and concluded that even after four squadrons peeled off towards Balaklava there must still have been around 3,000. In other words, Scarlett with three squadrons in his first line, just 300 sabres, was preparing to attack ten times his own number.38 As the two forces faced each other at a distance of a few hundred yards, Lucan arrived in a fluster. Seeing Scarlett’s second line moving eastwards to clear the camp and vineyard, he thought they were still heading for the redoubts and would be caught in flank by the Russians. He ordered them to wheel at once, and sent an order to Scarlett to charge. That was Scarlett’s intention, but only when he was ready. Impatiently Lucan instructed his orderly trumpeter to sound the charge. No one paid the slightest attention while they continued the meticulous dressing of the ranks.39

Sound the charge! Finally, satisfied with the alignment of his first line, Scarlett drew his sword and ordered his own trumpeter, Monks, to sound the charge, then spurred his horse and dashed off towards the Russians. The audience on the heights had by now grown to considerable size. One of their number wrote that almost all these spectators dismounted and watched in silence ‘as though they were looking on the stage from the boxes of a theatre’.40 They could see the white-whiskered and brass-helmeted general yards out in front of his men, closely followed by the cocked-hatted Elliot, and then by the rest of his staff – Trumpeter Monks and Scarlett’s giant orderly, Sjt Shegog, conspicuous among them. These eyewitnesses some hundreds of yards away do not mention Beatson* (who was possibly * Writing many years later, the 5th DG veteran ‘V.D.G.’ could not remember seeing Beatson at Balaklava, but all subsequent authorities accept his participation in the charge. Kinglake excused Beatson’s omission from his detailed narrative by the fact that the General was in India and thus unavailable for interview at the time of writing in 1868.41

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wearing an inconspicuous forage cap) but Scarlett reported him as being ‘by my side’ in the charge.42 The watchers saw Scarlett ride straight past a Russian officer into the thick of the opposing line, whirling his sabre about him (he was not much of a swordsman). He was followed by Elliot, who parried the Russian officer’s blow and ran him through, so that the unfortunate man was spun round as Elliot swept past, followed by the rest of Scarlett’s staff. Then they saw the Scots Greys, with their huge bearskins and distinctive grey horses, charge straight into the Russians, while the brass-helmeted Inniskillings swung right to ward off the oncoming Russian wing. They could hear the regiments’ distinctive cheers, the Scots’ deep in tone, almost a moan, the Ulstermen of the ‘Skins’ wilder and more high-pitched.43 It was not much of a charge, since it was directed uphill from a standing start and the squadrons had to flounder over the vineyard ditch. It seems also that their two carefully dressed ranks thinned to one as they naturally spread out to counter the great width of the Russian formation. The Russians received the charge at the halt, some popping away with carbines or pistols, a throwback to the ‘carbineer’ tactics of the seventeenth century – as fatuous now as when Cromwell or Rupert contemptuously swept them aside. Ignoring the shots, the British crashed into the Russian ranks.44 Horrified, the ‘gallery’ held its collective breath as the small knot of red disappeared into the thick mass of grey, and the extended Russian wings began to envelop them. ‘God help them! they are lost,’ someone cried out. But then two things happened. The amazed observers saw red coats reappearing beyond the first Russian mass and immediately moving on to attack the second. Simultaneously, the remaining squadrons of the Heavy Brigade, urged on by Lucan, came successively into action. The 5th DG coming up on the left rear of the Greys hit the Russian main body, ‘yelling and shouting as hard as they could split’, while Connolly brought up the other squadron of the Inniskillings, which slammed into the Russians’ swinging left wing, catching them on their vulnerable bridle arms.45 Caught up in it, Staff-Captain Evgeny Arbuzov of the Ingermanland Hussars remembered that the 2nd squadron of our regiment was pressed from the left side and moved to the right at a full gallop. They pressed the 1st squadron and made them do the same, so that the first platoon of the squadron, which was under my command, didn’t have an enemy facing them.46

Moments later, the Royal Irish, yelling ‘Faugh-a-Ballagh’ (‘Clear the Way’) and ‘advancing like a wall, buried themselves in an unbroken line, in the flank of the Russians’. Finally, the Royals, unbidden, came up to complete the attack.47 It was a tactically brilliant outcome, even though completely unplanned. The British regimental officers may have had no combat experience, but after years



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on the drill ground and in the hunting field they knew instinctively what was required. As each squadron came up, its leader aimed for the flank or rear of the Russian pincers, inflicting maximum damage and confusion.

No room for swordsmanship Lieutenant Richard Godman wrote to his father next day that ‘all I saw was swords in the air in every direction, the pistols going off, and everyone hacking right and left … for about five minutes neither would give way, and their column was so deep we could not cut through it.’ Troop Serjeant-Major Henry Franks remembered that ‘It was rather hot for a few minutes; there was no time to look about you. We soon became a struggling mass of half frenzied and desperate men, doing our level best to kill each other.’ But, as he observed, the British Heavy Dragoons were, man for man and horse for horse, heavier than the Russian Hussars, which helped them force their way through. Ryzhov, out in front of his men, had not deigned to draw his sword, but found himself bowled over by the Greys and unhorsed until a Hussar helped him to remount: ‘I had served for 42 years, taken part in 10 campaigns, been in many great battles such as Kulm, Leipzig, Paris, and others, but never had I seen a cavalry attack in which both sides, with equal ferocity, steadfastness, and – it may be said – stubbornness, cut and slashed in place for such a long time.’ Watching, Lt Thornhill of the artillery thought that ‘It was just like a mêlée coming in or out of a crowded theatre, jostling horse against horse, violent language, hacking and pushing.’48 Strangely, few of the combatants were seriously hurt. British cavalry troopers were rigidly trained in sabre drill: after making each regulation cut they were taught to guard against the opponent’s riposte. They found that the Russians did not play by the same rules: asked by the surgeon dressing his head wound how he came by it, an indignant trooper complained, ‘Well, I had just cut five [a body cut] and the damned fool never guarded at all but hit me over the head!’ They were also disconcerted to find that their swords were too blunt to slash through the thick Russian overcoats and bent if they thrust with the point.49 Officers’ swords were privately purchased and better made. Beatson probably carried the ivory-hilted example we see in his portraits; it may have been the sword presented to him by the Bundlecund Legion. However much he had to use this sword in the mêlée, Beatson came through the only hand-to-hand fight of his career without a scratch.

The Russians recoil After several minutes of mutual hacking, with their formation disrupted by British squadrons driving through from front to back and from both flanks, the Russians

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gave way. ‘They bolted – that is, all that could – like a flock of sheep with a dog at their tails,’ wrote a witness. ‘Their officers tried to bring them up, but it was no go; they had had enough and left the field.’ As Scarlett’s officers strove to rally and reform their men, the Russian flight was hastened by the RHA, which ‘gave them a fine peppering’.50 The British, participants and onlookers alike, were astonished how small the butcher’s bill from Scarlett’s charge had been. The Heavy Brigade’s total casualties that day were two NCOs and seven privates killed, 12 officers, 15 NCOs, one trumpeter and 70 privates wounded and, as we will see, many of these were hit later in the day rather than in the charge. The high proportion of wounded to dead reflects the inconclusive hacking with blunt swords. The Russian Hussars admitted to casualties of 30 officers and 227 other ranks.51 The Russians seemed to concentrate their attention on Elliot, probably because of his prominent cocked hat, while Scarlett was largely ignored. Beatson, who was familiar with Shakespeare’s depiction of the Battle of Shrewsbury, may have been put in mind of the ill-fated Sir Walter Blunt, who wore the King’s arms as a decoy and was killed in his place.52 While Scarlett’s helmet took a few blows, poor Elliot received 14 wounds, mainly about the head; only the handkerchief in his hat saved him.53 It was now about 10.00, and the British were feeling pleased with themselves. Raglan sent congratulations to Scarlett. As word of this ran down the ranks of the Heavy Brigade sitting at ease, the troops’ murmuring ‘became dangerous near being a cheer’ – until the officers stopped it. The old Highlander Sir Colin Campbell galloped over to congratulate the Scots Greys. A French general told Beatson that the charge was ‘truly magnificent … the most glorious thing I ever saw’.54

A glorious blunder Cardigan was less pleased, remarking, ‘Damn those Heavies, they have the laugh of us this day.’ In fact, he could have joined in with a flank charge, or pursued the broken enemy and finished off what the Heavies had begun, which would have been a proper use of light cavalry. But he did nothing, and Ryzhov was allowed to withdraw behind the Causeway Heights. When Morris enquired, ‘My Lord, are you not going to charge the flying enemy?’, Cardigan refused on the grounds that he was ordered to remain where he was. Dismayed that the success was not followed up, Raglan sent down his ‘3rd Order’, which read: ‘Cavalry to advance and take advantage of any opportunity to recover the Heights. They will be supported by the infantry, which have been ordered to advance on two fronts.’ Leaving aside what ‘advancing on two fronts’ meant, the infantry were delayed, and Lucan did nothing for another three-quarters of an hour.55



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Then a staff officer pointed out that the Russians were bringing up horse teams to drag the captured guns out of the redoubts. Quickly, without thinking it through, Raglan sent a ‘4th Order’ to Lucan, initiating the most notorious blunder in British military history. The text of this well-known order is worth repeating: Lord Raglan wishes the cavalry to advance rapidly to the Front, follow the Enemy, and try to prevent the Enemy carrying away the Guns. Troop Horse Artillery may accompany. French cavalry is on your Left.

The order, marked ‘Immediate’, was signed by the QMG and sent by his ADC Nolan.56 Up in his eyrie, Raglan could see that the Russians were not moving and there was nothing much to stop Lucan riding along the Causeway Heights to prevent the removal of the guns until the infantry arrived to retake the redoubts. Raglan intended both cavalry brigades to take part. But as we now know, the Cavalry Division could not see the redoubts from its starting position beneath the Sapounè, and after a bad-tempered exchange with Nolan, Lucan concluded that he was expected to attack the only guns they could see – two Russian batteries closing the east end of the North Valley. To get at them, the attack would run the gauntlet of Russian troops and artillery firing from elevated positions on both flanks. Lucan assumed that Raglan, seeing the situation better than he could, had ordered the movement deliberately, and he felt that to disobey this direct order would have been inexcusable. So with a heavy heart he launched Cardigan and the Light Brigade on what he feared was a death ride, and led up the Heavy Brigade in support.57 As Lucan and the first line of Heavies drew alongside Redoubt No 4, they came under musketry and artillery fire. Lucan himself was hit in the leg by a spent musket-ball (which he ignored). ‘When we had got round the ridge … we could see down the valley. It was then that we became aware of the formidable task that was before us,’ wrote Franks. The Greys and Royals in the first line were losing men and horses fast, so Lucan exercised his own judgement for the only time that day, and ordered the Heavies to halt, as ‘any further advance would have exposed them to destruction’. Bitterly, he remarked, ‘They have sacrificed the Light Brigade: they shall not have the Heavy Brigade if I can help it.’58 Scarlett was some 60 yards out in front of his brigade, with Beatson in attendance while Elliot had his wounds dressed. Not hearing Lucan’s trumpet command, Scarlett continued trotting up the valley at a sharp pace until Beatson ‘shot up alongside of him and shouted out that he was charging the Russians alone!’ The two then halted and watched the Light Brigade disappear into the maelstrom at the foot of the valley, closer than any other British observers. They sat their horses a few yards from the body of the unfortunate Nolan, part-author of the unfolding catastrophe, who had been killed by the first shell. About this time, Scarlett remembered, Beatson’s horse was struck by a spent musket ball, but he was uninjured.59

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Cardigan was one of the first survivors to emerge from the dust and smoke. Riding up to Scarlett and Beatson he began to curse Nolan, until Scarlett quietly pointed out that he had just ridden over Nolan’s corpse. The Heavy Brigade held their position, continuing to take casualties while the survivors of the Light Brigade dribbled back past them, some on foot, many badly wounded. The Heavies then retired by successive regiments, covering the final stages of the retreat. Both brigades would have suffered even more had not a dashing charge by the French Chasseurs d’Afrique distracted the Russian gunners on the other side of the North Valley, and an explosion (possibly of an ammunition waggon) similarly distracted the Russian riflemen on the Causeway Heights.60 The Heavy Brigade withdrew behind Redoubt No 6, where it remained until nightfall. As the battle petered out, Lord Raglan and his staff came down from the Sapounè Heights. Raglan rode up to Beatson and said, ‘I understand you were in the thick of it all day’ – a gracious gesture from a commander who was struggling to contain his anger at Lucan and Cardigan’s foolishness.61 The two noble earls would spend the rest of their lives trying to justify their actions that day through the press, Parliament, official inquiries and the law courts (Beatson was fated to tread the same dismal path in his own battles to clear his name). Lucan began his campaign early, giving out copies of the ‘4th Order’ soon after the battle ended, in an attempt to clear his name of responsibility for the disaster.62 Despite their frosty relationship, Lucan gave Beatson one of these copies (possibly because he knew Beatson had political connections), and he in turn sent it to Stratford as a curiosity; it remains in the Stratford Canning papers to this day.63

Aftermath At Balaklava, Beatson had been intimately involved in the making of history. Inevitably, public attention focused on the disaster to the Light Brigade rather than the success of the Heavies. What would we give for Beatson’s account of the two charges! His semi-official correspondence refers to his participation quite matter-of-factly,64 but what did he write to his wife? There is nothing in Beatson’s life to indicate that he was in the least introspective, and his surviving letters of this period give no indication of unusual excitement or stress. This contrasts with, say, the Duke of Cambridge, who showed great bravery at the Battles of the Alma and Inkerman, but then had a breakdown and was evacuated with what today would be described as post-traumatic stress. Cardigan also went home, pleading ill health.65 Beatson, who had seen action before in Spain and India, showed no such after-effects and settled down to camp life. After the battle, the Allies abandoned the Causeway Heights, and the Cavalry Camp moved up onto the windswept Chersonese Heights.66 Here they made the best they could of an uncomfortable situation, and officers tried to maintain



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a veneer of polite society. Beatson would have got to know many of them. He certainly became friends with some of the 8th Hussars. One was the 2i/c, Major Rodolph de Salis, a Count of the Holy Roman Empire from a Swiss family long resident in England, who became one of Beatson’s closest friends.67 De Salis survived the Light Brigade’s action and led his charger Drummer Boy back up the valley with a wounded trooper in the saddle. When the Crimean Medal was issued, he obtained a second one to present to Drummer Boy, and put the clasps on the collar of his rough-haired terrier Jemmy.68 Another friend was Fanny, wife of Lt Henry Duberly, the 8th Hussars’ paymaster. Fanny Duberly was one of a small number of wives who had managed to accompany the army to the Crimea. She was an intrepid horsewoman and incorrigibly inquisitive, which sometimes got her into trouble. At Balaklava the Highlanders preparing to repel Ryzhov’s Hussars had been astonished to see her galloping across their front to join her husband in the cavalry camp to watch the battle. She became a familiar sight around the camps and battlefields, and achieved even wider fame with the publication of her campaign journal.69 Beatson probably talked about horses and dogs with both of these new friends. The condition of the surviving horses was giving cause for concern, though the 4th DG did manage to remount some men when 30–40 ‘good Russian horses, some with nosebags on, galloped into camp’ after the French shelled the Russian horse lines. Similarly, some 200 robust ponies, possibly belonging to the Cossacks, rushed riderless into camp after a Turkish rocket landed amongst them while they were being watered. These were used to transport stores up from Balaklava, which was becoming the biggest problem facing the army.70 The Russians made further attempts to disrupt the siege, coming down off the Inkerman Heights and across the Tchernaya to attack the British camps. The largest of these incursions, on 5 November, precipitated a vicious infantry battle in dense fog, where small parties led by subalterns and NCOs defended and counterattacked key positions with reckless courage. The Cavalry Division was deployed in support, the remnants of the Light Brigade suffering a few casualties from long-range fire, the Heavies none at all as they faced the Russians across the North Valley. ‘For all the use we were we might as well have been in our tents. The fog never cleared away, and it was so dark in consequence, that the cavalry were never engaged at all,’ TSM Franks recalled with disgust. Beatson saw more of the battle than any other heavy cavalrymen that day, having been sent forward into the fog by Scarlett to find out what was going on. Later, when the campaign medal was announced, it took a firm intervention from Scarlett to obtain the ‘Inkermann’ clasp for the men of the Heavy Brigade.71 Beatson found himself at the centre of another controversy when The Times of 13 November, containing Raglan’s Balaklava despatch and Lucan’s report, reached the Crimea. Scarlett was furious to discover that Lucan had omitted any mention of his ADCs. His original report to Lucan had said, inter alia, ‘My best thanks are

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due to Brigade-Major Connolly, and to my aide-de-camp, Lieutenant Elliot, 5th Dragoon Guards, who afforded me every assistance, and to Colonel Beatson of the Honourable E. I. C. service, who, as a volunteer, is attached to my Staff.’ These words had been omitted and to add insult to injury Lucan had inserted the name of his own ADC – who had been in neither charge. Scarlett remonstrated with Lucan and then wrote to Raglan’s Military Secretary, praising Elliot and adding: ‘Colonel Beatson also gave me all the assistance which his experience and wellknown gallantry enabled him to do throughout the day.’72 This was no trivial matter because, as Beatson complained to Raglan, a ‘mention in despatches’ usually led to brevet promotion. When the Victoria Cross was instituted, Scarlett recommended Elliot for the medal, but it was refused on the grounds that Elliot had done no more than his duty in riding into the Russian ranks. Scarlett continued pressing for recognition for his aides, writing to Horse Guards in 1856 that ‘During the whole of the day’ of Balaklava, Beatson had ‘behaved with the utmost gallantry and coolness, and entirely supplied the place of my Aide-de-Camp (Captain Elliot) after the charge of the Heavy Brigade, in which Captain Elliot was severely wounded.’ By that time Beatson was in bitter conflict with Horse Guards and was never going to receive any recognition from that source. Even in the winter of 1854 Beatson heard that he had received no reward because Lucan ‘did not consider me under his command, as I was one of Lord Clarendon’s officers’.73

I shall remain here Three days after the Battle of Inkerman, Beatson finally received the orders that he had been hoping for: he was to proceed to Bucharest and begin raising 4,000 Bashi-Bazouks in British pay. Raglan had already written privately to Newcastle to reiterate his objections: I do not like the idea of re-establishing and taking into our pay the Bashi Bazouks. They will do us great discredit and all the crimes and horrors they may commit will be attributed to the English Army. If the Turkish government would consent to it, I should much rather that Colonel Beatson should be authorised to organise and command a body of regular cavalry. They are willing people and might render some service.

Raglan must have put this proposition to Beatson, who replied that ‘The Regular Cavalry are well paid, fed and clothed, and are commanded by officers of their own religion, who would naturally do all in their power to thwart any interference with their authority: With a bigoted race like the Turks this could be done in a manner that Christian officers could not prevent.’ This is special pleading by Beatson, who had previously assured Raglan that Turkish soldiers



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had no such objection.74 Clearly, Beatson had set his heart on raising a corps of irregulars, and merely being a brigadier of Turkish regulars did not appeal to him. At the same time, he felt an obligation to his comrades in the field, telling Stratford that ‘having entered on the Crimea campaign I should like to see the end of it, so unless ordered away I shall remain here for the present’. Though, as the siege was making no progress, he added, ‘When it will end God only knows. In a few such victories as we had on the 5th [Inkerman] and our army will be destroyed unless we get re-enforcements.’ ‘Excuse a hurried scrawl,’ he ended, ‘as we are expecting to be called out every minute.’75 However, it was not combat but that patriotic Russian, ‘General Winter’, who would destroy the army, abetted by the criminal negligence of the British Commissariat. There was nothing for horses to eat on the Chersonese, so every scrap of forage had to come by sea through the congested little port of Balaklava. Lucan argued that the Cavalry Camp was too far from the harbour, but the French insisted on the cavalry remaining on the plateau. They moved campsite more than once, but wherever they went the horse lines were soon reduced to mud and slush a foot deep. ‘The saddles are all lying in the middle of it, and Lord Lucan expects that under circumstances like these the men will turn out smart and clean,’ one CO complained on 10 November. Three days later he went on, ‘How man or horse can stand this work much longer I know not.’76 The army was becoming discouraged. There would obviously be no quick resolution at Sevastopol, and they were facing a Russian winter with no shelter, and with inadequate clothing and food. Dysentery and scurvy were rife, and Beatson was concerned that ‘Poor old Mehmet Aga is dangerously ill & will I fear scarcely reach Constantinople: he will be a great loss to me.’77 He must have been reminded of that desperate winter in Vittoria nearly 20 years before. Then things got much worse. After a week of incessant rain there was a thunderstorm on the afternoon of 13 November, and during the night the storm increased to hurricane strength. Beatson himself was living in a tente d’abri, a small French campaign tent. The following morning tents and their contents were strewn all over the plateau, horses had stampeded in terror and everyone, from private to general, had to sit in mud and misery until the storm abated. The sight of Lucan squatting uncomfortably on a box amid the wreckage was some consolation to the Cavalry Division. The damage was not just short term. All food and forage stored on the plateau was ruined, and Balaklava was a scene of disaster. Some 21 ships were wrecked in harbour or on the nearby coastline, and these were carrying all the winter clothing for the expedition, much-needed medical stores, and 20 days’ forage.78 After the hurricane, it began to snow and the unmetalled track from Balaklava became almost impassable. An ADC collecting fodder for the horses of a brigade staff complained that

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the roads are so bad, I was from early this morning until now, 6 o’clock, going 8 miles and getting through the streets (if they may be called so) on horseback. In every direction horses and oxen are to be seen dead or dying in the mud, and our men, working more like beasts of burden than Christians, are floundering about up to their knees in mud. Three horses in each cavalry regiment die on average every night of cold and hunger … The cavalry horses are so hard put to it that they have eaten each other’s tails off … I saw a horse today eating a piece of old canvas covered with mud.79

When the starving chargers of the Heavy Brigade heard the familiar trumpet call to ‘Feed’ sounded in the nearby horse artillery lines, they broke free and galloped down to snatch the meagre ration of hay and barley from under the gun horses’ noses. The problems of supply and transport descended into a vicious spiral: men and animals were dying on the heights while essential stores piled up in Balaklava harbour for lack of transport, yet the Commissariat could not bring in additional draught or pack animals because there was no forage for them. The cavalry were marginally luckier than the infantry: in an interval of fine weather they were finally allowed to return to the shelter of the valley under the Causeway, where they spent the rest of the winter.80 In private, Beatson was scathing in his condemnation of the army command: ‘it is lamentable … to see the state to which that fine Cavalry Division is now reduced chiefly from the incompetence of its commander,’ he complained to Ellenborough. ‘If Sir Charles Napier had been in command of the army, we should have taken Sebastopol immediately after Alma: the surprise at Inkerman, the destruction of the light cavalry would never have taken place; and if the soldiers got only half rations, and are without clothes, there would have been better reason for it than the laziness & incapacity of a Commanding General whom it is a great pity Picton did not hang when he threatened to do so.’*81 By now Beatson had received Stratford’s response to his offer to see out the campaign. There was, wrote Stratford, ‘nothing more natural than your desire to witness the fall of Sevastopol’, but this might take some time, and Beatson’s presence at Constantinople would be better for the public service. This amounted to an instruction, so no one could accuse Beatson of cutting and running; he sailed from Balaklava on 17 November.82 The rest of the army must have envied him.

* General Thomas Picton was said to have threatened to hang a commissary during the Peninsular War when Raglan served on Wellington’s staff.

11 DARDANELLES CAMP

An Irish Albanian quarrel took place last night, but as they use pistols instead of shilelahs four men were killed Beatson to Stratford1

W

hile Beatson campaigned in the Crimea, Walpole had travelled to Constantinople and convinced Stratford that despite the Danube fiasco, there was ‘nothing in the character of Turkish irregular partisans to prevent their being brought into order, and indeed rendered useful for military operations’. By 2 October Walpole was in London seeking interviews with Ellenborough and Clarendon. His briefing, together with the letters he brought from Beatson and Stratford, convinced the Foreign Secretary to make a second attempt to hire Bashi-Bazouks.2 Clarendon also received a long memorandum on employing Turkish cavalry from Maj Eugene O’Reilly, a former lance-corporal in the British 10th Hussars and officer of Sardinian lancers, who was commanding a cavalry regiment under Omer.3 Newcastle readily accepted Clarendon’s arguments for renewing the ‘experiment’ with Bashi-Bazouks, but Raglan still grumbled: ‘Colonel Beatson appears to be a man of energy and determination and to be more likely to succeed in the undertaking than probably anybody else, but he cannot alter the nature of men who journey any distance in the hope of plunder.’4 Overruled, Raglan suggested that 1,000 irregulars would be plenty to cover his army, but Newcastle adhered to the original plan for 4,000 and put matters in train, sending Walpole back to report to Beatson, followed by official letters of confirmation (now addressed to ‘Lieut-General Beatson’).5 The Government considered that because the recruits would be paid and officered by the British, they would not form part of Omer Pasha’s army. Nor could they yet be attached to Raglan’s distant army in the Crimea, ‘and still less can it act as a Corps independent of either army’. The compromise proposed was that when the force was ready to ‘render efficient service’ – in the spring, it

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was hoped – it would come under Raglan’s orders, ‘and that in the meanwhile Colonel Beatson should consider himself under the command of Omer Pasha’. In the event, Omer’s army joined the Allies in the Crimea, and Beatson concluded that he was indeed commanding an independent corps – a conviction that would have unfortunate consequences.6 Beatson was back in Constantinople by 23 November. He immediately set to work, requesting Turkish commissions for his officers, and preparing proposals to the Seraskier along lines suggested by Stratford for 4,000 irregular cavalry (Beatson would have preferred 8,000). From the Crimea he had written that, ‘The name of Bashi Bozooks will do harm to our recruiting; could we not change it into the Turkish Irregular Cavalry?’ Now he proposed the name ‘British Osmanli Cavalry’, but in a postscript shyly suggested that ‘if you think “Beatson’s Osmanli Cavalry” will be better than “British” by all means recommend that name’. For the rest of his time with the Bashi-Bazouks, the force would be known, following Indian practice, as ‘Beatson’s Horse’ (Beatson Suvari to the men).7 Raglan had no means of providing any commissariat, so Beatson was forced to continue drawing on the FO for his own and his staff’s pay and allowances. Clarendon considered this ‘somewhat vexatious after an arrangement had been made months ago to get rid of Beatson & his men’ and his under-secretary remarked to his opposite number at the WD that ‘I conceive when you do your duty by them as a Parent and provide for their subsistence you can make whatever arrangement you like. At present you have thrown them on the Parish, that is the Foreign Office.’ Eventually, it was arranged that the British commissary at Constantinople could pay the force, but Beatson continued to charge the FO account for several months. He finally got his commissariat officer in April.8

Lethargy at the Porte Any Westerner dealing with the Sublime Porte had to accept that things moved slowly – torture for a man like Beatson, whose instinct was to rush off like the local whirling dervishes. He complained that Every day’s delay will strengthen the hands of the enemy: I do not mean the Russian; but the more dangerous, because secret, enemies, Lord Raglan, Omer Pasha and the toadies of both, all of whom would be delighted if we were to fail in raising this Corps … I am ready to go to any place you may think best – only let us do something to show the people that we are serious and to knock in [sic] the head at once that proposal of Lord Raglan’s to limit the number to 1000.9

Despite this private grievance, Beatson still wrote to Raglan that, ‘If your Lordship thinks I could be more usefully employed in any position with the British Army in the Crimea, I am perfectly ready to return there at once’ – a sign of his frustration.10



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Beatson encountered (or created) difficulties everywhere – even arranging for his family to join him involved the Foreign Secretary. When the East India agent James Stopford enquired on Beatson’s behalf whether families of FO officials qualified for free passage on government steamers, the answer was no, but Clarendon offered to arrange a passage to Constantinople at the contract rate. Accordingly, Stopford requested a booking, but Marian arrived in London to find nothing arranged because the Government had no passenger steamers. In the end, Samuel Cunard of the shipping line obliged the Admiralty with berths on one of his steamers in early January – at £20 each for Marian, the girls and their governess, £12 each for their maid and manservant, a total of £104 or about £7,000 in today’s money.11 Billy Olpherts had resigned his Addiscombe post and had been appointed to Williams’s mission. In January he and Capt Henry Thompson passed through Constantinople on their way to Kars, and they dined with Beatson. Thompson noted that the General ‘has his wife with him, and is very comfortable with his English servants’. Beatson urged Olpherts to join the Bashi-Bazouks, and he agreed to return as soon as he could decently get out of his commitment to Williams.12 However, Beatson’s need for assistance was immediate: Creagh, Loch and Lane Fox had gone home on medical leave, while Sandwith and Green had found other posts,13 so he turned to the military tourists thronging Constantinople. One was Maj Charles Havelock, younger brother of the prominent Evangelical soldier Henry Havelock (their middle brother had died of fever at Vitoria while serving with the BAL). Charles had experience as a cavalry and staff officer in the Afghan and Sikh wars, but his spendthrift ways forced his retirement from the British Army. His wife was a member of the aristocratic Wemyss family – neighbours of the Beatsons in Fifeshire – and her young cousin Charles Wemyss, a former captain in the Scots Fusilier Guards, accompanied him into Beatson’s team.14 Another was Capt Godfrey Rhodes (94th Foot), who had escorted the Spanish military mission on Omer’s 1853 Danube campaign and published a book about it.15 These three, together with Mehmet Aga and Walpole, gave Beatson a skeleton staff. With Skene’s help, he was attempting to hire a secretary/interpreter and a cook from among the disreputable specimens available, while Skene himself was trying to wangle an attachment to Beatson’s force; ‘Mr Skene would I think be a valuable addition to the Corps of Osmanli cavalry,’ Beatson wrote.16 The WD asked officers whose earlier applications had merely been ‘noted’ if they wished to be considered again, but only Lt Henry Foord (Madras Army) actually set out.17 On 1 January the WD formally advertised for HEIC officers ‘who may be desirous of employment with the Turkish Army or with Irregular Levies attached to the British Army during the present war’. This appeal brought in a large number of volunteers, but they were mainly assigned to the Turkish Contingent rather than Beatson’s irregulars.18 Some volunteers made their own arrangements, such as the erudite artilleryman Capt Alexander Blakely. Forced to retire on medical grounds, he had been the

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Morning Chronicle’s correspondent in Turkey, where he had favoured Stratford with his views on Constantinople’s defences. On the outbreak of war, he offered his services as a brigadier-general of Turkish engineers – and was ignored – but now he used his connections to get a position with Beatson’s Horse. However, by the time Newcastle appointed him, Blakely had returned to England, and did not come back to Turkey until the summer.19 Loch wrote from England that Newcastle had refused him leave to go out again, ‘in consequence of his having retired from the Indian Army, it being the intention of Her Majesty’s Government that none but officers actually in the Queen’s or Company’s service shall be appointed to the Osmanli Cavalry’. Beatson commented that, ‘We may lose the services of some good officers by this, but as a general rule it is good & will add to the respectability of the service by keeping out all adventurers.’20 Yet Newcastle’s ruling was a dead letter – Havelock, Wemyss and Blakely were all retired, and others were to join Beatson who were not only similarly placed but were ‘adventurers’ in the worst sense. Whether due to boredom or the arrival of his family, Beatson began to chafe about his rank and pay. He reread his original instructions, which implied that he could draw Turkish allowances. A ferik pasha, he discovered, received rations for 64 men and forage for 20 horses in addition to his pay, so he sent the FO a claim for £523 15s 2d (over £34,000 today) covering the difference back to June the previous year. An FO minute advised Clarendon that Beatson had been promised the allowances of a British colonel on the staff, the difference to be made up by the FO if the Turkish pay was less, but now ‘a new light dawns on Colonel Beatson, and he claims to consider the scale as that of Turkish commanders’. Clarendon admitted, ‘I am not sure that he is wrong according to the letter … The literal construction of this bears out the meaning Col B puts on it.’ Clarendon agreed to meet Beatson’s claim, but only up to the date when he officially transferred to the WD, and complained that what Beatson ‘has been doing for many months past, except drawing Bills, which he has done with great regularity, the Foreign Office has no means of knowing’.21 In the new year the Seraskier finally produced his plan for recruiting Beatson’s force. There were to be eight regiments, each composed of five troops of 100 men. The document used French military terminology, but the British adopted Turkish ranks: a bimbashi (head of a thousand, or major), colassi (second-incommand) and buluk emin (writer) for the regimental staff, and a yuzbashi (head of a hundred, or captain), two mulazims (lieutenants), four choases (serjeants) and 10 onbashis (heads of ten, or corporals) to each troop. Above these were to be a British commandant, 2i/c and adjutant, as in the Indian irregular cavalry, but Beatson wished to rank these as colonel, lieutenant-colonel and major, together with a British surgeon. Two regiments were intended to be recruited from European Turkey, one composed of Albanians and Arnauts (ethnic Albanians from neighbouring provinces), the other of Bulgarians. Three regiments were to be Anatolian Turks,



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the remainder Arabs from Syria. In practice, Stratford and Beatson were forced to adapt this scheme to match British capabilities, principally the locations of consular officials who could recommend local officers and oversee the payment of the recruits in accordance with Treasury rules, as well the availability of seaports. The Seraskier proposed a lavish scale of rations, including bread, rice, butter, salt, onions and poultry, with barley for the horses – none of which Bashis ever received from their own commissariat. As HMG had laid down a payscale of 61/2 piastres a day, including rations, Beatson suggested that they should offer 5 piastres cash, together with bread and barley. The men could buy other rations from their pay: ‘That would be no hardship to men who are not accustomed to the luxuries laid down in the Seraskier’s note.’ ‘Above all,’ he concluded, ‘there must be no further delay: the season is advancing, and if we are to be ready for the spring campaign, all the officers must be off to their posts in a few days.’ The Asiatic side of the Dardanelles Strait was chosen as the place of concentration.22

Recruiting parties Beatson had by now acquired a few more officers for recruiting duty – O’Reilly from the Turkish service,23 another Irishman, Maj De Renzie Brett of the 3rd Madras Europeans,24 and Edward Shelley, a former captain in the 16th Lancers.25 He appealed once more to Newcastle to appoint some of his trusted friends from India – Billy Olpherts, Forbes Bruce from the Sind Camel Corps, Capts Clagett and Nightingale from the Nizam’s Cavalry, ‘and as many more as your Grace may think fit to send me’. But Williams could not spare Olpherts, and of the others only Bruce arrived.26 Beatson sent out four recruiting teams: Havelock and Wemyss sailed to Varna to co-operate with Neale in Bulgaria; Rhodes, Foord and Mehmet Aga (now a bimbashi with the title of Mehmet Bey) went to Salonika to recruit in Macedonia and Albania with Consuls Charles Blunt and John Longworth; O’Reilly and Shelley travelled to Sinope in Anatolia; while Walpole and Brett headed to Antioch in northern Syria.27 British newspapers trumpeted the arrival of Rhodes and Foord at Salonika. However, when Consul Blunt presented them to Osman Pasha, this official would do nothing without instructions from the Grand Vizier. Walpole and Brett reported the enthusiasm of Arab recruits to serve under British officers after their miserable experience under Ottoman command, but without assistance from the Pasha and clarification of the terms of service none could be formally enlisted. The other teams also encountered problems in the absence of vizierial letters. Although Beatson had foreseen the need, Stratford was slow in obtaining the letters and in some cases they did not arrive until April.28 The recruiters also noted that the cost of horses was a deterrent. Beatson authorised them to advance the

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recruits 1,000 piastres each from their future pay in order to obtain a mount as if they were Indian sillidars, a system well understood in Turkey.29 Rhodes had already got his commander’s measure and asked Beatson to ‘Kindly “stir up” in your usual manner the backalum Turkish authorities’. Expecting Beatson to come in person, Rhodes informed him that ‘I have a good room for yourself with a large reception room, together with stabling’. Rhodes then moved on to Monastir (modern Bitola, Macedonia), leaving Foord sick at Salonika to receive the recruits he sent down. Osman Pasha was instructed to make ready the ‘immense’ barracks at Salonika, but did nothing.30 In contrast to the tardy pashas, British officials were enthusiastic. Richard Wood at Damascus had seen newspaper reports of HMG raising foreign troops and had independently volunteered to enlist irregular cavalry on similar terms, stressing the good effects of enhanced pay, experienced British officers and the well-tried methods used with the Indian irregular cavalry. Wood estimated that there were about 1,000 disbanded Kurds, Syrians and other Arabs around Damascus who might be recruited. This fitted exactly with Beatson’s plans, so Walpole went to enlist these men while Brett moved on to Aleppo.31 Another supporter was Vice-Consul Christian Rassam at Mosul, who knew Walpole and Sandwith from their visit to Layard’s excavations. Rassam asserted that he could easily raise 6,000 Kurds and was almost as good as his word, recruiting a full regiment under a local chief, Osman Aga, entirely without assistance from Beatson’s officers.32 In Bulgaria, there were plenty of Bashis levied by the pashas, but they were owed 10 months’ pay and would not transfer to the British service until they had their money. O’Reilly and Shelley were held up by a delayed steamer but eventually reached Sinope and travelled into central Anatolia to begin work.33 Then, just as the recruiting machine got into gear, events in London threw it awry, and drove Beatson to fury.

The Bison stampedes Disquiet over the state of the army in the Crimea had been building, fed by uncensored despatches from newspapermen, by officers’ private letters, and by reports from volunteers like Florence Nightingale. When Parliament met in January, both Ellenborough in the Lords and John Roebuck, leader of the Radicals in the Commons, put down motions on the prosecution of the war. Roebuck called for an inquiry – effectively a vote of no confidence – and when his motion was passed by a large majority, the Government resigned. Lord Palmerston became Prime Minister and although he kept many of the previous ministers – Clarendon remained Foreign Secretary – Newcastle had to go. In his place came Fox Maule, 2nd Lord Panmure, a Scottish Liberal and cousin of Dalhousie. He had served in the 79th Highlanders before entering politics, and



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had once been a reforming Secretary at War. Now, by combining that portfolio with the Board of Ordnance and Secretaryship of State for War, Palmerston gave him sweeping powers to reform army administration. Panmure was businesslike to the point of rudeness, and was ruefully known among his officials and parliamentary colleagues as ‘The Bison’.34 The new minister was in an awkward position vis-à-vis Beatson: if Palmerston’s shaky coalition fell, the Bison would probably be replaced by the Elephant – Ellenborough, who was leading the attacks on him in the Lords. Panmure knew that Beatson was Ellenborough’s protégé, but as an administrator he disliked ad hoc arrangements, which Beatson’s Bashi-Bazouks decidedly were. His first communication to Beatson, on 15 February, contained a clear warning: ‘I find that my predecessor instructed you, under date the 1st instant, to report to him what progress you are making in the embodiment of this Corps, and I shall postpone sending out any more officers to you, until I shall be in possession of a full report from you on the subject.’35 Beatson had already despatched a chatty report to Newcastle, but Panmure demanded detail: ‘Until I receive further reports from you of the progress of the recruiting and of the behaviour of the men engaged, it is not my intention to sanction any larger number for this levy than 2,000 men.’36 Panmure initially questioned Beatson’s right to style himself Lieutenant-General, but on receiving confirmation of the Turkish rank he informed Beatson that ‘I have the honor to acquaint you that the Queen has been pleased to confer upon you the local rank of major-general during the period of your being employed on a special service in Turkey’, which was backdated to 1 November 1854. Although temporary and local, this promotion ended Beatson’s stream of complaints about rank and pay.37 Panmure did not oppose Beatson’s mission per se, and made several practical contributions, assembling a medical staff and sending out 2,000 percussion carbines, swords and ammunition to equip the irregulars. But he remained cautious: Brig-Gen Lord William Paulet at the Scutari Depot was not to release the weapons until authorised by Stratford, who was given delegated authority to disband the force ‘if the recruits are not amenable to discipline, but are guilty of those irregularities with which the Bashi-Bazouks were charged’.38 Before his fall, Newcastle proposed to take over part of the Turkish Regular Army, ‘to be organized, disciplined and commanded by British officers and to be armed, clothed and fed by the British Government’, exactly as the Portuguese Army had been reformed in the Peninsular War. Thus was born the Turkish Contingent (TC), commanded mainly by HEIC officers, which reached the size of an army corps. Faced with the British Army’s manpower crisis, Panmure embraced this project.39 To his tidy mind, it seemed obvious that Beatson’s irregulars would provide the TC’s light cavalry division. So when Beatson wrote ‘conceiving that it would be of the greatest importance to have two troops of Horse Artillery armed with nine pounders, and twenty four pounder howitzers attached to the cavalry force I am now raising …’, Panmure not only accepted but expanded this

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proposal. He authorised four troops of ‘Osmanli Horse Artillery’ (OHA) to be formed under Col Edward Crofton, a Royal Artillery veteran of the Carlist War. The TC had first call on available Turkish gunners, so Beatson would have to make his own arrangements with the Seraskier for men and horses, but Crofton was permitted 12 British NCOs to be commissioned as officers to train them.40

A resignation matter? Taken as a whole, Panmure’s contributions were positive for the Bashi-Bazouks, but his letters to Beatson were curt – very different from Newcastle’s courtly style. Beatson was disgusted with the proposed reduction in his force and change in their terms of enlistment (allowing discharge at any time on payment of three months’ gratuity). He considered that undertakings made to the men by British officers constituted a ‘sacred right’, and as the men had enlisted ‘for the duration’, Panmure’s alterations would destroy their trust. ‘Such a mass of confusion I venture to say never issued even from the War Office … neither the Turkish Government nor the war-like Tribes we are enlisting can be expected to stand being played fast and loose with in this manner.’ He threatened to resign if the numbers were not restored or if his force was attached to the TC.41 If Beatson’s Horse joined the TC, he would become subordinate to Robert Vivian, illegitimate son of Lord Vivian who led a Hussar brigade at Waterloo. As an HEIC officer the younger Vivian had a reputation as a ‘smart colonel’ and had been Adjutant-General of the Madras Army. He was given command of the TC with the local rank of lieutenant-general. Beatson was unimpressed: ‘General Vivian is I believe a good officer of the Pipe Clay School but I am not aware that he has seen any service or commanded a force on service.’* He was not alone – Ellenborough decried Vivian’s inexperience, while the Indian News did not ‘give Vivian credit for as much pluck as would qualify him to head a gang of “areasneaks” [petty thieves]; he is physically and morally suited only for a subaltern’s part.’42 Such was his desire for an independent command that Beatson would have resented any superior. He assured Stratford, ‘Depend on it I will not give up my present duty, unless they offer me a slight, which the appointment of a senior officer would be. But if he is to have a separate command of course that is no business of mine.’43 Luckily, Stratford and Clarendon persuaded Panmure to restore the 4,000 establishment and confirm Beatson’s command as an independent corps under Lord Raglan.44

* This is unfair: Vivian had been at the capture of Rangoon in 1824, and had commanded at the capture of Fort Napami in 1841.



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Cosmopolitan adventurers But apart from one volunteer (Lt John Meade, 83rd Foot), Panmure sent no officers, so Beatson was forced after all to employ cosmopolitan ‘adventurers’. These included Maj George Morgan from the Turkish army; two Anglo-Hungarian veterans of the 1848 uprising, Capts Francis Kiraly and Junius Harris, the latter acting as paymaster; Capt Fardella, a Sicilian and veteran of that island’s 1848 revolution; Francis Sankey, a civil engineer with the Egyptian honorary rank of major; and Edward Brenan, formerly a lieutenant-colonel in the BAL but never in British service. Beatson even renewed his request for Skene to be his chief of staff with the rank of brigadier – which was rejected.45 Beatson routinely requested local rank for the officers he appointed – frequently several steps above their substantive British rank, if they held one. He was repeatedly told that they could not have more than one step of local rank, but that he could make appointments as he saw fit. Panmure intended these to be as commandant, adjutant, etc., but Beatson treated them as acting ranks, given and removed with bewildering speed. He justified himself, saying, ‘it is only by trying officers that you can generally find out what they are, and the only remedy is, to place officers in the position as to rank and otherwise which you find they deserve, after you have tried them’.46 But he overdid it, making the chief interpreter, a native of Smyrna named Giraud, an honorary lieutenant-colonel. Beatson’s Horse also required specialists such as medical officers, veterinary surgeons and trumpeters. Panmure would not withdraw MOs from Raglan, but Dr Allen Fraser had been serving with Turkish forces and was available. Beatson sent him across to Scutari to arrange medical supplies for the force – in vain: Paulet had no official notification that Beatson’s Horse were entitled to draw British stores. It would be some time before the medical staff and supplies sent by Panmure arrived.47 Cavalry orders were normally transmitted by trumpet signal, but the Bashis only had their traditional drummers. Beatson tried unsuccessfully to get trumpeters from the Turkish regular cavalry and artillery or from Raglan. Panmure eventually sent out volunteers from the cavalry depots in the UK, one for each of Beatson’s eight regiments, together with 24 trumpets to train locals in British signals. He also ordered out eight vets and eight farriers with horse medicines.48 These arrangements meant long hours for Beatson at his office in Pankalde, a largely Christian district of Constantinople close to the embassy quarter. One evening, after his clerk had gone home, he scribbled a note to Stratford promising a formal reply in the morning, because ‘I do not wish to inflict on you [my] copperplate’, an apology he repeated on other occasions. When agitated, Beatson’s handwriting became even less legible than usual, and Stratford found it difficult to read. His relationship with Stratford remained good, and he sometimes dined with the Ambassador.49

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Volunteers Meanwhile, Beatson’s recruiters traversed the provinces. Traditionally, many Bashi-Bazouks were Albanians and Arnauts. Indeed, the term ‘Arnaut’ was often applied generally to mercenary soldiers. Mehmet Bey had boasted that he could raise 1,000 men, but Rhodes found that ‘the old buck’ had little influence at Monastir. Consul Longworth made up for this, recommending local officers, including his own cavass (police orderly) Adem Aga, who became colassi of 1st Regiment. Blunt vouched for Osman Aga, son of a decorated Ottoman officer, who became a 1st Class Interpreter with the rank of colassi. Rhodes went beyond his authority and also signed up an imam and a sarach (saddler). Enlistment was brisk, despite covert opposition from some Turkish officials, and by late March they had over 200 men from Monastir, while Vice-Consul T.F. Hughes sent 70 more from Elbasan in Albania. They continued to despatch a troop a week to Salonika to complete 1st Regiment and then moved to Uskub (Skopje) to begin recruiting 2nd Regiment. Unfortunately, without the promised barracks, and with no tents, Foord was obliged to lodge the men and horses in ‘filthy’ khans (inns) in Salonika.50 Brett at Aleppo had to deal with an obstructive pasha, while Walpole at Damascus and O’Reilly in Anatolia found they were competing for the best recruits with Turkish and Egyptian units preparing for service elsewhere. Despite these hurdles, Brett had 250 men while Walpole had 300 enlisted and 200 potential recruits by the end of April. Walpole recruited enough wandering Afghans to man a complete troop, some with previous HEIC service, like the Peshawar men he had led to the Danube.51 Hitherto, there had been no disciplinary problems, but then an Elbasan trooper at Salonika shot two comrades. Foord requested permission to hang him, which Beatson forwarded to Stratford, commenting, ‘There is no doubt that an immediate example should be made of the villain who has been the cause of the death of two of his comrades, and he should be hanged in presence of the troops.’ This was too rich for Stratford’s people: Hughes argued for clemency on the grounds that the unpremeditated crime was ‘of so common occurrence in Albania, as to be regarded as a matter of trivial importance’, while Blunt pointed out that under Turkish law the victim’s relatives determined the sentence. ‘Perhaps Mr Hughes is right,’ Beatson grumbled, ‘but I must confess that when a man commits murder my natural impulse is to hang him.’52 Panmure demanded an explanation, and Beatson had to reassure him that he ‘certainly never intended to hang him without a fair trial of the Turkish law’.53 The situation at Salonika was increasingly uncomfortable, with Rhodes pleading with Beatson: ‘Pray do your best to remove our men from that horrid hole.’ Concerned that the recruits would ‘get into mischief’, and that training time was being lost, Beatson repeatedly asked to march them overland to Gallipoli where they could be ferried across the Dardanelles. Panmure agreed that such a



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march would be a good opportunity to test their discipline, but it struck Stratford as ‘a very hazardous enterprize, to say nothing of the time’.54 He felt it safer to bring them by sea, which was why the plan called for concentration at ports. Unfortunately, the only ships available for charter at Salonika were slow sailing vessels unsuitable for horse transport. Government steamers returning from the Crimea might collect Havelock’s troops from Varna, but the TC was competing for space. Meanwhile, there was nothing available on the Levant coast to bring Walpole and Brett’s Arabs.55 To ease the situation at Salonika, Beatson sent Meade there with Dr Fraser, who would be on hand to deal with any outbreak of disease among the men crowded into the khans. Salonika was one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the world, and Beatson’s officers became caught up in intrigues involving pro-Russian Greeks and anti-British French. Influenced by a prominent Anglo-Greek family opposing Blunt, the immature young Meade snubbed the consul on arrival and disappeared up-country to join Rhodes.56 It then emerged that Foord had offered to raise irregulars for the French. Although France and Britain were allies, their diplomatic services were rivals within the Ottoman Empire. Beatson’s first reaction to this perceived treachery was ‘Capn Foord must be mad’, and he ordered Rhodes to send Foord under close arrest in Fraser’s charge to Constantinople.57

Shoot the Pasha! Salonika’s townsfolk were sorely afraid of Beatson’s men, and Osman Pasha alleged mistreatment, which Blunt rejected as ‘infamous’ and ‘a tissue of falsehoods’.58 Beatson commented that ‘we should carry with us full authority to shoot any man who has been guilty of the atrocities named in the Governor’s report, or to shoot the Governor if his report is found to be totally false’. He wanted the kind of summary judicial authority that Napier had given him on the Sind frontier, but threatening to shoot a pasha, even in jest, was ill-advised. Stratford merely despatched one of his orotund letters to the Porte complaining of the official’s ‘calumnious deception’ and calling for his dismissal and disgrace.59 In Damascus, too, the governor, Wamick Pasha, accused Walpole’s men of mistreating shopkeepers and gave them 24 hours either to disarm or march away. Next day Turkish regulars drove the Bashis out of town, Walpole’s lodgings were plundered and his wife was threatened by townspeople hostile to the Asker alInglese (‘English troops’). When Consul Wood returned, having been sent on a fool’s errand by the governor, he found Walpole and his regiment camped at an outlying village. Wamick Pasha produced no evidence of wrongdoing by the Bashis; Wood concluded that he had been misled by anti-British factions, and with the good offices of the Prussian Consul was able to smooth things over. Walpole made a ceremonial re-entry into the city, but further trouble with the regulars left one Bashi dead and two wounded. Walpole had to restrain the dead man’s

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relatives in the regiment from taking ‘a more speedy and terrible retribution than the law can give them’.60 ‘Never was there a force more maligned than the unlucky bashies,’ wrote one of their officers. Whether at Salonika, Damascus or Beirut, the evil reputation of former Bashi-Bazouks clung to Beatson’s men and they were blamed for every crime, while bolder inhabitants goaded them into trouble. And the prejudice extended to the top: British officials at Damascus suspected that the pashas had acted with the connivance of a faction at the Porte. Havelock had evidence of similar double-dealing,61 and the circumstantial evidence gives credence to the oftrepeated complaints by Stratford and Beatson of a conspiracy by Turkish officials against the British-raised troops. By late May there were 800 recruits waiting at Salonika with more to come from Uskub; Havelock had 170 men ready to embark with their horses, followers and baggage at Varna, and was due to march the rest of his regiment there from Silistria; Walpole, Brett and O’Reilly were marching around 600 men each towards Beirut, Aleppo and Sinope. In total there were 3,200 men, which would be brought to the full 4,000 by the Mosul regiment. Stratford had obtained tents from the Seraskier, and Beatson sent Bruce to establish camp at the Dardanelles and negotiate for vacant government buildings. All was nearly ready – except the shipping.62 Beatson bombarded Stratford with transport requisitions, but although the Great Elchi did his best, the Bashis were just one of his pressing concerns. Until a telegraph line was established it took a month to get a reply from London to the simplest question, and Stratford bore huge responsibilities – effectively heading the whole alliance in the Black Sea theatre. He found the constant demands wearing: ‘the difficulty of bringing the Vivians, the Beatsons and the Longworths into harness is enough to drive an ordinary mortal out of his senses,’ he complained.63 At last came word that the Royal Navy had sent steamers to Salonika and Varna, so Beatson embarked on the Charity transport to the Dardanelles, arriving there on 1 June.64 The first Albanians, 1st Regiment and part of 2nd reached the Dardanelles on 9 June.65 Foord had apologised, maintaining that he never intended to work for the French without permission, so Beatson reinstated him as CO of 1st Regiment. Beatson attributed Foord’s eccentric behaviour to ‘his head having been deranged from the effects of a coup de soleil which he had last year in India’, but he distrusted Fraser’s medical opinion on Foord, considering the doctor ‘a most incompetent person’.66 Shortly afterwards, Wemyss brought the first batch of Bulgarians from Varna,67 while a flotilla of steamers towing transports were on the way with the bulk of the Arabs. Brett had left Aleppo after parading his regiment, over 600 strong, for the civil pasha to present a standard, blessed by the head sheikh of the mosque.68 Walpole stayed behind with 60-odd men to wait for the arrival of the Mosul Regiment. But there was no second sealift – Walpole remained stuck in a malarial camp at Beirut and in desperation suggested hiring sailing vessels that could be tugged by steamers. Beatson disagreed:



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those sailing vessels are intolerable: the moment it begins to blow the steamers cast them off: our men which came on the Deva were about a week in disembarking after those by the steamer had disembarked. The men were thoroughly disgusted & said they would rather go any distance by land.

Beatson again wrote to Stratford about this: ‘I quite agree with you about the difficulties and even dangers of the land route, but the question is, what else can we do?’ Troops continued to ‘drop in’ from Salonika and Varna over the coming weeks, and later in the year O’Reilly’s Anatolian 6th Regiment and Kiraly’s Albanian 7th Regiment did march overland, with little trouble.69

Camp life The Hellespont, or ‘The Narrows’, has always been a strategic pivot. Its milewide waterway divides Europe from Asia and provides the only link between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. Stratford, in his rhetorical style, referred to ‘those celebrated straits, where Leander set a fatal example to Xerxes’,* and where Beatson, ‘who, without being either a Classical lover, or a Persian Despot, will, I hope, render good service by contributing to the establishment of a better understanding between Europe and Asia’.71 Beatson may not have recalled these classical associations from his Edinburgh schooldays, but he might have been reminded of crossing the Firth of Forth to school from his boyhood home at Rossend Castle. The hillsides on the Asiatic side are not unlike those that Beatson rode over as a boy around Kilrie, sloping down to the shores of the Forth. Like the Forth, the Hellespont teemed with boats. In 1855 many of these were military transports heading for the Crimea, pushing against the constant current from the Black Sea. The forts of Kalid-Bahri and Chanak-Kalessi – the ‘old castles of Europe and Asia’ – frowned at each other across the Narrows. Beside Chanak-Kalessi stood the town (modern Canakkale), then generally referred to as ‘The Dardanelles’. The fort was garrisoned by Turkish regular artillery, and nearby were a Land Transport Corps (LTC) horse depot and British and French military hospitals.72 The hillsides north of the town were dotted with the white tents of Beatson’s Horse, clearly visible from passing ships. But the thing a newcomer noticed as his steamer approached the anchorage was the line of windmills, ‘no less than twentyeight of them, – not scattered about on the hills like proper-behaved windmills

* In Greek mythology, Leander of Abydos drowned attempting to swim the Hellespont to visit his lover Hero. Xerxes the Great was King of Persia, who bridged the Hellespont to facilitate his invasion of Greece in 483 BC. When the first bridge was swept away, Xerxes ordered the waters to be whipped in punishment.70

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are, but in one long line’. Travelling to the camp from Beatson’s quarters on the edge of town, the visitor had to pass through the ‘horrid windmills’. Less accomplished horsemen (and many of the officers sent to the irregular cavalry fitted this description) found it nerve-racking persuading their mounts between these ‘revolving monsters’. Their Bashi guides rode through the line with complete nonchalance.73 It is not recorded whether any Bashis emulated Frederick the Great’s cavalry commander Seydlitz, who galloped between the whirling sails of a windmill, but it would have been entirely in character. Beatson lived with his family and staff in the military pasha’s official residence, a low, rambling, two-storied building on the waterside outside the fort. He wanted to use the requisitioned Russian Consulate next door, but British Consul Frederick Calvert had assigned it to his friend George Ward, a retired British Army paymaster, who refused to give it up, though Beatson ‘would infinitely prefer having to turn that crusty old fox Ward out’.74 Marian and the girls soon settled in. Burton recalled that ‘The two daughters were charming girls who seemed to have been born on horseback, and who delighted in setting their terriers at timid aides-de-camp, and teaching their skittish little Turkish nags to lash out at them when within kicking distance.’ Beatson himself ‘rode English chargers of good blood’. ‘This is a beautiful country and well adapted for cavalry: a very few weeks training here will make the men fit for service in the Crimea,’ Beatson wrote optimistically. ‘I wish you could see my camp here,’ he added. ‘The men are as happy and content as possible & every horse has his bag on, when he is not eating grass, the consequence is they are improving daily.’75 Although Beatson was impatient to push on with training, he was forced to do almost everything himself. ‘The War Dept is too bad, not an officer yet appointed, while they write me all kinds of twaddle about things of no importance,’ he complained. Creagh returned from sick leave, but Beatson had to ask Stratford ‘to order every officer of mine out of Constantinople by the first French, Austrian or British steamer. They loiter there while I have not half enough hands for the work here.’ Panmure did permit a trickle of volunteers to go out from home, but repeatedly refused to allow experienced officers to join him from the Crimea or India, concluding optimistically, ‘There will be no difficulty in finding good officers for your force without withdrawing them from regiments in actual service in the field.’76 Vivian lent Beatson some doctors, which provided the opportunity to get rid of Fraser. ‘The moment I get them I should send the Canadian* savage away: he actually struck one of the Turkish writers yesterday: it is a pity the man did not take his head off – no, if he did that would have prevented him attending to my

* As always, Beatson’s handwriting is terrible, and this could be ‘Caledonian’, but ‘Canadian’ seems to be the correct reading; nothing is known of Fraser’s background.



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Cholera and Typhus patients, whose existence alone prevents my sending him in irons on board a ship.’ Later, Panmure cryptically referred to ‘Mr Allen Fraser, who resigned his commission in M. General Beatson’s Corps of Irregular Cavalry under circumstances which preclude his further employment in the public service’. Soon Beatson could report, ‘I have since received a long list of medicos who are on the way out, so I am all right in that dept. I wish they would send me some more officers however.’77 Beatson applied to have the weapons entrusted to Paulet at Scutari released to him. But a month later they had still not arrived, and Paulet was making difficulties about medical stores and camp equipment. There were other shortages too: horseshoes were scarce, and Beatson had to beg some from British cavalry aboard a transport that stopped to allow Capt Henry Heyman and another officer to disembark and join the force.78

Training begins At least Beatson could begin collective training with the officers and men he had in camp, parading every day except the holy days of Friday and Sunday. These occasions proved quite unlike the drill of English Dragoons at Wormwood Scrubs. At first strange scenes occurred on parade. The men would smoke, sing and laugh; and occasionally an officer in command of a regiment would see his whole corps suddenly dash away in a headlong charge after an unfortunate hare disturbed by the noise. Away the whole line would go, shouting, yelling, and discharging their pistols, at a hard gallop; while pussy dashed away at full speed, and the European officers remained alone on their deserted parade ground. At other times, a few of the men would decline to be drilled on some particular morning; but all this was soon reduced to order.79

The same witness observed that: They looked curious enough on parade, as the different regiments fell in, dressed in the costumes of their country, and carrying their various colours. Their horses were small and wiry, generally vicious, and knew their places in the ranks quite as well as their riders. Their broad, shovel-shaped stirrups, short stirrup leathers, curious sabres, and belts stuck full of pistols, gave them a wild look. Steadiness in the ranks was a virtue difficult in attainment, and when a brigade was in close column many of the rear squadrons would kneel on their saddles so as to see what was going on in their front, while those still further in the rear would stand upright on them.80

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Then, On the parade being dismissed, some Arab regiment broke its ranks, and discipline being at an end, consigned all military manoeuvres to the Evil One, and shouting, yelling … they wildly careered over the plains, now rushing at full speed past the unfortunate officer’s horse, now riding at him with a wild shout … pulling up their shaggy little beast, on their haunches, or darting off wildly in some other direction.81

There was nothing the irrepressible Bashi-Bazouks liked better than an impromptu steeplechase – the better horsemen among their British officers agreed – and the men thought it ‘a very hard thing’ when limits were set, as when Beatson ordered that ‘Galloping into the town and about the streets is prohibited’.82 It being the height of summer, there was little activity in the middle of the day. Indeed, it seems that Beatson followed his custom in India and reduced the number of parades in hot weather. A newcomer recalled the following exchange with his regimental CO: ‘What do you do with yourself all day?’ ‘Eat a little, drink a little, smoke a little, and sleep a great deal’. ‘Ah, and what do the men do with themselves?’ ‘Much the same’. ‘But you give them something else to occupy them; you have parades sometimes?’ ‘Yes, two or three times a week; it won’t do to work them too much’. ‘Why?’ ‘They’d kick if you did’. ‘What – the men or the horses?’ ‘Both, I expect; they are not accustomed to it’.83

With little to do except polish their beloved weapons, the Bashis were negligent in camp. The same newcomer noticed that they were ‘very careless with their pistols. Everybody in camp was quite accustomed to the sound of fire-arms, at any hour or in any number, and paid no attention thereto.’ According to the stories, when a group of Bashis practised snap-shooting, it resembled a form of collective Russian roulette!

Magnificence One new arrival described the scene at Beatson’s HQ. Tied to the fence palings and to hooks on the outhouses were 15 or 20 horses, English, Arab, Persian and Turkish ‘with every sort of caparison and mounting’, while men of all nations were standing around inside the door and filling the hall and offices. ‘[E]very man,



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besides being booted and spurred, wore sword, pistols, dagger, or knife, as the case might be … while hot messengers [were] arriving and departing (always at full gallop)’. The officer concerned, Edward Money, retired from the 25th BNI, was put at ease by being greeted in Hindustani – probably by one of Walpole’s Pathans. After a brief interview with the General, Money was accepted as an officer of Beatson’s Horse. The atmosphere was completely informal, with little attention paid to dress. In his office, Beatson ‘dressed in some sort of light and easy costume’, while his ‘jack-boots, with their large brass spurs, his richly braided coat, his superb sword, all were there, and lent a martial air to the room, which the iron camp-bed and other camp contrivances scattered about did not lessen’. Beatson himself was a soldierlike looking man, with white beard and moustache … evidently, from his stature as he sat, a rather tall man [with] all the appearance of one who had seen much of life, not in its easiest shape, under a tropical climate, while a close observer might read in his countenance the temperament that delighted much in all the pomp and glory of war.

Although unconcerned by the motley uniforms sported by his European officers, Beatson had designed a uniform for those who chose to purchase it. This was similar to that worn by Lane Fox on the Danube the previous year, based on Beatson’s favourite green (Plate V). Money was one of those who had this made up by a Constantinople tailor. He describes it as: A dark green frock cloth coat fastened with hooks up one side of the chest, and totally without collar of any kind, as also without ornament, beyond a beading of gold lace to correspond with the small brass buttons running up one side of the chest, a pair of scarlet breeches, with a broad rich gold stripe running down the side of the leg, patent leather jack-boots, with large brass spurs, and a cap, without peak, of scarlet cloth, with gold band and braiding. ‘The dress was well enough; the coat especially was in good taste, and very comfortable for hard work’, but Money found the bright sun trying, and so added a peak to the cap. He also found the low-cut, collarless neckline of the coat (like an Indian alkalakh) uncomfortable, and after suffering a stiff neck wore a collar and black neckcloth. Next time Beatson saw him he demanded, What’s that bit of carpet you’ve got round your neck, Captain Money? It’s a simple neckcloth, sir. Take it off, I beg; when the neck is covered, it quite destroys the character of the uniform. I’m not particular generally as to dress, but I’ll allow nothing about the throat, which should be as naked as your hand.

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Money ‘found out afterwards this was his hobby, different somewhat from Sir George Brown’s,* who killed his men by strangulation’.84 On parade, Beatson himself wore the gorgeous Indian uniform that had created such a stir in Paris and Bulgaria. His appearance was heightened by patent leather jackboots and a turban ‘of some richly-coloured fancy material, bound round his head in graceful folds … contrasted by a fillet of cord of gold covering its base and the upper portion of his forehead’. Later, Beatson replaced his turban with the red helmet (which may have been lacquered metal, felt or leather) and horsehair plume of the Turkish Contingent.85 French newspapers ridiculed these uniforms: ‘General Beatson was left at liberty to choose their uniform, and as, judging from his own dress, he is rather an eccentric man, it is feared that he will indulge in some strange fancy. It is already ascertained that the officers are to be striped and embroidered from head to foot, and that it will require at least a year’s pay to purchase their equipment.’ The Constitutionnel suggested that this would have a bad effect in Turkey on the grounds that ‘everybody, and soldiers more especially, are accustomed to great simplicity in costume’.86 Clearly, the correspondent forgot the outrageous clothing of the Bashis and the profusion of gold embroidery on a pasha’s frockcoat! Burton later recalled much silly laughing at Constantinople, especially amongst the grinning idiot tribe, about his gold coat, which was said to stand up by force of embroidery. But here he was perfectly right, and his critics perfectly wrong. He had learnt by many years’ service to recognize the importance of show and splendour when dealing with Easterns. And no one had criticised the splendid Skinner or General Jacob of the Sind Horse …87

Holding court Beatson did indeed adopt the style of an oriental potentate with his native officers. Although Stratford mocked him as ‘the Grand Bozook’, Money noted the good effect this had. One beautiful summer evening Beatson had a large durbar tent from his Indian service pitched overlooking the Straits. He rode up at the head of a cavalcade of staff officers, ‘his fine soldier-like form set off by [his] superb uniform’. Sitting at the table, the General invited the native officers to seat themselves in a semicircle on Indian carpets, the British officers sitting or standing near him. He called to his pipe-bearer, or chibouque-jee, to bring him his pipe; ‘it soon came, a very thick and splendid cherry-stick, at least eight feet long, with a

* Brown was the old-fashioned commander of 1st Division who insisted on his men shaving and wearing the constricting neckstock even on service.



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costly amber mouthpiece’. The native officers summoned their own chibouquejees or accepted pipes from Beatson’s attendants, while trays of small cups of Turkish coffee were distributed. Like some clan chieftain, Beatson even included his eldest daughter at this durbar. Marian Jane stood beside him, ‘a girl of about thirteen or fourteen years old. She was very pretty, and her beauty was probably increased by the Amazonian kind of dress she wore, surmounted as it were by a golden turban the very miniature of her father’s’. The tent was open on three sides, so the whole crowd could witness proceedings. Girouad translated Beatson’s speech into Turkish and Arabic. The occasion for this gathering was to scotch a rumour that HMG would force the men to wear uniforms. After commending the native officers on their appearance and that of their horses, Beatson continued: ‘Now, let them look at me! (Translate each sentence as I utter it.) Do I look like a man who would do all this? Is this the sort of dress (and he struck his chest with his hand) that sort of man would wear? Are these the kinds of uniforms (and he glanced proudly round on both English and native officers) by which that sort of man would be surrounded? Do we look like a regular army?’ He assured them that the British Government regarded them as an irregular force, and promised that they would remain so as long as he was at their head, and he would lead them against the Russians so. Striking the table with his gauntleted hand, he concluded ‘And now let those stand forward who have said the reverse. I’m d––d but I’ll see whether their word or mine will be believed!’

The native officers discussed the speech excitedly, and repeated his words to those outside. His daughter’s ‘bright eyes sparkled with ardour as she listened to his discourse, and fancied herself, I dare say, by his side in the mêlée with the Russians he had alluded to’. Then they mounted, Beatson on his ‘splendid charger’ and Marian Jane ‘riding by his side, as if born in the saddle’. The native officers joined the mounted cavalcade back to his house, ‘accompanied to the crest of the high ground by the whole assembly, to the sound of tom-toms, the firing of pistols, the halooing of the Albanians, the yelling of the Arabs, and the neighing of the horses, who seemed to partake of the general excitement’. Morning and evening without fail Beatson rode through the camp with his staff: ‘He was generally accompanied by both his daughters, and the cavalcade perhaps numbered twenty or thirty. We used to term it the General’s tail, and it was an appropriate term enough, as it streamed out behind him on those grassy plains.’ Soon after joining, Money received an invitation to dine with the Beatsons. He never sat down to dinner alone, for, besides his staff, there were always three or four guests; he certainly was a prince in hospitality. The dinner was very

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excellent. Mrs Beatson, whom I then saw for the first time, had been with the General throughout, as also his two daughters … The elder had this evening doffed her golden turban, but looked quite as pretty without it, and amused me much by her lively sallies and naïveté of language and manner … I spent a very agreeable evening. General Beatson certainly made a charming host, and it was time to retire (for he kept early hours) only too soon’.88

Beatson was probably as content as he had ever been. After interminable delays he had finally achieved his goal. He was a general at last, with a large independent command making full use of his talents and experience. He had excellent quarters, his family were with him and his letters from this time are full of robust good humour. But the idyll lasted just a few weeks.

Donnybrook On 22 June Beatson reported that ‘An Irish Albanian quarrel took place last night, but as they use Pistols instead of shilelahs four men were killed and seven wounded’. Abdullah Mulazim of 4th Troop, 1st Regiment (the Elbasan Troop of Albanians), returning drunk from town with his friends, had squabbled with the yuzbashi of 5th Troop (Arnauts from Monastir) over the latter’s tents being pitched too near his own. A man was struck, he fired his pistol back, and the mulazim ordered his men to reply. ‘Then ensued a general firing’, involving about 10 men and lasting several minutes until Beatson and the native officers intervened. Abdullah and one of his troopers were arrested and sent aboard HMS Husky, but the man who fired the first shot escaped. This ‘Donnybrook’ incident, as Beatson called it,* led to the first of many courts of inquiry. We see here the first instance of Beatson playing down the severity of disciplinary incidents for the benefit of his audience in Constantinople. Despite his flippant tone, reflecting the Albanians’ own attitude towards such events, Beatson did take the incident seriously. He told Stratford that he was going to forbid the men from carrying ‘leaded’ pistols, but ‘I wish you could get me power to try at once villains of this kind: if I could have hanged the Lieut and Trooper this morning it would have a great effect: now they must be made over to the Turkish authorities & will probably escape punishment.’89 Beatson issued a string of general orders. One ran, ‘The British Government pays & feeds its soldiers to fight against its enemies and those of its Ally the Sultan … but a soldier who kills his comrade is a disgrace to any country, and will certainly go to hell.’ He told Stratford that ‘Whatever may be done with the

* The annual fair at Donnybrook near Dublin was famous for light-hearted rioting; coincidentally it was finally banned in 1855.



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Prisoners eventually, it will be as well to give them a long confinement in some prison where their friends will not know whether they have been hanged or not, which will have a good effect on them, and be more agreeable to the Prisoners than if they were hanged.’ He demoted two yuzbashis for making themselves scarce during the affray, but he released the imprisoned trooper on finding that the man had only fired after his two brothers were shot.90 To independent observers, the men were still totally undisciplined, and a number of desertions occurred. The jovial Irishman Creagh found these arose ‘not from any discontent or dislike to the service, but merely because the men, being naturally of a roving disposition, could not all at once leave off their wandering propensities’. Paymaster Harris agreed that ‘the men lead too idle a life, and if they had the excitement of active service, they would not think of mutiny and desertion’. Creagh thought the men would have returned of their own accord, but Beatson issued an order sternly informing them that ‘the punishment for desertion, during times of war, in all armies is death’.91 Worse followed. Said Effendi, the Turkish ‘writer’, and an Armenian interpreter were walking in a garden with their wives when they were assaulted by four Albanian Bashis. The two men and the Armenian woman escaped with a beating, but Said’s wife was dragged into another garden and raped. ‘The moment the General heard of this villainy he ordered the miscreants under arrest.’ Soon afterwards four men of 1st and 2nd Regiments who had been absent without leave were brought in, and the rape victim identified Hussein Mulazim, previously involved in the ‘Donnybrook’ incident. Hussein was imprisoned to await trial, although his comrades believed the woman to be a prostitute, and that moreover she had misidentified her attacker.92 Ever since they enlisted at Monastir, Adem Aga and his adherents of 1st Regiment had been at daggers drawn (almost literally) with their Bimbashi, Mehmet Bey. When some troopers complained to Beatson about Adem’s illtreatment of them, he told them to lodge their complaint formally through Bruce as camp commander, and on 6 July he refused Adem’s request for an interview until Bruce’s investigation was complete. Adem realised that the game was up. He blustered in the presence of Foord and Harris that if Beatson reduced him in rank, he would desert with 400 followers. The officers thought he was bluffing and did not report the incident. Adem intercepted the messenger carrying Bruce’s report to Beatson and then spent the afternoon plying his cronies with drink. In the evening he led them down into the town, ‘armed to the teeth’ and with standard flying. They released Hussein from the police house and rode on into town. Pierre Casian, one of the interpreters who had heard Adem’s threats, went to warn Beatson. Next door to Beatson’s quarters, the Ward family’s attention was drawn by the clatter of hooves and ‘the monotonous thump, thump of the Bashi-Bozouk jester’s drum. On going to the window we saw about 50 of these worthies, headed by an Albanian, fast approaching the Town; we observed too that considerable alarm

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and commotion prevailed about us, the pottery-people close by hastily closing their doors, and keeping a keen look-out from the roof.’ This, Ward observed, ‘looked something like coming mischief’. The Albanians ‘first of all parked up at the late Commissariat office, within a hundred yards of the house, and there two or three of them drank, as it seemed, somewhat plentifully’. Adem and his fellows were working themselves up to confront Beatson. ‘Then they came on in a body taking up a position near their General’s house.’ Beatson’s interpreter, Osman Aga, rushed in to warn him what was coming. Alone, ‘unarmed and unprepared for any tumult’, and with his wife and daughters in the house, Beatson went down to face ‘about 100 armed and mounted men, all Arnauts, and many highly excited by liquor’. It was an ugly moment, and looked as if it would end badly.93

12 THE GRAND BOZOOK

Beatson and his Bashee Bozooks [are] at daggers drawn Stratford to Clarendon1

O

n Friday 3 August a tiny item appeared in late editions of The Times: ‘A private telegraphic despatch received yesterday stated that General Beatson had been murdered by the Bashi-Bazouks.’ Panmure denied the story in the House of Lords that night, but the Saturday illustrated papers had already run with it: MURDER OF GENERAL BEATSON: A telegraphic despatch from Constantinople, on Wednesday, brought the melancholy intelligence that the Bashi-Bozouks, who had been for a long time under the command of General Beatson, have filled the measure of their iniquities by murdering their General … a sad termination to a distinguished and honourable career.2

Forty years earlier Alexander Beatson on St Helena had had sufficient warning to put Plantation House into a state of defence.3 His nephew at the Dardanelles did not have that luxury, and faced the drunken mutineers on his doorstep with no refuge for his family. In the event, and contrary to the sensational newspaper stories, the Beatsons were unharmed, and no blood was shed. The scene was melodramatic enough for Victorian tastes. Beatson stood in the doorway, alone apart from Harris and the two interpreters, Osman Aga and Pierre Casian, none of them armed. The Albanians halted about 20 yards away. Beatson beckoned, and three spokesmen –  Adem, Hussein and another – came over and conversed through the interpreters. They asserted that they had released Hussein because he was innocent, and if his arms were not returned they would all desert. According to Casian, ‘The General replied, “Why do you wish to go away? You should have come to me first, and I would have given you up the prisoner”.’ (Beatson later denied saying this.) ‘The Albanians answered, “Seek better soldiers than us, we want to go away”.’ This ‘was evidently very displeasing

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to the General’, who advanced towards the men and refused to render Hussein’s weapons. While they parleyed, Lt-Col Morgan arrived from camp – the men politely parting to let him through – and Hadji Hussein Effendi, 1st Regiment’s imam, hurried over from a nearby coffee shop. The tension was broken when Said Effendi, the Turkish writer, emerged from the house with the weapons. Undoubtedly, as husband of the rape victim who had identified Hussein, he feared for his life if the Albanians stormed in, but his intervention wrecked any chance of facing down the mutineers. Making the best of the situation, Beatson asked the Albanian officers and imam if they would stand surety for the prisoner. With their assurance, he handed over the pistols and yataghan, ‘as a concession to quiet the malcontents, until I could send for support’. Adem ‘received these arms with an air of self-satisfaction and almost defiance’. He then passed them to Hussein, who immediately primed the pistols. Adem dismounted, kissed Beatson’s hand, and promised to take the men back to camp; they remounted and rode away, drums beating.4 Adem Aga must have been a plausible fellow. His Albanian fellow officers considered him a man of ‘low origins’ before he became cavass to the Monastir Consulate. Appointed mulazim on Longworth’s recommendation, he was rapidly promoted by Rhodes and Foord. Before his inquiry, Bruce had considered Adem ‘one of the best native officers you have: he keeps his men in good order, and is strict with them; and if they were all the same it would be as well’. The bimbashis and troopers told a different story, of bullying and extortion by Adem and his cronies. Djemel Pasha, the civil governor at the Dardanelles, had previously served at Monastir and also knew him of old.5 Adem realised that the inquiry had uncovered his extortion, and now he had committed an act of mutiny and humiliated his general. Rather than wait to see what Beatson would do, he and his followers gathered their belongings and decamped en masse, a total of 147 men from the 1st and 2nd Regiments. Word reached headquarters when the deserters were about half a mile south of the town. Creagh and Heyman had arrived by now; Beatson sent Heyman to summon volunteers from his 2nd Regiment while Creagh accompanied Consul Calvert to the military pasha, Suleiman Pasha, to seek assistance. Faithful old Bimbashi Mehmet Bey offered to pursue with the loyal men of his 1st Regiment, but Beatson feared that they would be unable to tell friend from foe in the approaching darkness. In any case, the Albanians were reluctant, declaring that ‘they would shed the last drop of their blood in fighting against the enemy, but they did not like having to fight their friends’.6 Suleiman Pasha reacted swiftly, sending down some artillerymen with two field guns loaded with grape and summoning reinforcements from the European shore. Beatson regarded the affair as an internal matter and asked the Turks to hold back, but Suleiman disagreed: ‘I knew that after having made all these preparations it would have a bad effect, if we made no demonstration of force.’ The regulars



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secured Beatson’s quarters and the town bridge, a company set off aboard HM steam tug Redpole to protect the British hospital, while HM steamer Harpy and the French warship Tisiphone anchored close inshore with their guns covering the town. Suleiman Pasha noted individual Bashis galloping off to warn the camp and the deserters what was going on.7 Next morning Beatson assembled the men and called for volunteers to pursue, but there were few takers, and nothing further was done. The deserters were reported to be ransacking farms across the Plain of Troy, including Calvert’s property,* and responsibility for rounding them up was left to local Ottoman officials.9

Losing the public relations battle Unwisely – although understandably – Beatson played down the seriousness of the events. Although his first communication to Stratford began: ‘My Lord, I regret to have to report that an unpleasant affair took place yesterday’, and detailed Bruce’s investigation into Adem, the forcible release of the prisoner and the mass desertion, it skipped the doorstep scene to describe the pursuit. It is an unsatisfactory document, and Beatson’s lack of candour proved costly. He was accused of caving in to the mutineers because of fears for his family (though there was little else that he and the officers with him could have done). Doubtless he wanted to gloss over this personal embarrassment, but he laid himself open to accusations of misleading his superiors, especially when the confrontation had been widely reported.10 Although Beatson’s murder was soon contradicted, newspapers (particularly French ones) continued sensational accounts of events at the Dardanelles. The Sémaphore reported that ‘The Bashi-Bazouks in English pay broke into houses, violated women, assassinated people in the streets, and committed such horrible excesses of all kinds, that the inhabitants left the place and abandoned it to pillage.’ One account claimed that the Bashis had torn down and trampled the Union flag. Another alleged that during their confrontation with Beatson the mutineers had ‘struck their yataghans in the ground, and piling up combustible materials, threatened … that unless their comrades were instantly released from arrest they would set fire to the house and burn the General alive, with his wife and children. General Beatson had no alternative.’11 The principal source for these exaggerations was Battus, the French ViceConsul at the Dardanelles and correspondent of the Journal de Constantinople, whom Beatson had ‘with characteristic carelessness … neglected to square’.12

* Calvert’s farm included the mound of Hisarlik, where the family began excavations before Heinrich Schliemann took over and revealed the ruins of Troy.8

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Beatson denounced the reports and friends forwarded to London newspapers his private letters explaining the events. But the damage was done, and the garbled accounts coloured opinions in Paris and London, right up to Queen Victoria. She wrote that she ‘laments that the accounts of Beatson’s Horse are so very bad’.13 One reporter did go down to the Dardanelles to see things for himself: I have ridden three times through the lines of tents, once happening to be when General Beatson was making his evening circuit; and I am bound to say that the result was a very high opinion of their good order and tractability. As the General came in sight of each regiment the men hurried out of their tents, and ranged in line along his course, saluted à la Turque, with as hearty a good-will and deferential a manner as any troops who ever wore a uniform. He stopped from time to time and inquired of the native officers as to the wants and behaviour of their men, evidently much to the satisfaction and conciliation of those interrogated, as well as of the listening groups who clustered round.

He concluded that ‘in the absence of field operations in the Crimea, they can be of no present use there, and considering the lateness of the season, the snows would have set in before they could reach Kars’. Yet they could not stay at the Dardanelles indefinitely: an anonymous officer’s letter published in London complained that This place has been most ill-chosen for organising such a force to overawe any demonstration or mutiny, and, should the force be left here idling two months longer doing nothing, it will run the risk of falling to pieces, as it is not to be expected that men of the stamp we have got will long remain satisfied with an idle life. The great thing is to provide against their internal brawls, which, if not nipped in the bud, lead to bloodshed.14

Beatson argued that the best remedy was to ship the men off to the Crimea, ‘where we can give them something to occupy them’. If he had the Arabs, ‘I should have no difficulty in getting them to put down any excesses of the Albanians, and the one would have kept the other in check’. Providentially, the first Arab detachment arrived three days after the Albanians’ mutiny. Walpole had embarked 445 men without problems and they now arrived unexpectedly at the Dardanelles, to the consternation of the commissariat, but to Beatson’s delight: ‘This is a most opportune re-enforcement and will enable me to deal with the Albanians should any thing more take place.’ The Arabs were more sober and respectful than the troublesome Albanians, but they arrived unarmed, so Beatson repeated his request for the swords, carbines and ammunition supposedly sent out from Britain.15 Brett arrived with 350 more Arabs a few days later and he took over as camp commander, Bruce being sent to bring up the Mosul regiment.16 By now Raglan was dead – essentially of a broken heart after a failed assault on Sevastopol – and his replacement was Dismal Jemmy Simpson under whom Beatson



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had served in Sind. At first, Beatson welcomed his appointment, suggesting that he was unlikely to share the ‘petty jealousies’ of Raglan’s staff. Simpson, however, was no more enthusiastic than Raglan about Bashi-Bazouks, and begged to ‘decline having this Corps under my command, as I could only anticipate discredit upon Her Majesty’s Forces by having a crew of such undisciplined ruffians in any way connected with the Troops I now have the honor to command’.17

Calm returns Meanwhile, security was tightened at the Dardanelles with HMS Oberon sent down to protect British citizens. Three companies of Ottoman Imperial Guards from Constantinople were quartered in the fort to bolster Suleiman Pasha’s artillery recruits. By the time they arrived all was calm again. Calvert now recognised that the deserters had not committed the excesses claimed in his early reports. Outrages were confined to a few cases of highway robbery – without violence – and rather than plundering villages they had simply requisitioned bread and forage from the authorities in their traditional manner. Eight deserters had been captured and some others drifted back of their own accord. All maintained that they had no quarrel with Beatson and blamed Adem Aga and his raki.18 Beatson told Stratford that The late affair will do no harm, rather good, by enabling us to separate the sheep from the goats. The generality of the men are good and willing men and I shall bring the bad into order, or get rid of them. They are a strange race; but I do not despair of making good soldiers of them, when we understand them and they us. The Arabs are certainly a more easily managed race, and I think it would be well to have a preponderance of them.

Far from needing gunboats to protect British subjects, ‘we ride about the camp with our wives and daughters at all hours, and are treated with the greatest respect’.19 Beatson issued a series of general orders to show confidence. That of 15 July stated ‘that the late desertions and outrages were caused by a few drunken scoundrels’. ‘Acting on this belief,’ he continued, ‘the Major General has determined to confide to each regiment its own Prisoners, thus shewing that he has confidence in his Soldiers, and requires no other aid to enable him to punish those who are guilty.’ Next day: ‘Officers commanding regiments will call on their Bin Bashis and other native officers to point out to them any man who is in the habit of getting drunk, that he may be instantly discharged. This Order is to be explained to the men.’ Subsequently, ‘Mahmoud, trooper of the 1st Troop, 4th Regiment, is dismissed the service, for having been found drunk, and causing annoyance to the peaceable inhabitants of the town. He will be sent as a prisoner to Beyrout, by

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the first steamer leaving for that port. Drunkards can never be trusted as soldiers, therefore the sooner they are got rid of the better.’20 Stratford was less sanguine than Beatson. ‘We have sad work at the Dardanelles,’ he confided to Clarendon. ‘Beatson almost in the same breath wants [the irregulars] to be threatened with dispersion, to be sent to the Crimea, and to be reinforced by 6000 men from Mossul.’ Stratford suspected that Beatson was keeping him in the dark about the true state of affairs. He sent Skene down to investigate, ‘and to give, if needed, a little wholesome counsel to the Grand Bozook’.21 Skene reported favourably: ‘The troopers display a most remarkable degree of intelligence and quickness in executing the light evolutions which they are taught. Indeed, no regular cavalry regiment could go through some of them better than the two Albanian regiments do already. Their horses are active and swift, tho’ exceedingly small and somewhat out of condition. Those of the Arab Regt just arrived are however larger and much better animals.’ He observed that the ‘clothing and accoutrements are in general good and serviceable in some instances costly’, although the Arabs were still unarmed because the promised carbines had not arrived. But Skene warned that Beatson’s best endeavours would be unavailing without an efficient staff, more commissariat clerks and interpreters, and MOs to replace those loaned by Vivian. A Turkish judge advocate was necessary to assist the courts martial and apply the Sultan’s military code, because ‘Until desertion be proved a punishable offence, the men will continue to come and go as they like.’ Skene spent three days observing and was preparing to return to Constantinople when Beatson urged him to stay. ‘The Genl yesterday called me into his room with a few of his officers to hear a proclamation he had written for his troops. In it, he threatened summarily to disband them, seizing horses and arms to compensate the advances made.’ Skene advised against publishing this threat, and when they were alone he explained why: I did not see by what authority he could disband a force which he had been commissioned only to command, that the probable effect of his proclamation would be an immediate dispersion of his troops to retain possession of their horses and arms which he had not the physical means of seizing.

Instead of 150 deserters scouring the countryside, Skene argued, there would be 10 times as many.22 Beatson repeated his offer to make Skene chief of staff. Previously, Skene would have accepted gladly, but the attachment now seemed less attractive, and in loyalty to Stratford he declined the offer. But he did stay to help out, promising Stratford that he would run up to Therapia as soon as convenient, to brief the ambassador on ‘some particulars of the most delicate nature’ – probably the events that Beatson had omitted to report.23 Beatson thought that Skene had been



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sent to assist him, and only later realised that he was in fact the embassy spy. Nor did he comprehend that ‘advice’ from that quarter should be treated as an order.

Growing dissatisfaction While pipe-clay soldiers distrusted the discipline of Beatson’s force, the soldiers of the quill in London demanded that he pay more attention to administration: ‘Much inconvenience would be avoided if [sic] a strict adherence on your part to the Regulations & Warrants by which the Army is governed.’ Lacking trained staff officers, Beatson borrowed some from Paulet at Scutari. At least Panmure had sent out some more volunteers – a mixed batch of active and retired Queen’s and HEIC officers, with a couple of BAL veterans.24 This allowed Beatson to dispense with the eccentric Foord and petulant Meade. Like Quin and Hall in Bundelkhand, Meade appealed to higher authority over his dismissal, but drew no response: it was wartime, and Panmure was not going to contradict Beatson’s decisions publicly. Beatson offered Foord the pretext of medical leave, from which he never returned.25 Beatson remained dissatisfied with the standard of his officers and issued a scathing order: In the course of his military experience it has never been the lot of the Major General to meet with Officers whose ideas of the manner in which duty must be carried on, were so lax, as those of some of the Officers of this Force appear to be. Orders seem to be considered of things of no importance, if they interfere in any way with the personal convenience of Officers, instead of being instantly obeyed … This state of things cannot last. [If it does] it will become the duty of the Major General to save Her Majesty’s Government the expense of paying a large body of Officers, as he would rather have one Officer who did his duty properly than fifty who did it indifferently.

He sent Stratford a copy ‘that you may not suppose I am blind to the faults of my Officers, or allow them to remain blind to their own’.26 Skene had noticed ‘a growing dissatisfaction between Genl Beatson and some of his British officers. He exacts too much from them, and they get sulky and do nothing’. Later arrivals were disgusted to find themselves under the orders of locally recruited men like Sankey with little military experience.27 Beatson’s friends sought to rally them round: a group of 18 British regimental and medical officers signed a letter expressing willingness ‘to follow cheerfully wherever so distinguished a soldier may be directed to lead us … [with] the most unqualified reliance on your strategic skill and undoubted courage’. The first signatory – and probable instigator – was Creagh, followed by Brett and the others in seniority,

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though the newly joined Capt Money admitted that he had little idea of what he was signing. However, even loyal Creagh resigned soon afterwards (this time it was his wife who was sick).28 Unfortunately, most of those sent were not cavalry officers but infantrymen, such as Hugh Walmsley (retired lieutenant, 63rd Foot), son of Sir Joshua Walmsley, a Radical MP and proprietor of the Daily News, or John Dunne (retired ensign, 44th Foot). Other officers simply dropped by asking for a job and were accepted by Beatson after a casual interview (Money’s focused on his exploits in the hunting field). Both Walmsley and Money wrote accounts of their experiences, joining the long list of authors among the ‘Bazoukers’, as Beatson’s officers were known to the rest of the army.29 One passing gentleman was George Lennox Rawdon Berkeley, a former captain in the 35th Foot. As the Earl of Berkeley’s cousin, he was well connected, and Beatson utilised this by appointing him as his military secretary and personal emissary. Berkeley seems to have left the army under a cloud – he may have been one of those Harry Green described as having ‘served in British Regiments and … left them for reasons which they had kept to themselves’ – and Panmure flatly refused to confirm him in the local rank of major that Beatson had promised and to which his previous rank entitled him.30 Probably most welcome of these arrivals was Richard Burton. He had returned, wounded, from his first disastrous African expedition to discover that the British public was interested only in the war, not explorers’ tales. After convalescing, Burton travelled to Balaklava to see if he could get into action, but his old Sind acquaintance Simpson had nothing to offer. Burton then hung around the embassy offering Stratford advice on the situation in the Caucasus before joining the TC. He was not impressed with what he found, and decided to transfer his allegiance to Beatson, who gratefully made him chief of staff. Burton immediately purchased his uniform, blazing with gold (‘I was gorgeous,’ he wrote) and proceeded to the Dardanelles. There he found that Beatson had visibly aged: ‘I at once recognized my old Boulogne friend, although slightly disguised in uniform. He looked like a man of fifty-five, with bluff face and burly figure, and probably grey hair became him better than black.’ After Paulet’s officers returned to Scutari, Burton and Berkeley formed Beatson’s personal staff. Burton later claimed that he reintroduced parades, established a riding school for the British officers and a school of arms. He also claimed to have toned down the General’s correspondence, but Burton’s brusque style probably inflamed matters. As one writer puts it, ‘whenever there was a row Burton was not the man to be shy of making it worse’.31

Breakdown of trust By late July tranquillity had apparently been restored in camp, but Stratford was convinced that the General had lost control: ‘the condition of “Beatson’s Horse”



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is to the last degree unsatisfactory,’ he reported to Clarendon, and privately added that ‘Beatson and his Bashee Bozooks at daggers drawn … I am sorely puzzled about Beatson’. Troubled by Beatson’s lack of candour, Stratford wrote, ‘The general to be called upon for an explanation as to the pistol scene and the case of the men who refused to join drill.’ If Beatson did not obey, Stratford would disband the whole force and reorganise it under another officer. If he complied, Stratford would await instructions from London, providing Beatson with an adviser in the interim. He wanted to send the TC chief of staff, Maj-Gen John Michel, but ‘Vivian is haggling’ and for the moment he relied on Skene’s influence over Beatson, ‘who justly esteems him’.32 Stratford informed Beatson that though empowered by HMG to disband the force, he was ‘naturally unwilling to resort to so extreme a measure’, and requested him to set up a military inquiry into the facts. Skene could assist, and would ‘furnish you with a statement of the circumstances’ that had led to this decision, including the ‘serious and uncontradicted rumours which have reached H. M.’s Embassy’. Puzzled, Beatson asked Skene about these rumours: ‘I said that I could only conjecture that the giving up of the arms to the released prisoner had something to do with it. He answered that he had never mentioned that circumstance even to me because he thought it to be a matter of no consequence whether the arms were given up or not, the man having been already released.’ It dawned on Beatson that the Great Elchi had his own sources, and Skene’s hints about secret instructions from Stratford fed the General’s growing paranoia. He did, however, ask Skene and Calvert to constitute the required Court of Inquiry under the independent presidency of Lt-Col Richard Blacklin, commandant of the British Hospital.33 Skene in turn believed that Beatson was withholding information. He was also resisting a move into camp, ‘despite his repeated promise to me to do so’. Skene had his own and Beatson’s tents pitched and ‘we went there together this morning with his baggage. I wished to see how it would be taken. He was coldly received. He made a speech and had an order read but it would not do.’ Beatson continued to live at his comfortable family house in town.34

Devil makes work Unfortunately, peace at the Dardanelles had been, in Stratford’s words, ‘a brief deceitful lull’. More Albanians deserted, and a couple of Bulgarians fired at their yuzbashi, without hitting him. The culprits were conveyed in irons to the citadel. Now the Arabs were following these bad examples: on the night of 21 July about 50 deserted with their horses, complaining of too much drill and fearful of being made to wear uniforms. A local official caught eight of them, and sent them in the charge of a bullion convoy escort going to the Dardanelles. Unfortunately, other deserters not only released their comrades, but robbed the convoy. Sankey went

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out with a party and caught about half of them, but others were reported still plundering.35 Beatson assembled a court martial of native officers, admitting that without a law officer it was illegal, but having experience of the panchayat system in the Indian irregular cavalry he probably reasoned that it would be respected by the men. Two Albanians who had drawn their yataghans on each other were sentenced to be flogged, as were the trigger-happy Bulgarians. ‘What was my astonishment, however, when Genl Beatson gave [the latter] a full pardon?’, Skene reported; ‘on this point he listens to no advice’.36 Both Ambassador and Seraskier disapproved of Beatson’s drumhead court martial, preferring to establish a ‘Mixed Commission’ of British and Turkish officers. Stratford advised Beatson to come to Constantinople for discussions, handing over temporary command to an officer of Vivian’s.37 Unfortunately, although less than a day away by steamer, Beatson ignored the hint, when a meeting might have cleared the air. Instead he remained at the Dardanelles in truculent mood: As far as I am personally concerned I am quite indifferent if the Corps were disbanded tomorrow. The direct opposition I have met with in some quarters, & the lukewarm support in others, look as if Her Majesty’s present Government are anxious that a measure which was originated by the late Government should fail … Had I followed my own personal feelings & convenience, the difficulties thrown in my way by the War Department would have made me resign long ago; but I felt I had a higher duty to perform.

As for the rumours, Beatson decried the ‘tissue of falsehoods’ appearing in the Journal de Constantinople.38 Skene reported Beatson to be in a ‘state of excitement’ and unwilling to listen: With regard to his resignation, I said that in his position I should never throw up my commission in a huff, … but that if he felt he could not carry out the views of the Govt I thought he will do quite right to resign, and need not talk of insults etc etc. He said he would not disarm the Albanians under any circumstances and that if the Govt insisted on that measure he must resign. This was taking a better ground to stand on.39

Thereupon Beatson wrote to Stratford, ‘I cannot in justice to myself do otherwise, than place my resignation in the hands of Her Majesty’s Government, and make over the Command to any Officer whom your Excellency may choose to send.’ In the meantime, he would stay on to deal with the difficulties he anticipated would be caused by ‘the unnecessary and injudicious measures now in progress’. In particular, ‘I most decidedly protest against secret arrangements for the disarming of the Albanians, which however worthy of a Government which murdered the



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Janissaries,* are not such as a British Officer can with honor adopt.’ It could have been done immediately after the mutiny, but now he had expressed his confidence in them, it would be treacherous and would involve bloodshed. ‘Every person knows that the Albanians would rather part with their lives than with their arms.’40 Unfortunately, Stratford’s reply to this resignation offer avoided the issues by maintaining that ‘It will be for Her Majesty’s Government to appreciate the circumstances under which you have announced the intention to resign your command.’41 Panmure had sent a military adviser to reduce the load on the Great Elchi. William Mansfield was top of his year at Sandhurst and had served through both Sikh wars and on the North-West Frontier under Sir Colin Campbell. Now, aged just 36, he was a brigadier-general with a key military-diplomatic role. Like many intelligent men he was impatient with perceived stupidity, but he was an ideal enforcer.42 Mansfield urged Stratford to bring matters to a head: ‘M. Genl Beatson must be called on peremptorily to sustain order with the means at his disposal. The other alternative is instant resignation … I am perfectly willing to take all the responsibility of decisive measures regarding the General and of the expressions to be used in addressing him.’ Shaken by this forthrightness, Stratford demurred: he had to take diplomatic factors into account. Anyway, Beatson could simply be superseded by Vivian’s officer. Unfortunately, Vivian selected James Neill, a mere brigadier-general – and thus Beatson’s junior – who could not replace him unless he chose to go.43 Neill was a poor choice. Later notorious as ‘The Avenger’ of the Indian Mutiny, he was so sure in his opinions that he was downright insubordinate, as Henry Havelock discovered during the Lucknow campaign. Burton resented Neill’s ‘offensive presence and bullying manner’, and Money considered that sending Neill ‘was a great mistake. Either General Beatson was fit to command the force or he was not … if the latter, it were better to have suspended our chief at once’ than to subject him to unjustifiable indignity, ‘leaving out the fact that a man of General Beatson’s peculiar temperament was sure, as the events shortly proved, to be driven to greater excesses thereby’.44 Neill was instructed to take over temporary command if Beatson went to Constantinople as Stratford wished, otherwise he was to work with Skene and Calvert to advise Beatson on restoring discipline among the Bashis. Stratford and Mansfield seem to have thought that this would precipitate Beatson’s resignation, but they were disappointed. When he arrived on 28 July, Neill found Beatson disinclined to give up command even temporarily, despite threatening resignation only hours before.45 Beatson complained of the ‘want of courtesy’ in sending a

* In 1826 the Turkish authorities brutally destroyed their famous Janissary corps, which had become a king-making Praetorian Guard.

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junior to supersede him, without informing him of that officer’s orders. Taking Stratford’s hint, he appealed to HMG ‘to judge if I have been fairly treated’. Beatson conceded that ‘Brigadier General Neill appears to be an officer of discretion, and of him I have not the slightest reason to complain’, and asked him to preside over the Mixed Commission. He even stood up for Neill against the ‘insolence’ of the Turkish officials. However, Beatson’s good opinion changed once he divined that Neill’s loyalty was to Stratford.46

The Mixed Commission Each morning between 06.00 and 12.00, the ‘Mixed Commission’, comprising the two British consuls and two Ottoman pashas, together with two British and two Turkish officers, sat as a court martial under Neill’s presidency, clearing the backlog of disciplinary cases. In the afternoon, the Court of Inquiry investigating the events of 6 July took evidence, but Blacklin soon went home sick, and Neill took over the presidency of this as well. The other members were Calvert and Skene. Beatson seems to have been content to let the commissioners busy themselves with this inquiry while he got on with training.47 The Mixed Commission started by sentencing a trooper to 500 lashes for the bullion robbery. This sentence, the heaviest permitted under Turkish military law, was carried out before the whole command drawn up in square. The man was laid face down and flogged on the buttocks with rods, the choases being urged to strike harder. The only deviation from Turkish practice was the presence of British MOs, as Beatson would ‘not allow humanity to be outraged in any Force under my Command by allowing a Prisoner to be flogged to Death’. Neill reported that had it been a Punishment Parade before the best disciplined corps in H.M.’s or any other service, the demeanour of the men could not have been better – there was no talking nor excitement of any kind, the men sat steadily on their horses observing closely what took place, but grave silent and respectful in their bearing – none of the regular troops were present, M General Beatson assuring me of his perfect confidence in his men.48

On succeeding days further sentences were passed: for discharging a pistol to frighten a civilian; for violent conduct towards a commissariat officer; for using a pistol in a dispute with a melon seller. Beatson considered these offences trivial, and scrawled scathing comments down the margin of the proceedings. ‘Served him right,’ he wrote beside a description of the accused breaking a melon on the head of the vendor who had refused to sell him one. Even Neill accepted that this offender was provoked and released him from prison with a severe admonishment. But to Neill’s dismay Beatson released the others as well, citing irregularities in the proceedings.49



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Neill blamed these procedural errors on the inexperienced officer Beatson had provided as clerk. He was further irritated when the officer promised by Beatson to act as prosecutor did not turn up, and he complained that the court included two young officers only just out from England. To run proceedings efficiently and retain the respect of the Turks, Neill asked to use Paulet’s officers. Beatson duly appointed one of them, Maj John Hackett,* as Judge Advocate to the court. But Neill refused to acknowledge this grandiose appointment, and in any case Hackett was upset at working with junior HEIC and Turkish service officers who enjoyed higher local rank than he did. Beatson was furious at Neill’s snub over this appointment, but did not hold it against Hackett – they became friends and Hackett would help him on other occasions in the future.51 From what he had heard so far, Neill sought to identify causes for the disturbances. He advised Stratford that the mistakes over Adem Aga had caused much of the trouble, but the raw material of the corps was good, and he could see no difficulty in getting it organised ‘if a regular and proper system of discipline’ was instituted. In a dig at Beatson, Neill expressed the opinion that all officers should live in camp with their men and should not have their families with them.52 However, when Neill put his suggestions to Beatson, the General was furious: ‘You state that no respectable woman can leave her house and that the soldiers are in the habit of fixing the prices of the goods they wish to purchase in the Bazars. I have to request you to state any instances in which a respectable woman has been insulted in the town, or any instance, lately in which goods have been sold from fears of danger from the arms carried by my men.’ He rejected Neill’s assertion that it was ‘unmilitary’ for troops to carry their arms when off duty, citing the custom of irregular cavalry in India – and because all the inhabitants carried arms ‘I decline to expose my men unarmed to insult and murder’. One of his officers later recalled, ‘General Beatson would hear no wrong said of his men’, and refused to disarm them. Others confirm the Albanians’ resistance to being disarmed, and one is reminded of the bahaduri of the Hyderabad Cavalry: ‘No promises, no threats, will induce [him] to give up his arms … he is disgraced for ever.’ But Beatson’s obstinacy on this point was extreme. His only concession was to issue a characteristic order that ‘This drawing of pistols must be put a stop to. The Major-General has no wish to take your pistols from you, but if this goes on, and men use their pistols against any person but the Russians, he will take them away from you.’53 Beatson instructed Neill to confine himself to acting as president of the Court and to report in person if he had suggestions to make. When Neill continued to send him notes on how to run his command, Beatson was apoplectic: ‘You did not use the Courtesy due to me as your superior officer by neglecting to call and

* Brevet Major John Hackett of the 44th Foot held the certificate of the Senior Department at Sandhurst, the forerunner of the Staff College.50

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personally offer me the advice.’ He threatened to place Neill under arrest for the snub over Hackett, but left it to his superiors to ‘take notice’ of Neill’s behaviour.54 Mansfield cleared Neill of intentional disobedience, but relations between General and Brigadier had broken down irretrievably, and now Beatson made the grievous error of insulting Stratford himself. With his suspicions raised by a comment from Neill, he wrote to the Ambassador that ‘I know not what secret instructions Brigadier General Neill alluded to … I have a right to doubt that an English Gentleman would send any officer into my Corps with secret instructions differing from those openly sent to me.’ This was probably the letter that Burton claimed to have toned down, removing its coded challenge to a duel (‘P.S.– This is official, but I would have your Lordship to know that I also wear a black coat’). But even without the postscript (which may be Burton’s invention), it was stupid to impugn the Ambassador, who was under immense pressure.55

Hot heads The volcano finally erupted one hot day in early August when Stratford penned a 20-page rant to Clarendon about ‘the punishment of dog-day heat coinciding with vexatious drudgery’. As well as liaising between the Porte and all British commanders in the Black Sea theatre, he was responsible for British military establishments in Turkey, and for Russian prisoners of war, yet Vivian and Beatson pestered him over every detail: ‘Vivian’s wants are not few and Beatson is the first of Bashee Bozooks.’ Furthermore, he was upset by perceived WD criticism of his handling of Beatson’s Horse.56 So the Great Elchi was in a dangerous mood when he received Beatson’s insulting suggestion that he was no gentleman. Henceforth, Stratford refused to communicate with him except through Mansfield. While Stratford complained to Clarendon about Beatson’s ‘insulting or disrespectful insinuations’, Beatson simultaneously appealed to Panmure about Stratford’s interference, asking whether, ‘with honor to myself, & justice to the service you have entrusted to me’, he should remain in command of the force. He clearly had no intention of actually resigning – even though rumours of it had reached the newspapers – and he repeated his request to be placed under Simpson’s command.57 Unaware of the impact of this correspondence, Beatson tried addressing Stratford in a friendly-ironic manner: ‘My Lord, it has been truly said that from the sublime to the ridiculous there is but one step.’ He explained that the Mixed Commission’s time was being ‘frittered away’, asserting that Skene’s procedural errors ‘would enable any school boy to gain damages’ against a conviction. He argued that cases were being ‘got up’ against the Bashis and proposed replacing Neill as president of the Mixed Commission with the newly arrived Brett, who was ‘an officer of energy’ and ‘will not allow justice to be made a mockery of’. The commissioners had enraged Beatson by suggesting that Djemel Pasha



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should station guards to prevent off-duty Bashis entering the town unless they checked in their firearms as if entering a Wild West township. He accused Neill of ‘impertinence’, and wrote, ‘I hereby order you, as your superior officer, to take steps to prevent the measures in question being acted on till I refer them to higher authority’.58 Now it was Mansfield’s turn to lecture Beatson: ‘An officer of your experience cannot but be aware, that when any dispute arises between the people of a town and troops stationed in the neighbourhood, the first precaution taken by the Commander of the latter, is to confine them to their camp or cantonment, till, all ill feeling shall have subsided.’ Mansfield concluded that ‘although the demeanour of the troops under your command is good on parade’, the town and countryside were terrorised by the lawless Bashis. The Times correspondent made the same point: although the Bashis treated their British officers with deference ‘they imagined that docility on parade entitled them to enliven their hours of leisure by such objectionable practices as robbery, rape, and murder’.59 Beatson’s rose-tinted view of his command was increasingly challenged by the evidence. The Court of Inquiry had shown that Rhodes and Foord’s men had not been as orderly at Salonika as reported. Lord Napier went to investigate, and confirmed that although the Pasha’s complaints were highly coloured they did contain some truth. Once Kiraly took over at Salonika, more care had been taken in selecting ‘respectable’ native officers.60 The Inquiry concluded that the disorder and desertions had been due to idleness and boredom, the Arabs’ fears of being uniformed and drilled, and the Bulgarians’ dislike of their native officers. Trouble in town could be stamped out with a proper system of sentries yet, as Skene complained, ‘The streets are still full of armed troopers.’ As to the ‘colloquy’ with the mutinous Albanians on Beatson’s doorstep, the inquiry blamed Harris and Foord for not reporting Adem’s mutinous threats, but, ‘The Court being presided by an officer who is junior in military rank to Major General Beatson abstains from making any remarks on these incidents.’ Neill’s accompanying confidential report contained devastating pen portraits of Beatson’s officers. Although some of the adventurers such as Kiraly and Fardella were ‘gentlemen’ and good officers, Neill deprecated their promotion above officers from the British service, and he accused Beatson of ‘prostitution of rank’ in promoting men like Sankey and Giraud.61 Neill demanded that Beatson should either act or hand over command pending a decision from London. Beatson retorted: ‘it is my intention to act according to the usage of the British Army, of which the Force I command forms part, and to retain my command until Her Majesty shall otherwise order or until a senior officer shall come to take it’, though he was prepared to hand temporary command to Brett if Stratford wanted to see him in person. Neill advised Stratford that Brett was unsuitable even for acting command. Sending a superior officer would be the only way to get Beatson out. Stratford asked Simpson to do so, urging him to use his new telegraph link to London for rapid confirmation.62

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Beatson conceded that men would only be allowed into town with a pass, but Neill noted further violence between the Albanians and the police and Jewish inhabitants of the town, and when nothing further happened he made direct arrangements with the Turkish authorities.63 This called down one of Burton’s unnecessarily curt notes: Sir, I am directed by Major General Beatson to acquaint you that he considers your presuming to inform him of the wishes and intentions of the Turkish authorities an uncalled for proceeding on your part. When the Pasha applies direct to the Major General he is always ready to cooperate with him.64

When Skene visited Beatson, the General ‘refused to listen to any advice or to allow any interference, and concluded by saying “Who is General Neill? I do not know him”.’ Beatson became so angry that Skene could no longer maintain relations with him.65

Tempers fray Memoirs refer to Beatson as ‘an old Indian officer of fiery temper’, and ‘peppery like most old Indians’,66 These clichés usually contained some truth: the climate, fevers and isolation of service in India could ruin the sweetest temper. Beatson’s officers attempted to patch things up, Blakely informing Skene that ‘the MGeneral had not the least intention of writing anything that could give offence to Y.E. and that the MGenl feels grieved that his letter should have produced that effect’. Skene accepted, but Neill considered it inadequate.67 In his anger, Beatson acted unwisely, suppressing the more critical remarks of the Mixed Commission and holding back the Court of Inquiry’s report while he prepared a response to its ‘vague and unfounded assertions’. But Neill had anticipated this and sent copies direct to Constantinople and London.68 Unlike the rest of his strident correspondence at this time, Beatson’s response to the Inquiry was well argued and crisply expressed, suggesting literary assistance from Burton. It refuted the commissioners’ conclusions point by point. It set out what Beatson saw as the motivation of the hostile witnesses – the LTC officers supporting Calvert’s profiteering. It decried the panic: while some townspeople sent their families across the Hellespont for safety and slept with loaded pistols by their pillows, Beatson proudly stated that ‘I had no guard at my own house and certainly never went to bed with my pistols, I rode through the camp twice a day with my daughters, the ladies of the British Consul’s family and Mrs Whittall’ (the wife of a prominent British trader). He contended that the men had enlisted to fight, not to sit around in camp; yet he had not been provided with sufficient



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officers or the judicial means to inflict any punishments: ‘my hands are tied. I am a General commanding, without the means of supporting the dignity of command.’ As for excessive leniency, Beatson drily remarked that ‘this is the first time that such defect has ever been attributed to me’.69 He employed the tactic of sending sheaves of opinions from his officers arguing that the measures proposed by Neill and the consuls would lead to bloodshed, while Brett furnished petitions from the COs and native officers asking to be sent on active service. Beatson also appealed to ‘the gentlemen at the Dardanelles, civil and military’, to refute negative reports circulating in Constantinople. Friendly British residents like Frederick Whittall stated that they were unaware of such outrages, and Sankey commented that ‘If soldiers have been outrageous and dangerous they must have been so very quietly.’70 Neill was as angry as Beatson, and allegedly told Skene that Beatson did not recognise the Ambassador’s authority (like other hearsay from Skene, this may be inaccurate). Neill warned that ‘Major General Beatson’s violent and unsoldierlike conduct’ would inevitably lead to a collision between his troops and the Turkish Regulars. If that occurred, Neill declared, he would ‘secure that officer by force, send him off under restraint to Y.E., and assume command of the troops here’. Although this accorded with Skene’s advice,71 it was a mad idea: any court would have treated this action as a prima facie case of mutiny, and broken Neill rather than Beatson.* It remained to be seen if Panmure and Simpson would do what Stratford, Neill and Mansfield had failed to do, and dislodge the Grand Bozook from his command.

* When that serial victim of mutinies Admiral Bligh was removed as Governor of New South Wales by his own officers in 1808, it was they who were broken, even though they did achieve his recall.72

13 DESCENT INTO FARCE

A scene entailing ridicule and disgrace on the Queen’s Commission Skene to Stratford1

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ow came a breathing space. Stratford was away in the Crimea distributing medals, and Panmure was at the end of a fortnight’s communication gap. Indeed, opinion in London was now quite positive towards the Bashi-Bazouks. Panmure informed the Queen ‘that favourable intelligence has arrived of the irregularities of Beatson’s Horse’. He intended to send them with Vivian’s force to reinforce Omer Pasha’s army stationed at Eupatoria, menacing Russian supply lines.2 The Prime Minister understood that the great bulk of that Cavalry force is obedient and submissive … Consequently it would be unwise to disband them, and to throw away a good Cavalry force which has cost us much time, trouble, and money to get together. But they are useless at the Dardanelles … I am glad Stratford gave up the intention of disarming the Albanians. To have done so would have required a battle.

With a dig at Simpson, Palmerston suggested that Beatson’s Horse should be sent, ‘just as they are’ to the Crimea, ‘without waiting to ask who likes or dislikes to have it there; if actions take place and the Russians are worsted, it may become a matter of first-rate importance to have a large Cavalry force at Eupatoria to harass and interrupt communications.’3 Simpson, however, had heard that ‘Beatson’s Horse is in the most undisciplined state, and that General Beatson himself is acting in so contumacious a spirit’ that Stratford was on the verge of disbanding them. ‘I have already informed Her Majesty’s Govt that I decline having this Corps under my command, as I could only anticipate discredit upon Her Majesty’s Forces’, and he informed Stratford that he could not spare a senior officer to supersede Beatson.4

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Simpson and Stratford had to work with their French allies, who were loud in their complaints against the Bashis after clashes with their men. French soldiers took delight in goading Bashi-Bazouks (there was never any trouble between Beatson’s men and British troops). Beatson was sceptical: ‘A French officer asserts that an Albanian struck him with his fist. This is not the custom of the Albanians.’ Another’s claim that an Albanian levelled a pistol at him and received a blow in return ‘was palpably false. An Arnaut with a levelled weapon will not tamely put up with such a disgrace.’5 Beatson had previously issued orders to protect the vineyards. On 22 August a patrol of 5th Regiment apprehended a group of French orderlies (infirmiers) from Nagara Hospital stealing grapes. They resisted with vine stakes and stones while the unarmed Arab Bashis used their stirrup irons on them. Beatson triumphantly told Stratford that ‘the Irregular Cavalry have proved themselves the protectors of the property of the inhabitants against the depredations of a more civilised soldiery’. The prisoners were quickly released, but the French were outraged.6 A more serious affair took place a week later between a dozen or so infirmiers and the picquet from 4th Regiment. Word of the affray got back to camp – an excitable bimbashi shouted that two Bashis had been killed, and led his men out for revenge, while Brett and his officers went up to investigate reports that a Frenchman was dead. Money watched the Arabs rounding up the pilferers, ‘doubling and turning much like greyhounds after a hare’, and he rescued one frightened Frenchman by taking him up on his saddle. Brett kept the prisoners for safety at his HQ overnight and Beatson released them next day. The two missing Bashis also turned up in the morning. Money considered that if the Bashis involved in violence had been punished, and an apology sent to the French, no ill will would have resulted, but only one trooper was sent for trial and Brett’s inquiry seemed intent on proving the French to have been in the wrong. Money was prevented from giving oral evidence, and later claimed that Beatson misrepresented his written evidence. The following evening, while Beatson was doing his camp rounds, Calvert reported some of his men stealing grapes. Wemyss and Burton went out with a couple of troopers, and discovered that the plunderers were French. Beatson asked the commandant at Nagara to prevent trespassing in the vineyards: ‘The men on both sides are beginning to use their arms, and if collisions are not prevented some lamentable incident may occur.’7 But Battus would not let the matter drop. He accused Beatson’s men of dragging their earlier captives back to camp at the end of their horse ropes. The French did not recognise the authority of Beatson’s men to police the countryside, and Mansfield instructed him not to interfere with any Allied subjects.8 The Turks put their own sentries on the vineyards, and Djemel Pasha asked Beatson to withdraw his guards in town (posted to prevent black market sales of government barley) to camp each evening. At last, to reduce confrontation with the French, Beatson moved his camp further from Nagara.9



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Spies and schemers Neill concluded that he was doing no good, and left by steamer to rejoin his division. This occasioned a rebuke from Beatson about Neill’s failure to report to him first – not that Beatson cared: ‘I do not complain of his absence; it will now be easy for me to transact business with the Turkish authorities, and the men of this Force will no longer be harassed by the presence of one who is known to be taking notes.’10 Beatson identified Calvert as another ‘authority’ making false reports to the Embassy. Even Stratford once described Calvert to him as a ‘schemer’, and Beatson believed that the Consul was skimming LTC contracts and preparing inflated claims for damage caused to his business by the Bashis. Despite his growing paranoia, Beatson may have been right about this: Calvert was later accused by Mansfield of profiteering, and some years later was convicted of insurance fraud.11 But some of Beatson’s own officers also went behind his back. Blakely corresponded with Skene on whether Beatson should be removed from command. On balance, Blakely felt that it would be best to send the force to the Crimea under Beatson’s command, because ‘none of the nominally superior officers are capable of commanding for half an hour’.12 While many men would have bowed to the pressure and insults and resigned to preserve their remaining dignity, that was not Beatson’s way. He would fight to keep his cherished command, and it became an increasingly unedifying spectacle. Clearly, if Stratford, Simpson and Vivian lacked the will, the only person who could remove him was the War Secretary. Beatson sent Berkeley to London to plead his case with Panmure and refute Stratford’s despatches, because, as he put it, ‘It is very evident that his Lordship has been misled by the misrepresentation of the French Ambassador’.13 Panmure was not prejudiced against the Bashis per se: he was ‘fully aware of the difficulties of Major General Beatson’s position and is inclined to think that the men under his command have not been culpable to the extent which has been represented’. He now decided that Beatson’s Horse should become an integral part of the TC. Not only was this a logical administrative move, but it also removed opportunities for Beatson to be insubordinate towards FO officials.14 Although he had promised not to attach them to Simpson without his agreement, Panmure now changed his mind and informed Simpson that HMG had placed ‘the corps of Irregular Cavalry, raised with much zeal by Major General Beatson, under the immediate command of Lieutenant General Vivian’, and that both generals were Simpson’s responsibility.15 These orders would take time to arrive. In the meantime, Panmure sent Beatson a new batch of officers, of varied experience, including the Australian Mounted Police, West Indies Regiments and English Militia. Among them was Lt & Paymaster Joseph Hely of the 11th Hussars, who had served at Balaklava and Inkerman and whom Beatson had once watched galloping into Pasajes at the head

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of the BAL’s lancers.16 Panmure also appointed a second brigadier. Recommended by Beatson, Edward Watt was his contemporary in the HEIC and had retired as a lieutenant-colonel; with this seniority he would be Beatson’s second-incommand.17 Beatson was still fighting for the rank he felt Burton and Berkeley deserved. Burton believed that the HEIC directors had blocked his promotion because of allegations of sexual misconduct during his East African expedition – the reputation acquired during his researches in the brothels of Sind continued to haunt him.18 Similarly, Berkeley’s shady past (whatever it was) harmed his chances. Even after Berkeley’s personal mission, the WD informed Beatson that Panmure would not promote him.19 Some of Beatson’s officers were equally fastidious. Blakely had applied to transfer to the TC because he objected to serving under foreigners like Fardella, or even British officers from Turkish service like Morgan, Sankey and the exranker O’Reilly. Burton relates that a newly arrived Hussar officer claimed that O’Reilly was a deserter from his regiment. Beatson may have sprung from the landed gentry and surrounded himself with aristocratic officers, but his reaction shows that he was no snob: The objection to serve under Lieut.-Colonel O’Reilly appears to be on the grounds of this officer having formerly held the position of a lance-corporal in one of Her Majesty’s regiments; and I confess that I have still to learn that the raising of a man from the lower ranks of a profession, when all grades are honourable, can be made an excuse for not serving under him, more especially where the rank had been obtained by distinguished gallantry and merit.20

Snobbishness did not affect the Osmanli Horse Artillery, where Royal Artillery serjeants were given local commissions.

Gathering force The OHA had been due to arrive about the end of July, but the advance party did not embark on the steam transport Adelaide until mid-August, finally bringing the promised swords and carbines for the Bashis.21 Even then, Panmure was advised not to land the guns and stores with Beatson’s Horse in their present state. So although some officers and NCOs landed on 4 September to assist at the Dardanelles, Beatson had to watch all his equipment steam away to Scutari.22 The rest of his force was now assembling by overland marches: O’Reilly’s 6th Regiment arrived from Anatolia, and Kiraly crossed from Gallipoli with 7th Regiment, although Havelock was stuck at Varna with some 200 Bulgarians waiting for transports. Meanwhile, the Kurdish 8th Regiment had reached Aleppo. Panmure erroneously believed that Rassam had enlisted this regiment



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without authorisation, and disavowed it until Beatson confirmed that it was a unit of Beatson’s Horse. Without shipping, it remained marooned in Syria.23 Several of Beatson’s trusted friends were also on the way. Harry Green was returning from convalescence, bringing his brother Malcolm from the Sind Horse. Bruce, Havelock and Walpole would soon rejoin the main force. Even Billy Olpherts outside Kars was negotiating to leave Williams and join ‘my old friend and quondam Commander General Beatson’.24 With his regiments nearly complete, and trustworthy men coming to lead them, Beatson was anxious to take them on service. This was also the Government’s desire; as Palmerston wrote, they were ‘of no use at the Dardanelles (not being seahorses), and they might be of much use’ in the Crimea. The Porte wanted Omer to relieve Kars, so Panmure suggested that his force at Eupatoria could be replaced by the TC ‘and perhaps Beatson’s Horse, if they can be trusted’. He soothingly told Simpson, who had ‘the same pious horror of them as your predecessor’, that ‘as I entirely sympathise in your feelings, I will stand between you and them’.25

Resignation threats When Beatson finally received Panmure’s orders placing him under Vivian’s command, his immediate reaction was to ‘decline to serve’. He disingenuously claimed that he had nothing personal against Vivian, ‘for whose character public and private I have the greatest respect’ (though he had earlier dismissed him as a pipe-clay soldier). Beatson had accepted his command on the basis that it would be an independent corps directly under the British CinC in the Crimea, which Panmure had previously confirmed in writing. ‘Firmly believing that the Irregular Cavalry will follow no other leader,’ Beatson declared that he was ready to march them wherever Vivian might direct, but that unless Panmure reversed his decision Beatson would have ‘no other course’ than to tender his resignation, to take effect when his troops had joined Vivian’s force.26 He explained to Vivian that if he accepted a secondary role it would be an acknowledgement of censure against him. He would clear his name by publishing the correspondence with the WD and Embassy, ‘which is the only course left to me’. Vivian warned against publication – ‘You know that it is an unsanctioned course and quite contrary to Military rule’27 – and Beatson accepted this advice. Ironically, both men broke this rule within the year. Yet Beatson had no intention of actually giving up. His resignation was conditional – he would continue in command if he was directly subordinate to Simpson. So confident was Beatson that this demand would be met that he continued to report to Panmure, Stratford, Simpson and Vivian on the state of the Bashi-Bazouks. ‘The want of Regimental officers is no longer the crying evil it was,’ he said, and when the arms aboard the Adelaide were distributed and lances arrived from Aleppo, the men would be well equipped ‘for out-post

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duties, for cutting off convoys, and for meeting Cossacks on any ground’. He had sent officers up the Danube to buy artillery horses. ‘All we suffer from here is an enforced idleness,’ he complained. The rainy season heralded the approach of winter, and he advised moving the force to the front. Traditionally, BashiBazouks went home for the winter, plundering the country on the way, and did not return in spring until they had spent their booty. This could not be tolerated, so Beatson proposed to hire transports and tugs on his own authority, and as soon as ‘any one of the numerous authorities under whom I have had the honour of late to serve, sanction our departure from the Dardanelles, I will instantly embark for Eupatoria, Yenikaleh, Batoum, or Balaklava, as ordered’.28 Critically, while awaiting a response to this appeal, Beatson and Burton did not promulgate the order placing Beatson’s Horse under Vivian’s command: failing to publish it in Daily Orders was a serious matter. However, Panmure’s decision was widely known, and the native officers of some regiments sent Beatson touching petitions regretting his impending departure and expressing the fervent hope that they would not become uniformed regulars.29 Then on 12 September came news that Sevastopol had fallen. This changed the whole strategic situation. Eupatoria was less important, so Simpson decided to use the TC to garrison Yenikale on the Kertch Peninsula, with Beatson’s Horse to fend off the Cossacks.30 Beatson and Burton had other ideas, and Burton went off to Constantinople to try to persuade Stratford to send them across Asia Minor to relieve Kars. Stratford called Burton ‘the most impudent man in the British Army’ and angrily refused to allow the Bashis to go to there, but still invited him to dinner.* While awaiting the outcome of his appeals, Beatson became embroiled in more childish disputes with the consuls, after which Burton informed them that Beatson no longer ‘knew’ Skene ‘in either his official or private capacity’, and declined further correspondence.32 This was the level to which relations between Beatson and Skene had descended from their earlier intimate friendship. After his death, Beatson’s nephew recalled that ‘He was safe enough if you did not differ from him; but if you once disagreed it seemed as if you would never again recover his friendship.’33 He had displayed this vindictiveness to Dr Ginders in Bundelkhand, to Col Steinbach on the Danube and, of course, to Neill. Now it was Skene’s turn. Equally, most people had had enough of Beatson. Stratford complained of the ‘impropriety’ with which he had been treated and ‘rejoiced’ that Beatson was now Vivian’s problem, but warned that through seniority Beatson would succeed to command if Vivian was incapacitated.34 Vivian, for his part, protested that ‘Major General Beatson ignores, or at least evades my authority … I consider

* Many years later Burton got into a heated literary exchange with Stratford’s biographer, who refused to accept the truth of Burton’s story.31



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such conduct insubordinate, and subversive of all discipline, rendering an Officer capable of so conducting himself totally unfit for military command.’35 Finally, the French accusations against Beatson’s men – including the story of ‘tying prisoners to their horses’ tails’ – reached London. Panmure instructed Vivian to constitute an immediate inquiry, and ‘should it be proved that no apology was offered to the French general and that the offenders remained unpunished, His Lordship will require that Major General Beatson and Brigadier General Brett should be dismissed’.36 Unknown to Panmure, the situation was already a lot worse.

Armed stand-off Now occurred what Beatson called ‘the final catastrophe’ of his command. The Turkish authorities decided to put an end to disorders by armed Bashis. On 26 September Money ‘was surprised … to find the plain between the high ground where our camps were and the town covered with Turkish regular troops’. Skene reported what followed: The Civil and Military Pashas were on the ground at an early hour with 300 infantry, 250 cavalry, 250 artillery, and 8 field pieces. They formed a line round the town, with advanced pickets, and H.M. Ship “Oberon”, moored on their left with her guns run out so as to command the road. Great excitement was perceived in the Camp, Officers and orderlies galloping about for some time, and then two squadrons of the Irregular cavalry formed and effected a reconnaissance, as if they expected to be attacked.

Simultaneously, 300 French troops landed to protect Nagara Hospital. Beatson was thunderstruck: Judge of my surprise when … at dawn I found the whole of the regular troops drawn up, prepared for action, Infantry, Cavalry and Artillery, the guns in position and three Men of War steamers anchored to command the approach, the advanced picquet of their cavalry being stationed within three hundred yards of my first Arab encampment, and leading my men to the conviction that battle was offered them.

The Pasha declared that the demonstration was simply to prevent Beatson’s men entering the town with their arms, but Beatson issued a provocative order to his men not to enter town ‘until such time as the Turkish authorities shall have recovered from their panic and housed their guns’.37 There was ‘great commotion in camp. The native officers and men thought themselves insulted’, and there was wild talk of driving back the Turkish troops.

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However, even Money – who blamed him for bringing the situation about – conceded that Beatson behaved well in this crisis and exerted his influence to calm the men and avert a clash. Beatson referred to ‘officers of my personal staff riding backwards and forwards between the town and camp, to show the men no violence was intended’.38 Unfortunately, this traffic led to what Skene described as ‘a scene entailing ridicule and disgrace on the Queen’s Commission’. According to him, an argument occurred between the Turkish Colonel Muheiddin Bey and Lt-Col Giraud of Beatson’s Horse, ‘a native of Smyrna, and formerly connected with a boarding house kept by his mother in that town’. The Colonel referred to Giraud as a tradesman, an insult which was misreported as applying to Beatson. According to Skene, Beatson called for Muheiddin Bey to be put under arrest, but the Pasha – a witness – confirmed that the slight had not been directed to the General. In the febrile mood of the camp, the story became exaggerated, and a group of Beatson’s officers rode across to confront the Pasha and Muheiddin Bey. Skene listed them as: ‘Lt Col: Giraud, a Smyrniate of antecedents already specified, Colonel Fardella a Sicilian whose principal duties are said to be teaching Italian to General Beatson’s children, Major Kirali, a Hungarian who was a guitar master, and, I regret to say, two British officers, Major Berkeley and Captain Burton.’ What the five men did next was sensational. Citing the alleged insult to their commander, each in turn challenged Muheiddin Bey to single combat, threw down his glove, and rode back to camp. Although Giraud issued the first challenge, one wonders if the ringleader was Burton, the fencing-master and romantic scholar.* Unfamiliar with obsolete notions of European chivalry, the Turks were mystified; the consuls advised them to ignore it.40 In the evening, the Pasha withdrew his men to barracks. The incident had passed off without bloodshed, and the Presse d’Orient conceded graciously: ‘General Beatson and all the English officers showed great calmness, and contributed by their attitude to the preservation of peace in the camp. Now the Bashis come unarmed into town, and there is perfect tranquillity.’41 But Beatson’s reputation was in tatters, and his report to Stratford was as disingenuous as that on the mutiny of 6 July. It began with a complaint that the Turkish police had beaten up a mulazim two days earlier. Only then did Beatson turn to the afternoon’s events. He does not mention any ‘challenge’ by his officers and may have been unaware of it. ‘At 4 o’clock P.M.,’ Beatson concluded, ‘finding the difficulty of their position, and perhaps the terrible responsibility incurred by them’, the Turks withdrew their men, warning that they would ‘resume the offensive’ if there was any further provocation.42

* Skene and Money are the only sources for the more colourful parts of this story, and on other occasions Skene was guilty of telling tall tales. A Times correspondent described the ‘challenge’ story as ‘stupid’, but ‘generally believed to be true’.39



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Months later he still found it ‘scarcely credible’ that the pashas had not only been allowed to take such measures against a British force, but had been urged on by ‘the Consular clique’ of British and French officials: ‘No soldier of character or honour could be expected to serve in a corps in which similar insults might be offered with impunity.’ The French landing at Nagara, ‘to attack us in rear in case of a conflict’, was, Beatson maintained, ‘truly degrading: it was heaping insult to the British uniform’. Although admitting that his order referring to the authorities’ ‘panic’ was inflammatory, he tried to excuse himself: On occasions of strong excitement men think strongly, speak strongly, write strongly. I saw no reason for adopting a conciliatory language towards our insulters. They sought a quarrel, I thought proper to avoid it. But I would not repay the insolence with a politeness which they would have construed into timidity. Their demonstration was an absurdity, and I treated it as such.43

Beatson superseded Back at Constantinople, the stand-off at the Dardanelles was misinterpreted: T]he Bashi-Bazouks at the Dardanelles are in full revolt. Two English and one French war steamer are ordered to proceed thither immediately, and 700 men of the Contingent are by this time on their way to bring the rebels to reason. This proves pretty conclusively the value of recent statements which I perceive have found their way into English newspapers respecting the good conduct and subordination of the distinguished corps now known out here by the name of ‘Beatson’s Ravishers’.44

This was wild exaggeration, but Stratford and Vivian now had no choice but to carry out the sanction they had previously avoided, and supersede Beatson.45 Vivian despatched Maj-Gen Michael Smith of the TC’s Cavalry Division to take command and instructed Beatson to report to the TC HQ. Smith reached the Dardanelles on 29 September aboard the Redpole, accompanied by a steam transport with a regiment of TC infantry in case of trouble.46 Bowing to Beatson’s appeals, Smith did not immediately announce that he was taking command of the irregulars, simply that he was superseding Beatson as senior British officer at the Dardanelles.47 Beatson was laid up following a riding accident – his horse had fallen and kicked him on the head – so Berkeley and Burton called a meeting at his bedside to announce the handover. According to O’Reilly, Burton rode to the camp to summon him in person, saying, ‘Of course, you know what to do.’ Arriving at Beatson’s house, O’Reilly met Brett, and asked if he had seen the General. Brett replied, ‘Yes, poor fellow; they have sent General Smith to replace him. It is a great shame.’48

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As Brett left, O’Reilly joined some other COs (Morgan, Sankey and Shelley, with Maj George Colclough of the OHA) in Beatson’s bedroom. Burton read the letter announcing Beatson’s supersession, but what happened next became shrouded in dispute.49 The strange events at that meeting almost destroyed Beatson, but at the time, in the chaos of transferring command, they passed with little comment. Next day Beatson boarded the Redpole with Burton and Berkeley to travel to Vivian’s HQ.50 His family probably did not accompany him, because even at this stage Beatson was confident of reinstatement.

At Buyukdéré Vivian’s HQ was in the requisitioned Russian Embassy at Buyukdéré, a suburb of Constantinople on the Bosphorus.51 The Redpole anchored there on the morning of 1 October and Beatson despatched one last appeal to Panmure.52 Vivian came aboard the steamer to meet the injured man. After hearing Beatson’s side of the story, with his assurances that he could control his troops, Vivian was sympathetic and he left to confer with Stratford. ‘I had parted with Lieut-General Vivian as a friend; he had spent a few hours with Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, and this meeting completely altered the tone of his official conduct,’ Beatson complained. Instead of returning in person, Vivian sent Beatson ‘a stiff official letter’ – the Great Elchi had forcefully explained to him that Beatson’s reinstatement ‘would not be satisfactory’.53 Vivian later demonstrated that this was nothing personal by paying Beatson a friendly visit before departing for Kertch, and Beatson clung to hopes of a reprieve as he recovered from his injury at lodgings in Therapia.54 Now that the crisis had passed, attitudes towards him were softening. ‘Popular opinion here is dead against the luckless Bashi, let him behave ever so well,’ wrote a reporter, but ‘it seems unfair to blame General Beatson, as so many here appear disposed to do, for not keeping better discipline amongst men upon whom no previous chief has been able to impose it.’55 Still unsure sure whether his assumption of command would be permanent, Smith was ‘much embarrassed’ by Beatson having taken all the official papers, and found rumours being ‘industriously circulated through the Camps’ that Beatson was to return. But he reassured the officers and men that he had no intention of altering the irregular principles of the force, and the transfer proceeded calmly.56 On 9 October Beatson at last received Panmure’s response: it was devastating and final. Far from heeding his appeals, the War Secretary had placed the irregular cavalry ‘absolutely’ under Vivian’s command and wrote that he had ‘no hesitation’ in accepting the resignation Beatson had submitted on 9 September. Although made as a hotheaded gesture, Panmure took it at face value. It had been Beatson’s duty to obey the instructions to place himself under Vivian, and although Panmure ‘regretted’ the hasty decision to decline to do so, he took it to be irrevocable.57



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The Prime Minister backed his colleague’s decision, observing that it was ‘impossible to allow an officer or a corps in the Queen’s Service to decide – the officer, whether he shall or shall not continue to command the corps; the corps, whether it shall continue to be commanded by the officer. Beatson therefore must be removed; and if the men refuse to serve under his successor, the only question will be of discretion’ – whether to subdue the Bashis by force or simply disband them. He noted objections to both courses: in the first case ‘we might be obliged to kill some of our own troops’, and in the other they might turn to robbery and murder on their way home. Panmure declared himself ‘not alarmed’ by Beatson’s claim that the men would follow no other leader, and reassured Simpson that ‘I suspect … they are not as black as they are painted’.58 His hopes now extinguished, Beatson left for England with his family and staff on 18 October. What must have been his feelings as the steamer passed the tents of the irregular cavalry and tied up for a brief stop at the Dardanelles? At the landing point, one of his former bimbashis came aboard to pay his respects and ask what the men should do; Beatson advised them to keep quiet. He was also given a letter in Turkish from the officers of the 3rd Regiment. In London he had this translated by the Turkish Embassy, and read their thanks for his ‘kindness and amiable conduct towards them’, and their willingness to serve under his command again if he should ever return.59 He never did.

14 THE MAN IN THE GOLDEN COAT

Beatson struts about in his uniform Panmure1

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ven before Beatson and his entourage reached England, news of the manner of his going was reverberating round London, and Panmure was not looking forward to his arrival: ‘I am at my wits’ end about these irregulars … Beatson is half-way to England by this time, to pour his grievances into Ellenborough’s ear, who will doubtless fight his battle next [parliamentary] session with elephantine vigour.’2 According to Beatson, his interview with Panmure actually passed off well enough. He offered to ‘proceed on any service’ and was given to understand that the Government attached no blame to him, and the possibility of enlisting new levies in Kurdistan was raised. Burton was offered a mission to the rebel leader Shamil in the Russian Caucasus.3 But nothing further happened; fresh reports from the Dardanelles diverged from Beatson’s account. When Panmure heard of the comic opera ‘challenge’ his reaction was predictable: ‘I cannot too severely censure the ridiculous and disgraceful proceedings of those 5 persons, calling themselves British Officers, who systematically insulted the Turkish authorities in defiance of military discipline.’ He ordered Vivian to investigate and, if the allegation proved true, ‘I shall have no hesitation in supporting your removing them from the Forces. I have already … expressed my approval of the compulsory resignations of Major Berkeley and Captain Burton.’4 Despite Beatson’s doom-laden predictions, the former Beatson’s Horse – now called the ‘Osmanli Irregular Cavalry’ (OIC) – did not rebel; Panmure was ‘glad to see that Beatson has not proved a true prophet as to his wild horsemen’.5 Smith was favourably impressed when he reviewed his new command and reported as much. Beatson requested a copy of this document, but had to content himself with the report in The Times, whose Constantinople correspondent wrote perceptively, ‘I think it is but fair to General Beatson to bear in mind the very short time that has elapsed since General Smith took over command of the force, and to infer

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that, since it is already in such a capital state, it cannot have been in so bad a one as was asserted when its former chief left it.’6 The best of Beatson’s officers assisted Smith loyally: Watt, Brett and Havelock remained brigadiers, while Walpole, Wemyss, Bruce, Olpherts, O’Reilly, Brenan, Kiraly, Morgan, Sankey, Shelley and the Green brothers served on, disciplining and training their regiments. (What might Beatson have achieved had he ever had all of them together?) Skene rejoined as liaison officer. They now had an abundance of junior officers, which enabled the WD to carry out ‘a thorough and unsparing weeding of the officers and men’. Vivian rid himself of several of Beatson’s cosmopolitan adventurers, but even Mansfield – displaying a degree of humanity at odds with his brusque reputation – considered Fardella harshly treated in the way he was demoted and manoeuvred into resigning.7 Simpson intended the OIC to follow Vivian to Kertch, but a terse telegram announced, ‘Beatson’s Horse cannot go to Kertch. No forage there.’ Nor could the men remain under canvas, so Smith moved them to Shumla in Bulgaria for winter quarters – with few of the outrages usually associated with marching Bashis.8 Once at Shumla, any disorders were firmly put down, but the British officers continued to bicker. When Smith went on sick leave, Watt, Brett and Havelock clashed over who was in temporary charge. In January Vivian sent his cavalry commander, Maj-Gen Arthur Shirley, to keep the peace and inspect the force.9 It was during this visit that Skene told him – with colourful embellishments – about the meeting at Beatson’s bedside. Although Skene had not been present, he depicted it as a mutinous assembly, with Beatson calling on his officers to defy Smith’s authority. If true, this was explosive stuff. Shirley took the tale seriously and reported it to Vivian when he returned to Kertch at the end of February. Vivian in turn contacted Watt (in Smith’s continued absence) on 5 March 1856 about the ‘very serious charge against Major-General Beatson. I consider it necessary both for that officer’s character and the public interests, that the report … should be thoroughly investigated.’ But no one thought to tell Beatson of this inquiry.10

London life Beatson spent the winter in London recovering his health and self-possession, and brooding on what had happened. The Beatsons took lodgings at Lower Grosvenor Place, in a modest terrace behind Buckingham Palace, a five-minute stroll from Ellenborough’s grand house in Eaton Square and from numerous livery establishments where Beatson could stable his chargers and the girls’ ponies to ride on Rotten Row in Hyde Park. Later, the family changed lodgings to Suffolk Place, a grander Nash terrace off Pall Mall, then moved again to Bennett Street, off the Piccadilly end of St James’s Street. All these addresses were close to Beatson’s clubs: in February 1856 his correspondence address was the Junior United Service Club in St James’s Square, but from July he was using the United



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Service Club (‘The Senior’) in Waterloo Place. Meanwhile, Burton was living in gentlemen’s chambers nearby in St James’s Square, convenient for ‘The Junior’ and the East India United Service Club.11 It is easy to imagine Beatson, Burton and their supporters meeting in the smoking rooms of these clubs, planning their campaign for vindication, with Marian acting as his correspondence secretary (to judge by the legible handwriting). Their offensive began in December 1855 when Burton wrote a long letter to The Times. Published under the headline ‘A Defence of the Bashi-Bazouks’, it outlined Beatson’s career and what he had achieved at the Dardanelles. Burton asserted that the problems stemmed from Neill’s inquiries, which turned Stratford against Beatson. ‘An angry correspondence ensued; no allowance was made for the plain speaking and the warm words of a man beset by petty annoyance.’ From that point, Beatson’s resignation was inevitable: ‘The old and tried General who would see service … has lost his command … General Beatson has returned home unnoticed and unknown; and but for the candour of your correspondent [in the report on Smith’s inspection] his laurels would have been placed on another’s head.’12

Fall of Kars Williams’s starving and freezing garrison of Kars had finally surrendered after an epic siege. The Russians released Dr Sandwith as a non-combatant, and he made an epic ride across snow-covered country, infested with disbanded BashiBazouks, to bring the tidings to the Allies. The news reached London on 17 December, Sandwith and all the members of Williams’s military mission becoming instant heroes.13 Many, including Beatson and Burton, believed that Kars had been cynically sacrificed by Stratford and the French as a piece of realpolitik, to exchange for Sevastopol in the forthcoming peace negotiations. ‘Had we been sent to Kars … the fate of its heroic garrison might have been changed; we could have conveyed any amount of provisions,’ Beatson wrote. Williams apparently believed that the Bashi-Bazouks were marching to his aid, and in captivity was reported to be bitter about Beatson’s apparent lack of energy.14 Prominent among groups using the Kars debacle to attack the Government was the Administrative Reform Association. Founded to promote public sector reform, the Association added army reform to its agenda as the Crimean War stumbled from disaster to disaster. A leading member was the friend of Walpole and Sandwith, Austen Layard of Nineveh fame, now a backbench MP. The association had the support of prominent industrialists, bankers and journalists like Charles Dickens and Alfred Bate Richards, a friend of Burton from undergraduate days. On 26 January the Association held a meeting to call for an inquiry into the fall of Kars, for which Beatson provided information. Speakers attacked Stratford, Prince Albert and the Duke of Cambridge for various failings, while Williams, Beatson

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and William Mayne were portrayed as their victims. The Government published the despatches relating to Kars in an official ‘Blue Book’, debated over three nights in the Commons. James Whiteside opened the debate for the opposition, quoting Beatson in an attempt to refute Panmure’s contention that no troops could have got through to the beleaguered garrison.15 Beatson was mentioned in Omer Pasha’s despatch on the Danube Campaign of 1854 and awarded the gold medal of the Nishan-i-Iftikhar.* He and the officers who had accompanied him were given royal approval to accept this foreign decoration.17 They had more trouble obtaining the British Crimean medal. Loch was denied it because he barely landed on the peninsula before being sent home, and Creagh was nearly refused it because his name had not appeared in general orders as being officially attached to the force. Beatson was allowed only the ‘Sebastopol’ clasp to the Crimean medal, to go with his ‘Balaklava’ and ‘Inkermann’ clasps, after Scarlett supported his claim. Later, he received the Turkish Crimea War Medal† and the 3rd Class of the Turkish Order of the Medjidie, widely distributed to mid-ranking officers of the Allied armies, and something of an insult when Smith was awarded a higher class.19 Beatson was quick to take offence at any slight. Robert Cannon, the exHEIC and BAL officer who had served at Silistria as a ferik pasha, was made an honorary British lieutenant-general, upon which Beatson complained that he – who had served on the Danube in the same Turkish rank – was not given similar recognition.20 Beatson asked East India House to submit his name to the Queen ‘for honorary distinction’, probably considering that in common with other colonels and major-generals he deserved a Companionship of the Order of the Bath (CB) if not the knighthood of the order (KCB). He was advised that recommendations lay with the appropriate government department – the WD again – and years later he complained that ‘the unparalleled injustice of a War Minister, prevented his being a K.C.B. long ago, which distinction one of the most chivalrous and high-minded officers in the British Army declared his services entitled him to’ (possibly referring to his old friend Macdougall).21 It is hardly surprising that these requests for recognition were rejected when Beatson was simultaneously conducting a public campaign against Panmure and the WD.

Going into print Beatson stepped up this offensive by preparing a pamphlet. Entitled The War Department and the Bashi Buzouks, it comprised 118 pages of letters selected * Literally ‘medal of pride’; more prosaically rendered by the National Army Museum, which now owns Beatson’s medal, as ‘Turkish General Service Medal 1854’.16 † The consignment of British pattern medals was lost at sea, and Beatson like many other recipients eventually received the pattern struck for issue to allied Sardinian officers.18



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from the mass of documents he had removed from the Dardanelles. These were linked by a commentary in which Beatson gave full rein to his offended pride.* Possibly heeding Vivian’s strictures against publication, the pamphlet’s title page reads, ‘Privately Printed and not Published’ – though such a declaration has no standing in law (to send a statement in written form to one other person is sufficient to ‘publish’ it). He distributed the pamphlet to anyone he thought might help, and Vivian, Money and Burton all quoted from it in their own publications, as did Whiteside in the Kars debate. There was no Official Secrets Act in those days, and the ownership of public documents was hazy, but Beatson was entering dangerous territory. Beatson’s commentary on the events leading to his dismissal admits no error, and attempts to justify every action. Even the tone of his correspondence with Stratford is excused: ‘Lord Panmure appears to forget, that a man, beset by petty annoyance and annoyed by official persecution, is uncommonly likely to lose sight of that amenity of style so highly valued by the votaries of pipeclay and red tape.’ Everything was the fault of other people – Russian spies among the Greeks, the unruly French infirmiers, the interference of Neill and Mansfield. He was especially bitter against the consuls, whom he accused of lacking honesty and impartiality – Calvert was upset, he suggested, because Beatson’s friend Whittall got the LTC food contract, and Beatson had refused to give Calvert the contract for Beatson’s Horse to ‘stop his mouth’. This pamphlet would have been even more bitter had he known of the mutiny allegation that was soon to be levelled against him. One of Beatson’s complaints was that his detractors stooped to personal attacks; for example, that ‘my “gold coat” was paraded, or said to be paraded, about Pera. Skinner, Jacob and other well-known successful commanders of irregular troops, always thought it proper to display a certain Oriental magnificence, which in their cases was not blamed.’23 This Oriental magnificence reappeared somewhat incongruously in London. During the winter Beatson visited the photographic studio of J.J.E. Mayall and had his portrait taken. Mayall’s pictures of prominent personalities were often engraved by D.J. Pound to illustrate Henry Tyrrell’s ‘instant history’ books. Pound’s engraving of Beatson (Plate A) appeared alongside the likes of Raglan, Omer Pasha and Cardigan in Tyrrell’s History of the Present War with Russia.† Beatson is shown wearing his ‘gold coat’, Mameluke sword * The British Library has a copy of this pamphlet. The late James J. Reid22 quoted Letters to the Earl of Clarendon, apparently a later production by Beatson including letters with 1857 dates and therefore compiled with knowledge of the mutiny allegation, but I was unable to trace a copy in a public collection. † A separate engraving by G.J. Stodart, based on the same photograph but simplified by omitting the medals, appeared in E.H. Nolan’s Illustrated History of the War with Russia, published the following year by James S. Virtue, who reissued this engraving after Beatson’s death.24

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and general’s sash, his hand resting by his red helmet. The medals he had received so far are clearly depicted: the star and the cross-of-swords badge of the Spanish Order of San Fernando; the British Crimea War Medal with three clasps; and the gold Nishan-i-Iftikhar. A cruder woodcut in the Illustrated Times of 8 March derived from the same photograph but showed a fanciful Eastern encampment in the background. The accompanying article described Beatson’s removal from command as a ‘considerable mystery’ and gave a clear (if one-sided) account of his career, the raising of the Bashi-Bazouks and the events leading to his resignation. Stratford, the consuls and the French are painted as the villains. This article was probably from the pen of Burton, continuing the public relations campaign in his friend’s support.25

Peace The Crimean War officially ended with the signature of the Treaty of Paris on Sunday 30 March 1856. Londoners got the news at 10.00 pm, when guns at Horse Guards and the Tower began firing a Royal Salute. Crowds thronged Whitehall, Pall Mall and every avenue leading to the Mall and Horse Guards. Living close by, the Beatsons probably went to witness the jubilation. Beatson routinely went to bed early, but he could not have slept through cannon fire, cheering crowds and the bells of St Martin’s-in-the-Fields and the city churches, which continued pealing until midnight.26 As a result of the peace, the OIC – Beatson’s Horse – never saw active service and was quickly disbanded. The last case of trouble involved the Mosul Regiment, still isolated in Syria, which mutinied and deserted en masse upon rumours that they were to be sent to India.27 The men of the other regiments were marched without any trouble to their places of recruitment to be paid off. Paid in full – and with an additional gratuity – they were astonished to be treated so well, and many offered to serve Britain again whenever required. Their British officers were less satisfied, complaining of being left out of pocket after paying for their expensive uniform, horses and equipage, and that awards of brevet and honorary rank were capricious. After the Indian Mutiny broke out next year, they expressed regret that the force had not been kept up, or re-enlisted for service in that conflict, and that all the money spent on it had been wasted.28 A twentieth-century officer commented that all three men who had commanded the corps – Beatson, Smith and Watt – ‘were convinced that the Bashi Bazooks could have been made into excellent soldiers despite their reputation … yet popular opinion failed to be convinced’. He concluded that ‘It would perhaps be fairer to describe the raising of the corps as a bold and imaginative attempt to provide the British Army with the Irregular Cavalry that it did not then possess, and that the experiment was never concluded.’29



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The Chelsea Board Peace did not end national soul-searching about the war. Roebuck’s inquiry had led Panmure to despatch Sir John McNeill and Col Alexander Tulloch to report on the supply difficulties in the Crimea. They poked their noses into wider affairs and made senior army figures uneasy. When McNeill and Tulloch’s report appeared in January 1856, they criticised not only the rotten system, but several named individuals, including Lucan and Cardigan, who were accused of destroying the horses of the Cavalry Division through neglect of simple matters like shelter and forage. The resulting outcry, led by Layard in the Commons, induced Panmure to assemble a Board of General Officers to allow those named in the report to defend themselves.30 Lucan and Cardigan were already locked in dispute over the Charge of the Light Brigade, using their positions in the House of Lords to disparage each other. While Cardigan remained a popular hero, Lucan was widely blamed for the disaster and his supporters called for a court martial to clear his reputation. The Judge Advocate General (JAG) – Clarendon’s brother, the Hon Charles Villiers, MP – explained that Lucan had no right under military law to a court martial (this ruling would have important consequences for Beatson) but the Board gave Lucan a fresh opportunity to clear his name.31 The Board’s sittings in the Great Hall of the Royal Hospital at Chelsea attracted considerable attention. Punch ran a cartoon of a trooper of the Scots Greys leading in the skeleton of a horse, in full cavalry trappings, captioned ‘The Witness that ought to be examined’. It also ran a spoof list of new books, including ‘On Breaking the Horse. The joint work of Lord Lucan and the Earl of Cardigan, from experience learnt in the Crimea’.32 Beatson was summoned as a witness along with several cavalry colonels who had served in the campaign. ‘Military witnesses will appear before the Board in uniform,’ they were instructed, and Beatson took full advantage, ‘his martial bearing and magnificent uniform’ attracting considerable attention. The Times recorded that ‘his gorgeous dress rendered him conspicuous, even among the brilliant uniforms by which he was surrounded’, which suggests that he was dressed in his trademark mixture of Hyderabad and Turkish uniform. The Illustrated Times published a large woodcut depicting Beatson before the Board. Viewed partially from behind, Beatson’s bushy white beard is apparent, but his uniform resembles a hussar officer’s short jacket, with a heavy cavalry sword, rather than his long alkalakh and Mameluke sword. Unless he had adopted the old uniform of British officers of the Hyderabad Cavalry, this simply shows how unfamiliar his Eastern finery was to the sketch artists and engravers.33 The Board was not interested in Indian cavalry or Bashi-Bazouks, but in Beatson’s observations from his service with the Heavy Brigade. He confirmed that the horses had arrived in the Crimea in poor condition and had then been picketed in the open. It had been impracticable to erect shelters while there was

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uncertainty over their final position, but there had been a sheltered place only 300–400 yards downhill that was not used. He pointed out that while his Bashis made shelters for their horses from tree branches, no wood was obtainable on the Crimean heights. ‘The horses were in the mud, they were occasionally frozen to the ground, from which they never arose,’ he observed. Lucan had said that only a madman would have thought of erecting canvas shelters, and Beatson agreed: ‘I would certainly not have placed my own horses under canvas on that plateau … in the first wind the canvas would be blown down, and would injure the horses.’ ‘Did you not reside in a wattled hut, constructed by the Turks, which was afterwards sold to General Scarlett?’, Tulloch asked. ‘No I did not. I left the Crimea in November, and while there lived in a tente d’abri.’ Only after Lucan, Cardigan and Beatson had all left and Scarlett was in command were the horses finally stabled in sheds or roofed-over pits.34 After Tulloch had finished, Lucan cross-examined. Describing Beatson as ‘an old cavalry officer of experience’ (though we know that he had not wanted to employ that experience at the time), Lucan got him to reaffirm his aversion to canvas shelters, and the poor condition of the horses on landing, since these points were the only real support for Lucan’s inactivity.35 The Chelsea Board sat for several more weeks, but despite Lucan’s poor performance he and his colleagues managed to get McNeill and Tulloch’s criticisms shelved. Reformers were disgusted: Florence Nightingale and her friends described it as the ‘Whitewashing Board’. Nevertheless, Beatson’s appearance had been useful for his personal campaign, keeping his name and distinctive appearance in the public eye.36

Beatson charged While attention focused on the Chelsea Board, the WD was secretly considering Shirley’s damning report against Beatson. It is worth stating in full the charge that was being investigated: When General Smith arrived at the Dardanelles General Beatson assembled the commanding officers of the regiments, and actually endeavoured to persuade them to make a mutiny in their regiments against General Smith and against the authority of General Vivian. Two of these commanding officers left the room saying they were soldiers and they could not listen to language which they thought most improper and mutinous. These two were Lieutenant-Colonels O’Reilly and Shelley. General Beatson subsequently had a sort of round-robin prepared by the chief interpreter and sent round to the different officers, in the hope that they would sign it, refusing to serve under any other General but himself. Both of these mutinous attempts are said to have originated from Mr Burton.37



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Vivian’s despatch had been received on 27 March, but the officials concluded that they could not do anything about ‘This very serious allegation’ until they received the full report. Back at Shumla, Watt also did nothing, leaving it for Smith when he returned from sick leave. Smith instructed the officers present at the meeting in Beatson’s bedroom to provide their recollections of those events. O’Reilly and Shelley were the first to respond.38 O’Reilly stated that Beatson had called the COs to his bedside and informed them that Stratford had induced Vivian to send Smith to replace him, ‘which he conceived he had no right to do, as he was under the orders of no one but Lord Panmure’. Then, ‘Captain Burton and Captain Berkeley both spoke for a long time about intriguing on the part of the Embassy to deprive General Beatson of his position’. Berkeley allegedly said ‘that Lord Panmure had broken faith with us, and the Bashi Bozuks … it was our duty to inform General Smith that it was impossible for him to take the command at present’. Berkeley wanted the COs to go to Smith in a body and tell him that they ‘could not answer for the fidelity of our regiments’ if Beatson was removed, and that if he persisted they would resign. O’Reilly claimed to have ‘argued against the unsoldierly reasons which [Berkeley] was giving for our resignations’, and it was later alleged that he threatened to arrest Burton if he came near O’Reilly’s regiment.39 After Shelley and O’Reilly left Beatson’s quarters they went to Calvert’s house, where the consul and Skene were dining with the new commander. They spoke to Smith privately, pledging their regiments to him. Subsequent conversation round the dinner table became the principal source for the story that Skene later relayed to Shirley; it is not mentioned in Smith’s report. It does not seem that O’Reilly had any personal grievance against Beatson, or that the ex-ranker was being disloyal to the man who had supported him against snobbish fellow officers. Indeed, O’Reilly stated that the injured Beatson ‘did not appear to notice what was going on, nor say anything’ during the meeting, and he later denied making the accusation against Beatson attributed to him by Skene. O’Reilly’s animus was apparently directed at the aristocrats Burton and Berkeley. Burton and Green’s attacks on O’Reilly in their memoirs were coloured by his later involvement in a failed Arab revolt, but there is no doubt that O’Reilly was a schemer. It was rumoured that this educated man had originally enlisted in the ranks of the British cavalry in order to escape political charges in Dublin.40 The rest of Smith’s report was inconclusive. Shelley simply confirmed a meeting where the letter subordinating them to Vivian was produced. He and O’Reilly left to report to their new commander. As for the ‘round-robin’, Beatson’s chief interpreter, Giraud, denied preparing any such letter. Another interpreter, Nassif Mallouf, did supply a paper signed by native officers – this was the petition sent to Beatson a fortnight before the meeting. It only asked that the promises made to them by Beatson and Brett (that they would not be incorporated into the uniformed Turkish Regulars) would be honoured, and expressed the hope that they would continue under his command as ‘Beatson’s Horse’ (Beatson-Suvari).41

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The file wound its way through the WD. Ministers were briefed that ‘Col O’Reilly’s letter implicates BrGenl Brett and Captn Burton in a degree, and as the language used by the latter was in Genl Beatson’s presence it implicates the General also’. Colonel Mundy (Under-Secretary of State) suggested that the petitions were ‘clearly got up by Beatson’s partizans – Burton at their head, who is cut out to be a firebrand’, but because Beatson was no longer employed by the WD, ‘the course will be to forward the whole case to his real Masters the Hon: Company’. Panmure had the final say: This is not a very satisfactory report on a very grave occurrence. Neither Berkeley nor Burton are in the force and Beatson struts about in his uniform but is equally out of employment. There is scarcely sufficient in this report to warrant our sending a complaint to the EIC. Smith should have constituted a court of inquiry… Acquaint Col Beatson of the charge & O’Reilly’s explanation and say that if he has any thing to say to it I am ready to receive it.42

Beatson had in fact just found out about the charges against him. Vivian had arrived in England ahead of any of his officers or their reports, and bumped into Beatson at East India House. ‘Soon after my arrival I met General Beatson,– and on alluding to the subject of the inquiry at Shumla, and finding he was in ignorance on the matter, I sought and obtained permission of the War Minister to communicate to him, in an unofficial shape, the information contained in my letter to Brigadier Watt.’ His ADC provided Beatson with a copy of Vivian’s despatch to London of 5 March – or at least the important part. Vivian was trying to help, but a minor slip by his ADC in certifying this as a ‘true copy’ instead of a ‘true extract’ set off Beatson’s paranoia, and henceforward he believed that Vivian was trying to deceive him.43

Capital offence Like any British soldier, Beatson was fully aware of the Articles of War, which were read out every three months before each regiment of the Crown or the HEIC. They included the chilling pronouncement that: ANY Officer or Soldier who shall begin, excite, cause, or join in any Mutiny or Sedition … or who being present at any Mutiny or Sedition, shall not use his utmost Endeavour to suppress the same … SHALL, if an Officer suffer DEATH

‘Mutiny’ was not defined in either the Mutiny Act or the Articles of War, but was ‘understood to signify a combined or simultaneous resistance to Military authority’. The same penalties were applicable to those ‘Who shall disobey the lawful command of his superior officer’.44 If the story reported by Shirley was true, Burton and



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Berkeley had attempted to induce the other officers to refuse Smith’s command, and if Beatson had done nothing to stop them, then all three were liable to be charged. If convicted, they could have faced execution, though in fact the penalties available to a General Court Martial also included cashiering or loss of rank. Beatson received the extract from Vivian on 26 April, but despite the gravity of the accusation, he kept his counsel until officially informed by Panmure on 17 May. He immediately denied the charges as ‘false and malicious’, stated that he would ‘rejoice in the opportunity to show that an injustice was done’, and demanded the name of his accuser.45 He had used the elapsed time to obtain Burton and Berkeley’s accounts of what had transpired in the bedroom meeting.46 Burton’s was delayed because he was increasingly distracted by courting his future wife Isabel Arundell and, later, when his friend John Speke returned from service with the TC, by preparations for their joint expedition to discover the source of the Nile.47 Burton’s response was typical of the man: cleverly argued, amusing – and entirely partisan. He excused his failure to promulgate the order placing Beatson’s Horse under Vivian (and to provide the voluminous reports Vivian demanded) upon the circumstances at the Dardanelles, where they faced Turkish regulars drawn up in line of battle. He noted that Smith had found nothing amiss when he took over command, and suggested that O’Reilly had a suspiciously clear recollection of every word said in the bedroom meeting when the other witness, Shelley, could remember little. And he demolished the interpreters’ testimony on the ‘round robin’, describing Mallouf as ‘a half-witted Syrian, educated at some Jesuit college, strong at languages, uncommonly weak in intellect’.* There was little that Beatson needed to add. He guessed that Skene was the real author of his troubles, although shielded by Vivian, and affirmed that ‘I have nothing to do, at present, with Mr Skene, or Mr anybody else’ on the civil side. But as a military man he objected to a secret inquiry and demanded that ‘public justice be done between Lieut-General Vivian and myself’. Beatson was made to wait 10 days before he received any acknowledgement of this letter and the ‘very extraordinary one’ from Burton. The officials were stalling while they waited for the report of the follow-up inquiry that Smith and Havelock were conducting at Shumla, which Smith only sent on 14 June.49

Public campaign But the WD could not keep a lid on the scandal, which became public on 30 June when the London fortnightly Indian News ran an editorial headlined ‘Mutiny in * This was unfair: Nassif Mallouf was a distinguished linguist and orientalist, later a senior dragoman with the British Consular Service and a member of the Royal Asiatic Society and the Athenaeum Club in London. His French–English–Turkish language guide and elementary Turkish grammar are still in print today.48

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High Quarters’. ‘A rumour has for several weeks prevailed in military circles,’ it began, explaining that an officer holding the rank of lieutenant-general in Turkey had charged another officer of the same rank with ‘MUTINY, and of exciting the troops under his command to mutiny against constituted authority’. The correspondence contained ‘specimens of the retort uncourteous, such as have rarely, if ever, been known to feature in official documents’. Having flirted with the reader, the article finally admitted that the ‘principal parties’ were Vivian and Beatson, both of the HEIC service. Whether this story really was based on rumour, or was deliberately planted, Beatson immediately informed Panmure that he must now go public to clear his name. His letter appeared in The Times next day to ‘refute the base calumnies against me’ and outlined the unsatisfactory correspondence he had so far had with Panmure. Beatson repeated his complaint of ‘secret proceedings’ and his demand that ‘public justice should be done between Lieutenant-General Vivian and me’, and for the name of his anonymous accuser.50 It was only now that Panmure received the results of Smith and Havelock’s inquiry. It transpired that most of the other COs present at the meeting had been engaged in a separate conversation and did not hear the alleged exchanges between O’Reilly, Berkeley and Burton (though Morgan remembered ‘high words’ passing between Burton and O’Reilly). Sankey recalled Beatson ordering them to remain vigilant in camp in case there were any demonstrations by the men, but none of the COs corroborated the more colourful elements in the original account.51 With insufficient evidence of mutiny, the WD concluded that ‘it would appear that no greater imputation can be thrown upon [Beatson] than an error in judgement, unless it be that he did not reprimand Captain Burton for the statement which there seems to be satisfactory evidence that the latter made’. Frederick Peel, Panmure’s Under-Secretary, felt that ‘Smith has not managed this enquiry with much skill. The charges against General Beatson have not I think been substantiated.’ The COs’ statements contradicted Burton, but ‘It is not worth while pressing a case against so inferior an officer as Lt. Burton … In my opinion General Vivian has taken up a case which has failed in its proof.’ But again Beatson was not informed of this conclusion, while the WD attempted to get final testimony from Colclough who had represented the OHA at the meeting in Beatson’s bedroom.52 Even with dreadful accusations hanging over him, Beatson was unafraid to display himself in public. On 10 July the Guards Brigade made a ceremonial return to London. In full marching order, still with their campaign beards, they marched through cheering crowds from Nine Elms Station to Pall Mall, where they were met by Cardigan on his Balaklava charger, Ronald. Cardigan got a special cheer. Then, as the column entered St James’s Park, ‘General Beatson joined the other officers, and throughout the day was a general theme of speculation to the people, from his unique and remarkable costume as commander of the Bashi-Bazouks.’ The Guards marched past the Queen at Buckingham Palace and continued to



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Hyde Park to be inspected by Her Majesty, who was escorted by a galaxy of staff officers, prominent among them ‘General Beatson, whose peculiar red helmet created some sensation, mingled with amusement’.53

Radical friends Now Beatson’s case was taken up in Parliament by Col Francis Dunne, known as ‘the Honourable Member for the Army’ because of his advocacy of the military. Dunne first raised the matter on 3 July, referring to Beatson’s letter to The Times the day before, and asking for the correspondence to be laid before the House of Commons. Peel objected that the correspondence was not completed.54 On 15 July Dune formally moved for production of the correspondence: charges had been brought ‘which, if proved, would have subjected General Beatson to the punishment of death’, and a secret inquiry had been instituted without informing him. ‘If General Beatson be guilty he ought to be punished, and if he be not guilty he ought to be acquitted.’ (The WD had still not told Beatson that it did not intend to charge him.) Peel maintained that Smith’s inquiry was incomplete and it would be improper to publish the correspondence but, as the COs’ statements ‘did not confirm the anonymous charges’, there was unlikely to be any action against Beatson. Peel meant this to settle the affair, but Dunne continued to complain about ‘the extraordinary character of this proceeding’. Over the following days the newspapers took up the story, generally agreeing with Dunne and supporting Beatson against Vivian and the WD’s ‘secret’ proceedings.55 Now that the controversies over McNeill and Tulloch’s report and the Kars Blue Book had run their course, the Beatson affair gave the Opposition a new stick with which to beat the Liberal Government. The Conservative Morning Herald railed against the WD’s ‘cruelty, injustice and meanness’ towards Beatson, while Roebuck and his Radicals eagerly adopted the case. Roebuck had been in the House for Dunne’s motion, and was disgusted by Peel’s response, turning to his neighbour saying, ‘This can’t be borne; it shan’t be borne.’ Roebuck immediately applied for a full debate on the motion ‘that a British officer of 35 years’ standing has been subjected to an anonymous charge, and upon that charge to a secret inquiry’. Vivian was equally unhappy, asking Panmure to submit the whole correspondence to Parliament, ‘that the public may be disabused of impressions so injurious to my character’.56 Roebuck’s debate was scheduled for the evening of 22 July. The Morning Advertiser* published five full columns of documents that Roebuck planned to use.57 Although the House was by no means full, one imagines Beatson and * The Morning Advertiser is the newspaper for licensed victuallers and in the 1850s its circulation was second only to The Times: while The Times was read in gentlemen’s clubs, the Morning Advertiser was widely read by pub customers.

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his supporters watching intently from Strangers’ Gallery. Roebuck opened by reading a glowing account of Beatson’s career provided by Ellenborough and recapitulating previous statements to establish that the WD had acted upon inadequate and anonymous information. Peel replied for the Government, explaining that Beatson had resigned his command, but Vivian superseded him before Panmure had accepted it, because of ‘circumstances’ at the Dardanelles. Peel would not specify these except to say that ‘the local authorities at the Dardanelles considered that General Beatson did not give them the assistance they were entitled to’ in preventing his soldiers from abusing the inhabitants. Peel cleared Vivian of acting on an anonymous accusation by revealing that Shirley had brought him the story. But Peel had to admit that the name of Shirley’s informant was unknown to Vivian or the WD. He conceded that while awaiting further reports, the WD had not communicated the charges to Beatson until Vivian had already done so. Peel, too, read out sections of the correspondence between Beatson and the WD. The small number of MPs present must have become heartily bored listening to these long documents being read into the record – everyone who was interested would have seen them in the newspapers already – but Roebuck and Peel ploughed on. A few other ministers and backbenchers contributed to the debate, then the Prime Minister wound up for the Government. Palmerston said that he ‘made full allowance for the nice sense of honour which has caused General Beatson to writhe under what he conceives to be an unjust imputation’, and to his friends for trying to clear his name before the results of the inquiry were known. But Palmerston believed that the anonymous charges were so serious that they had to be investigated. Roebuck concluded by reading out O’Reilly’s and Shelley’s reports, asking if there was anything in them to justify the charge brought against Beatson. When the House divided, 23 MPs voted for the motion, 71 against, a Government majority of 48 (most had probably not been present for all or any of the debate).58 The vote was not the point – the Government was never going to be defeated on this matter – but Roebuck had dragged the whole affair into the public eye, and exposed the evasions of generals and ministers.

Newspaper war The Indian News certainly detected shiftiness. A leader headlined ‘The Vivian “Conspiracy”’ opined that Beatson was an ‘active man, we believe, at home or abroad; but we never yet gave him credit for being such an energetic sportsman as he has approved himself during the past fortnight. The chase, however, is pretty nearly at an end now … General Beatson has, in short, contrary perhaps to public anticipation, succeeded in unmasking the dastard foe’ who had poisoned his good name. The newspaper praised Dunne and Roebuck for bringing the ‘extraordinary case’ before the public, and noted the officials’ ‘nervous anxiety’



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and ‘most transparent terror of something awkward oozing out’. Although the paper did not consider Vivian the villain, ‘we don’t give Vivian credit for as much pluck as would qualify him to head a gang of “area-sneaks”, he is physically and morally suited only for a subaltern’s part, even in work of the safe-and-dirty order’. The WD was protecting ‘some more important Jonah than this Vivian’.59 Vivian was not off the hook, however. After the debate, an ex-TC staff officer named Wellington Guernsey sent Roebuck a scathing attack on his former chief, describing the animus stirred up against Beatson among the Contingent’s officers (many of whom reacted by supporting Beatson, he claimed). Every week, he wrote, some cock-and-bull story from the ‘consul-contractors’ Skene and Calvert reached the embassy at Constantinople, and Vivian had always been on hand to offer his services, finally sending one of his ‘Brummagem Generals’* to supersede Beatson. Guernsey claimed that the behaviour of the TC regulars at Kertch had been no better than that of Beatson’s irregulars at the Dardanelles. Roebuck showed the letter to Beatson, who was eager to collect any dirt on Vivian and scrawled a letter seeking Guernsey’s permission to publish it as from an anonymous ‘Staff Officer of the Contingent’, though it did not appear in the Indian News until October. Guernsey, a successful songwriter in civilian life, was an odd person to have been commissioned into the TC, and as it was alleged that he had been sent home by Vivian, he had a personal grievance.60 There was also a spat in the letters columns of the Morning Advertiser between ‘G.R.L.’, supporting Vivian, and a correspondent who first signed himself ‘Expertus’ and later revealed himself to be Beatson’s former shipmate round the Cape in 1837, Cadet (now retired Capt) Thomas Spankie. Spankie asserted that ‘General Vivian has no name to defend’.61 The Government disagreed, and Vivian was awarded a KCB in the new year – which must have rankled with Beatson. Given the personal nature of these attacks, it is perhaps surprising that Vivian did not sue the newspapers concerned, as Lucan later did. Instead, Vivian ignored his own advice and followed Beatson in publishing his version of the story as a pamphlet, later printed in full in the Morning Advertiser.62 This alerted Beatson to the critical reports that Skene and Calvert had written on the ‘stand-off’ at the Dardanelles, which he had not previously seen. The newspapers had become Beatson’s chosen battlefield. The leader writers agreed that the WD had acted unjustly towards him: ‘Were Mr PEEL or Lord PANMURE to deal with a gentleman in private life as they have dealt with General BEATSON publicly, we should not very much like to stand in their shoes,’ opined the United Service Gazette (USG). Shortly afterwards, the Morning Advertiser reported that Shirley had been offered a post in the Turkish Army, and speculated that this was to keep him out of Beatson’s reach.63 * Goods manufactured in Birmingham (‘Brummagem’) were considered shoddy; the correspondent credits Sir Colin Campbell with coining the derogatory term ‘Brummagem Generals’ for the TC’s commanders.

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Although Burton was engaged on his own affairs, Beatson now had less need of his pen. As one recent writer puts it: ‘Though not perhaps as stylish a controversialist as Burton, Beatson showed himself in his correspondence to require no lessons from Burton on how to combine outraged innocence and sarcasm.’64 In one published letter, Beatson responded to Peel’s threats to report him to the HEIC Directors: I am assured that they, and all honourable men, would feel the same warm indignation that I do if they were treated with the unparalleled, cruel injustice, that I have been by the War Department, and would express themselves accordingly. No THREAT from any quarter can or shall deter me, Sir, from continuing to persist in exerting myself in every kind of manner to obtain that justice and redress which I have, as a British officer and subject, a constitutional right to demand.65

Yet this widely held belief in the right to a court martial was false. When Lucan claimed one as his ‘undoubted privilege’, the CinC was advised that ‘No such right is given to the soldier by the Mutiny Act or Articles of War, nor does any such privilege exist, by the Customs of War, or by the Rules of the Service.’66 That reasoning now applied in Beatson’s case; even the fact that his accuser was anonymous did not alter the situation. The USG lamented that ‘whilst the humble Private may insist upon being brought to a Court Martial … the Commissioned officer owns no such prerogative.’67

Court of Inquiry Even if he was denied a court martial, Beatson did succeed in getting an inquiry established to examine Shirley’s actions, a concession that the USG attributed to the reformist Duke of Cambridge, newly installed as CinC at Horse Guards. Congratulating itself for campaigning on Beatson’s behalf, the USG acknowledged that the inquiry was going to be expensive: ‘Many officers who would otherwise have been placed on Half Pay or disbanded, are retained on Full Pay. Others have been summoned as witnesses from the Levant and Turkey, at a great expense to give their testimony at this momentous struggle of the three Generals.’68 In November HMS Gladiator conveyed Skene, Mehmet, Giraud and Mallouf to Marseilles, thence to London by train and packet boat, while the FO brought the Dardanelles police chief to London with an interpreter – all at government expense. ‘This looks very like business,’ commented the Indian News, but the newspaper doubted whether all the witnesses would turn up. One was ‘labouring under diffidence, on account of some little matters that occurred in Ireland a few years since’. This must have been O’Reilly, whose evidence should have been crucial. To Beatson’s irritation the Government allowed Shelley to withdraw –



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he was the only officer of Beatson’s Horse who was not allowed to receive a Medjidie, but what his offence was is unclear.69 Burton was definitely not coming. He left England in October 1856 on his expedition to the source of the Nile and had reached Cairo when he received orders to return for ‘some wretched court-martial’. Knowing that Beatson had not requested him, he ignored the orders and continued with Speke to Zanzibar. Until their re-emergence in March 1859, the two explorers were completely cut off. The HEIC Directors were furious, but Burton considered himself employed by the Royal Geographical Society (RGS).70 People naturally assumed that the inquiry was into Beatson’s alleged ‘mutiny’. Then it was reported that the case was a court martial on Shirley, but the Indian News corrected this misapprehension: ‘General Shirley had no interest in Beatson’s ruin’, and had been trapped by circumstances. The newspaper hoped that the proceedings would flush out ‘the slanderer who was rash enough to promulgate a calumny’, and believed that Cambridge wanted ‘far more searching investigations than could be effected by trying General Shirley on a mere isolated matter’. Formally, the Court of Inquiry was to determine whether there were sufficient grounds to try any of the participants before a court martial.71 Sir Colin Campbell, the hero of the Crimea, was selected as president of the court, assisted by four other officers of HM’s service and two HEIC officers. Opinion was divided over the likely outcome of the inquiry: ‘some saying that General Beatson has been very hardly used; and as many more that the effect of investigation will be to damage that officer.’72 He, of course, was supremely confident that it would exonerate him and punish his enemies.

Justice delayed Now came a hitch: because Shirley was technically in the service of the Sultan and only on half pay in the Queen’s service, it was debatable whether he was answerable to a British court for his actions and the JAG took time to rule on this. ‘I find the delay is proving positively injurious to my cause,’ Beatson complained in early December, warning that some witnesses were preparing to leave in the belief that the inquiry would not happen. He was resentful that the WD’s witnesses had a warship to transport them and were lodged at public expense, whereas his witnesses received nothing. But he expressed confidence in Cambridge’s fairness, and that he would prove that ‘there has been an infamous conspiracy against me’. He was assured that the inquiry would not be long delayed.73 Unfortunately this was not the case. Months passed, while Beatson tried to keep his case before the public. When Money published his book Twelve Months with the Bashi-Bazouks, containing mild criticism of Beatson’s handling of the affair with the French infirmiers, the two clashed in print, with Beatson publishing his letters to Stratford on the disorders at Salonika (including his notorious

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proposal to shoot the pasha, which could not have improved his reputation).74 When Vivian’s pamphlet reappeared in the Morning Advertiser, Beatson took the opportunity to belittle this ‘red tape manifesto’ and point out that O’Reilly had ‘in the strongest terms, repudiated the language, to my disparagement, which artful conspirators “put into his mouth” but which does not find any place in his original written testimony’.75 Required to frame a formal charge against Shirley, Beatson sought legal advice for the first time, but his lawyers could not deter him from continuing to attack Vivian in print. Although the charge was that Shirley with others had improperly originated an accusation of mutiny against him, Beatson acknowledged that the real questions were whether he had been guilty of mutiny or Vivian was guilty of slandering him.76 Watt was dragged into the correspondence to explain that Shirley had questioned the OIC’s officers without his (Watt’s) knowledge, and that he did not know who had started the rumour, which left Beatson to declare, ‘Let Lord Panmure, General Vivian and General Shirley settle among them who is responsible for the Star Chamber proceedings.’77 Vivian had published Skene’s account of the challenge to Muheiddin Bey, in which Giraud was described as a boarding-house keeper. Giraud was in London as a witness and, signing himself ‘Lieutenant-Colonel’ (a result of Beatson’s ‘prostitution of rank’), he defended himself thus: ‘although Mr Skene is closely connected with my family (his sister being married to a first cousin of my wife’s) neither myself nor any of my friends have any reason to be proud of the connection’. With animosities like this, the atmosphere during the Gladiator’s voyage must have been tense.78 Still the inquiry was delayed into the new year – the USG joked that this was ‘to give the British public an opportunity of staring at the Bin Bashi witnesses who have been summoned from Turkey, and who prowl the streets in full fig’. The Morning Advertiser – well-informed as usual of matters on Beatson’s side – said that ‘such obstacles have been interposed by the War Office to the holding the court-martial [sic] that we should not be surprised to learn that General Beatson had abandoned all idea of proceeding with the matter so far as regards the military authorities, and that he had instituted an action in the Civil Courts for defamation of character’.79 Beatson sought other ways to stay occupied. In February he requested tickets for himself and one of his daughters (presumably Marian Jane, now nearly 15) to attend some lectures on Persia at the RGS.80 Persia was much in the news at that time because the HEIC was fighting a war there – illustrating the increasingly anomalous position of a trading company acting as an arm of British Government policy. The authorities in India seemed to have forgotten Beatson’s existence – he complained that he had not been gazetted as a colonel in the Bengal Army, which according to the regulations should have happened automatically on 15 November 1856, the third anniversary of his promotion to lieutenant-colonel; eventually a general order was issued for the backdated brevet.81



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A closed court The court finally assembled on 26 February 1857 at Whitehall Yard, opposite Horse Guards. This was a low-key setting compared with Chelsea Hospital, but Peel had decided that it was a preliminary hearing analogous to a grand jury, so the public would not be admitted – much to the disgust of the newspapers. Beatson was unhappy with this secrecy, but had to accept the situation.82 Villiers allayed some concerns about the inquiry mechanism when he deemed that the Board was empowered to examine witnesses under oath.83 Hackett, the staff officer who had proved so useful at the Dardanelles, was back in England on half pay, and took unofficial notes on Beatson’s behalf.84 The charges drawn up by Beatson and his legal advisers were as follows: That Colonel Shirley, without reasonable or probable cause, made private inquiries at Shumla among the officers and others of the corps formerly under General Beatson’s command, he being at the time to which these inquiries referred a superior officer to Colonel Shirley. That he equally, without reasonable cause, and without the means of proving his statements, transmitted such statements to General Vivian, which were highly derogatory to General Beatson’s character as an officer, and which he must have known to be untrue, and was therefore guilty of wilfully slandering him. That he wilfully suppressed evidence which he had received, and which was material to show that General Beatson was not guilty of the acts which he (Colonel Shirley) alleged against him.

The Deputy JAG reframed these as a list of questions for the court to answer: did Shirley make private inquiries? … without reasonable or probable cause? … did he transmit the statements to Vivian? … had he no means of proving such statements? … and so on. After hearing the statements and witnesses, the court concluded that Shirley did have reasonable cause to send the allegations to Vivian, but the evidence he had was not ‘so precise and full as to warrant his making those statements so strongly’. There were no grounds to court-martial him.85 Peel’s decision to hold the inquiry behind closed doors proved damaging to Beatson – and to later historians. Not only were the military newspapers unable to report the proceedings of the inquiry for which they had campaigned, but no record was ever made public.* Only the court’s replies to the DJAG’s questions and its final opinion were released – a month after the hearing. These brief proceedings had cost £4,423 (over £300,000 today) for officers’ expenses and government

* Unfortunately, none of the court martial proceedings and minutes of boards of general officers for the period survive in the National Archives, having been destroyed by German bombing in 1940.86

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steamers.87 The Government had little to show for this expenditure, but as far as it was concerned the affair was closed. Beatson had been cleared of inciting mutiny; Vivian and Shirley had been cleared of impropriety towards him, and Burton had conveniently disappeared from the scene. But in the course of the inquiry Beatson had made a crucial discovery: during the proceedings, Skene acknowledged that he had made the critical statement to Shirley.88 At last Beatson had identified his real enemy. He was advised by John Gray, a leading London barrister, that Skene was open to an action for slander.* Beatson immediately requested a copy of the proceedings so that he could begin an action, but Horse Guards and the WD declined, because such a course would be ‘unusual’; even Beatson’s lawyers were not allowed to see the record of the evidence. He had Hackett’s ‘pretty full notes’ of the proceedings, but these might be inadmissible in court.89 As soon as the summary of the inquiry’s findings was issued, Shirley published it in order to clear his name.90 Beatson’s response appeared the next day in The Times. Unfortunately, he was as intemperate in writing as usual. Although welcoming the publicity Shirley had given to the case, he bemoaned the secrecy. He also attacked the court’s decision – not that he blamed Campbell and the members, arguing that they had no alternative, given the way the questions had been framed. He concluded that Villiers had screened Panmure and his original decision not to reveal Skene’s name.91

Career in jeopardy This letter to The Times created a storm serious enough to pose a new threat to Beatson’s career. Panmure had shrugged off plenty of public attacks from Beatson and others – he was not called the Bison for nothing – but Villiers was thinnerskinned. He complained to Cambridge that he had been ‘libellously defamed’, but Beatson was an Indian officer, so the complaint was passed to the India Board,92 drawing attention to ‘the highly improper proceedings of General Beatson, which are calculated to bring discredit upon the service to which he belongs’. Once again, Beatson does not appear to have been informed of these fresh proceedings against him, but it is no surprise that he found government departments unhelpful over providing the documents he required for his civil action. Skene had returned to his consular post after the inquiry, probably thinking he was safely out of reach of British courts, but Beatson’s counsel advised that the writ could still be served on him. FO officials were naturally embarrassed when Beatson requested their assistance in serving a writ on one of their own number. Panmure advised Clarendon to treat it as a private affair between the two men, and the Advocate * In Common Law, slander refers to a malicious, false and defamatory spoken statement or report, while libel refers to any other form of communication such as writing.



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General assured him that it was appropriate to refuse assistance.93 Beatson’s lawyers did manage to get the writ served on Skene in Aleppo without FO help.94 In bringing a civil case, Beatson was following in the footsteps of Lucan and Cardigan – not always a wise course to take. Lucan had recently sued Walmsley’s Daily News for its reporting of the Chelsea Board. The USG found this funny: ‘Lord LUCAN is amazingly fond of desperate charges. Balaklava was not enough for him. He must show his hardiness in assaulting, against fearful odds, the Daily News’, and cited legal maxims by Lord Ampthill (Scarlett’s father). Lucan lost. Cardigan later sued Raglan’s nephew Col Somerset Calthorpe over comments in his book Letters from Headquarters, and also lost.95 These were not good precedents, but Beatson was determined to get his man. Beatson wanted Clarendon to provide copies of the reports by Skene and Calvert from the Dardanelles, since he had not known of their existence until Vivian published some of them. The FO and WD operated on a prior assumption of refusal, and then sought grounds to justify this decision. One was that as the documents were ‘Confidential Consular reports it is deemed inexpedient to furnish copies to a private individual’. Another, that ‘General Beatson having failed to show that the Consuls did worse than slightly misapprehend, being civilian, the military affair upon which they reported, it is considered unnecessary to submit any further despatches from them to his hypercriticism’. In fact, all the crucial despatches had been published by Vivian in the Morning Advertiser, and the officials concluded that Beatson could argue about them there.96 Skene made similar requests for papers, and hinted that he wanted government help to pay the costs of his defence. The officials were even-handed and refused him as well.97 Behind the scenes, Beatson’s career was still in danger from his intemperate letter to The Times. Upon Cambridge’s complaint, the Court of Directors cancelled his remaining furlough and ordered him to India, commenting, ‘Had Colonel Beatson so misconducted himself whilst on service it would assuredly have been the duty of the Military Authorities in India to place him on his trial by court martial.’ Although Cambridge and Villiers considered that an HEIC officer on furlough was amenable to British Military Law and could be court-martialled in England, Panmure advised his officials ‘not to reopen the decision on Beatson’s case’. The file ends ‘let the matter drop’.98 It was not just exasperation with the whole unprofitable affair that led the authorities to drop the case; appalling news from India also obliged Beatson to suspend his action against Skene and hurry back to Calcutta to resume his military career. He had been saved from a court martial by the outbreak of the Indian Mutiny.

15 RETURN TO INDIA

Sub lal hogea hai (‘Everything will turn red’) Slogan circulating in India before the Mutiny1

B

eatson had already been ordered back to India, but the news that caused him to shelve his legal action and take the first available passage was truly catastrophic. Large sections of the Bengal Army had mutinied, killed their officers and any British civilians they could catch, and broken out in armed rebellion. The ostensible cause was the famous ‘greased cartridges’ – the new Enfield rifle being issued to the troops required them to bite off the end of a paper cartridge greased with animal fat – but this merely symptomised the employment disputes and religious pressures that had been simmering in the Bengal Army for some time. The sepoys’ confidence in the good faith of their European officers had waned: however often the authorities protested that there was no intention of converting them to Christianity, the activities of a small number of ‘preaching colonels’ seemed to give the lie to these assurances. If the Colonel Sahib was so keen to Christianise them, was it not likely that he would first ‘break their caste’ by making them bite cartridges greased with fat from unclean or sacred animals (pigs for Muslims, cattle for Hindus)? The fuse was lit at Barrackpore, and the regiment involved was the 34th BNI, formerly Beatson’s Bundlecund Legion infantry, now commanded by Stephen Wheler from the old 34th. It had received many Brahmin Purbiyas in place of Beatson’s original heterogeneous recruits, and was one of the units most worried by the cartridges.2 On 29 March one of these sepoys named Mangal Pande went berserk on the parade ground. He wounded the adjutant and serjeant-major before being subdued by the guard, led in person by the divisional commander while Wheler looked on, wringing his hands. The 34th had not heeded Pande’s call to rise, but the regiment was deemed guilty of passive mutiny and was disbanded – a sad end for the Bundlecund Volunteers.

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From then on, all sepoy mutineers were ‘Pandies’ to the British troops sent to subdue them.3 Afterwards, it emerged that Wheler had been preaching to his men, assuring them that they would sooner or later be converted to Christianity. This was despite his solemn promise to Ellenborough, made after the mutiny of the original 34th, that he would cease his missionary activities.4 Wheler cheerfully acknowledged that he preached to sepoys and civilians outside of barracks. He had already been refused promotion to brigadier and now was deemed unfit for command, but never faced a court martial; amazingly, he received the rank of major-general upon retirement the following year. The Governor General, Stratford de Redcliffe’s nephew Viscount Canning, blamed Wheler personally for what happened next, as disgrace for the 34th turned into catastrophe for Bengal.5 Full-scale mutiny broke out with appalling savagery at Meerut in May, whence the mutineers marched to Delhi, then it spread like an epidemic to Cawnpore and Lucknow, and onwards throughout Oude and the Doab. Reports of the Meerut outbreak only reached London in early June, and the newspapers relegated them to a downpage item below the crises in China and Persia. These first telegrams referred only to the 3rd BLC. Ellenborough had been drawing Parliament’s attention to dissatisfaction among the sepoys and urging the Government to send out reinforcements. Now he remarked that he could not understand how a mutiny in a single cavalry regiment had not been more swiftly put down by the large British garrison there. Beatson’s nephew believed that if his uncle had commanded at Meerut, ‘he would have headed a party of horse, galloped off, and not left the saddle till he had done his utmost to secure the mutineers on their way to Delhi’, but there were few commanders with Beatson’s energy in Bengal at this time of crisis.6 It was almost three weeks before more detailed accounts arrived, with lengthy lists of military and civilian casualties revealing the scale of the calamity.7 Belatedly, the Government and HEIC reacted to the obvious need for reinforcements and began ordering the estimated 800 HEIC officers on furlough in Britain back to their regiments.

Beatson travels out The London-based Indian News commented that this sudden rush would ‘tax the resources of the Peninsular and Oriental steamer of 4th of July’. Luckily, berths were available, because the July steamers carried only a quarter of the usual number of passengers – most people avoided travelling when the Red Sea was at its hottest. In fact, when the Colombo steamed from Southampton on 4 July she only carried one officer other than Beatson booked to Calcutta, the remainder dropping off at Gibraltar, Malta and Bombay, or travelling on to Singapore or Hong Kong. Beatson, as usual, was ahead of the crowd in his eagerness for service.8



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At Malta the Colombo was held to await the P&O steamer Vectis, which was overdue from Marseilles with the last-minute mail and passengers. After waiting four and a half days, the Colombo continued to Alexandria, where the Vectis finally caught up, carrying a distinguished party hastening to Calcutta. A week after the Colombo left Southampton a telegram had reached London announcing that the CinC in India had died of cholera on campaign. Panmure and Cambridge immediately offered the command to Sir Colin Campbell. He selected his staff, had an audience with the Queen, and started the same night, travelling via Paris to join the Vectis, which was delayed for him.9 From Alexandria the passengers travelled to Cairo and then took the dusty road to Suez to catch the P&O steamer Bengal, which departed on 23 July. ‘Our voyage to Calcutta was a very trying one,’ wrote a fellow-passenger. ‘The heat in the Red Sea was overpowering, and all hands were in a state of feverish anxiety which was not allayed in any wise by the rumours we picked up at Aden of fresh mutinies & further atrocities.’10 There must have been some sticky moments for those two crusty Scots, Campbell and Beatson, cooped up together in the desert stagecoach and aboard ship in the Red Sea. After all, Campbell had chaired the inquiry into Shirley’s actions, which had shown Beatson in a poor light, and then Beatson had criticised the Board’s findings. This uncomfortable proximity at least offered Beatson an opportunity to make a more favourable impression on the new CinC; but in this he seems to have failed. They reached Calcutta on 13 August. The British residents were exasperated with sick and elderly generals who would not take responsibility or risk, and welcomed the brisk Campbell (even aged 65) who had a fine reputation in India. The Bengal Hurkaru wrote, ‘it is in the highest degree encouraging to hear of the triumphant manner in which Sir Colin landed, running up the steps of the P&O Ghaut like a young man. He was in full uniform, as were the officers who accompanied him.’ While Campbell went to Government House to be briefed by Canning, Beatson reported to Fort William. He subsequently appeared in general orders as having ‘returned to his duty on this Establishment, without prejudice to his rank, by permission of the Honble the Court of Directors’, though there was some confusion over this: in the rush of leaving England, Beatson had omitted to collect the prescribed certificate from East India House.11

Loss of friends On arrival, they became aware of the full horror of recent events. For the British in Bengal this was a terribly personal conflict and Beatson would have heard sad stories of the deaths of many friends and colleagues from his long years in the country. One was John Waterfield, former commander of the Bundlecund Legion’s 2nd Battalion, whose dâk was set upon by mutineers while he travelled to take up

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a new command.12 At Delhi the Commissioner was Simon Fraser, formerly Agent in Bundelkhand; he was killed confronting the mutineers.13 Captive European families at Cawnpore had been massacred and other important British stations such as Agra and Lucknow were under siege. The Resident at Lucknow was Sir Henry Lawrence, whose wife had been the late Honoria Marshall; he was killed by cannon fire at the side of his staff officer Capt Thomas Wilson, veteran of Chirgong.14 Mannton Ommaney, Charles Fraser’s incompetent deputy in Saugor, was on Lawrence’s Council, and also died of wounds during the siege.15 The Bengal mutineers had been joined by many disaffected native rulers in Central India. Predictably, rebellion broke out in the wild country of Bundelkhand, starting at Jhansi, where the widowed Rani, Lakshmi Bai, was embittered because Dalhousie had deemed the state to have lapsed on her husband’s death in 1853. Thus she could not follow Bundela tradition and pass the throne to her adopted son and reign in his name as so many of her predecessors had done. Her troops seized the Star Fort that Beatson had built to protect the treasury and magazine, while the Europeans and Eurasian Christians took refuge in the great fortress. Unable to defend it, they accepted an offer of safe passage, but were slaughtered in cold blood.16 Among them were Capt Alexander Skene,17 who as a cadet had accompanied Beatson, Spankie and Honoria Marshall on the long voyage to India in 1837, and Dr MacEgan, the sword-wielding surgeon of the Hyderabad Contingent, who had later served in the TC.18 Dr Kinloch Kirk, formerly of the Bundlecund Legion, had been stationed at Gwalior. He wrote home about the outbreaks at Meerut and Delhi, assuring his family that ‘we are perfectly safe & a few weeks’ hence will find these wretches done for’. But following the Jhansi massacre the Gwalior Contingent rose too, and began killing their officers. His widow wrote that ‘Poor dear K’ dashed out to confront ‘at least 25 armed ruffians with a walking stick in his hand’ – they fired a volley and killed him while she looked on. She was robbed but allowed to escape to Agra with their four-year-old son.19 Several regiments with which Beatson was associated had disappeared in the maelstrom: in addition to the 34th, the 54th BNI, of which he had formally been an officer for over 25 years, had mutinied at Delhi, and the 10th BLC, his old Bundlecund Legion Cavalry, had been disbanded at Nowshera. The 43rd Bengal Light Infantry, to which he was currently attached, had been at Barrackpore but resisted Mangal Pande’s exhortations and was quietly disarmed: it was one of the few BNI units that survived the Mutiny.20 However, Beatson seems never to have joined this regiment and was soon transferred (on paper) to the mutinied 1st BNI (perhaps to prevent him superseding the officer in actual command of the 43rd). The following year the officers of the 1st BNI were transferred en masse to command the British recruits of the newly raised 4th Bengal European Infantry, but again Beatson never joined this regiment.21 Rebellion spread over Central India; by the end of August 1857, there had been mutinies at Nowgong, Banda and Saugor. Most of the men of the



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Contingents had followed the lead of their comrades of the Bengal Army, but the regiments of Punjab, Madras, Bombay and Hyderabad mainly remained loyal, and held the ring.

Fightback The British were doing their best to fight back. When Beatson and Campbell landed in August, all eyes were on Delhi, which was assailed by British and loyal Gurkha, Sikh and Punjabi troops, and on the attempts to relieve the besieged Residency at Lucknow. Charles Havelock’s brother Henry was in charge of the latter expedition, with Beatson’s former antagonist James Neill as his Brigadier, Billy Olpherts commanding the artillery, and Beatson’s kinsman and Marian’s nephew, William Stuart Beatson (son of the former Bengal Adjutant General), on his staff. They all won glowing reputations, mostly posthumous. Dying of cholera and too weak to ride, the younger Beatson had himself driven into action at the Battle of Cawnpore in a cart.22 Olpherts did good work with the column’s artillery and won a VC when he charged on horseback to capture two enemy guns outside Lucknow and later brought in wounded under fire. ‘Billy’ became known to the troops as ‘Hellfire Jack’ because of his insane bravery, yet he survived.23 Neill exhibited a streak of coldblooded cruelty in suppressing the revolt. The ferocity of his 1st Madras Fusiliers – ‘Neill’s Blue Caps’ – and his drumhead condemnation and execution of captured mutineers, and anyone else who looked suspicious, earned him the nickname of ‘the Avenger’ among admiring Victorians. But the habitual insubordination that had so infuriated Beatson reemerged in Neill’s relations with the saintly Havelock. Neill was probably heading for a court martial when he met a hero’s death, picked off by a sniper in the outskirts of Lucknow.24 When Havelock’s column finally reached the Residency on 25 September it had lost a third of its strength, and was only able to resupply and join the garrison as the siege resumed. In Calcutta, Campbell resisted the clamour for instant action while he sorted out the chaos among the Company and Queen’s forces in Bengal. During previous Indian service, Old Hands had dubbed him ‘Old Khabardar’ (Old Be Careful), now his critics called him ‘Sir Crawling Camel’. But Campbell was not to be rushed: he deprecated Havelock’s rash attempts to reach Lucknow, and refused to move until he was satisfied that everything was ready and the cooler weather had arrived. He complained that he was besieged by ‘officers of every rank anxious to be sent at least as divisional commanders and at the head of small columns independent of all control’.25 Beatson expected one of these commands, irregular cavalry for preference – after all, he was a former inspector-general-designate of this arm. Fine new irregular units were being formed to address the army’s deficiency in cavalry – Hodson’s Horse, Probyn’s Horse, Murray’s Jats, Cureton’s Multanis and others,

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led by experienced officers from recently mutinied or disbanded regiments. However, the best Muslim and Sikh recruits were predominantly to be found in the Punbjab and it was impossible to travel there. There was no suitable command for Beatson in the Calcutta Presidency.26 It was doubly unfortunate that Campbell relied on his chief of staff, who was none other than Maj-Gen William Mansfield, formerly Stratford de Redcliffe’s military adviser. Mansfield had been recalled from diplomatic duty and rushed out to India a month after Campbell and Beatson. So the man who had advised Stratford to force Beatson’s resignation now had Campbell’s ear. Beatson had no chance of employment while these two were running military affairs in Calcutta.27 With nothing better to do, Beatson agitated to get his Turkish rank and medals included in the Indian Army List. He got shirty with the staff wallahs who assumed that his Turkish rank had expired at the end of the Crimean War – unlike other HEIC officers attached to the TC, he held a permanent commission as ferik pasha. But in India he ranked only as a brevet colonel.28 As British reinforcements arrived by the slow sailing route round the Cape and others were diverted from the China expedition, Campbell sent them up the Grand Trunk Road by bullock hackery – an unconventional but effective means of transporting unseasoned troops. The army concentrated around Cawnpore preparatory to a march on Lucknow, and Campbell followed them on 27 October. His little army fought its way into Lucknow and evacuated the Residency in November. The exhausted garrison (Havelock died shortly afterwards) was reinforced and established in a stronger position at the Alam Bagh on the outskirts of the city, while Campbell fell back to prepare his campaign of reconquest.29 Left behind, Beatson resided at the Bengal Club on Calcutta’s prestigious Chowringhee Road, next door to the United Service Military Club and just a few doors from the office of the Military Secretary to the Government of India, Col Richard Birch.30 This was an ideal position from which to lobby the staff; he also pestered Canning’s nephew and military secretary, Lt-Col Lord Dunkellin. By January the rebellion in Upper India was broken, and Canning prepared to move the seat of government to Allahabad to be nearer the action.31 But there was still much to do in Central India, where forces from Bombay, Madras and Hyderabad were engaged in what promised to be a long campaign. This was the area that Beatson knew so well, and finally he got his opportunity to contribute to the war.

A new command With Campbell and Mansfield out of the way, Beatson exerted his powers of persuasion on the Governor General (over the years politicians as varied as Auckland, Ellenborough, Clarendon, Newcastle and – at first – Stratford de Redcliffe had fallen for his combination of bluff charm and professional straight-



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talking). At Canning’s request, he prepared a memorandum on irregular cavalry that neatly expresses the Beatson philosophy, honed with the Bundlecund and Hyderabad horsemen: Irregular Cavalry equipped as they ought to be with a Tattoo to every two horses and the Bazaar keeping up cattle [baggage animals] for five days supply, without a single cart or other wheeled carriage being allowed with the Force, ought to think nothing of marching 50 miles a night which rapidity of movement followed up by vigorous measures is the best means of checking insurrection in the bud. I have known insurgents give up even fortified places if finding themselves hemmed in by a rapid march of cavalry from a distance they did not expect, but even if they do not give in, you can always keep them there until infantry & guns come up when you have established your cavalry round the place.32

Persuaded, Canning gave Beatson permission to recruit fresh units of irregular cavalry at Hyderabad for service in Central India, to be designated – inevitably – ‘Beatson’s Horse’.* Beatson hoped to raise four regiments, but Birch allowed him only two. Beatson argued that his experience entitled him to a larger command, but he swallowed his pride, declaring that he was ‘quite ready to take command of 10 men if the govt consider I can be more useful to them than in commanding 10,000’. He was entitled to a brigade major to assist him, and a personal staff allowance of Rs 700 per month on top of his pay (as a substantive lieutenantcolonel of infantry serving outside the Presidency, his monthly pay and batta would be Rs 1,032 4 annas).33 Beatson’s reputation was not what it had been when he left India in 1851. Mud from the Dardanelles debacle had stuck, but now he would show that he really could train the best irregular cavalry. This time Beatson’s Horse would be drawn from the same respectable Deccani Muslims as the Nizam’s Cavalry, for whom soldiering was an honourable profession, not an excuse for pillage as for the drunken, roistering Albanians. Indeed, Beatson planned to replicate the Hyderabad Cavalry in the smallest detail. The authorised establishment was six troops per regiment, 600 all ranks. The details were almost exactly as Beatson had proposed, except that a camel gunner had been added to each troop – he declared these useless and omitted them. He hoped to get about 100 experienced men for each regiment from the Contingent to provide the cadre of officers and NCOs – as with the Bundlecund Legion, they would gain a step in rank by volunteering to transfer to the new regiments, but (perhaps with the ‘dead wood’ offloaded onto the Legion in mind) he wanted such promotion to be a reward for distinguished service in the current campaign.

* Confusing later historians who do not appreciate the distinction between the BashiBazouks and these new regiments.

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The rest of the sowars were to be relatives of Hyderabad cavalrymen from loyal provinces, and with the officers and NCOs holding most of the asamis, it would be in their interest to introduce reliable men as bargirs. Beatson assumed that there were plenty of trained men available, probably thinking of those disbanded from the old 5th Hyderabad Cavalry and the Nizam’s Line-wallahs. If so, the regiments could be quickly made ready for service, with the less experienced troopers being instructed on the march. Weapons would come from the Bombay and Madras armies, because there was no time to order them from Britain as irregular regiments normally did. The COs would be given money advances to equip their regiments, and silladars would repay these advances from their pay. All of this was accepted by Canning. Unfortunately, these concessions to the silladar system were storing up trouble for the future, when their financial impact became clear.34 By late January 1858 Beatson was on his way, with passages booked for himself and three servants on the Bengal to Madras, whence he would travel overland to Hyderabad.35 He asked Lord Dunkellin for six particular officers he wanted – just as he had given a list to Clarendon in 1854. One name is common to both lists – Billy Olpherts – but he was under siege in the Alam Bagh.36 To command one regiment Beatson asked for Lt-Col Charles Becher of the disbanded 5th BLC. Beatson would have known ‘Charley’ Becher from the Gwalior campaign, when he was 2i/c of the 8th Bengal Irregular Cavalry, brigaded with the Bundlecund Cavalry, while Becher’s brother had also briefly been adjutant of the Legion. Becher’s mother was a Humfrays, so he was probably a kinsman of Marian Beatson.37 For the other regiment Beatson asked for Capt Thomas Wilson, the hero of Lucknow whom Beatson remembered as a keen young ensign at Chirgong. ‘The list of officers is not complete, but these will be enough to begin with,’ Beatson told Dunkellin. Becher and Wilson both accepted the commands at once, but each had responsibilities to hand over and then long distances to travel. The post of brigade major was still to be filled, while the Bombay and Madras armies were instructed to find the junior officers.38 After three weeks Beatson had heard nothing of these officers, and impatiently telegraphed from Hyderabad that if Becher could not come he wanted De Renzie Brett, who had served him so well at the Dardanelles. Brett was in Bundelkhand with his regiment, the 3rd Madras Europeans, and although Canning agreed, Becher and Wilson had turned up before Madras released him.39 Passing through Madras on his way to Hyderabad, Beatson found the invaluable Maj John Hackett in garrison with HM’s 44th Foot, and immediately borrowed him again as acting brigade major. During February Hackett was the only officer Beatson had to help, though two subalterns (Henry Thurburn and Charles Lennox) were on their way.40 The Bombay Government ordered Asst-Surgeon John Sylvester to join him, but he too was serving in Bundelkhand, 700 miles away across rebelinfested country, and clearly could not arrive for several months.41



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Return to Hyderabad Hyderabad had been one bright spot for the British in India during the terrible months of 1857. The old Nizam died just days before the Meerut outbreak, and his son was an unknown quantity: ‘If the Nizam goes all is lost,’ the Governor of Bombay had warned. Luckily the Nizam threw his lot in with the British. A small outbreak in Hyderabad City directed at the Residency was soon dispersed by the Arab guards, after which the Nizam, his Minister and the Resident took a firm grip on affairs; there was no repeat of Lucknow here. With the exception of one troop of the 1st Cavalry, which took potshots at their CO, Henry Abbott (formerly Beatson’s Brigade Major), before deserting, the Hyderabad Contingent remained loyal. They had marched north to burnish their reputation in Central India, led by men whom Beatson knew well, like Thomas Clagett, James Fraser’s son Hastings and Rissaldar Zulfikar Ali Beg.42 Beatson reached Hyderabad City on 12 February to discuss his mission with the Resident, Lt-Col Cuthbert Davidson, who had been Fraser’s deputy when Beatson was last here. He issued his first ‘Brigade Orders’ from the Residency, specifying the establishment and pay scale for the new regiments – a sort of company prospectus aimed at investors in asamis.43 Beatson had been through the process of pleading with governors and headquarters for officers, soldiers, arms and equipment for the Bundlecund Legion and the Bashi-Bazouks. He knew what to guard against, such as bureaucratic delays or COs eager to offload their deadbeats. Although his correspondence is just as demanding as before, it seems to be crisper – the telegraph encouraged brevity and clarity, and reduced the opportunities for Beatson to deploy sarcasm, even if it made it easier for him to pester Fort William. He formally asked the Resident for cadres of officers and NCOs from the Contingent Cavalry, but Davidson would only permit volunteers who could supply adequate substitutes, and with the bulk of all four regiments operating north of the Nerbudda the transfers would be difficult.44 There was another problem: Hyderabad sowars were paid Rs 30 a month, but Calcutta only allowed Beatson’s Horse the Bengal rate of Rs 25. Beatson warned of this: ‘In 1804 the Duke of Wellington recorded his opinion that 25 Rs a month was too little for Irregular Cavalry and in those days they were not so expensively got up as they are now, a sowar had merely a matchlock, a spear and a quilted jacket.’ He informed Calcutta that if the pay scale was not raised, potential recruits might wait for a vacancy in the Contingent or Scinde Horse and only ‘an inferior description of men’ would enlist. Many recruits in fact came from the levies of various native states, but the majority were poor riders. They were mostly Muslims, but one complete troop of Hindus joined through the influence of Duffadar Burmadin Singh.45 Hyderabad was India’s peacetime horse market, but with the country to the north swarming with rebels, the dealers were not coming from the North

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West Frontier, and horses were scarce. Beatson got as many Arab stallions as he could from the Bombay stables, but had to accept mares and geldings as well (1st Regiment got the stallions, 2nd got the mares). Then he had to abandon the usual silladar rule that ‘no man is to be entertained without a horse and no horse without a man’. Instead, horses and men must be taken as they can be found. Horses at Bombay, Ellichpore and other places can sometimes be obtained where riders cannot. On the other hand men can sometimes be recruited at Kurnooh or Hingolee where horses cannot be procured. The only way to meet this is to draw the pay of the horse only when he is entertained without a rider and of the rider only when he is entertained without a horse until they join Head Qrs when men and horses will be drawn for as usual.46

The consequence of creating a traditional regiment from scratch was that large sums of money were advanced to those who supplied horses and men. For example, Rissaldar Rustum Ali Khan received Rs 20,321 – over 11 years’ pay – and Mahomed Banker, a Bombay horse dealer, got Rs 96,520. Rustum was one of the first officers appointed by Beatson. Events suggested that he was a scoundrel, but Beatson ‘would trust him with ten times the amount of my own money’, and at least he was a good soldier, later winning the Indian Order of Merit for tactical skill and bravery leading a squadron against a large party of rebels.47 Less creditable was a silladar named Mir Ahmed Ali, ‘detected in writing false reports of a treasonable nature to his friends in Hyderabad’ and deprived of his 45 asamis, which Beatson deemed should be ‘made over to some person of loyalty and respectability who can re-pay the money advanced by Government’. The numbers of asamis concentrated in a few men’s hands was far higher than usually allowed. Rissaldar Imam Khan had over 150, and his pagai of sowars followed him like feudal retainers. Meanwhile the benoker sillidars (non-serving investors) traded their asamis as if they were ordinary investments, and despite Beatson’s orders, the records of which sowars the sillidars had given surety for were not well kept.48 These excesses would cause Beatson and his colleagues problems for years to come, but in the short term his ‘liberal interpretation of the permission to advance’ made up in part for the lower pay, and enlistment was brisk. Unfortunately, as Sylvester observed, these recruits included ‘the sweepings and idlers of the Nizam’s capital’, some ‘accustomed to arms, [while] others were strangers both to arms and the saddle’. ‘Unprincipled men’ drew Rs 400 and then brought a horse and equipment worth maybe Rs 100 less. ‘Much of the immediate profit was spent in nauches [dance entertainments] and debauchery.’49



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Arming Beatson’s Horse In February 1858 Palmerston’s Government fell, and the Earl of Derby became Prime Minister. As President of the Board of Control for India, charged with root and branch reform of Indian administration, Derby appointed the Earl of Ellenborough. This appointment – the fourth time he had held it – should have been the culmination of Ellenborough’s career. It was his chance to wreak revenge on the Court of Directors who had sacked him as Governor General. Yet his reign at the Board lasted only until May, when he resigned over Parliament’s rejection of his India Bill and his criticism of Canning. ‘I could almost pity the poor Peacock. He is so miserably crestfallen,’ wrote one of Canning’s friends.50 But for a brief period Beatson had a highly placed patron once more, and we find him writing to Ellenborough about the tribulations of raising new regiments in wartime. He also sent him extracts from the diary that Wilson had kept during the first siege of the Lucknow Residency* – it appears that Beatson was helping to have it published in London through his other patron, Sir Duncan MacDougall.51 Beatson’s first complaint to Ellenborough concerned his men’s arms. He wanted the Sharps breechloading carbine, a new US design being evaluated by British cavalry regiments. These weapons were establishing a reputation for long range and accuracy, as well as the high rate of fire offered by a breechloader compared with conventional muzzleloaders.52 Here Beatson was ahead of his time: the introduction of breechloaders brought a profound change in the use of cavalry – as was demonstrated in the American Civil War, when both sides largely abandoned shock tactics in favour of mounted and dismounted firepower. But we should remember that Beatson was an infantryman, and both Bundlecund Legion and Hyderabad Contingent cavalry fought dismounted actions under his command, while his Albanian Bashi-Bazouks were intended to act as mounted riflemen, armed with Jacob’s or Minié weapons. This was altogether too advanced for Calcutta, which was understandably worried about putting modern weaponry into the hands of native troops who might turn against their sahibs. Beatson was told that ‘Your Regiment must therefore be supplied with ordinary arms, it being inexpedient to furnish under present circumstances any other description of weapon to Native Troops.’ Beatson complained to Ellenborough that this policy would have a bad effect on the future Indian Army, ‘even supposing the very improbable contingency occurring that “Beatson’s Horse” with 1100 Sharpe’s [sic] breech loading

* The anonymous The Defence of Lucknow: A Diary Recording the Events During the Siege of the European Residency From 31st May to 25th September, 1857, By a Staff Officer became one of the classic sources on the Indian Mutiny. It was republished for the 150th anniversary under the author’s real name.

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Carbines were to shoot Beatson & their other officers then to move on Calcutta to threaten the Secretary to Government in the Military Department [Birch]’.53 He despaired of getting any carbines at all, unless Ellenborough sent him Sharps by overland mail, because Madras and Bombay both reported ‘no available carbines in store’. Madras ‘sent me mirabile dictu 1100 swords’, but even these got held up in transit. As Beatson wrote to Ellenborough, ‘I look back with regret to the time when your Lordship sent me two Howitzers from Cawnpore, which the Military Board had taken two years to consider of; Regret that the same master mind is not here to give me swords or carbines.’54 Next he indented for 150 Colt Navy revolvers, presumably to arm officers and NCOs. He ought to have guessed that this advanced weapon would also be denied, and he was told that ‘the ordinary percussion pistols must answer’. Frustrated, Beatson asked if he should order what he needed from England. Luckily, the Inspector General of Ordnance tracked down a consignment of 565 rifled carbines sitting in a Calcutta warehouse. These had been ordered from British manufacturers for the mutinied 3rd Oude Cavalry, and he described them as ‘very good weapons, admirably suited for cavalry’, which would take the standard Enfield Rifle cartridge, and was told to buy them for Beatson’s Horse. They were sent by sea to Bombay, thence overland.55

In camp In March Beatson established camp near Bolarum, the cavalry HQ outside Hyderabad City, to begin organising his recruits. ‘I am mounting my men splendidly on horses from Bombay, at 350 to 375 Rs each,’ he wrote, ‘and if we had any proper arms, we should soon be in the field.’ He later discovered that the horses from the dealers were young and many suffering from galls and other diseases, so he employed a European farrier-major to superintend the care of the sick horses and get them fit for campaigning, native horse-doctors (salustries or nulbands) having proved almost impossible to hire.56 Training these horses led to accidents, and although Brigadier Hill of the Contingent allocated part of the Bolarum hospital to his force, Beatson wanted a tented hospital to administer first aid in camp. The Hyderabad Subsidiary Force lent him Asst-Surgeon Beaumont, and some scarce hospital supplies, but native doctors in Madras were paid more than Calcutta had authorised. Beatson was furious when Madras ordered Beaumont away without providing a replacement, and telegraphed Calcutta: ‘fractures and accidents occurring daily I solicit the interference of the Supreme Government to prevent this injustice to my men.’ Luckily, this appeal got the order rescinded, because the overstretched Bengal Army could not have provided a replacement.57 In Becher’s continued absence, Beatson transferred Wilson to command 1st Regiment; later he had to ask the Governor General’s permission to swap them back



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– unlike at the Dardanelles, where he could move officers at a whim, here he was bound by rigid Indian bureaucracy. The invaluable Hackett took over 2nd Regiment in addition to his own duties, until he returned to Madras at the beginning of May, when poor Wilson was left acting as CO of both regiments and brigade major as well, while his 2i/c, Thurburn, doubled as adjutant. Becher finally joined in May.58 As permanent brigade major, Beatson asked for Capt Edmund Wood of the Nagpur Irregular Cavalry, who had won plaudits from his CO, Maj Henry Shakespear, formerly one of Beatson’s officers in the Hyderabad Cavalry. Wood accepted and Canning agreed, but Birch sent a different officer in whom Beatson had apparently expressed interest. Beatson announced his ‘decided objection’ to this substitution, so there was considerable embarrassment when the officer turned up expecting to be given the appointment. This seems to be another case of the Governor General making an appointment without reference to his military staff, as had happened more than once in Bundelkhand. One wonders if Beatson’s habit of going direct to the top was at the root of the problem.59 The regimental historian characterised Beatson’s orders at this time as ‘long and didactic’, but attributed this to the preponderance of infantry officers: ‘He had to rely to a great extent on his own exertions.’ For example, brigade orders forbade off-saddling the horses too soon after exercise, which led to sore backs. On another occasion Beatson quoted his hero Sir Charles Napier: ‘We have all heard that if you put a beggar on horseback he will ride to the devil; but neither beggars nor any other persons have a right to send other people to the devil; galloping in cantonments is therefore prohibited.’60 In May the rains began, so Beatson moved the force to Jalna, where the permanent cavalry cantonments were unoccupied while the Contingent was on campaign. Beginning on 25 May the march covered 240 miles and involved several river crossings, which was ‘a severe ordeal for a half-fledged corps, but they accomplished it creditably’, and Beatson complimented them in brigade orders. At Jalna the men, horses and equipment were under cover and, being in the far north-west corner of the Nizam’s Dominions, it was a good starting point for a campaign in ‘Hindustan’ (India north of the Deccan – see Map 7).61

Expensive tastes The uniform for the force was to be green with red turbans and cummerbunds – obviously based on the Hyderabad Cavalry. When Sylvester* was first appointed to Beatson’s Horse, he wrote to his brother that it was * Sylvester was yet another of Beatson’s subordinates who was a writer: he contributed articles to the Bombay Standard, which were published in 1860 as Recollections of the Campaign in Malwa and Central India under Major General Sir Hugh Rose G.C.B., and republished in extended form in 1971.62

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Commanded by the General of that name who was the Bashi Bazouk hero of the Crimea, it is to be immensely crack. I don’t know what pay, but I fancy good, the worst part of the business is it will cost me about £200 in uniform to start with & as much more in horses. The bridle alone costs 16 guineas. The Helmet is like the Life Guards but with a green plume. Alcolic [alkalakh] or coat green loaded with gold lace, overalls full dress scarlet & gold stripe, undress buckskin breeches and jack boots. As I shall have to send home for it you will have an opportunity of seeing it when ready. I dare say now this is all very well but a frightful expense, it will however pay in the end.

In fact, when Sylvester arrived – in an old cavalry undress uniform that had ‘long been strengthened by reinforcements of leather’ – he was able to buy this expensive outfit from another officer who resigned after just a few weeks with the regiment.63 Presumably Beatson had designed this uniform so that officers and NCOs transferred from the Hyderabad cavalry could continue to wear their existing uniforms – and of course he could wear his trademark embroidered green coat that had seen so much service. When the British officers of 1st Regiment put on full dress to visit the Begum of Bhopal, Sylvester refers to their ‘scarlet helmets and white horsehair plumes’, which suggests that Beatson had kept the TC red helmet as well. In the office Beatson wore a simple green baize tunic and red baize overalls tucked into jackboots. The recruits, however, were less well off. As late as July ‘scarcely one in a score was dressed in uniform [probably ex-Hyderabad cavalrymen], but the remainder were in every imaginable variety of dress’. They had jackboots, but ‘it may be readily therefore guessed how exactly they resembled Tantia’s horsemen,’ Sylvester noted.64 Beatson had loyally accepted a smaller command than he expected, but now he complained that he had not contemplated ‘being a loser in a pecuniary point of view’. His expenses were high: ‘I do not wish to make money out of the appointment but I wish to be secured against loss’, explaining that his English and Persian ‘writers’ cost him Rs 40 and Rs 30 a month respectively, together with four hurkarus or office messengers at Rs 6 each. Then again an offr in my position with such men as I have raised must be well mounted. My six chargers have cost me close on seven thousand rupees, that is very nearly a year’s staff allowance, but I do not think an officer in command of a brigade of irregular cavalry in the field could do his duty properly with less than six chargers & an officer must always be prepared to take the field at a moment [sic] notice. If the Commdg Offr does not keep horses, tattoos & everything ready he could not expect other officers to do so.

Beatson was bluntly told that John Jacob got Rs 1,500 a month when he commanded two regiments of Scinde Horse, and that with his Rs 700 staff



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allowance, Beatson was ‘already in possession of a salary commensurate with the command he holds’. Even his farrier-major was disallowed.65 Beatson’s horses may have been expensive, but the quality of his stable was legendary: ‘He always rode English chargers of good blood,’ Burton wrote of him at the Dardanelles. Evelyn Wood later borrowed Beatson’s horses, but ‘I rode one of his horses so eagerly in chasing a deer, that he was not so willing later to mount me’. Cheaper horses were available: when Sylvester arrived he found that he was able to pick up an adequate second charger from a dealer for Rs 450: ‘I got him more reasonably than I had anticipated.’66

Life at Jalna Sylvester arrived at the end of July 1858. He was very much in the mould of Hyderabad cavalry surgeons, who accompanied their regiments into action, sword in hand. Indeed, he had toyed with giving up medicine and taking a commission, and Evelyn Wood considered that he would have made a good cavalry officer. Adventurous and scientifically inclined, he had been due to accompany Burton and Speke on their first African expedition but could not get away from a new posting. His uncle was a surgeon serving with the Hyderabad Contingent, and his influence may have induced him to volunteer for Beatson’s Horse.67 Sylvester came from hard campaigning and his first impression of the cavalry lines was oddly similar to Edward Money’s description of the Bashi-Bazouk camp at the Dardanelles: I found them full of natives just such as we had been killing. Scarcely one in a score was dressed in uniform, but the remainder in every imaginable variety of dress … [Beatson’s] bungalow was besieged by applicants for enlistment, strings of horses hung about what had once been a garden, but now, tramped by men and horses, looked much like those I had left behind in Gwalior.

Inside, Beatson and Edmund Wood were ‘Seated at a table covered with pistols, small arms, and a few papers … surrounded by a bevy of the cutthroat looking desperadoes such as I had encountered outside. [These] were the native officers who rose and saluted me.’ Sylvester found Beatson ‘very civil and polite, though in bad odour with his officers’. On parade at 05.00 the next morning, Sylvester noted some 500 men present, ‘a very great mixture in very various dresses as their uniforms had not arrived … Horses very young some very fair but mostly too small, weak and young for Cavalry. The men had advanced tolerably well in their drill.’ The doctor’s diary is invaluable for its insight into everyday life at Jalna that summer. As he settled into the ‘capital house’ that served as the European officers’ mess, Sylvester made himself conversant with the hospital. He ‘found

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much wanting as everything connected with the regiment is in a state of infancy’. At least the weather was cooler than in the north, but ‘Parade every morning is rather heavy & makes me sleepy towards night’. On Sundays the officers attended church parade and went hunting hogs or antelope, but apparently Beatson did not accompany them on shikar.68 We do not know who had the idea, but the officers of Beatson’s Horse bought enough hog spears from the leading manufacturer of sporting goods, Bodraj of Aurangabad, to arm five men in each troop in lieu of lances. When the swords arrived from Madras, Beatson had the steel scabbards returned to store and replaced by wooden ones made locally – he remembered how the Hyderabad Cavalry kept their legendary swords so sharp. He even hired local barwallahs (sword sharpeners). There were enough carbines for only one regiment, but Beatson chose to divide them equally between his two regiments; the rest of the men made do with old matchlocks if they had them.69 ‘The men seemed very delighted’ with their carbines but Sylvester found it ‘rather queer work arming the fellows again’. A potential problem arose when Becher and Wilson discovered that the ammunition supplied was the same greased Enfield cartridges that had contributed to the Bengal Army’s mutiny. Wilson wanted the men to be asked if they objected, and Sylvester reports that the Muslim sowars ‘evidently don’t relish it’, thinking that it was probably pig’s fat. Once the ammunition was issued, Beatson trained his men to load and fire on horseback – a risky operation, but no accidents were recorded. On 10 August Sylvester went to inspect a fresh batch of sowars: ‘Not a decent horse amongst them,’ he complained. There were undesirables among the men as well. Some deserters from Abbott’s 1st Hyderabad Cavalry were discovered to have re-enlisted and were summarily discharged. Others were found to be jailbirds. In 1st Regiment alone, 630 men were enlisted before the end of August to fill the nominal roll of 500 sowars. Some were discharged for what seem trivial reasons: ‘for having been a khitmatghar’ or ‘for having been a barber’.70 The fact was, these men were not asraf (noble) and did not meet the high standards Beatson expected. It is an unusual instance of snobbishness from a man who professed to find all soldiers ‘honourable’; perhaps he was indulging his exHyderabad officers. One day Sylvester ‘called on the General’ (Beatson was of course only a brevet colonel, but people used his Turkish rank out of courtesy) and found him up to his elbows in pistols & powder &c. He invited me to have a shot at a target in his verandah. I did after he had hit wide & by good luck put a shot into his bull’s eye which slightly astonished him. I from under my coat pulled out my big revolver which astonished him more.

Sylvester in turn was amazed by Beatson’s training methods:



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General Beatson’s system was very peculiar; sometimes he suddenly marched upon a peaceful village, surrounded and stormed it, with dismounted troopers, greatly astonishing the inhabitants who, in such troubled times, imagined their turn had arrived for slaughter. At others he raised an alarm of fire in cantonments, and turning us all out at midnight, would call the roll and punish the missing.

Such modern attitudes to training were most unusual at the time, but Beatson’s previous experience in Bundelkhand and Hyderabad had demonstrated the efficacy of irregular horsemen in assaulting fortified places and street fighting – which no officer of the British cavalry would have countenanced. Until the end of June the shortage of experienced native officers meant that the sowars paraded by pagais rather than troops, but by early August the organisation had progressed sufficiently for Beatson to report to Campbell that his corps was ‘now ready to cut its way to Hindustan’.71

16 HUNTING TANTYA TOPE

Soldiers! There are different kinds of glory – The glory of battle and the glory of endurance Sir Charles Napier1

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ampbell had pacified Upper India, Sir Hugh Rose had cleared Central India, the rebels in Gwalior and Bundelkhand had been dispersed, and the Rani of Jhansi was dead.* The war was considered virtually over, but there was still one rebel leader in the field: Ramachandra Pandurang Tope, known as Tantya Tope. He was an adherent of Nana Sahib, claimant Peshwa of the Mahratta Confederacy, and after the defeats in Bundelkhand the two moved south into Central India, pillaging what they needed and never staying in one place long enough to be trapped.3 Rose organised a new concentration to counter Tantya. Here was the opportunity that Beatson had been waiting for – but there was a sting. He was ordered to send one of his regiments north, but he was to stay at Jalna to oversee the training of the other – or ‘drawing large pay and squabbling with his officers,’ as Sylvester put it. Being the most advanced in organisation and training, Becher’s 1st Regiment went. ‘All now was bustle paying and getting paid, repairing tents & making clothes &c,’ wrote Sylvester. They marched out on 4 September, joining reinforcements coming up from Bombay.4 Two columns were already on Tantya’s trail from the north, one led by John Michel, formerly Vivian’s chief of staff in the TC, the other by Michael Smith, Beatson’s successor in command of the OIC. Michel’s Malwa Field Force included HM’s 8th Hussars – Beatson’s friends de Salis and the Duberlys among them. On

* Lakshmi Bai was killed in a cavalry mêlée, dressed as a sowar, fighting with sabre and pistols. Characteristically, Fanny Duberly (unarmed) got caught up in the same cavalry charge.2

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18 October Michel caught the rebels at Sindwa, and his cavalry put them to flight. A week later he caught and beat some more detachments. As usual Tantya got away with his main body, but at Bagrode he fell in with Becher and 1st Beatson’s Horse marching to join Michel. Although the men were recruits and many lost control of their stallions, Becher did not hesitate to charge Tantya’s far superior force. ‘We dashed amongst the mounted rebels in some sort of line,’ noted Dr Sylvester, who was himself in the charge wielding his hog-spear. ‘They drew up into close order as though intending to receive our charge, but not liking the pace, broke and fled,’ and he remembered Beatson’s promise of ‘cutting our way to Hindustan’. Despite the losses inflicted by Beatson’s Horse, Becher could not halt Tantya’s march towards the Nerbudda, and the pursuit continued.5 Beatson was informed that Michel and the CinC Bombay considered that Becher, ‘with his new Levies, deserves credit for the promptitude with which he attacked the enemy’.6 But praise for his subordinates and the regiment he had trained, however gratifying, must have been galling for a man who still desired military distinction. All the opportunities were going to others. As Sylvester put it: In the pursuit, Divisions, Brigades, regiments, and detachments of troops, regular and irregular, mounted and foot, commanded by officers of every rank and description, were engaged … Many an officer, whose patrons had languished in despair of finding an excuse to shower on him the honours of the Bath, sped the pursuit with the decoration in his pocket. He had but to write a despatch and be forthwith gazetted to the most honourable order, and nowadays these honours command a money price in the directorships of companies limited!7

There is no evidence that Beatson desired company directorships, but he definitely wanted a CB, and Ellenborough and other patrons would have nominated him for one if the opportunity arose. For now, Beatson had to content himself with training his 2nd Regiment. While marching north, Becher began angling to get away from Beatson’s control by a transfer to command the independent Berar Horse – unless his current regiment was ‘to be detached from under the command of Colonel Beatson and to be an independent command’. Of course, if Beatson were to leave, Becher fancied succeeding him in command of both regiments! Yet Becher was overwhelmed by the financial and administrative responsibilities of his command. With so much money advanced to the silladars, and so much responsibility on the shoulders of the overworked COs, ‘it appears to me that an inextricable confusion of accounts will hereafter ensue,’ he wrote prophetically.8 1st Regiment had set off in ragged civilian calico clothes, suitable for summer but not for an arduous campaign in the autumn rains. In desperation, Becher bought winter clothing for the men, which provided some military appearance until their uniforms finally arrived in December. Poor Becher, whose health was breaking down (he had to be carried in a doolie during the action at Bagrode),



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found the cost of the clothing stopped from his pay because he had not followed correct procedure. Michel supported him: ‘The necessity for clothing, was absolute, the Regiment was in chase of Tantia Topee’s rebels, there was no difference in the appearance of Lieutenant Colonel Becher’s men from that of the rebels, except that they were, if any thing, more ragged. If met by our troops, and no British Officer near with them, they would infallibly have been attacked, and the most disastrous consequences would have ensued.’ Michel later said that he could not have taken them on service if Becher had not supplied the warm clothing. Beatson took a different line: as early as March he had instructed the COs to order cloth from Bombay, in May he noted that the Government had ‘very liberally’ advanced public money to them for equipping their regiments ‘immediately’, and in June he had ordered: ‘Officers are requested to bear constantly in mind that the force may, at any time, be ordered to move from Jaulna; every hour is therefore of importance to make arrangements for completing the clothing and equipment of the men.’ Becher had not carried out his orders. Campbell agreed that Becher had to pay, but he died the following year and the Government never recovered the money.9

Frayed tempers In August Sylvester noted additional officers ‘put in orders’ for the force, leading Beatson to hope that he would be directed to raise a third regiment, but his optimism was misplaced. When one of these extra officers turned up, Beatson sent him away again, to Bombay’s fury. Beatson claimed that the young man had turned down a temporary appointment with Becher’s regiment, which ‘certainly did not give me a good opinion of Lieut Johnston’s military zeal and I was therefore uncommonly glad to get rid of him particularly as he was of no use as an officer’. To Beatson, as to his idol Sir Charles Napier, ‘want of zeal is a floorer!’10 Beatson’s temper had been badly frayed by his Dardanelles experiences, and his chance to redeem his reputation by active service seemed to be slipping away, so it is not surprising that relations with his officers were strained. But disputes between the officers themselves were just as much a feature of Beatson’s Horse as the Bundlecund Legion or Bashi-Bazouks. When Edmund Wood took over from Becher, he and Thurburn argued so fiercely that it led to a court of inquiry and both had to leave. The new adjutant, Lt James Becher Tudor, also fell out with Wood and soon left – but he had probably only come in the hope of serving with his uncle Lt Col Becher. Wood seems to have been a hard taskmaster, much esteemed by Beatson. His successor, Henry Evelyn Wood (no relation) – another ‘zealous’ officer, who got on well with Beatson – had to use guile to get Sylvester and the next adjutant to talk to each other.11 More immediately, Wilson resigned from command of 2nd Regiment in August 1858; ‘no wonder, the Commanding Officers have no power whatever,’ noted

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Sylvester.12 Yet given Becher’s poor administrative record, Beatson probably felt that he had given his COs too much leeway. Younger officers like Charles Lennox, who took over 2nd Regiment, were kept very much under Beatson’s eye during the coming campaign. (Lennox, a grandson of the Duke of Richmond, was aged only 23;13 Evelyn Wood14 – appointed Brigade Major in the new year and later CO of 1st Regiment – was even younger.)

Constant readiness Beatson’s insistence on readiness to move at short notice had been a hobbyhorse since his days with the Bundlecund Legion and Hyderabad Cavalry, who were always ready to pursue dacoits or troublesome Rohillas. Sylvester recalled that the only furniture in Beatson’s quarters at Jalna was ‘a bed in the adjoining room and the table at which he sat’; The remaining necessaries of life were always kept in his holsters ready for any emergency. Ordering his saddle to be brought, he emptied them on the table while the Dekkan nobles (as he characterised his native officers) looked on without a smile. I cannot recall all the items which were produced: a hoof pick, piece of soap, a tin cup, a powder horn, wads and bullets, a loaf of bread, some tea, and a towel occur to me.

Sylvester thought this little episode was ‘puerile’ and disliked Beatson’s lifestyle, preferring the officers’ mess of the 1st Regiment – ‘Thank Heavens! they were not Spartans’.15 Evelyn Wood remembered: The General ordered me – for though put as an invitation it was practically an order – to come and live with him, stating he lived ‘Camp fashion’ and our fare would be plain. Plain it was, but this did not disturb me so much as the want of refinement. He had lived in great discomfort, with iron cups and metal plates, which were seldom washed.

Contrast this with Beatson’s reputation as a ‘prince in hospitality’, serving excellent dinners to his officers at the Dardanelles where he had Marian to rule over his household. Evelyn Wood claimed that his khansama soon improved the cooking of Beatson’s meals. (However, Wood’s own standards left something to be desired: in later years the Duke of Cambridge complained about ‘the noise, the dirt, and the terrible meals’ when visiting Wood’s headquarters.)16 Certainly, Beatson could be eccentric in his behaviour. His nephew tells of an instance when the officers of Beatson’s Horse were sitting around the small table for chota haziree (light breakfast) after morning parade. ‘Beatson suddenly drew his sword, and made a smart cut at the helmet of one of the officers, who,



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naturally looking up from his tea, inquired the reason for such an assault. “I only wanted to find out whether or not your helmet was sword-proof” coolly replied Beatson.’17 But Beatson’s insistence on preparedness eventually paid off. On 16 November news arrived that ‘a large rebel force is on the north bank of the Taptee … and they are supposed to be moving towards Boorhanpoor [Burhanpur]’. Beatson was requested to ‘march a light column by forced marches’ towards the town.18 The war was finally coming to him. Within 24 hours he had ridden out at the head of a smart-looking regiment – unlike Becher, the efficient Wilson had ordered 2nd Regiment’s uniforms from Bombay in good time.19 Together with troops from Burhanpur, this regiment would form the ‘Jalna Field Force’ (JFF) under Beatson’s command. Burhanpur was a once-prosperous market town where the old Mogul road from Hindustan to the Deccan crossed the River Tapti, about 120 miles from Jalna. North of the town and commanding the road lay the ancient fort of Asigarh, sited on a spur of the Satpura hills that dominate the country between the Tapti and the Nerbudda rivers.20 The fort was occupied by a detachment of HM’s 18th Foot, The Royal Irish. They had plenty of combat experience in China, Burma and the Crimea, and were disgusted to be stationed in this tedious backwater, of which the locals said: ‘Chahar chiz ast tohfaye Burhan Gard, garma, gada-o-goristan’ (‘Burhanpur is noted for four things – dust, heat, beggars and graveyards’).21

On Tantya’s approach, this suddenly became a key position and the 18th was ordered to send a detachment down to help defend the town. This looked like being a sacrificial force, but when the assistant surgeon made his rounds, ‘I found every sick man in war paint. My acting hospital sergeant said there was not much the matter with them; they had heard there was to be a fight that night, and wanted to join the party going.’ So he discharged them to take their places in the forlorn hope.22 Having these keen Irishmen in his force must have reminded Beatson of his first command, when he led the Munster Light Infantry. He was also given a detachment of Bombay Foot Artillery with European gunners, and a company of Bombay Native Infantry. The ‘Peshwa’s Army’ under Tantya numbered about 6,000, some being mutineers from Becher’s old 8th Bengal Irregular Cavalry, the Gwalior Contingent, and Beatson’s former regiment, the 54th BNI. They had 18 elephants and 200 camels with them.23 Having crossed the Nerbudda, they were barred from the Deccan by the Hyderabad Contingent and were pursued by other columns, including Becher’s, so they turned west. Tantya aimed to cross the

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Tapti at Burhanpur and move south into the country claimed by Nana Sahib, but Beatson’s prompt appearance made that too dangerous, so he cut northwestwards, hoping to recross the Nerbudda unseen. Pursued by Highlanders riding camels, he abandoned his guns and on 23 November made it back across the Nerbudda, ‘marking his route by fire and plunder’.24 This news caused panic at Indore and its cantonment of Mhow, so the Resident, Sir Robert Hamilton, summoned Michel and Becher. He also wrote to Asirgarh: ‘Pray send us as many Europeans and men as you can spare, as quickly as possible, for there is not time to be lost.’25 Beatson was already on his way, having learned of Tantya’s movements from his own sources. He ordered Becher to force-march to Indore and informed Michel that Having just received intelligence that Tantia Topee has crossed the Nerbudda … and that the Asseerghur line is threatened … I think I can do no wrong in moving to Asseerghur in anticipation of your instructions to move further north, where it appears to me that operations must now be carried on.26

Knowing that detachments of the Hyderabad Contingent were nearby, Beatson was confident that Burhanpur was safe, so he marched towards Mhow the following day (1 December), expecting to reach it in four marches of 19–28 miles: The Bandies attached to the European Infantry and Artillery preclude my proposing to make longer marches; but if the state of the country between this and Mhow will admit of the guns and infantry being left without cavalry, I could push on with that at a greater rate if Cavalry are so urgently required as to render it advisable to risk the guns and Infantry without a Cavalry escort.

As Sylvester commented, the nature of this campaign was such that ‘The larger the force and heavier the impedimenta, the smaller the chance of success. Those alone without wheeled carriage could follow the track when Tantia discarded his guns.’ As we have seen, Beatson was always opposed to bullock carts on the march, preferring to rely on pack ponies, but European troops, and especially gunners with all their equipment, had to have hackeries or bandies.27

Beatson’s last campaign Michel welcomed Beatson’s initiative because Becher was moving too slowly. Beatson noted with satisfaction that this was despite Becher having ‘the lightest Force in the field, Horse Artillery, Hussars, Lancers, and Irregular Cavalry, while I had outmarched him with Foot Artillery and Infantry along with my Irregular Cavalry’. His deteriorating relationship with Becher was not improved when



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Hamilton ordered Beatson to halt at the Nerbudda crossing at Khalghat, one march short of Mhow, and he accused Hamilton of favouritism towards his subordinate. Beatson considered that he could have caught Tantya if allowed to proceed. ‘By the time I got there, a change had come over the spirit of Sir Robert’s dream: the Indore panic had disappeared, which [previously] caused him to apply for troops … at any price and at any place.’28 The JFF now settled down to patrol the river crossings near Khalghat. The Nerbudda (modern Narmada) runs in a narrow, forested valley between the Satpura hills to the south and Vindhya hills to the north. The river is steeply banked, seldom more than 150 yards broad, with frequent rocky outcrops in the stream. The hills formed an undulating table-land, a succession of stony ridges and narrow valleys covered by abundant jungle inhabited by aboriginal tribes like the Bhils. The countryside was a patchwork of lands belonging to Sindhia of Gwalior, Holkar of Indore, and the state of Dhar, currently under confiscation because the boy-raja’s regents had supported the mutineers.29 For a few days all was quiet, then a party of rebels evaded Becher ‘and even the posts of one of the best Irregular cavalry officers in India, Major Abbott’, as Beatson described him – this was the same Abbott whom Beatson once wanted to sack in Hyderabad.30 On 15 December Holkar’s officials brought intelligence that these ‘3 or 400 rebels were expected to encamp at Boolukwara [Balakwara] … they said 10 miles off. I immediately marched with 300 sabres by foot-path across the hills, in hopes of surprising them’. Beatson reasoned that even if he didn’t catch the rebels he could drive them into the arms of the infantry and artillery, which he sent round to Thikri by the Trunk Road. My Guides, whether by accident or design, took me 20 miles instead of 10, so I did not reach Boolukwara till midnight, and found no rebels. On arrival here, Major Barrow* heard of some rebels, said to be 3 or 400 in the hills near this, and was out the greater part of the night with the Royal Irish, looking out for them, but without success. Having left tents, bazar and baggage with Major Barrow’s column, I returned here [Thikri] with the Cavalry about 2 P.M. to-day, when I heard that the rebels had gone to the west. I immediately started off all the horses that were fresh to guard the fords at Mohapoora Duttora [Moipura and Datwari], and shall follow with my whole Force as soon as the men and horses are rested and fed.

As promised, he made a march of 30 miles and reached the fords in time to prevent the rebels crossing to the north bank, and they took refuge in the Satpura hills.32

* John Borrow (not Barrow) was senior Major of 1/18th Foot, and by seniority was 2i/c of the JFF.31

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His appearance was so unexpected that villagers fled to Indore reporting that rebels had arrived. Hamilton demanded an explanation, and Beatson delighted in telling him that the body of ‘rebels’ ‘was composed of the 18th Royal Irish, the Bombay Artillery, and Beatson’s Horse’.33 Beatson, like all the column commanders, was suffering from lack of intelligence. ‘From what I saw of the hill road last night and to-day, I am convinced that I cannot stop the rebels moving to the west without a first-rate Intelligence department, and a Force of Infantry as well as cavalry in the hills.’ De Salis similarly complained of chasing rebels, about whom they could get little information, while the villages warned the rebels of the approach of the British ‘& give them time to slip through what otherwise might be reasonably called the butter fingers of our generals’.34 Ten days later, Beatson got word of the same party trying to cross the river, near ‘Balkooa, under Daba Bowrie’ (probably Balkhar, some three miles south-east of Khalghat). As he cabled Hamilton: ‘At midnight heard of rebels here; marched immediately with 100 Europeans and 200 Sowars of 2nd Regiment Beatson’s Horse; rebels had gone into the Satpoora Hills; sent to the Berwanee [Barwani] for Guides, and shall follow into the hills as soon as I get any person to show me the road.’ He did so, penetrating the hills as far as ‘Salond’ (probably Silaod), on the ‘Gohee Nuddee’ (Goi River), where they ‘caught one old man and two tattoos, but could find no other traces of the enemy, the jungles being very thick and the foot-paths into the hills almost inaccessible for cavalry’. This was ‘as far as my supplies would admit, which I believe was farther into the hills than British Troops had been before’.35 In case any of the rebels had slipped round behind him, ‘which is by no means improbable from the nature of the country and the extent of the jungles’, Beatson ordered up the rest of 2nd Beatson’s Horse with the tents and baggage, while Borrow established posts at the fords and a depot for the kit of the European soldiers, guarded by the detachment of Native Infantry. Beatson wanted supplies sent up to him, escorted by these Native Infantry, without which he could go no further. Then, realising that the rebels had disappeared again, he fell back to a position from which he could command all the major roads.36 The men of the pursuing columns spent a cheerless festive season. De Salis wrote in a Christmas letter that We have been wandering about after those poor misguided followers of some arch rebels & miscreants who will neither allow them to disband & accept our only too lenient clemency nor can induce them to stand up & fight us manfully. They are now wandering about sticking closely to the dense jungles that separate & divide this country up into fertile tracts & rocky low elevated ranges of hills all covered with thorn plant, through which there are only a few paths which men & beasts may tear their way through in single file & where our Europeans with their baggage & necessaries of life are left long way behind. We are gradually hemming



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them in and better still restoring confidence to the other quietly disposed natives who stay at home … We shall please God finish this laborious work we have now in hand possibly before the hot weather or before some General European war obliges us to withdraw our forces … We have still some 3 months of cool weather before us & we must make the most of it & finish it as well as we can.37

On another occasion, de Salis commented that unless they hunted Tantia Tope the way ‘an Irishman hunts a pig’ they would never catch the slippery rebel. By now the 8th Hussars had been continually on campaign for 11 months, marching thousands of miles, and de Salis was an Acting Brigadier commanding a mixed column including British and Bombay infantry mounted on camels. He was still riding the black charger Drummer Boy that had carried him through the Light Brigade charge.38 Keen young officers found this kind of campaigning a bore, but the jungles teemed with game, and Beatson tried to rouse them: ‘when duty does not require officers in camp there are Tigers, Pigs, and other animals in the neighbourhood, all of which would afford manly sport to young officers; and going after which would be much more creditable to officers than lying in bed on halting days.’ Beatson does not seem to have joined them on shikar – he was no longer young, and nor was De Renzi Brett, who had wrapped up his duties in Bundelkhand and was finally appointed to Beatson’s Horse in December.39

End of the campaign On 25 December Tantya emerged from the hills into Rajputana, and the pursuit began once more, moving further and further from Beatson’s force. However, small parties of Tantya’s supporters remained at large in Central India – the newspapers referred to them as Rohillas, but they were a heterogeneous collection of desperate men, including local Bhils and Bundelas, with a few surviving Mutineers.40 The JFF remained on the Nerbudda to try to stop them crossing. On 4 January, from his camp at Chikalda, Beatson reported his efforts to catch them, a despatch that illustrates his tactical thinking during this frustrating campaign. I have the honor to report that I proceeded yesterday with about 180 sowars and 100 of the 18th Royal Irish to Dhurumraj, where the rebels were reported to be in a strong position in the hills close to the Nerbudda; but I did not find a man, and as the whole of the inhabitants of the country had also disappeared, I could get no information as to where the Rebels had gone. I went up the hills with the infantry, the country being quite impracticable for cavalry; but could find no traces of the rebels, nor any thing to indicate by which of the numerous tracks they had gone.

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… It must be borne in mind that the river is now in a very different state to what it was a month ago: there are fords in all directions … I visited yesterday the part which has always been reported to me as impossible for cavalry, the Hirn Pal or Deersleap,* there is nothing to prevent men passing there, and horses could pass both above and below it. With a party of Infantry on the hill you could command the ford at the Hirn Pal, but the enemy would then go to some of the other fords.

He could see ‘numerous tracks leading from the Nerbudda to the Satpoora Hills’ but while the rebels had Bhil guides, the British forces could get no intelligence. One local official he obtained to guide him into the hills ‘was of no earthly use, so I sent him away. I firmly believe he was in league with the enemy.’ It was impossible to cover all the concealed fords: ‘You cannot prevent parties of 40 or 50 men crossing every day, for it must be recollected that those people have no baggage, and are over and off into the hills in half an hour, where troops with baggage would take a day to cross.’ He considered that the nearby 1st Hyderabad Cavalry might as well be withdrawn and replaced with infantry to cover the hills near the fords. He planned to leave Borrow with one such party, and if he found no enemy in the vicinity he would march back to join the troops concentrating at Mhow for the pursuit of Tantya Tope. But Tantya was long gone, and the remaining troublemakers were drifting south, back into areas that had been thought safe. When the town of Ajanta, far in the rear, was plundered by a body of rebels, Rose himself went after them with a flying column including the rest of the Royal Irish, while the JFF was ordered to Ajanta itself, arriving on 25 January, and there it remained for the next three months. It was effectively the end of Beatson’s last campaign.42

Newspaper war Newspapers in India (whether in English or native languages) were notoriously irreverent about HEIC officials and commanders. Beatson shrugged off lighthearted stories in the Bombay papers that he had ‘made Joe Buggins and his Commissariat Donkey discontented by my long marches’. But a Delhi Gazette story of 1 February deeply upset him, especially when it was widely reprinted around India. The correspondent drew comparisons between the two regiments of Beatson’s Horse. ‘Becher’s Irregulars came in here yesterday … looking rather

* Haranphal, or the Deer’s Leap, is a narrow channel in the Nerbudda about a mile from Dharamraj, where it was popularly supposed that deer could jump across the large rocks obstructing the stream.41



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the worse for wear, but well, considering they were raised only in the middle of the hot season, and have marched over about 1500 miles.’ Beatson, on the other hand, had ‘knocked [his] little force up by marching fruitless long marches … Had he remained as ordered at Adjunta, that place and the surrounding villages would have escaped from the merciless, ruthless hands of those Rohillas.’ Beatson was furious when he read this – he had been operating in accordance with his orders on the Nerbudda while Ajanta was supposed to be covered by other forces. The Delhi Gazette included an erroneous statement that Beatson had captured some elephants from Tantya Tope. He did not know where the paper got this story, but studying the newspaper files we can see that it originated with the Bombay Times, which had confused him with Col Henry Benson, 17th Lancers, commanding another column.43 If he had caught sight of elephants or camels, Beatson wrote, ‘I doubt not, with such admirable Soldiers as I had with me, we should not have been long in taking them.’ Beatson penned a long screed to headquarters justifying his every move in the campaign against the smears of the ‘anonymous assassin’ of the Delhi Gazette. ‘The only regret of those glorious Soldiers of the 18th, of the Bombay Artillery and of Beatson’s Horse,’ he maintained, was that ‘the enemy declined waiting to fight them, and so far from being knocked up by their marches, the men of the 18th expressed regret at going back to Jaulna. I am certain they would have cheerfully made double the marches they had made with the prospect of a fight at the end of them.’ The ‘miserable scribblers’ could not understand the sentiments of ‘that glorious Soldier, Sir Charles Napier, in his address to the Troops after the Hill campaign: “Soldiers! There are different kinds of glory – The glory of battle and the glory of endurance”.’ Miserable scribblers or not, they made ‘serious charges against an officer who has had some experience in command … the slander should not go uncontradicted. I trust therefore that Major General Sir Hugh Rose will give me the means of contradicting it authoritatively.’44 Rose advised him to take no notice, and certainly not to rush into another defamation case. Generously, he stated that ‘Sir Hugh Rose has recently made known to the Commander-in-Chief of the Bombay Army the satisfaction he derived from the manner in which you discharged your duties whilst under his command, and he avails himself of the opportunity of conveying to you his best thanks for the zeal and energy with which you carried out your instructions. He is perfectly aware of your readiness to encounter any hardship or fatigue for the good of the service.’ 45 It was all the thanks Beatson was to get for two years of effort. Unlike most of the other column commanders he never got a CB, nor even a formal mention in despatches.*

* Although one contemporary biographical source refers to Beatson receiving the campaign medal, it is not among his medals in the National Army Museum, nor did Beatson’s Horse appear in the list of units eligible for the ‘Central India’ clasp.46

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Financial fallout One reason for this lack of official recognition may have been concern about his financial dealings. In raising Beatson’s Horse, he had made large, openended commitments. In February 1859 the army’s Auditor General began asking questions of the paymaster at Hyderabad, who had advanced Rs 475,508 to Beatson over the previous 12 months, of which only Rs 28,880 had been refunded. The worried paymaster begged him to provide receipts so that he could adjust ‘this enormous balance’. Beatson explained that he had discontinued the deductions from sillidars’ pay while they were in service, but would now reinstate them so that the advances would eventually be paid off. ‘Five lakhs of Rupees for two regiments of cavalry ready for the field in six months, nearly the whole of which sum will be repaid to Government in about 8 years – what could be better!’ he added, cheerfully missing the point. He promised to send the accounts, which would have been done sooner had he not been constantly on the march.47 Beatson assembled a committee at Ajanta under Brett to consider the debts of Beatson’s Horse. He assumed that this absolved him from further responsibility, but the report simply listed the payments, some for relatively small amounts. The Auditor General could not quibble with paying for ammunition camels, but baulked at reimbursing a dealer whose horses had died on the road, or for sharpening the men’s swords and providing wooden scabbards.48 The real concern was over the large amounts advanced to relatively small numbers of officers and silladars, apparently without security. This was a longstanding problem with the silladar system. In the 1840s Fraser worried about the huge debts owed by the officers and men of the Hyderabad Cavalry. Debt was cited as one of the reasons for dissatisfaction in the 10th Bengal Irregular Cavalry (ex-Bundlecund Legion), leading to its disbandment in 1857. (The opportunity to disavow debts by changing sides was a constant temptation in traditional Indian armies.)49

Hot weather Edmund Wood had taken over as CO of 1st Regiment after Becher’s death. His replacement as Brigade Major was Lt Henry Evelyn Wood of HM’s 17th Lancers, a promising young officer who, having served as a midshipman with the Naval Brigade at Sevastopol, found that he preferred war on land and transferred to the cavalry. He led a troop of Bombay Light Cavalry at Sindwa and charged the enemy almost single-handed. De Salis commended Wood’s bravery and Michel mentioned him in despatches.50 Evelyn Wood later wrote a pen portrait of Beatson at this point in his career:



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[He had] a handsome face, was 5 feet 7 inches in height, weighing 14 stone. He was a man of remarkable energy, always riding an hour before daylight. He was not particular about uniform, but insisted on a sword always being worn, and went so far in being ready for service as to ride daily with a supply of groceries in his wallets, he worked all the forenoon, and dined at two o’clock, riding again between four and five, had some tea at seven and went to bed at nine o’clock.51

Much as he liked his new commander, Evelyn Wood found him distracted from military duties by preparations for his slander action. The writ had been served on Skene after Beatson’s departure for India, and his solicitors had been preparing the case. At the beginning of March 1859 he learned that it was to be heard in London on 12 June. He immediately telegraphed for six months’ leave to attend the trial, hoping to be back in time for the next cold weather campaigning season. Hearing nothing after almost a month, he became anxious and fired off repeated requests to Bombay, Simla and Calcutta. This was classic Beatson: by trying to do things too quickly and informally, he created administrative chaos. Having been in the jungle, he had not checked the new furlough regulations, nor had he seen an order that all telegrams should be followed up by written confirmation. In fact his telegrams were not getting through. Sloppy work by telegraph operators (or was it his handwriting?) meant that his messages to the Adjutant-General of the Bengal Army were going to the AG Bengal Artillery, and replies were coming to Ahmadabad instead of Ahmadnagar (the nearest telegraph office to Ajanta). He was reprimanded for cluttering the telegraph with private messages, and instructed to put his request in writing.52 Sitting in his quarters, with nothing much to do in the hot weather, Beatson responded with a long letter to Birch, explaining the background to the court case and giving vent to his animosity against Skene. ‘The opportunity I scented of bringing him face to face with myself in the witness box did not suit the Levantine Consul who made his escape from England as soon as he got a hint of my intention of bringing him before a British jury.’ One wonders what the busy administrator thought of receiving this irrelevant rant! Beatson concluded that it was a convenient time for him to be away because ‘owing to the monsoon, Military operations must necessarily be at a standstill’.53 No one raised any objection to him taking unpaid leave, but the confusion meant that he missed both the 26 April and 12 May steamers from Bombay, so his solicitor had to get the trial postponed to December. Beatson now proposed to leave Aurungabad in August, sail from Bombay in September, and return to his command in March.54

Planning a future In April 1859 Tantya Tope was finally betrayed, captured by Meade’s Horse, tried and executed.55 The only outlaws remaining were Rohillas, Arabs and common

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dacoits – the same troublemakers whom the Hyderabad Contingent regularly chased in peacetime. What the Central Indian provinces needed now was their own mobile irregular force like the Hyderabad Cavalry or the Scinde Horse. Beatson filled his last weeks in command by making proposals about the future role for Beatson’s Horse. He recommended Harsul (two miles outside Aurungabad) as HQ for both regiments. From there, with a few detachments, ‘the whole country to the Nerbudda might be watched’. Although he envisaged the role as being local, ‘At the same time I wish it to be understood that Beatson’s Horse are available for service in any part of the world.’56 This is more or less what eventually emerged but, in the meantime, far more irregular cavalry had been raised during the Mutiny than could be justified for peacetime duty and the Government was desperate to make cuts. As a first move they reduced the establishment of every regiment by 80 sowars. Beatson pointed out that if this was applied to his regiments before the advances had been paid off, the public purse would lose about Rs 4 a month for each horse. His recruitment methods, with money paid off over seven or eight years, were suitable for permanent regiments, but Beatson’s Horse (like many other units) had been intended for war service only. Canning considered that one or both regiments could be transferred to the Bombay Army and based at Jalna, but Sir Colin Campbell – now created Lord Clyde for his victories – ‘conceives they are hardly wanted anywhere and might, he suggests, be disbanded’.57

Life after Beatson Both regiments of Beatson’s Horse were called out again in the next campaigning season, with young Evelyn Wood in command of 1st Regiment. In December he led a small party of his sowars and police to surprise a large band of dacoits and release a hostage. In combination with his bravery at Sindwa the previous year, this exploit won Wood a VC.58 But Beatson was no longer in command. On 11 September the P&O steamer Columbian left for Aden and Suez, with Beatson listed as a passenger bound for Marseilles.59 As soon as he had gone, Clyde decided that the organisation of Beatson’s Horse was ‘most inconvenient and expensive’, and that the two regiments should become independent under their own COs, leading to a ‘considerable saving of expense’ because ‘the services of Colonel Beatson and his Brigade Major can then be altogether dispensed with’. Beatson thereby lost his command.60 Within months, both regiments were merged with the two of Mayne’s Horse and with Meade’s Horse, the five being reduced to two regiments known as the Central India Horse (CIH, or the Be Number Rissalla – ‘No Number Cavalry’). The CIH served directly under the Government of India, tasked with the internal security role that Beatson himself had sketched. In later years they developed an enviable reputation for efficiency, reckless daring and ‘a light-



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hearted dislike of red tape and pipeclay’ – all attributes that Beatson instilled in his commands.61 Yet the birth of this force was unhappy. The reorganisation was carried out by Harry Mayne, with whom Beatson had clashed when he was Colin Mackenzie’s Brigade Major. Drawing up the final accounts of his regiment, Evelyn Wood found a financial and organisational mess, the result of Beatson’s over-hasty recruitment. With wholesale disbandment hanging over the regiment, discipline was poor, and in an eerie reprise of the Bashi-Bazouks, Wood found himself confronted by a round-robin written in mutinous language by his native officers, whom he had to face down. In the end Wood selected only 100 of his own men for the combined regiments and made up the numbers with disbanded sowars from Hodson’s Horse.62 This does not reflect well on Beatson’s reputation for training, but as Wood implies, Beatson had been too busy preparing his case against Skene to give his full attention to his ramshackle command.

17 TALK OF THE TOWN

It is never difficult to distinguish between a Scotsman with a grievance and a ray of sunshine P.G. Wodehouse

W

hile Evelyn Wood and other young men made their names in India, snuffing out the last embers of the Mutiny, Beatson went into battle for his own reputation. During his absence his solicitors Pemberton & Meynell had been preparing his case. John Gray, QC, advised that it hinged on proving that Skene had spoken the alleged words to Shirley: ‘the Plaintiff might call Coll Shirley if his evidence could be relied on, but the easier and better course will be to prove them by the Defendant’s own admission in his examination before the Court of Inquiry.’1 The solicitors therefore requested a copy of the evidence taken at the inquiry held in Whitehall Yard. The Judge Advocate General (JAG) decided that the inquiry’s minutes fell into the category of documents that ministers could lawfully refuse to release, and as Panmure had already rejected a similar request from Skene’s lawyers, Beatson’s should also be rebuffed.2 This was a crucial decision, as later events would prove, but it was open to challenge. The Government’s attitude towards release of documents was hardening. In December 1858 Wellington Guernsey, the songwriter and former TC officer who had supplied Beatson with malicious gossip on Vivian, had been tried at the Old Bailey on a charge of stealing Colonial Office documents that subsequently appeared in the Daily News. The Defence successfully argued that Guernsey had merely borrowed the papers for the purpose of leaking them to the press and he was acquitted. In the absence of an Official Secrets Act he had committed no crime, but Whitehall became increasingly concerned about internal documents getting into the public domain.3 In the final weeks before Beatson versus Skene opened, Henry White of Pemberton & Meynell tried again to obtain WO documents, issuing a subpoena for a long list of despatches and letters that had passed between Panmure, Stratford,

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Vivian and Smith at the time of Beatson’s sacking and of Shirley’s inspection.4 The new Secretary of State for War was Sidney Herbert, a Liberal friend of Florence Nightingale who has gone down in history as one of the great army reformers. But in this case he proved as intransigent as Panmure, whose assistant he had been. The WO’s solicitor, Charles Clode, advised that if ministers refused the papers, the parties concerned could apply to the Court of Queen’s Bench to force their disclosure. Instead, Clode cited the case of Home versus Bentinck where the WO had obeyed the subpoena and delivered the documents into court, but persuaded the judge not to allow them as evidence on the grounds of confidentiality.5 He advised the JAG to follow that precedent.6

Beatson’s day in court The case of Beatson versus Skene began at 10.00 on Friday 13 January 1860 (an inauspicious day) in the Exchequer Court off Westminster Hall. It was eagerly awaited by London Society, involving as it did a galaxy of exotic military officers and some of the most prominent and expensive advocates of the day. It was held before a senior exchequer judge (or ‘baron’), Sir George Bramwell, sitting with a special jury drawn from the County of Middlesex. Bramwell was popular with barristers who appeared before him, ‘owing to his kindness, good humour, and businesslike grasp of affairs’. Nevertheless, he was no soft touch, being regarded as ‘one of the strongest judges that ever sat on the bench’. Skene – who was not present, being still en poste at Aleppo – was defended by William Bovill, QC, MP, assisted by Robert Lush, QC, and Robert Garth. Bovill and Lush were recognised as the leading advocates on the home circuit. Bovill was a patient, courteous man. Lush was small and unassuming in appearance, and delicate in constitution. Their junior, Garth, was quite the opposite: a noted cricketer for Eton College and Oxford University, he was described as ‘a bluff, genial, fresh-complexioned man’ and later in his career ‘looked more like a country squire or naval officer than a judge’. Although John Gray, QC, had prepared the case for the Plaintiff, he was only to assist, together with Henry Hawkins, QC. As lead counsel, Pemberton & Meynall had retained Edwin James, QC, MP. This choice was a gamble. As a young man James had been an actor, but ‘his appearance was against him’ because ‘he looked like a prize-fighter’. James then abandoned one theatre for another, being called to the bar, where his histrionics appealed to juries even though his knowledge of law was alleged to be limited. He had built a considerable practice, being described by the Spectator as ‘a leader in all actions for seduction, breach of promise of marriage, assault, and false imprisonment, and in all cases that involved the reputation of an actress or a horse’. By 1860 he was reputed to be making £7,000 a year and had become a Palmerstonian MP.7 James’s Liberal credentials may have commended him to Beatson, but he was another of those



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flashy, eccentric or downright dubious characters to whom the General seems to have been attracted.

Opening moves The Defence entered a plea of ‘not guilty’ for their absent client. James then opened the case for the Plaintiff, explaining that Beatson had brought the action to vindicate his character as an officer and a gentleman, ‘from the aspersions which had been cast upon it by the Defendant’. Skene had alleged that he had excited the troops under his command to mutinous conduct: ‘No charges more serious could be made against a soldier.’ James outlined Beatson’s instructions from Clarendon to command the Bashi-Bazouks, his service at Balaklava and Inkerman, the raising of the irregular cavalry in British pay, and his supersession by Smith. He then read out the words of the alleged libel (see p. 264). James next called Beatson to the witness box. Gray had advised from the start that Beatson must appear in person to clear his name, but in any case it is hard to imagine Beatson refusing such an opportunity to rehearse once more the wrongs done him. This was for the benefit of the public and press galleries as much as judge and jury. In those days newspapers reported important cases almost verbatim, and Beatson wanted his revenge on Skene and the WO to be as public as possible. Under James’s questioning, Beatson gave his account of the Bashi-Bazouks and the obstacles that had hindered him: The Turks were jealous that an Englishman* should succeed in doing that in which they had failed, and the French were jealous because one of their African generals had failed in organising them. I had differences with General Neill. I thought he interfered too much, and I told him so. I afterwards told Mr Skene that if he continued to associate himself with General Neill I could no longer receive him in my house on the same terms as heretofore. A coolness then arose between Mr Skene and myself.

Panmure’s despatch refusing Beatson’s resignation and placing him under Vivian’s command was then read to the court. Next, the WO clerk Robert Thompson was called upon to produce Beatson’s reply, listed in White’s subpoena. Instead, Thompson handed the judge a letter from Sidney Herbert politely refusing to produce the document. Bramwell decided that James could not compel the document to be produced, and advised him to call Thompson under the subpoena. James opted to subpoena Herbert himself.8

* In common with many nineteenth-century Scots, Beatson routinely referred to himself as an ‘Englishman’.

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While the new subpoena was being served elsewhere in the Palace of Westminster, James and Hawkins took Beatson through subsequent events, leading up to the Court of Inquiry itself. Then, using Hackett’s notes of the Inquiry, Beatson related Skene’s response to the question he had put to him about the allegations: ‘Mr Skene replied. “I made that statement to General Shirley, or something to the same purport”.’ Skene had also acknowledged that he had made no inquiries as to the truth of the allegations, but merely mentioned them in conversation as ‘a subject which had passed by but was still talked of’. Having laid out the key points of Beatson’s case, James sat down. Cross-examined by Bovill on the disturbances at the Dardanelles, Beatson observed dryly that ‘It is not an uncommon thing for Bashi-Bazouks to kill one another – that is a thing thought nothing of’ – which produced laughter in the courtroom. There was further laughter when Beatson described his men taking the Frenchmen prisoner in the vineyards. He was quizzed on his relationship with Skene and the officers mentioned in the allegation, and why the case had been so long delayed so that none of them were in court. When he explained that he had taken six months’ unpaid leave for the case, the judge genially remarked that it would not last six months, ‘besides, it is a rather expensive leave’. Now the case ran into problems. When Thompson was called to produce the next document, the proceedings of the Court of Inquiry, he informed the judge that Cambridge and Herbert would not reveal it unless the court ordered it. Over James’s objections, Bramwell ruled that the CinC and Secretary of State were the best judges of public interest. By now Herbert had arrived in court in response to the subpoena, and he was called to produce the other letters. He declined to do so, claiming that they were confidential reports, even though James argued that they were Beatson’s own letters to Panmure. Again, the judge accepted the Government’s right to withhold documents in the public interest.* This was a huge setback to Beatson’s case. Like a great shikari, he had patiently stalked Skene through the Whitehall jungle, using Shirley as a tethered goat to flush his prey from cover. Now his ring of legal elephants had surrounded the helpless quarry and he was ready to make the killing shot – but his primary weapon had misfired because Sidney Herbert refused to hand him the ammunition. The fact that he had attacked Panmure and the WO so vigorously for so long may well have influenced the decision against him, but as the judge remarked, at least Herbert had been even-handed in refusing documents to both sides.9

* Ministers’ use of Public Interest Certificates remains controversial today, notably in the ‘Arms to Iraq’ trial in 1992.



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Burton sparkles Despite the underlying drama, these legal arguments must have seemed rather dry to the jury and gallery. Now they were treated to some light relief. This time, unlike the Whitehall Yard Inquiry, Burton was available to give evidence in person. He and Speke had re-emerged into civilisation in March 1859. Together they had reached their objective, Lake Tanganyika, but then Speke on a solo trek came upon an even greater lake, which he named Victoria, and correctly deduced that it was the true source of the Nile. Burton refused to believe him and then made the mistake of lingering while Speke went straight to London to report his version of events to the Royal Geographical Society. This created a sensation, and when Burton arrived a fortnight later he found ‘the ground completely cut from under my feet’. The journey had taken its toll, and Burton was described on his return as ‘wild-eyed and so gaunt and emaciated that the flesh hung in hollows on his cheeks’. He fell into a deep depression. But by January 1860 Burton’s mood had lifted with devoted help from Isabel Arundell. She was among the crowd in the public gallery to see Burton entertain the court with his waspish humour. For example, Bovill asked him in crossexamination: ‘In what regiment did you serve under the Plaintiff?’ ‘Eh?’ ‘In what regiment, I say…’ ‘In no regiment.’ Eventually, Burton condescended to inform Bovill that he had served in a ‘corps’.10* Burton’s version of his argument with O’Reilly was that it hinged on a misunderstanding of the Irishman’s words ‘You shan’t resign’ – ‘he came from the “Emerald Isle” and his “shan’t” meant “can’t”.’ To O’Reilly’s reported threat to arrest Burton if he came near his regiment, the fencing master replied, ‘No such thing could have occurred between two armed men without consequences following, which have not.’ As Burton’s former partner, John Speke, wrote to a friend, ‘Wont Burton give [O’Reilly] a good hyding [sic] the next time he catches him.’12 Next into the witness box was Edward Watt, but he could add little, because he joined the Bashi-Bazouks after Burton and Berkeley had left, and Shirley had never mentioned Skene’s allegations to him.

Case for the Defence Bovill began the Defence case by asking why Beatson had persisted in bringing the action even though his good name had already been cleared by the Inquiry. Bovill actually answered his own question when he stated that Skene could lose * Coincidentally, Burton also gave evidence at the celebrated Tichborne Claimant trial in 1871–2, over which Bovill presided and Gray and Hawkins appeared on opposing sides.11

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his consular post if he was found to have ‘wantonly and maliciously circulated unfounded falsehoods’ – that was the point: Beatson desired his destruction. The judge intervened to suggest that if Beatson’s character was no longer in question the two sides could ‘make an arrangement’. But Bovill and James could not agree, so the case continued. Bovill then argued that Skene’s comments to Shirley were a confidential communication, and he had given his sources (O’Reilly and Shelley), so why was Beatson not pursuing the others? He went on to quote Beatson’s own writings against him: In his pamphlet General Beatson charged everybody with malevolence. He accused Lord Stratford de Redcliffe with ‘implacable illwill’, General Mansfield with ‘abominable falsehoods’, Lord Panmure with ‘breach of faith’. Entertaining these opinions, no doubt conscientiously, was it to be wondered at that he charged Mr Skene with malicious falsehoods?

Bovill pointed out that Skene had only passed on what O’Reilly, Shelley and Calvert had told him. ‘Mr Skene did no more than he considered he was bound to do as a public servant.’13

The case continues The court adjourned for the day after Bovill’s opening speech. He was not present when proceedings resumed the following morning. The first Defence witness was Frederick Calvert (who happened to be in London to fight charges of profiteering from the WO).14 He started to explain the disturbances among the Bashi-Bazouks, until he was interrupted by the judge pointing out that they were not trying Beatson, but the words spoken by Skene. Calvert then described the dinner party he had held for Smith and his staff at which Skene, O’Reilly and Shelley had been present. This was when conversation turned to threats of resignation over Beatson’s conduct, and rumours of mutinous round-robins. Cross-examined by James, Calvert caused laughter when he said that he had heard that Beatson wanted him ‘hanged out of the way’. Lush next called Arthur Shirley, who recollected that Skene had volunteered the information about the rumours, and that Shelley had also told him of his and O’Reilly’s response to the bedside meeting. Unlike Beatson, he saw nothing unusual in not revealing to an officer what was said about him in a confidential report. Sir Robert Vivian was next up, to answer Garth’s questions, confirming that it was within Skene’s duties to report every matter concerning the Bashi-Bazouks to Shirley. Vivian had found it ‘repulsive’ that this had led to an inquiry about which Beatson knew nothing, and he had tried to make amends by supplying Beatson with the document.



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Bovill now made a dramatic entrance to present the jury with a copy of Beatson’s own pamphlet, implying that it was sufficient to clear his client. He concluded the Defence case by saying that he was instructed to say that ‘his client believed General Beatson to be a gentleman’. James the former actor then deployed his own theatrical skills: Why, what a miserable equivocation! A gentleman was to have his character destroyed, and then be told he was believed to be a gentleman. The calumnies had been spread and had not been withdrawn, and even now they would not withdraw them. What was the cause of them? Why, a miserable truckling to the authorities. General Beatson had announced his intention of laying his case before Parliament, and these charges were brought forward for the purpose of crushing the man who sought to right himself …

At this point Bramwell called out, ‘Usher, just find those persons who are applauding, and turn them out. They are not fit to be in a decent court of justice.’ Clearly, the gallery – probably including Marian Beatson and the girls, as well as Isabel Arundell – was enjoying the performance. James continued in similar vein at some length, even working in a reference to Marathon and Thermopylae, and concluding with ‘the only legacy [a] brave and upright officer can leave to his children – the unstained honour of an English soldier’. Summing up for the jury, Bramwell reminded them that the charges Shirley had made against Beatson were very serious, and if untrue they were slanderous. He concluded that the case hung on the defence of Privilege. If Skene had simply retailed gossip, he must be held responsible, but if he had made the statement without malice and in the course of his duties, it was privileged and he was protected even if it slandered Beatson. The jury retired for about an hour and a half to consider their verdict. On returning, the foreman announced that ‘they had found a verdict for the defendant on the ground that the communications were privileged, but they wished to express an opinion that, on discovering how unfounded the reports were, the defendant ought to have thought it proper to withdraw his statement’. Bovill remarked that there had been ‘communication’ between Skene and Beatson ‘and it must not be supposed the defendant had done nothing to settle this matter. Even now with the consent of the plaintiff, he would, on the part of the defendant, make a statement.’ This was no time to negotiate with a man famous for his towering rages, and Beatson refused to hear Bovill’s statement, denying that there had been any contact between himself and Skene. One can imagine his legal team hustling the angry old soldier out of the court before he made things worse.15

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Victory in defeat Although Beatson had been defeated, the press and public regarded the case as a moral victory for him. ‘How very elegantly both Beatson and Burton have come out in the court!’, Speke wrote.16 The editorial and correspondence columns of the Morning Advertiser thundered against Bramwell’s summing up: ‘a monstrous piece of toadyism’, ‘bent judges’, and ‘twaddle’ that had ‘neutralised’ James’s ‘fervent rhetoric’. According to one observer the verdict was ‘entirely contrary’ to the evidence. To another, Bramwell’s interpretation of privilege left the character of every Crown servant ‘at the mercy of any unprincipled person in office’. Several correspondents mentioned Beatson’s loss of pay in coming from India for the case – as the Naval and Military Gazette put it, not only had Skene inflicted a ‘grievous wrong’ on Beatson, but that he had effectively ‘added a very heavy pecuniary fine in the way of expenses’.17 But Beatson and his legal team were not prepared to admit defeat. Within days, James and Gray were back in the Court of Exchequer, appearing before Lord Chief Baron Sir Frederick Pollock and three of his colleagues (including Bramwell) to argue for a new trial. James deployed three arguments: first, that Bramwell should have compelled the production of the documents; secondly that he had misdirected the jury – he should have told them that Skene’s ‘communication’ was not privileged; and thirdly that the verdict was contrary to the evidence. These arguments were sufficient for the court to agree a full hearing to decide if a new trial was justified.18 Beatson was obliged to apply for six months’ further extension of his unpaid leave.19

The Beatsons in Society The new hearing would not be until May, so for now the Beatsons could enjoy London Society. On Saturday 24 March, Queen Victoria, accompanied by Prince Albert and their 16-year-old daughter Princess Alice, held a ‘Drawing Room’ at St James’s Palace, at which many young ladies ‘coming out’ in Society were formally presented to Her Majesty. Among these mostly titled debutantes was ‘Miss May Beatson’, four days short of her 18th birthday, who was presented by her mother, with her father in attendance. Presumably Marian Jane was known as May within the family to distinguish her from her mother Margaret Marian. Etiquette dictated that the lady presenting must herself have been presented at court, but we have no record of this for Mrs Beatson, which might have been around the time of her own 18th birthday (if the Humfrays family was sufficiently grand), or after her husband’s rise to prominence. Families had to apply for the honour of an invitation to the Queen’s Drawing Room, so this reveals the Beatsons as ambitious for a place at the pinnacle of British society – and that they were accepted there, despite William’s notoriety.



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Social acceptance did not come cheaply: Marian and May required formal white court dresses, with train, ostrich feather head-dress and jewels. It was reported that for this occasion the Queen wore a green train trimmed with velvet ribbon and gold braid over a white double-skirt satin petticoat with gold braid and fringe, while Princess Alice’s train was mauve and white trimmed with tulle and bows over a petticoat of white glacé with bouillionnes and bows.20 And the expense did not end there, because the debutante needed a fashionable gown for each of the subsequent balls and dinners she would be invited to during the ‘London Season’. The social season had much in common with the hunting or shooting seasons, only here the prey were eligible upper-crust bachelors. Horsy May Beatson, who had delighted in getting her pony to kick her father’s young staff officers, failed to snare one.

A retrial? The case for a retrial was supposed to be heard on 7 May, but James was engaged in another court that day and Gray appeared before the judges to ask permission to hold it over. The court ruled that ‘it should stand peremptory for the second day’ of the new term’ (Wednesday 23 May). Gray cheekily pointed out that this was Derby Day, ‘but their Lordships made no alteration in their decision’. Doubtless they could see the joke, because everyone knew of Henry Hawkins’s fondness for horseracing,21 and the Beatsons probably wanted to attend as well. The hearing was held on 24 May (the day after Derby Day), but Hawkins was absent anyway, having ‘paired off’ with Lush. The four other counsel were there to argue before the Lord Chief Baron and three other Exchequer Barons (including Bramwell). It is unclear who was paying for Skene’s legal team, but their arguments against a retrial were largely to do with WO protocol and his privileged position lay in his public employment, so one has to conclude that the Government footed the bill. Once again the story of the Bashi-Bazouks at the Dardanelles and Beatson’s arguments with Stratford and Vivian were rehearsed, the voluminous correspondence drawing the sardonic comment from The Times that ‘a flock of geese, a hogshead of ink, and a papermill should form part of a general’s outfit’. Bovill and Garth argued that the judge had no power to compel production of the documents, and Beatson’s pamphlet contained most of them anyway. The nub of their argument was that Skene was acting as private secretary to Vivian and civil commissioner for Stratford when he made the remarks to Shirley, and that ‘it was his duty, which rebutted all imputations of malice’. On James’s third point, the jury had reached their verdict and this should not be disturbed. James and Gray countered that Skene’s words had been slanderous and had been spoken in a conversation that could not be construed as privileged, nor had there been any

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attempt to withdraw them. The judges went away to consider all this, reserving their judgement until 2 June.22 After an anxious week for Beatson and his supporters, the court reassembled on that Saturday morning to hear Pollock deliver the judgement. He first made the point that most of the documents in the subpoena were dated before Skene’s alleged libel, and so could have no bearing on the case. Although Hackett’s notes of the Whitehall inquiry were inadmissable because he was not at the trial to vouch for them, Beatson had suffered no harm from the non-disclosure of the official inquiry record because at no time during the trial had anyone questioned whether Skene had said the words to Shirley, or that he had admitted doing so to the inquiry. Pollock made a lengthy and careful case for confidentiality of Government documents, and for the secretary of state (or in extreme cases the judge) to decide which should remain so. Here the Chief Baron was clarifying the law on public interest certificates for the future guidance of ministers and the legal profession, which gave rise to an approving editorial in the serious-minded Manchester Guardian.23 Once more, Beatson’s battles had influence long after they were over. As for Bramwell having misdirected the jury, his colleagues considered that his summing up had favoured Beatson, but that the jury had properly been left to decide a matter of fact, and that they had decided that the words were privileged. There would be no new trial.24 Defeated and deflated, Beatson had little to do except kill time until he was due to sail back to India in September. But the round of sporting and social activities that constituted the season for the upper classes was not the first thing on the combative General’s mind that summer.

Cavalry debts We have seen that since Beatson left India his regiments had been merged with those of Mayne and Meade. But the transition was not smooth: Mayne and the Governor General’s Agent for Central India, Col Sir Richmond Shakespear, struggled with the large debts owed by the men of Beatson’s Horse. Mayne complained at the high prices Beatson had paid for horses supplied to the men and quoted Michel on the debt situation being a recipe for desertion. Shakespear rebuked him for using expressions that Beatson would find offensive. He reminded Mayne of the difficulties Beatson had overcome, which ‘ought to be a warning to us’, and cautioned that his letter ‘is in reality a severe censure on the proceedings of an officer, very much your superior in rank … I think you cannot be too careful in avoiding expressions prejudicial to Colonel Beatson’. Mayne probably remembered their mutual dislike of 10 years before, but Shakespear (a cousin of Beatson’s friend Henry Shakespear, and formerly Sleeman’s assistant at Gwalior), knew Beatson and his temper,



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and did not relish a defamation claim from the litigious old soldier when he returned.25 Nevertheless, rumours of Mayne’s accusations reached London that summer. One of Beatson’s political friends, Maj George Gavin, MP, buttonholed the India Secretary, Sir Charles Wood, in the lobby of the House of Commons about the rumours and sent him a sheaf of papers showing that Beatson had been given carte blanche when raising his regiments. He also urged Wood to recommend Beatson for an honour. Wood smoothly parried that there was simply ‘an impression that general Beatson had been over-liberal in some of the allowances’, and that recommendations for awards for Turkey or India had to come from the relevant governments.26

Volunteers That summer London was agog with news of Garibaldi’s filibustering expedition to Sicily and subsequent invasion of the Italian mainland in the cause of liberty and unification. Among his Redshirt army was an ‘English Regiment’ – British officered but recruited from the street urchins of Palermo, led by Milordo Colonel Dunne. John Dunne was one of the more romantic Garibaldini, with ‘a share of the mysterious power of Nicholson or Gordon to inspire confidence, discipline and courage into untrained races’, a talent he had developed as an officer of BashiBazouks under Beatson. Other ‘Bazoukers’ among Garibaldi’s followers included Lennox Berkeley commanding a battalion, the egregious Henry Steinbach running the depots, and Daniel Dowling, one of the Royal Artillery serjeants commissioned into the Osmanli Horse Artillery, who ended the campaign as Garibaldi’s Colonel of Artillery.27 Beatson’s Radical friends hero-worshipped Garibaldi. Edwin James visited the great man, and joined in his liberation of Naples in September, even appearing at a skirmish in ‘half-military, half-navvy’ dress, with a pair of pistols stuck piratically in his belt.28 Sympathisers, including Burton’s journalist friend Alfred Bate Richards, began raising a British Legion to join Garibaldi. As with the BAL in Spain, Palmerston winked at this breach of the Foreign Enlistment Act, and the usual rag-tag collection of roughs joined the old soldiers and enthusiastic middleclass volunteers of the ‘Garibaldi Excursionists’.29 If Beatson considered getting involved with this new British Legion – and given his Spanish experience and his contacts in Garibaldi’s camp he may have been sounded out – he was probably wise not to. However, he did lend his name to another Liberal craze sweeping Britain in 1860. Richards, together with Beatson’s patrons, the former BAL Generals de Lacy Evans and McDougall, were leading figures in the Rifle Volunteer Movement that grew out of a French invasion scare of 1859.30 Thousands of volunteers up and down the country formed themselves into units ranging from shooting clubs to

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whole brigades of serious-minded patriots. For example, the former commandant of the Bundlecund Cavalry, Belfast-born James Verner, became CO of the London Irish, which trained in Hyde Park.31 Richards himself founded the 3rd City of London (Working Men’s) Volunteer Rifles, which unlike most of the mainly middle-class Rifle Volunteer Corps, was composed of artisans.32 As an admirer of Beatson (and doubtless with one eye on the publicity he would bring), Richards asked him to be the regiment’s colonel. On Saturday 22 September the men paraded at London’s Guildhall to be inspected by the distinguished Indian officer. Afterwards he made a speech to them, expressing his pride in being invited to be their honorary colonel and brigadier (Richards had ambitions to raise a full brigade). He told them that the volunteer movement ‘was taking the right direction’, and that from what he had seen ‘the working classes would do credit to themselves as loyal Englishmen and soldiers’. Because he was under orders for India, he regretted that he could not take an active part in their development, but ‘when he returned he hoped to find them 10,000 strong, and he would lead them against any enemy in the world’. The ever-friendly Morning Advertiser reported that this address was greeted with ‘great enthusiasm in the ranks and deafening cheers’ and commented on ‘The noble soldierly bearing and frank aspect of this popular General.’33 Beatson’s connection with the regiment was short-lived. Richards needed wealthy patrons to keep the Working Men’s battalion going, and Sir William de Bathe, Bart, became the first official Honorary Colonel the following year. Despite its financial straits, the unit flourished, becoming the 7th (City of London) Battalion, The London Regiment, in the twentieth-century Territorial Army.34 Beatson definitely did not have the money to support the Volunteers. According to his nephew35 the court case had cost him £3,000 (at least £230,000 at today’s values);* adding the cost of his daughter’s ‘coming out’ and his months of unpaid leave, all the savings of a long career must have been wiped out. All he had was his salary, and so he had to return to India, which he did by the steamer leaving on 27 September 1860.37

* Soon after this expensive case Edwin James was found to be £100,000 in debt, accused of fraud and disbarred. He resigned from Parliament and fled to New York, where he resumed his dual career as an actor and lawyer.36

18 SOLDIERING ON A Military Impresario

One of the finest military spectacles ever witnessed in India Bombay Gazette1

W

hen the Beatson family disembarked at Bombay on 26 October 1860,2 they returned to a very different India. Marian and the girls had been away for over 10 years, and Beatson himself during his two-year return had only seen Calcutta and Hyderabad before disappearing into the jungles to hunt Tantya Tope. Much of the Upper India and Bundelkhand they had known had been devastated during the Mutiny. The British living there were apprehensive: too many friends and relatives had been massacred or died in the subsequent campaigns, it would be years before their comfortable way of life was restored, and they would remain wary of Indians until Independence. Politically, India had changed. The HEIC had been swept away as Ellenborough had planned, the Governor General becoming the Queen’s Viceroy, and the administrators working for the British Crown rather than a trading company. The Indian Army had changed too. It was still a predominantly native force – the HEIC’s European regiments had been absorbed into the British Army – but there was a higher proportion of European troops stationed in the country. The native regiments in Bengal were recruited from the ‘martial races’ – Sikhs, Gurkhas, Pathans, Punjabis, etc. – who had remained loyal during the Mutiny, while the Purbiyas of Oude who had been the backbone of the old regiments were now shunned as recruits.3 All regiments were now to be organised on the successful ‘irregular’ model, with real responsibility given to the native officers and only a small number of attached European officers. The latter would be borne on a single list or ‘Staff Corps’ for each army, so that officers could be transferred between regiments or to other duties without leaving the regiments depleted. This resulted in a pool of unemployed British officers left over from disbanded regiments. Beatson was one of them: Beatson’s Horse having disappeared, his official posting was to the 4th Bengal Europeans, which had never been fully formed, and thus he was listed on the cadre of a ghost regiment.4

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As noted before, Beatson could have retired at any time after completing 22 years’ service in India, but he had always harboured ambitions to reach the top of his profession. Now he probably couldn’t afford to retire even if he had wished to. Although he had held a string of well-remunerated commands, the expenses of ‘a little Oriental magnificence’ and an excellent stable had been considerable. Unlike Brett who had done well from the suppression of Bundelkhand,5 Beatson had received little prize money (only the pittance from Chirgong) and he had never enjoyed the additional income of staff or political employment. Beatson versus Skene had wiped out his savings and his immediate prospects were not good. He probably reflected on Sir Charles Napier’s advice to Billy Olpherts: ‘Make money, Sir! because if you have got money, you will be independent, and if you are not independent, they’ll kick you about like a football.’ (Napier spoke from the heart, having lost his life savings in a bank crash.) Utterly dependent on his pay, Beatson would indeed spend the next few years being treated no better than a football.6 To induce the surplus officers to retire, the Royal Warrant establishing the Staff Corps offered enhanced pensions with a step of honorary rank. Large numbers of unemployed, sick and weary officers took advantage of this concession. The regulations were complex, and throughout 1861 a series of GOs was issued to answer the questions.7 Some of these FAQs relate so closely to Beatson’s anomalous position that he may have posed them himself. For example: Question 45. Will a substantive Lieutenant-Colonel, and Brevet Colonel [Beatson’s rank] joining the Staff Corps on its formation, be eligible to ‘get one step of rank’ on transfer to the Staff Corps, i.e. will he be promoted from ‘Colonel’ to ‘Major-General’? Answer: There is no such rank in the Staff Corps as Substantive Colonel. No instructions have been received regarding promotion to Major-General in the Staff Corps. Question 46: Service in the Crimea having been allowed to count as service in India towards retirement, it has been asked whether staff employ during such Crimean service will be allowed to go towards the qualifying period for promotion under the Staff warrant? Answer: Staff service in the Crimea is not staff service in India, neither is it permanent. On these grounds it cannot reckon for promotion in the Staff Corps.

Another asked whether a retired field officer, whose name would be retained in the gradation list, was eligible for promotion by seniority, as happened in the British Army – again, the answer was no. It was clear that neither joining the Staff Corps nor accepting the retirement terms would secure Beatson the General Officer’s rank he so desired. He therefore chose to remain on the roll of his disbanded regiment and take his chance of promotion by seniority.



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Writing history In the meantime, Beatson lobbied tirelessly for an appointment to one of the reduced number of staff posts available. His tarnished record may have counted against him, but he understood the value of publicity and made efforts to ensure that his version of past events appeared in the reference books. When a Calcutta publisher compiled Ubique: War Services of all the Officers of H.M.’s Bengal Army (1861), Beatson’s entry included an extraordinary footnote: Colonel Beatson has the proud satisfaction of knowing, that his having refused to submit quietly to the arbitrary acts of a despotic Ambassador, caused by the false reports of Levantine Consuls, and to the unparalleled injustice of a War Minister, prevented his being a K.C.B. long ago, which distinction one of the most chivalrous and high-minded officers in the British Army declared his services entitled him to; the same cause prevented his getting the 2nd Class of the Medjidié, which every officer who served in the late war must acknowledge was most unjustly withheld from Colonel Beatson after his services on the Danube, in Turkey, and in the Crimea; while it was given to some who were never under fire in either. This has been inserted at Colonel Beatson’s request.

With his recent experience in court, Beatson should have known that this was close to being actionable! He also supplied information (including letters of commendation he had received from such personages as Ellenborough, Napier and Scarlett) to Alexander Kinglake, who was compiling the magisterial The Invasion of the Crimea, and to his nephew Alexander Beatson of Rossend, who wrote the Genealogical Account of the Families of Beatson.8 During 1861 this nephew died in Malta, the traditional refuge of Victorians in poor health, leaving his uncle as the nominal head of the family. If the lairdships of Rossend and Kilrie had been peerage titles, William Beatson would have inherited them by primogeniture, but they were attached to the estates, and Alexander’s widowed mother officially continued to reside at Rossend until at least 1870. In fact it was William’s younger sister Harriet and her husband William Laurie, a writer to the signet (Scottish solicitor), who lived at the castle, where Laurie built up an impressive collection of arms and armour.* We have encountered their son * After Laurie’s death, the town council bought the estate to extend Burntisland Docks, selling the castle and a parcel of land to James Shepherd, a Kirkcaldy manufacturer, who agreed to preserve intact the collections of arms and armour, furniture and panelling. After Shepherd, the council bought the site once more, using the land for the refuse disposal department and football pitches. Today, there is a cluster of local authority houses round a small green facing the castle and its outbuilding. The castle itself became a tearoom and was derelict by 1975, when it was restored by Hurd Rolland Architects as the firm’s offices. In 2011 it was put on the market with a planning application to revert to residential usage.9

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William Ferguson Beatson Laurie who was serving with the Madras Artillery. In any case, Beatson had no need for declining Scottish lands and empty titles when his career and immediate family were firmly established in India.10

Meerut Unemployed officers in India could choose where they resided,11 and the Beatsons decided to live at Meerut; for the next few years the army lists show him as ‘doing duty’ at that station. Meerut was the scene of the first massacres of the Mutiny, and the scars of that dreadful period had not yet been effaced. The district was close to famine, but new railway building provided much-needed employment. The prosperity of Meerut town was based on the large military presence: it was a divisional HQ, with a full brigade of troops stationed there.12 Among the units in residence was the 8th Hussars, and Beatson renewed friendships forged in the Crimea. Rodolph de Salis, now a brevet colonel, commanded the regiment. De Salis was tired, and wanted to retire on half pay and go home, but had to wait while the army reforms were completed. Meanwhile, he cultivated his garden at Meerut.13 Also with the 8th Hussars were Paymaster Henry Duberly and his wife Fanny. As a friend of both parties, Beatson may have tried to act as peacemaker in the feud between the Duberlys and de Salis.14 Following the publication of her bestselling books on the Crimean and Mutiny campaigns,15 Mrs Duberly was now the second most famous woman associated with the army after Florence Nightingale. She was still writing, but her lively notes on peacetime India were never published. We read that in March 1861 Fanny invited General (‘the Turkish Contingent man’) and Mrs Beatson to a dinner party.16 Fanny and the Beatsons shared a passion for horses. In May she wrote that ‘Old General Beatson and his daughters, “The Ratcatcher’s Daughters” alias “Minerva & the infant Bacchus”,* are gone off to Simla at last. – they staid [sic] to see our steeplechase last evening, and went off during the night. The steeplechase was good fun.’18 Simla in the Himalayan foothills was becoming the regular summer resort for Government officials and Army HQ. Meerut had a bad cholera outbreak that summer, the European regiments losing a number of good men; officers shut up * The allusions are rather obscure: Minerva was the Roman goddess of war, but her sibling Bacchus was a male god whose female followers, the Bacchantes, abandoned themselves to wild, torchlit dancing on hillsides, clothed in the skins of fawns. Maybe Fanny, like Richard Burton before, saw the Beatson girls as wild tomboys. The God Apollo was known as the rat-killer, having despatched a swarm of them with his arrows, but Minerva and Bacchus were the children of Jupiter, not Apollo.17 Fanny may have misremembered her classical mythology. More prosaically, ‘Ratcatcher’ is the term applied to informal foxhunting attire, usually tweed.



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their bungalows and took their families away to hill stations if they could get leave.19 In February 1862 Fanny Duberly sent a photograph to her sister in England.20 This may be by the same photographer who captured images of Beatson and his daughters about this time (Plates X and Y). He stands in his full Hyderabad uniform, with turban, Mameluke sword and jackboots, pistol stuck through his cummerbund, his bushy beard now totally white. His dog sits on the upholstered chair at his side – it is a small animal, somewhat resembling a Pekinese, but we cannot be sure, because it didn’t sit still long enough for the exposure time of a plate camera! For their joint picture, Marian Jane and Margaret Maria wore identical riding habits complete with riding crops. Although now young women, there is still something of the Dardanelles tomboy about them, slight smirks playing round their mouths as they pose for the camera. Unfortunately, if their mother was photographed at the same time, the picture does not seem to have survived.21

Unemployment What Beatson desired above all else was military employment, but the debt problems of his former command continued to haunt him. In March 1861 Rose, now CinC India, asked Calcutta whether Beatson’s conduct was ‘in any respect under the consideration of Government in a light calculated to debar that Officer from Military employment at present’.22 In reply he was sent the latest sheaf of complaints and a request that ‘Colonel Beatson may be called on to furnish any explanation he may wish to offer’.23 For example, the new officers of the Central India Horse (CIH) were angry at the useless horses they had inherited, and one observed that when Beatson’s Horse was raised at the height of the Mutiny the horse dealers could charge what they liked. His poor sillidars, ‘who are debited with large sums, never saw more of the money than was represented by the piece of horse flesh handed over to him’. Shakespear loyally backed Beatson, pointing out that when the Government advanced the money it apparently planned to keep the regiments on the permanent establishment, and that if they had continued to 1864 the debts would have been cleared; ‘I think it but due to Colonel Beatson to place these points prominently before Government.’24 Beatson reacted exactly as we have come to expect: with angry telegrams followed by a long letter enclosing a bundle of annotated documents.* His telegrams, he wrote, ‘do not half express the indignation I feel, as an Officer of * This correspondence takes up over 11 pages of the printed Proceedings of the Military Department, and the typesetters clearly had difficulty with Beatson’s handwriting, but it provides a treasure trove of evidence for the history of Beatson’s Horse in 1858–9.

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40 years’ service, with an unblemished reputation, at the unworthy conduct of those who have been morally stabbing me in the dark in my absence’. Mayne’s statements were ‘mischievous vanity’, while ‘the straightforward and manly letters of Sir Richmond Shakespear contrast favourably with those of Major Mayne, and one [?are] probably an index of the character of the men’. He acknowledged that he had spent large sums of public money on raising Beatson’s Horse, but quoted Michel, who said ‘that an officer who in time of war shrinks from pecuniary or any other responsibility, when by incurring it he would do good service to the State, is deserving of censure’.25 Mayne’s most damaging accusation was that Beatson had failed to take adequate sureties from the holders of multiple asamis for the money advanced to them. Beatson demanded a court martial upon Mayne or himself or – as Shakespear had predicted – permission to take out a civil action for slander against Mayne. Birch had the whole matter placed before the JAG, which took another six months.26 Luckily for Beatson, the JAG was an old friend, Col Keith Young, who had served in the Bundelkhand and Saugor insurrection and later as judge advocate in Sind when Beatson held judicial powers.27 He wrote to Beatson, ‘I do not think there is any probability of Government entertaining your request for a Court Martial on Mayne, and certainly not upon yourself. I hope they will speedily appoint you to a command, thus shewing to you and to your friends the good opinion they entertain of you.’28 Beatson was not satisfied. He had been cleared of dishonesty, but he detected reservations in Birch’s report, and felt that ‘somewhat exaggerated’ was too mild a verdict on Mayne’s complaints. He appealed to the CinC ‘as the guardian of the honor of British Officers in India’ for an unreserved acquittal, and renewed his demand for a court martial or permission to sue. (He also campaigned for ‘justice’ for Rissaldar Rustum Ali Khan, who had been dismissed.)29 Then news reached him of the deaths of both Mayne and Shakespear. He sent one last rambling explanation to Army HQ, but Young urged the CinC to let the matter drop.30 The Viceroy’s Council drew a line under the matter, while deprecating the ‘very objectionable style of Colonel Beatson’s correspondence’.31 Beatson concluded that ‘nothing will clear me in the eyes of the world and of my brother officers but employment’. The bleak response was that the Viceroy ‘regrets that he knows of no employment likely to be available for you’.32 Although sympathetic to their plight, Rose was anxious to rid himself of older unemployed officers ‘who considerably embarrass the Commander-in-Chief by their continued applications for employment’. Apart from one colonel (Beatson), there were three lieutenant-colonels, six majors, 21 captains and 18 lieutenants doing duty at Meerut alone. Rose recommended a further pension enhancement to encourage them to go, since several confessed themselves unsuited to the new ‘irregular’ Indian Army.33 We can be sure that Beatson was not of this opinion.



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Limited duty In October 1861 a new man arrived to command at Meerut. He was Maj-Gen Francis Wheler, cousin of Stephen Wheler the ‘preaching colonel’ who had twice ruined the 34th BNI. But Francis Wheler was a less objectionable man.34 Just a few years Beatson’s senior, he treated him with respect and made use of his talents when required, so that ‘doing duty’ became less of a fiction. Beatson acted as president of Courts Martial, of the Board of Health, the Standing Barrack Committee and of a special committee to select a site for new cantonments.35 One of Rose’s concerns about officers doing duty was that they might succeed to command of a station by their seniority. He quoted one colonel who had already been passed over for regimental command, yet who had become an acting divisional commander in this way.36 He became anxious when Wheler proposed to leave Meerut for a few days in early 1863, leaving Beatson in command, but was told that ‘Government do not consider sufficient reason has yet been shewn to forbid the exercise of temporary command by Colonel Beatson’. If Rose felt that Beatson was unfit he should say so. A proposal to remove Beatson and two other senior officers for ‘inefficiency’ (a description of their unemployment, not their competence) was deferred until the whole question had been put to London.37 At the end of the day no one in India quite had the resolve to put the old warhorse out to grass. And so, for the first time in over three years, Beatson actually exercised command, however briefly. He was again acting commander at Meerut during Wheler’s absence for several months in 1864. This time he applied to Calcutta for the acting rank of brigadier-general while officiating – earning a rebuke for communicating direct with the Government.38 While in command, he busied himself with tasks like demolishing buildings wrecked in the Mutiny to make way for the railway.39 Another unemployed officer who had arrived in 1862 to ‘do duty’ at Meerut was Captain Charles Noble McMullin. On 7 November 1864 he married Marian Jane Beatson.40 McMullin was not one of the high-born ‘deb’s delights’ May would have met during her season in London Society. His Irish father had also been a BNI officer, now living quietly in Boulogne.41 McMullin had been commissioned in 1848 but his experience of active service was slight – he had briefly chased rebels through the jungles of Chittagong at the beginning of the Mutiny, until his regiment was disbanded.42 After the wedding McMullin was attached to the 28th Punjab Infantry at Dehra Dun.43 The couple’s first child – Beatson’s first grandchild – was born at the hill station of Mussorie the following year and was baptised Charlie Beatson McMullin.44 He was followed by two daughters (Maria Marian, who died young, and Clara Seymore, born in 1869) and a second son (Alexander Campbell, born in 1870).45

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Promotion On 25 May 1864 Maj-Gen William Sage died at home in Devon. He had been colonel of the old 22nd BNI and his death cleared the way for the senior lieutenantcolonel to be promoted to substantive colonel. That officer was Beatson, and once word reached India, his name was removed from the cadre of the 4th Bengal Europeans and he began to draw colonel’s allowances.* He had held the rank of colonel by brevet since 1856, and so when Lt-Gen Matthew Paul died in London, and Maj-Gen J. Bell of the Madras Army moved up, Beatson as senior colonel was automatically promoted to major-general. Thus on 8 January 1865, 10 years after he first achieved the rank on a temporary and local basis, he became a substantive general officer.47 No longer was he ‘General’ Beatson merely by courtesy, but by right. March 1865 saw the appointment of a new CinC India. This was Sir William Mansfield, formerly Stratford de Redcliffe’s military adviser and Sir Colin Campbell’s chief of staff. He was not a popular selection, being prone to ‘discreditable quarrels’.48 He was, we recall, the man who urged Stratford to sack Beatson, and whom Beatson in turn had accused of ‘abominable falsehoods’. It appeared that Beatson would receive no favour from the new CinC. Yet despite his harsh reputation Mansfield was a fair-minded man – he had taken pity on the Sicilian Fardella when Vivian forced him out of the OIC49 – and he would have been aware of Beatson’s continuing high reputation in some quarters. So when Wheler was nearing the end of his tour of duty, Mansfield recommended Beatson to succeed him as a divisional commander. There was one stronger candidate, Sir Neville Chamberlain, a hero of the Mutiny, but he was convalescing in England from a severe wound and unlike Beatson he had not applied for a division. The Viceroy’s Council approved the nomination.50 And so, on 3 October 1866, six years after he returned to India, and after 46 years’ service, Beatson was appointed to command the Allahabad Division.51

Allahabad Allahabad was one of the great commands of the new Indian Army. Traditionally, the city housed a brigade, but recently the divisional HQ had been moved there from Benares. The British battalion in residence was HM’s 107th Foot (the former 3rd Bengal Light Infantry) together with two Royal Artillery (former Bengal * When this allowance was stopped after six months in accordance with regulations, and the paymaster clawed back the additional money he had claimed, a typically Beatsonian complaint went to Army HQ, arguing that he was not unemployed but actively doing duty for Wheler, and that the Mutiny Act did not allow the Minister of War to dock even a private soldier’s pay in this way. He lost.46



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European Foot Artillery) Batteries, detachments of Bengal cavalry and a Bengal native infantry regiment.52 And, not least, the appointment was worth £4,000 a year and would go a long way to repairing Beatson’s finances.53 Beatson had served at Allahabad as a young officer. Since then it had been the scene of terrible massacres of Europeans and Eurasians during the Mutiny, but European gunners and loyal Sikh troops in the fort had held out until Havelock and Neill relieved them. Now fine new cantonments and civil lines were being laid out north of the fort and the crowded city, while a great railway bridge had been constructed across the Jumna the previous year, completing the direct railway line from Calcutta to Delhi.54 It was a commanding general’s privilege to select his own ADC, and Beatson chose his son-in-law Capt McMullin (not for nothing was a general’s personal staff called his ‘family’). The staff at Allahabad also included Maj Fred Roberts, a promising artillery officer who had won a VC during the Mutiny.55 The Beatsons had been at Allahabad only a few weeks when Roberts noted in his diary on Saturday 22 December: ‘Poor Mrs Beatson died this morning, and was buried at 5 pm. Aged 61.’ Death could be shockingly sudden in British India, and burial was usually immediate. The cause of death given in Marian’s burial record is ‘apoplexy’, a common description in these registers, usually meaning a cerebral haemorrhage or stroke. The burial was performed by Rev E.H. Blyth at Trinity Church, attended by many officers of the garrison, whose sympathy touched the General. Four days later Roberts ‘Went to the poor old General’s … office again. Found him pretty well’, but it is likely that the shock of losing his wife of 26 years was slow to sink in.56 Just a month later, McMullin left for England on sick leave, taking May and the children with him.57 Although Beatson’s younger daughter Margaret was 18 years old and probably took charge of his household, he would have been more dependent than ever on his staff ‘family’ for support. McMullin’s replacement was Lt Edward Rivett-Carnac, who came from a line of distinguished HEIC commanders and administrators and had seen service in the Mutiny and China. Rivett-Carnac was yet another of Beatson’s subordinates who was an author, writing the seminal Presidential Armies of India, published posthumously in an edition by Beatson’s nephew W.F.B. Laurie.58 One of Beatson’s responsibilities was to oversee work on the new military station of Allahabad, known as ‘Cannington’ after the Governor General who had annexed the land for it. When first planned after the Mutiny, it was intended for a brigade, but now it needed to house the divisional staff and the Gun Carriage Works from Fategarh as well. Beatson recommended extending the area to allow for barracks for a planned second British battalion, staff quarters, and the hospital, education rooms and garrison church. He emphasised the need for the church to be within the lines, to reduce the distance British troops had to march for church parade and to enable him as commanding general to regulate the service times to suit the garrison’s needs. Civilians who found Trinity Church

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too far away could also use it. He proposed moving the new native troops’ lines a little further from the European barracks, both for health reasons and to save a group of five old trees, the only source of shade, which he wanted to include in a garden for the British troops and their families, where the band could play.59 During the cool weather Allahabad could be a pleasant station, and Beatson’s habit was, as Evelyn Wood and Laurie recalled, to be ‘up in the morning early’.60 On 14 January 1867 a brigade parade was held, ‘the first one we have had for some time,’ Lt William Cavaye of the 107th Foot noted in his diary. ‘A good conduct medal was presented to a troop sergeant major of the Artillery and the General made a grand speech.’ Brigade parades became regular thereafter, the troops returning to barracks over hedges and ditches in skirmish order, while firing blanks – on 1 March Cavaye recorded ‘rather a good one, & very orderly considering the rough ground we had to go over. We skirmished through the general’s compound, then came back here for breakfast’. That month, Beatson carried out the annual inspection of the 107th, a full-day programme of parades, inspecting the accounts, and observing theoretical instruction and officers’ sword drill. As always, Beatson’s short speech to the regiment went down well.61 There was an active social life for the tight-knit European community, many of whom had family connections. The garrison surgeon was Beatson’s distant kinsman, Surg-Maj John Fullarton Beatson, one of the Beatsons of Glassmount.62 His cousin Maj Albert Balcombe Beatson, son of old General Alex Beatson, was also ‘doing duty’ at Allahabad. Fred Roberts was friendly with one of these Beatsons (probably Albert) and often borrowed his fine horse.63 Roberts, RivettCarnac and Cavaye got on well together and among Cavaye’s other friends were Ens Edwin Wardroper of the 107th (nephew of Fred Wardroper of the Bundlecund Legion)64 and Capt James Creagh the DAQMG (possibly one of Jasper Creagh’s extended family).65 Beatson must have been a father-figure to this younger generation, but his bushy beard, his eccentricities and his rages probably made him a figure of fun as well. The band of the 107th gave evening concerts on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays in the cool weather, and there were theatrical evenings, though apparently these were not well attended. By April sudden storms presaged the onset of the hot weather, after which ‘the days of mangoes and prickly heat cannot be postponed many days longer’.66 Roberts recalled that the hot season of 1867 at Allahabad was a particularly bad one: cholera broke out, the troops had to be sent away to healthier camps, and he and the staff had to visit these daily and dream up entertainments to keep the troops’ minds off the disease. Beatson and his whole headquarters camped behind the new cantonments.67 The heat is followed by rain, which lashes Allahabad around August. One Sunday morning in 1867 Cavaye was sitting in his room when the 107th received an order from Beatson to take a party down to help repair the bund and prevent the river flooding the station: ‘any amount of coolies were employed at it.’68 The following year a great storm deluged Allahabad with 10 inches of rain in six hours,



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causing subsidence to the foundations and failure of arches in the European Infantry Hospital and the Gun Carriage Factory workshops then under construction. Beatson shot off a complaint about the superintending Royal Engineer, but the poor fellow was absent sick at the time and was exonerated by his superiors, who blamed shoddy workmanship.69 In August 1867 news came of a Bengal brigade being organised to join an expeditionary force to Abyssinia. Roberts thought that his unit (a mountain battery) might be sent, so he went to Simla to lobby the CinC to join the expedition, and was appointed AQMG. Rivett-Carnac also got a staff berth in the transport department of the expedition.70 Beatson was unlikely to stand in the way of keen young officers who wanted to see active service, and he remained lucky with his staff. Cavaye was appointed DAQMG in December 1867,71 and in 1868 the talented young Capt Herbert Stewart of HM’s 37th Foot joined as Beatson’s ADC, remaining with him for the next two years.72 One headache for Beatson was eased when the remaining state prisoners at Allahabad were moved to the fortress prison of Chunar; Cavaye commanded their escort.73 In November 1867 Mansfield arrived on a tour of inspection. Beatson laid on a field day, with the 7th, 10th and part of the 5th Bengal Cavalry, the 107th Foot, 7th and 21st BNI and all the artillery. ‘It was a large parade, & must have been a pretty sight. There were a good many spectators,’ recalled a participant.74 Subsequent events suggest that Mansfield was impressed by Beatson’s talents as a military impresario.

The Great Durbar In February 1869 rumours began to circulate that Beatson was to be moved to command the prestigious Sirhind (‘Head of the Indus’) Division at Ambala in the Punjab. Two other divisional commanders were candidates, but the Pioneer newspaper reported of Beatson that the ‘veteran officer’s claims to the selection are undeniable’. A month later it was confirmed and Beatson took up the new command.75 It was probably not by chance that his arrival coincided with the greatest military show put on by the Indian Army for many years. Ambala (frequently spelt Umballa) lies about 120 miles north of Delhi. The 10,000-acre cantonment dated from 1843, when the site was chosen for its healthy location. The hill resorts of Simla and Dehra Dun were not far distant, and a new hill station for British troops had just been opened at Chakrata.76 The brigade stationed at Ambala consisted of the 21st Hussars, two troops of Royal Horse Artillery (RHA), 12th Bengal Cavalry, 3rd Buffs, 106th Light Infantry and 26th BNI.77 But in March 1869 additional troops were gathering from all over Northern India: a further troop of RHA and the 4th Hussars from Meerut, 55th Foot from Cawnpore, 79th Highlanders from Delhi and Rurki, 41st Foot from near Simla, 2nd Gurkhas from Dehra Dun and 15th BNI (Ludhiana Sikhs) from

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Ferozepore.78 All this was to impress the Amir of Afghanistan who was coming to pay a state visit. Sher Ali has been described as ‘possibly the most emotional, high-strung and petulant amir in Afghanistan’s history’. After battling his way to the amirship through a five-year civil war against his elder brothers that ended in 1868, he wanted to rebuild his country and shore up its defences, so he put out diplomatic feelers. Britain regarded Afghanistan as a barrier to Russian designs on India, so the new Viceroy, the Earl of Mayo, invited Sher Ali to visit.79 Ambala was probably chosen for this historic meeting because of its convenient position on the Grand Trunk Road, the ancient trade route to Kabul. When as a young ensign Beatson had first travelled up-country, the journey took months. Now the railway would bring the Viceroy and his entourage – complete with a squadron of his mounted Body Guard – the 1,000 miles from Calcutta in just two days. Even the Amir made the last 50 miles of his journey from the frontier by train along the new line thrusting its way across the Punjab.80 Beatson reached Ambala on 9 March and in his usual energetic fashion immediately began training the troops for the ceremonies: ‘Beatson was now in his glory,’ his nephew wrote. There was just a fortnight to get everything ready. A newspaper reported that ‘the troops have been out every second morning for the last ten days (when the weather admitted of it) under the command of General Beatson … He handles troops well, above an average.’81 This was the task for which Mansfield had chosen him, and he did not disappoint. Mansfield arrived by train on 19 March and in the evening he and his wife, accompanied by Beatson and all the ADCs, went round the whole extensive encampment. The extra troops were camped on the plain in front of the cantonments, with the Viceroy’s tents pitched in the shelter of a clump of trees with a view of the manoeuvre grounds and the Himalayas as a backdrop. Mansfield was satisfied with what he saw. The following day Beatson put the division through its paces: an artillery brigade, a cavalry brigade and three infantry brigades. Mansfield planned to manoeuvre the whole force himself the next day, but rain intervened. He did inspect a parade on 23 March, at which the 79th Highlanders and ‘A’ Battery, ‘A’ Brigade RHA (the ‘Chestnut Troop’) were especially admired. The daily showers were gentle enough to lay the dust without turning everything into mud.82 The Amir arrived at Ambala station on the afternoon of 24 March, where he was greeted on the platform by Mansfield, Beatson and the staff, and then driven to a house on the Mall that had been fitted up for him, with a newly planted garden. Beatson rode in the second carriage with the Amir’s son, Abdullah Jan.* Beatson seems to have been assigned to attend the prince during the visit. He was * Abdullah Jan was the Amir’s favourite son, and in 1874 the British Government recognised him as Sher Ali’s heir-apparent, upon which his elder brother rebelled. The prince died in 1878, just as tensions between his father and the British were leading to the 2nd Afghan War.83



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described as ‘a very fine bright intelligent looking boy of seven or eight years, quite fair’ and not disturbed by the large crowds of strangers. Sir Henry Durand of the Viceroy’s Council less charitably described the child to his wife as ‘a fair, fat faced boy, with thick lips and [a more] animal sort of expression than any promise of higher faculties’.84 A grand review was held the following day. This was the main event for which Beatson had been preparing. Delayed from morning to late afternoon by the rain, the ceremony began with the Amir’s carriage being driven down the lines of troops drawn up for his inspection. Then he and Mansfield proceeded to the saluting base, while Beatson on horseback led the whole division in a march past in quick time. The review was intended to demonstrate Britain’s military might, hence the high proportion of British units gathered along with picked native regiments. Indeed, the Amir was unimpressed with the native troops, though admitting they were well drilled. However, he admired the European regiments, and was delighted by the cannon. Watching the kilted Highlanders march past, Sher Ali remarked that their dress was ‘beautiful, and indeed terrific, but is it decent?’ (He later formed his own Highland Guard wearing kilts made of checked tablecloth material.)85 Mayo’s train arrived at Ambala at 5.00 am on Saturday 27 March. After breakfast he was introduced to the native princes of the region, led by the young Maharaja of Patiala. Then, dressed in a plain frock coat, he rode the two miles to the camp at the head of a brilliant entourage (though some officials had not been able to retrieve their uniforms or horses from the train in time). He was escorted by the 4th Hussars, the Chestnut Troop and the Body Guard, and the road was lined with troops, including contingents from some of the Native States (Patiala’s ‘pantomime’ camel-gunners evoking some mirth). On arrival at his camp, the Viceroy was met by a guard of honour of Highlanders.86 After the heat of the day, the great durbar was due to begin at 5.00 pm, and Mayo’s staff had the Viceroy waiting on the dais, even though it was not until 5.20 that a gun salute announced that the Amir was on his way. Beatson and the Lieutenant-Governor of the Punjab had met him with a procession of carriages, and Beatson once again rode with the Amir’s son. When they reached the durbar tent, the artillery fired a royal salute, and the guard of honour presented arms. The Amir and his sirdars arrived very plainly dressed, while Mayo wore his goldencrusted vice-regal uniform to greet them with a short speech before entering the durbar tent.87 Mayo was a charming Irishman who put the Amir at ease as they conversed through interpreters for a quarter of an hour. Then the diplomatic gifts were exchanged. The Amir brought carpets and shawls and he and his entourage in turn were presented with trays full of presents, ranging from jewels and fabrics to ‘a pair of splendid revolvers’, and beautiful Arab horses. Politically more significant were the gifts that would follow: £60,000, 6,500 rifles, four 18-pounder siege guns, two 8-inch howitzers and a mountain battery of six guns, complete with ammunition, stores and draft animals (including nine elephants).88

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Mr Craddock, a photographer, had been summoned from Simla to record the event, but the surviving group portrait of the high personages in front of the tent was taken by Maj Clarence Taylor, one of the ADCs (Plate AA). It shows Beatson standing behind the Amir’s son, looking much older than the others with his white hair and beard.89 The Viceroy paid his return visit to the Amir on the Monday, and they had a quarter-hour private meeting. The following day there was another review of the troops under Mansfield’s command, this time for the benefit of the Viceroy, while the Amir went off to the races in the afternoon (we are not told if Beatson accompanied him). During the remainder of the week Lady Mayo held two receptions (the Amir had apparently expressed a wish to attend a European ball) and there was a firework display. The great gathering then broke up, the Amir returning home and the Viceroy to continue his progress round India.90 Sadly, although the durbar appeared to be a success, it proved a failure in the long run: Sher Ali did not get what he most desired, which was a guarantee of British intervention if Russia invaded Afghanistan. The loss of trust led to war a decade later.91

Life and death at Ambala and Swindon This durbar was the biggest ceremonial event in British India until the great Delhi Durbar of 1877, and it effectively marked the end of Beatson’s active career, though he continued to command at Ambala. He took leave from August until October 1869 when he was rejoined by his daughter and son-in-law from Europe. McMullin, now a major, did ‘general duty’ at Ambala, and acted as Brigade Major and Cantonment Magistrate.92 Charles and May had left the children in England to be brought up in the household of the Rev George Campbell, who was Vicar of New Swindon, Wiltshire and a friend of the McMullins; he had previously been curate at St Mary Redcliffe in Bristol, where several of the family lived.93 New Swindon was an orderly estate of cottages built in the 1850s by the Great Western Railway Company for the workmen of the great Swindon railway works. The GWR also provided a fine church beside the railway where Campbell had been vicar since 1852, with one absence to serve as a volunteer chaplain in the Crimea. Campbell was also chaplain to the 11th Wiltshire Rifle Volunteers, recruited from GWR employees.94 The last McMullin child, Alexander Campbell, was born at Ambala after the couple’s return to India.95 Apart from McMullin and Stewart, the senior staff at Ambala included LtCol William Café, who had seen action in the Gwalior and Sikh campaigns, and then won a VC during the Mutiny, and Capt William Lockhart, who had distinguished himself in Abyssinia and some smaller expeditions. Like Roberts and Stewart, both men went on to become generals (Roberts and Lockhart were both CinC India).96



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Beatson encouraged his subordinates to use their initiative. In the summer of 1870 Stewart was alone at divisional HQ when cholera broke out. He promptly took responsibility for dispersing the troops into camps away from the infected area. The CinC praised his judgement and promptitude, and later gave him a staff job. The time spent with Beatson was the start of Herbert Stewart’s rapid rise. He distinguished himself in the Zulu and Egyptian wars and his death while commanding the Desert Column in January 1885 took the spirit out of the Gordon Relief Expedition and many feel it was the direct cause of the fall of Khartoum.97 Beatson had been on leave in England when Stewart took charge. Despite many years of serving in unhealthy spots – Arakan, Vitoria, the Dobrudja and Sind as well as Upper India – Beatson’s health had remained remarkably robust. Few of his contemporaries had lasted so well, and there was no one with his seniority left in the active Bengal Army, most of them having retired to genteel towns in England long ago. But now, at the age of 65, he went into a rapid decline: Originally of a strong constitution, his health, from over-work and anxiety, now gave visible signs of being somewhat shattered … more than a year of his divisional command still remained to be served; but he determined to visit England early in 1870, leaving the year in reserve for his return.98

In March he took a month’s leave to attend a medical board at Bombay, followed by six months in Europe.99 On 26 March the P&O steamer Baroda sailed for Southampton via Aden and the new Suez Canal. Aboard were ‘General Beatson and daughter’. The canal permitted passages by fast steamer between Bombay and England in as little as 30 days, compared with the 105 days of the Cape route when Cadet Beatson first went out in 1820. Indeed, Beatson and Margaret were booked only to Marseilles: taking the train across France to the Channel cut several days (and the storm-tossed bay of Biscay) from the journey.100 However, this leave may not have been solely for his own health: his daughter was also sick. Soon after their arrival, Margaret Maria died, aged 22, on 31 May 1870 in Leamington, Warwickshire.101 A few weeks after this sad event, Beatson visited the London solicitor Henry White, who had acted for him in Beatson versus Skene, to write his will, in which he named Rodolph de Salis, White and the Rev Campbell as his executors.102 The death of Margaret had hit him hard and there was nothing to keep him in England, so before his health was fully restored he returned to India, ‘to accomplish the “one year more”, which has killed … so many Anglo-Indians’.103 He landed at Bombay on 24 September 1870 and resumed his command.104 But the family tragedies continued. The following March Charles McMullin was taken ill at Ambala with gastritis and dysentery. He made his will on 22 March and died in the night of 23/24 March. He was buried the following day. He had been 39 years old, and left May a widow, aged not quite 29, with three young children.105 She returned to England with the baby to rejoin her other children.

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Her father followed her later that year. Again forced to take medical leave, he handed over command of the Sirhind Division in November 1871106 and arrived back in England a very sick man. His doctor pronounced his condition ‘precarious’ and recommended him to go to Malta for a change of climate. It did no good, and he returned to England, where ‘On arrival he was so weak that he had to be carried from the ship.’107 Beatson was taken to Swindon, where May and her children were living at the Vicarage with Rev Campbell and his family. William Beatson died there on 4 February 1872. He was aged 67, and was still – officially – in harness, his occupation being given on the death certificate as ‘Major General, Full pay’. The cause of death was certified as ‘Mitral disease of the heart. Jaundice. Congestion of lungs.’108 In death, his nephew remarked, ‘he reminded you of an effigy in a cathedral of one of the knights of old’.109 He was buried in the churchyard at New Swindon, opposite the west door of the church. His memorial consists of a stone cross carved to resemble logs.* It is an incongruous resting place for a man who gave almost his whole life to India. Today, as when he was buried, express trains thunder past the churchyard on the line to Bristol and the West Country, while brambles encroach on his grave. In his will he left £100 to his spinster sister Jane, a similar sum to his son-in-law (who had actually predeceased him) and the rest of his estate to be administered by his executors on behalf of May and her children. At probate his total estate was certified as ‘under £5000’.111 His unique group of medals† is now in the collection of the National Army Museum, having been transferred from the Royal United Service Institution to which they had been presented in 1938 by a Miss C.R. Heanley. Her relationship to the Beatsons (if any) is unknown.112

Last of the line Beatson’s daughter settled in the Bristol area, near her McMullin in-laws. In 1881 she was living in Westbury-on-Trym when she applied for a Queen’s Cadetship for her elder son Charlie Beatson McMullin to go to the Royal Military College at Sandhurst. The application was supported by Maj-Gen Alfred Beatson, who had done duty at Allahabad with her father and was now retired and living nearby in * The weathered lettering on the plinth appears to give his date of birth incorrectly as 1805. His nephew, in his short biographical note on the General, also gives his birth as ‘about the year 1805’.110 Clearly his family knew his age but made the common miscalculation of a year. † Badge and star, Spanish Order of San Fernando, 2nd Class, 1837; Turkish Nishan-iIftikhar in gold, 1854; British Crimean War Medal with clasps for Balaklava, Inkerman and Sevastopol; Turkish Order of the Medjidie, 3rd Class, 1855; Turkish Crimean War Medal, Sardinian issue, 1855. It does not include the Indian Mutiny medal.



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Clifton.113 By then, Sandhurst provided the only direct route to get a commission in the peacetime army. Queen’s Cadetships were awarded to the sons of officers who died on service, and whose families were financially embarrassed.114 Mrs McMullin claimed since she had only her HEIC widow’s pension. Charlie did not get the cadetship – only one in nine applications was accepted at that period115 – and instead joined the 1st Warwick Militia as a part-time officer.116 If he planned to use this ‘back door’ route to a permanent commission it never came off, and he resigned from the Warwicks after five years.117 After years of ‘living on his means’ with his mother and younger brother (who became a farmer),118 Charlie Beatson McMullin disappears from British records and seems to have emigrated to North America, paying occasional visits to the UK from Canada.119 His mother died on 1 May 1912;120 the lack of any registration of her death in England and Wales suggests that by then she was living overseas with her son. She had been the last living Beatson of Kilrie. When Surgeon-General William Burns Beatson (from a branch of the Vicarsgrange Beatsons) wrote a new family history in 1900,121 he regretted that ‘the direct lineal descent of Kilrie and Vicarsgrange have passed away after becoming landless, but not without leaving “footprints in the sands of time”.’

Retrospect What were William Beatson’s footprints in history? After his death they were mostly washed away by the tide of army reform. His regiments had disappeared and it was left to his staff ‘family’ to carry on the lessons he had taught them. The timing of his death, a dozen years after his greatest notoriety, was unfortunate for his reputation. He was ignored by the Dictionary of National Biography (1885) and its supplements (only when the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography arrived in 2004 was he included, in an inaccurate entry). Fleeting appearances in Kinglake’s history, or in the memoirs of former colleagues like Evelyn Wood, were all that kept his name alive, though his influence could still be found in odd corners, such as the Kilmarnock bonnets of the Indian Army, or the case law on ministers’ Public Interest Certificates. It is from his life rather than his visible legacy that we must draw our conclusions about him. Clearly, his character embraced several contradictions. For such an apparently conservative and conventional soldier, with his emphasis on hard work and duty, his ponderous humour, and standing so punctiliously on his honour, Beatson had a liberal, imaginative, even rebellious streak. His tactical ideas were advanced for his time. As an infantry officer who became a leader of irregular horsemen, he was not hidebound by the ‘arme blanche’ notions of conventional cavalrymen, and was ready to employ his troops as mounted infantry in sieges and jungles. He endeavoured to procure the best firearms for them to fulfil this role, and he also understood how to integrate them into a fast-moving, all-arms force

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unencumbered by baggage. He would probably have been in his element leading a column in one of the later colonial campaigns in southern Africa, where mounted riflemen came into vogue.122 His disciple Evelyn Wood was one of those who insisted on better standards of shooting for the mounted arm, and combined arms training.123 Some of Beatson’s realistic training methods, such as sending his men in skirmishing order through a village, or turning them out without notice at night, were unusual enough to excite comment from his contemporaries. His only experience of a sword-in-hand charge was at Balaklava with the regular British cavalry – a throwback to older times – but the charge of Beatson’s Horse at Bagrode showed that the men he trained were still capable of delivering such a blow. His personal bravery was never questioned – even Skene admitted that Beatson would have ‘led his division against any odds with the utmost bravery and military skill’.124 Beatson was not a formally trained staff officer, nor was he usually supplied with an effective staff (as he himself complained). He avoided filling in returns and other ‘silly punctilios’ – rather than push paper he preferred to be up with the lark, riding round his camps and drilling his men, while ‘pipe-clay soldiers’ like Vivian assiduously did their office work. However, when he wanted something for his regiments he was an energetic correspondent – virtually every steamer between the Dardanelles and Constantinople carried these missives, which enraged Stratford. Back in India, the new electric telegraph gave him even greater opportunities for pestering his superiors. Boredom also led him into unwise correspondence, and his pen often ran away with him when Marian was not there to curb his forthright prose. Beatson’s financial management was not always sound: costs got out of control during the raising of the Bashi-Bazouks and, though arguably not his fault – Beatson complained repeatedly of his lack of commissariat officials – this laxity re-emerged during the Indian Mutiny. When things started to go wrong, Beatson kept his superiors in the dark, hoping it would all come right in the end, while resenting any interference by higher authority in ‘his’ domain. When he received an order he didn’t like, he simply ignored it (as Vivian quickly realised) until it could no longer be avoided. Impetuous and prickly, with a dislike of the ‘brass’ probably enhanced by his long years of independent command of irregular forces, Beatson must have been a terrible subordinate to have under one’s command. Rather than wait for the backalum Turkish authorities, he would have preferred drumhead courts martial held by his native officers, followed by swift punishment meted out within the unit, in the Hyderabad style. In this he may have had a valid point, but threatening to string up malefactors – or a Pasha or two – was no way to impress a sophisticated civilian like Stratford de Redcliffe. Beatson perhaps showed too much faith in his men and was blind to the political effects of their worst failings – it was Stratford and Calvert who had to deal with the Turkish authorities, local opinion and the French Allies when Britain’s good name was dragged through the muddy streets



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of the Dardanelles. In this respect Beatson shared the same blinkered paternalistic outlook as his fellow officers of the Company’s armies – a trust that proved disastrously misplaced when the Bengal Army erupted in mutiny in 1857. Although at this distance it is impossible to know what Beatson’s political views were – if, indeed, an officer who served outside the British Isles for most of his life actually thought much about such matters – we can at least infer his general sympathies from the company he kept. He followed the Radical MP, Sir George de Lacy Evans, in his quixotic crusade to Spain, and stood in high favour with Napier (whose sympathy for the Chartists was well known) and the Liberal Tory Ellenborough. Later, he was supported in Parliament by Radicals and Liberals like Roebuck, Dunne and Gavin, as well as by the newspaperman Richards. But grateful though he was for their support, he must have realised that they took up his case as a stick with which to beat the establishment. He certainly knew how to impress politicians – Auckland, Clarendon, Newcastle and Canning all succumbed to his brisk personality – and he understood the power of patronage and the press. But he also made political enemies too casually: after his dismissal at the Dardanelles his quarrel was with the War Office, whether it was headed by Panmure, Peel or Herbert. These rows had a cumulative effect: by 1857 he had used up all his credit with Whitehall. Although Beatson occasionally referred to himself as a Christian, this was in the context of Turkish officials’ jealousy. Unlike so many of his contemporaries in that evangelical age, his letters never appeal to divine protection, and his religious observance seems to be purely formal (marriages, christenings, funerals). That he died at a vicarage was simply coincidental. Even his promotion of a military chapel at Allahabad was concerned with discipline and church parades. He was always respectful of the religious views and practices of his troops, Indian or Turkish, unlike the ‘preaching colonels’ Wheler and Mackenzie with whom he clashed. Drunkenness, cowardice or shirking were not tolerated, and although he had the reputation of being harsh on his officers, this seems to be directed at those who failed to meet his standards, especially in ‘zeal’. Those who stuck with him and wrote admiringly of him in later years tended to be the competent, zealous types who went on to great things, whereas those who fell out with him rarely enjoyed such glittering careers. He had a good eye for subordinates, nurturing the careers of many of the best and brightest of the future empire (Wilson, Olpherts, Harry Green, Evelyn Wood, Roberts, Café, Stewart and Lockhart all went on to become generals, while Loch became a colonial governor), and if he showed favouritism in repeatedly using the same officers, he was doing no more than Wolseley and Roberts did in the following generation. If Beatson had a weakness in this respect, it was for flamboyant characters – some of them good soldiers and leaders in his favoured ‘irregular’ mode, like the naval officer Fred Walpole, and the adventurous doctors McEgan and Sandwith – but others were rogues and schemers like Berkeley, Burton, O’Reilly, Nabi Bux or Rustum Ali Khan. Choosing a high-profile chancer

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like Edwin James to fight his slander case may not have made much difference to the outcome, but it was of a piece with Beatson’s frequent lack of judgement. He adored fine horses and gorgeous parade uniforms, and could put on a magnificent show to impress a viceroy or an amir, yet was indifferent to how his officers and men dressed on campaign, as long as their sword was sharp and they restricted themselves to a few essentials in their saddlebags. He also adopted practical service kit for the men (such as the soft Kilmarnock bonnet). The love of uniforms was part of his romantic view of soldiering, as witnessed by his actions at Fuenterrabía and his insistence on the nobility of soldiers, even if they were Albanian bandits, Rohilla renegades, or promoted Irish deserters. He was no snob, even though he cultivated noble patrons and gathered aristocratic officers around him. But he imbued the light horseman’s spirit of bahudari and intense sense of honour to the detriment of his career and fortune. The feuds he prosecuted with such vigour, and the emphasis upon honour, are reminiscent of soldiers of the eighteenth century, rather than the Victorian era. If Burton is to be believed, Beatson came close to challenging Stratford to a duel, and there are similar undertones to the Hall–Lauder affair. Beatson was a product of the late Georgian Bengal Army, and many of his attitudes and failings were a result of being a man out of his time. His nephew sums up his character flaws without mercy: He was impetuous in most of his dealings with mankind, to a remarkable degree; and he seemed to consider that every one should be subservient to his rule. He was safe enough if you did not differ from him; but if you once disagreed it seemed as if you would never again recover his friendship. Although a first-rate officer, and strict disciplinarian, and, from the nature of his profession, obliged to succumb in weight matters to the higher powers, still this unfortunate spirit of dislike of correction, or advice, sometimes followed him into quarters where, had he acted otherwise, marks of high favour and distinction were certain. There can be no doubt that he had numerous very fine qualities; but disappointed ambition seemed occasionally to freeze ‘the genial current’ of his soul, and prevent his achieving that greatness which he so eminently deserved.125

From the evidence of a frequently turbulent military career spanning over 50 years, we may conclude that William Beatson lived up to the first but not the second part of his family motto: Cum prudentia sedulis – ‘Diligence with prudence’.126

NOTES

Key to Correspondents FDA CB ACB RWB WFB CGB RJHB FWC VC WC EoC JC FC MoD CD LdE HME CF JSF SF HG PG RNCH EH BH HH GJ EoL JRL JMac CM

Maj F.D. Atkinson, Dep. Sec. to Indian Mily Dept 1856–62; Controller of Mily Accounts 1862–70. Cecil Beadon, Foreign Sec. to Indian Govt 1859–62. Alexander Campbell Beatson. Robert Wedderburn Beatson. William Ferguson Beatson. Lt-Col Charles Becher, CO 1st Beatson’s Horse 1858–9. Col R.J.H. (later Maj-Gen Sir Richard) Birch, Sec. to Indian Mily Dept 1854–61. Frederick Calvert, HM Consul at the Dardanelles 1848–61. Viscount Canning, GG 1855–62. Maj-Gen Sir William Casement, Sec. to Indian Mily Dept to 1839. Hon George Villiers, HM Minister to Spain 1833–7, afterwards Earl of Clarendon, Foreign Sec. 1853–8. John Croomes, Chief Clerk to WD 1853–7. Frederick Currie (later Sir Frederick Currie, Bart), Sec. to Indian Foreign Dept 1842–6. Marquis of Dalhousie, GG 1847–56. Capt (later Lt-Col) Cuthbert Davidson, Assistant Resident at Hyderabad 1849–55, Resident 1857–62. Lord Ellenborough, GG 1842–4; President Board of Control 1858. H.M. (later Sir Henry) Elliot, Sec. to Indian Foreign Dept 1848–54. Charles Fraser, GG’s Agent, Saugor and Nerbudda, to 1842. Maj-Gen James (later Sir James) Fraser, Resident at Hyderabad 1839–52. Simon Fraser, GG’s Agent, Bundelkhand, to 1842. Sir Hugh (later Viscount) Gough, CinC India 1843–9. Lt-Col Patrick Grant, AG Bengal Army 1846–50. R.N.C. (later Sir Robert) Hamilton, Sec. to NWP Govt, 1841–2; Resident at Indore 1844–60. Edmund Hammond, Permanent Under-Sec., Foreign Office, 1854–73. Benjamin Hawes, Deputy Sec. at War 1851–7. Sir Henry (laterViscount) Hardinge, GG 1844–8, CinC 1852–6. Maj George Johnston, Mily Sec. to the Resident, Hyderabad, 1846–51. Earl of Lucan, commanding Cavalry Division 1854. Maj-Gen J.R. (later Sir James) Lumley, AG Bengal Army, 1833–46. Capt J. Macdonald, AQMG Poona Division 1858–9. Brig Colin Mackenzie, Hyderabad Contingent 1849–55.

348 WHM THM WRM WAJM HOM JM GCM CJN EStJN JGN DoN JN HWN WOp VP LdP LdWP FP JP LdR SdeR HHR DR JYS RS CS JSp JHS WHS MWS JS WHMS JTk JT GT JEV RJHV FWe DoW TFW FWr LdW HEW WW CY

Notes W.H. Macnaghten, Sec. to Indian Political Dept to 1839. T.H. (later Sir Herbert) Maddock, Sec. to Indian Political Dept 1839–43; President Council of India 1847. Brig-Gen W.R. (later Gen Sir William) Mansfield, Mily Commissioner to British Embassy, Constantinople, 1855–6; CinC India 1865–70. Lt-Col W.A.J. Mayhew, DAG Bengal Army 1856–7; AG 1857–61. Capt H.O. Mayne, Hyderabad Contingent; CO Mayne’s Horse 1859–61. Maj-Gen John Michel, TC 1855–6, India 1857–9. Col G.C. Mundy, Permanent Under-Sec. for War 1854–7. Lt-Gen Sir Charles Napier, Governor of Sind 1842–7. Lt-Col E.StJ. Neale, HM Consul at Varna 1847–58. Brig-Gen James Neill, TC 1855–6, India 1857. Duke of Newcastle, Sec. of State for War and the Colonies 1852–5. Gen Sir Jasper Nicholls, CinC India 1839–43. Maj H.W. Norman, DAG Bengal Army, 1858–61; Sec. to Indian Mily Dept 1862–70. Lt William Olpherts, CO Bundlecund Legion Artillery 1845–6. Viscount Palmerston, Foreign Sec. 1830–41; Prime Minister February 1855–8. Lord Panmure, Sec. of State for War February 1855–8. Brig-Gen Lord William Paulet, CO Scutari depot 1854–5. Frederick Peel, Under-Sec. of State for War February 1855–7. Maj-Gen Jonathan Peel, Sec. of State for War 1858–9. Lord Raglan, CinC British Army of the East 1854–5. Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe, HM Ambassador to the Sublime Porte 1841–58. Col (later Gen Sir) Hugh Rose, HM Mily Commissioner to French HQ 1854–5; GOC Central India Field Force 1857–9; CinC India 1860–5. Capt David Ross, Superintendent at Jhansi 1838–42, Jalaun from 1842. Brig-Gen Hon James Scarlett, GOC Heavy Brigade 1854. Col Sir Richmond Shakespear, GG’s Agent for Central India, 1860–2. Brig-Gen Charles Shaw, BAL 1835–6. Gen Sir James Simpson, 2i/c Sind, 1845-46; CinC British Army of the East 1855–6. John Skene, HM Vice-Consul at Constantinople 1852–5; afterwards Consul at Aleppo. Maj William Sleeman, GG’s Agent, Bundelkhand, Saugor and Nerbudda, from 1842 (and Gwalior from 1843) to 1849. Maj-Gen Michael Smith, GOC OIC 1855–6, India 1857–9. Lt-Col James Stuart, Sec. to Indian Mily Dept 1839–54. Maj W.H.M. Sturt, Asst Sec. to Indian Mily Dept 1846–8. Maj-Gen J. (later Sir Joseph) Thackwell, GOC Cawnpore Division 1840–6. James Thomason, Sec. to NWP Govt, to 1841. Brig George Twemlow, GOC Aurungabad Division, Hyderabad Contingent, to 1853. Capt James Verner, CO Bundlecund Legion Cavalry 1840–59; London Irish Volunteers 1860. Lt-Gen (later Sir) Robert Vivian, GOC TC 1855–6. Lt Hon Frederick Walpole, RN, Beatson’s Horse 1855–6. Duke of Wellington, CinC 1842–52. Ens (later Col) Thomas Wilson, 13th BNI 1838–57, CO 1st Beatson’s Horse 1858; DAG 1868–72. Capt Francis Winter, Bundlecund Legion 1844–6. Lord Wodehouse, Under-Sec. of State for Foreign Affairs 1852–6. Lt Henry Evelyn Wood, Beatson’s Horse 1859–60. Lt-Col William Wylde, HM Mily Commissioner to Queen Cristina’s Army of the North 1834–8. Maj-Gen Charles Yorke, Mily Sec. 1854–60.

Sources include: EIR; Foreign Office List; Imperial Calendar; Hodson, ODNB.



Notes to pages xiv–5

349

Other Abbreviations in Notes (See also Glossary, p. xi) Asst Assistant Bd Board BO Brigade Order CoI Proceedings of a Court of Inquiry corresp. correspondence Dep. Deputy Dept Department enc. enclosure FL Foreign Letter from India GG Governor General GGGO General Order by the GG GO General Order GOCC General Order by the CinC Govt Government MD Military Despatch to India Mily Military ML Military Letter from India PD Political Despatch to India PL Political Letter from India Sec. Secretary SR Service Record

Glossary 1

Sources include: H.H. Wilson, A Glossary of Judicial and Revenue Terms … of British India, (Calcutta, 1940); Col Henry Yule and C.C. Burnell, Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Terms and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymologies, Historical, Geographical and Discursive, 2nd edn (London, 1903); Ivor Lewis, Sahibs, Nabobs and Boxwallahs: A Dictionary of the Words of Anglo India (Oxford, 1998); Charles Allen (ed.), Plain Tales from the Raj (London, 1976); Concise Oxford Dictionary; Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913).

Preface 1 James Henry Skene, With Lord Stratford in the Crimean War (London, 1883), p. 50. 2 H.B. Eaton, JSAHR LXII (1984), p. 86. 3 Priscilla Napier, Raven Castle: Charles Napier in India 1844–1851 (Salisbury, 1991), p. 281.

Prologue: Friday the Thirteenth: An Action for Slander 1

C.N. Elvin (revised R. Pincher), Elvin’s Handbook of Mottoes (London, 1971).

Chapter 1. The Beatsons of Kilrie: The High Road to India 1

The primary source is Beatson of Rossend’s Genealogical Account of the Families of Beatson (Edinburgh, 1860), which forms the basis for the family’s entry in BLG (1868), and for Surg-

350

Notes to pages 5–10

Gen W.B. Beatson’s Story of the Surname of Beatson (London, 1900). An ingenious attempt to disentangle the family’s intermarriages is the circular format of the anonymous Table of the Fifeshire family of BEATSON… in the National Army Museum (NAM 6311-53) (London). Additional detail from registers of births and baptisms, banns and marriages, census records, and wills and testaments (www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk), but there are gaps in these records. 2 C.N. Elvin (revised R. Pincher), Elvin’s Handbook of Mottoes (London, 1971). 3 Beatson of Rossend; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography [ODNB] (Oxford, 2004); Beatson of Vicarsgrange’s publications (see p. 8). 4 Robert Chambers, Lives of Illustrious and Distinguished Scotsmen (Glasgow, 1832); Anon, A New Catalogue of Living English Authors (London, 1799). 5 Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 4 (1798), p. 35; the title page of Robert Beatson, An Essay on the Comparative Advantages of Vertical and Horizontal Wind-mills: Containing a Description of an Horizontal Wind-mill and Water-mill Upon a New Construction; and Explaining the Manner of Applying the Same Principle to Pumps, Sluices, Methods for Moving Boats or Vessels, &c, &c (London, 1798) describes the author as ‘Robert Beatson, Esq., F.R.S.E., Honorary Member of the Board of Agriculture, Member of the Society of London for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, and of the Royal Highland Society of Scotland, and late of his Majesty’s Corps of Royal Engineers’. 6 Robert Beatson of Pitteadie, General View of the Agriculture of the County of Fife, with Observations on the Manner of its Improvement (Edinburgh, 1794). 7 Capt T.W.J. Connolly, Roll of Officers of the Corps of Royal Engineers from 1660 to 1898, ed. Capt R.E. Edwards (Chatham, 1898); Beatson of Rossend. 8 Testament Dative (St Andrews Commissary Court, 18 April 1816, Ref CC20/4/30) describes Robert Beatson as ‘of Kilrie, thereafter of Rossend’; Beatson of Rossend, Appendix V. On Scottish maiden names, Alexander Somerville (ed. John Carswell), The Autobiography of a Working Man (London, 1951), p. 29. 9 John Gifford, The Buildings of Scotland: Fife (London, 1988); Raymond Campbell Paterson, My Wound Is Deep: A History of the Later Anglo-Scots Wars 1380–1560 (Edinburgh, 1997); Fifeshire Advertiser, 29 April 1873. 10 On his son’s cadet papers (L/MIL/9/140 ff 45–9), he is referred to as ‘one of His Majesty’s Justices of the Peace for the County of Fife’. 11 Beatson, Essay. 12 Beatson of Rossend, Appendix VII. 13 Rev James Wemyss, ‘Number XXXVIII: Parish of Burntisland (County of Fife)’ (Vol. II), and Rev Thomas Fleming, ‘Number I: Parish of Kirkaldy (County of Fife)’ (Vol. XVIII), in Sir John Sinclair (ed.), The Statistical Account of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1791–9). 14 Beatson of Rossend; ODNB: ‘Alexander Beatson’ and ‘Oakeley’; Lt-Col Alexander Beatson, A View of the Origin and Conduct of the War with Tippoo Sultaun; Comprising a Narrative of the Operations of the Army under the Command of Lieutenant-General George Harris, and of the Siege of Seringapatam (London, 1800). 15 Beatson of Rossend. 16 ODNB. 17 ODNB; Beatson of Rossend. 18 ODNB; Sir John Fortescue, History of the British Army, Vol. III (London, 1899–1930), p. 557. 19 Fortescue, Vol. III, pp. 600–8. 20 ODNB; Fortescue, Vol. IV, Pt I, p. 402. 21 ODNB. 22 Beatson, View; Beatson of Rossend. 23 Fortescue, Vol. IV, Pt II, pp. 715–48; Beatson, View. 24 Mason, p. 205; L/MIL/5/159, pp. 415–20. 25 Beatson of Rossend; Beatson, New System. 26 Beatson of Rossend; ‘Novar’, in Burke’s Peerage and Baronetage (1939 edn); James Ferguson and Robert Menzies Fergusson, Records of the Clan and Name of Fergusson, Ferguson and Fergus (Edinburgh, 1895), p. 311.



Notes to pages 10–19

351

27 WFB’s date of birth is given in Beatson of Rossend and in the extract from the register of births and baptisms of Burntisland included in his cadet papers (L/MIL/9/140, pp. 45–9). Robert Beatson’s date of death (18 August 1805) is included in the confirmation of his testament at St Andrews Commissary Court (18 April 1816, Ref CC20/4/30) after Jean died. 28 St Andrews Commissary Court, 19 April 1816 (Ref CC20/7/8). 29 Cadet Papers: ACB: L/MIL/9/130; RWB: L/MIL/9/134; WFB: L/MIL/9/140. 30 Beatson of Rossend, Appendix VII. 31 Beatson of Rossend, p. 44. 32 Maj-Gen Alexander Beatson, A New System of Cultivation without Lime, or Dung, or Summer Fallows, as Practiced at Knowle-farm, in the County of Sussex (London, 1820) p. 6; [Maj-Gen Alexander Beatson], Papers Relating to the Devastation Committed by Goats on the Island of St Helena, from the Period of their Introduction to the Present Time; Comprising Experiments, Observations, & Hints, Connected with Agricultural improvements and Plants (St Helena, 1810); ‘Experiments in the Cultivation of Potatoes upon the Island of St Helena, by Colonel Alexander Beatson, Governor, &c, &c, &c’, The St Helena Monthly Register for January 1811; ‘Remarks on the Culture of Mangel Wurzels in the Island of St Helena, by Colonel Alexander Beatson, Governor, &c, &c, &c’, The St Helena Monthly Register for October 1811; R.H. Grove, Green Imperialism: Colonial Expansion, Tropical Island Edens, and the Origins of Environmentalism, 1600–1860 (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 356–60. 33 Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 34 Maj-Gen Alexander Beatson, Tracts Relative to the Island of St Helena (London, 1816), pp. lxxvii and 220–1. 35 Beatson of Rossend; Hodson. 36 Hodson. 37 ODNB. 38 Niall Ferguson, Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World (London, 2003). Ian Fletcher and Natalia Ishchenko, The Crimean War; Clash of Empires (Staplehurst, 2004), p. 45; John M. MacKenzie, International History Review, Vol. XV (1993), pp. 714–39. 39 Hugh Thomas, The Story of Sandhurst (London, 1961), p. 66. 40 EIR (1820); Capt Walter Badenach, An Inquiry into the State of the Indian Army, With Suggestions for its Improvement and a Plan for the Establishment of a Military Police for India (London, 1826), p. 37. 41 Roger T. Stearn, SOTQ No. 79 (1994), p. 1. 42 EIR (1820). 43 L/MIL/9/140, ff 45–9. 44 Thomas, p. 11; Col E. Maude, Oriental Campaigns and European Furloughs: The Autobiography of a Veteran of the Indian Mutiny (London, 1900), p. 2. 45 J.H. Stocqueler, Handbook of India, A Guide to the Stranger and the Traveller, and a Companion to the Resident (London, 1844), p. 117.

Chapter 2. First Passage to India 1 2

EIR (1821). Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47); Naylor SR (L/MIL/10/23/372). 3 Hodson; ODNB. 4 CKPOD (1821). 5 EIR; Henry Vigo Cary, The Cadet’s Guide to India, Containing Information and Advice to Young Men About to Enter the Army of the Hon. East India Company, by a Lieutenant of the Bengal Establishment (London, 1820), p. 7. 6 Kelso SR (L/MIL/11/38/357). 7 Cary, pp. 2­–4, EIR (1820). 8 Cary, p. 16.

352 9

Notes to pages 19–29

Henry Wise, An Analysis of One Hundred Voyages to and from India, China, &c, Performed by Ships in the Honble East India Company’s Service (London, 1839); H.M. Elmore, The British Mariner’s Directory and Guide to the Trade and Navigation of the Indian and China Seas (London, 1802); Cary p. 16. 10 Wise; Elmore; L/MIL/11/38/357; F/4/540(12973). 11 J.H. Stocqueler, Handbook of India, A Guide to the Stranger and the Traveller, and a Companion to the Resident (London, 1844), p. 164. 12 Wise. 13 Cary, p. 23. 14 Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 242, 266–338; William Howard Russell, My Indian Mutiny Diary (London, 1860), pp. 9–10; Bellew, Vol. I, p. 101; Major H. Bevan, Thirty Years in India: or, a Soldier’s Reminiscences of Native and European Life in the Presidencies from 1808 to 1838 (London, 1839), p. 9. 15 Bellew, Vol. I, p. 104; Cary, pp. 24, 62. 16 Calcutta Directory (1822); Cary, pp. 62 and 25–6; WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373). 17 BAAD (1821). 18 Russell, Mutiny, p. 9; FM Lord Roberts, Forty-One Years in India (London, 1898), p. 4; Bellew, Vol. I, p. 104. Russell was writing in 1858, Roberts recalling the city as it was in 1852. 19 Bellew, Vol. I, p. 104; Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 272. 20 Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 338–42. 21 Russell, Mutiny, p. 9; Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 242; Roberts, p. 3; Maj George A. Vetch, The Gong: or, Reminiscences of India, Edinburgh (1852), p. 55. 22 Cary, p. 26. 23 Alexander Mackenzie, History of the Mackenzies, with Genealogies of the Principal Families of the Name, new edn (Inverness, 1904); GGGO, 15 December; GOCC, 16 December 1820. 24 Bellew, Vol. I, p. 116–17; Cary, pp. 4–6. 25 Boris Mollo, The Indian Army (Poole, 1981), pp. 22–8. 26 Capt Freddie Guest, Indian Cavalryman (London, 1959), p. 29. 27 GOCC, 16 December 1820; Hodson; John H. Rumsby, JSAHR 84 (2006), p. 349. 28 New Cambridge History of India, Vol. III/.5, Science, Technology and Medicine in Colonial India (Cambridge, 2000), pp. 104–6, 129–31. 29 Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 191–7; BAGD (1824); Col Henry Yule and C.C. Burnell, HobsonJobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Terms and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymologies, Historical, Geographical and Discursive, 2nd edn, London, 1903. 30 Bellew, Vol. II, p. 52; Sir John Lawrence and Audrey Woodiwiss (eds), The Journals of Honoria Lawrence: India Observed 1837–1854 (London, 1980), p. 51. 31 Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 198. 32 Bellew, Vol. II, p. 65; Lawrence and Woodiwiss, pp. 51–2. 33 Bellew, Vol. I, pp. 192–3. 34 Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 372; Vetch, p. 108; Lawrence and Woodiwiss, p. 52. 35 Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 377–86. 36 Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 380–6. 37 J.C. Pollock, Way to Glory: The Life of Havelock of Lucknow (London, 1957), p. 35; Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 392–9; H.R. Nevill, Ghazipur: A Gazetteer (District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Oude, Vol. XXIX (Allahabad, 1903); EIR. 38 T.A. Heathcote, The Indian Army: The Garrison of British Imperial India 1822–1922 (Newton Abbot, 1974), p. 156. 39 GO 27, November 1820. 40 Bellew, Vol. II, p. 1; Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 215–16. 41 Bellew, Vol. I, p. 272; Capt Albert Hervey, A Soldier of the Company: Life of an Indian Ensign, 1833–43, ed. Charles Allen (London, 1988), p. 23. 42 CKPOD (1821); BAAD (1822); Hodson. 43 Mollo, p. 28. 44 WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373).



Notes to pages 29–41

353

45 46 47 48

Roberts, p. 6. CKPOD (1821); GO, 18 October and 28 November 1820. Vetch, p. 109. Vetch, pp. 108–9; W.W. Hunter, Imperial Gazetteer of India (London, 1881); Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 402. 49 CKPOD (1821). 50 Hodson; L/MIL/10/24/372; GOCC, 13 September 1831; McKenzie SR (L/MIL/10/24/365). 51 Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 187; Vetch, pp. 109–10; Roberts, p. 7. 52 Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 189; Olpherts, Memoirs, p. 379. 53 Roberts, pp. 7–8. 54 BAGD (1824). 55 Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974), pp. 15–16, 136–7, 141–3; Maj G.F. MacMunn, The Armies of India (London, 1911), pp. 65–81; Mollo, pp. 10–12; IG; AR (1819), p. 199. 56 IG; CKPOD (1821); Lawrence and Woodiwiss, pp. 54–5. 57 Lt F.G. Cardew, A Sketch of the Services of the Bengal Native Army to the Year 1895 (Calcutta, 1903). 58 Vetch, p. 130; Hodson; EIR; GO, 23 December 1820. 59 Hodson; EIR.

Chapter 3. The Young Sahib 1

Niall Ferguson, Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World (London, 2003), pp. 136–46; Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974), pp. 167–9, 176–7 and 260. 2 James Lunt (ed.), From Sepoy to Subedar, Being the Life and Adventures of Subedar Sita Ram (London, 1970), p. 24. 3 Bellew, passim. 4 Lunt, p. 23; Barat pp. 113–4; Jacob p. 2. 5 Hervey p. 23ff. 6 Amiya Barat, The Bengal Infantry, its Organisation and Discipline 1796–1852 (Calcutta, 1962), pp. 60ff, 118. 7 Barat, p. 104. 8 Lunt, p. 23. 9 John Fraser, JSAHR 79 (2001), p. 119. 10 Barat, pp. 119–27; Mason, p. 229. 11 Maj John Jacob, Remarks on the Native Troops of the Indian Army and Notes on Certain Passages in Sir C. Napier’s Posthumous Work on the Defects of the Indian Army, with Some Account of the Scinde Camel Baggage Corps (Bombay, 1854), pp. 3 and 8. 12 Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), Vol. 1, p. 153. 13 EIR (1820); Mason, p. 190. 14 Henry Vigo Cary, The Cadet’s Guide to India, Containing Information and Advice to Young Men About to Enter the Army of the Hon. East India Company, by a Lieutenant of the Bengal Establishment (London, 1820) pp. 34–7; J.H. Stocqueler, Handbook of India, A Guide to the Stranger and the Traveller, and a Companion to the Resident (London, 1844), p. 216; Charles Allen (ed.), Plain Tales from the Raj (London, 1976), pp. 273–87. 15 Mason, p. 190; Barat, pp. 92–6; Capt Freddie Guest, Indian Cavalryman (London, 1959), p. 141. 16 ‘An Abridged Code of Standing Orders regarding Military Staff Officers’, BAGD (1847); Lt F.G. Cardew, A Sketch of the Services of the Bengal Native Army to the Year 1895 (Calcutta, 1903), p. 142; Capt Walter Badenach, An Inquiry into the State of the Indian Army, With Suggestions for its Improvement and a Plan for the Establishment of a Military Police for India (London, 1826); Barat, pp. 104–11, Mason, pp. 177 and 320. 17 EIR (1822). 18 Barat, pp. 109–12; Cardew, p. 144; Jacob, p. 3.

354 19 20

Notes to pages 41–50

BAAD (1822). Capt Albert Hervey, A Soldier of the Company: Life of an Indian Ensign, 1833–43, ed. Charles Allen (London, 1988), pp. 118–33. 21 Mason, p. 45; GGGO, 2 December 1824, quoted in WFB to the Bundlecund Legion 21 September 1844 (P/39/17). 22 W.W. Hunter, Imperial Gazetteer of India (London, 1881); IG; BAAD (1822). 23 Guest, pp. 120–5; F. Yeats-Brown, Bengal Lancer (London, 1930), pp. 85–101; Gen Sir Bindon Blood, Four Score Years and Ten (London, 1933), pp. 62–71. 24 BDAR (1823); Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 25 GO 22, October 1822. 26 BAAD (1823); Hodson. 27 Bellew, pp. 2–3. 28 Boris Mollo, The Indian Army (Poole, 1981), pp. 26–7; Cardew, p. 93; BAAD (1823). 29 Barat, pp. 80–7; GOCC, 11 September 1823. 30 EIR; Hodson. 31 Philip Woodruff, The Men who Ruled India: The Guardians (London, 1954), p. 119; Thomas Campbell Robertson, Political Incidents of the First Burmese War (London, 1853), pp. 2–3, 13, 23–35; IG; Col W.F.B. Laurie, Our Burmese Wars and Relations with Burma: Being an Abstract of Military and Political Operations 1824–25–26, and 1852–53, 2nd edn (London, 1885). Sir Algernon Law, India under Lord Ellenborough, March 1842­–June 1844 (London, 1926), pp. 19– 21; AR (1824), pp. 188–92; D.G.E. Hall, Europe and Burma (Oxford, 1945), p. 113; BH (25 May 1824); Cardew, p. 148. 32 BH (25, 26, 28, 29 May 1824); IG; Guest, p. 204; Sir John Kaye and Col G.B. Malleson, History of the Indian Mutiny of 1857–8, 2nd edn (London, 1889–93), Vol. 1, p. 266; Laurie, Burma, pp. 21 and 30; Robertson, pp. 47–8; Hall, p. 114; B.R. Pearn, JSAHR 24 (1946), pp. 115–24; BDAR (1824). 33 Robertson, p. 4; Barat, p. 212; Kaye and Malleson, Mutiny, pp. 265–6. 34 Kaye and Malleson, Mutiny, pp. 264–9; Mason, pp. 242–6; Barat, pp. 202–5. 35 Barat, pp. 210–15; GGGO, 25 March 1825; Mason, pp. 242–6. 36 GGGO No. 195 of 1824 and GOCC, 12 July 1824; GOs, 20 and 21 May 1825. 37 Laurie, Burma, p. 43; Woodruff, p. 119; Cardew, pp. 149–53; Barat, p. 220; AR (1825), p. 130; Robertson, pp. 108–9, 116–17; Kaye and Malleson, Mutiny, p. 270; Hodson. 38 GOCC, 15 July and 5 September 1825; Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 484–6; Hodson; BDAR (1824). 39 GOCC, 11 and 14 November 1825, 15 January and 29 April 1826; Cardew, p. 153; Barat, p. 224; MD No. 59, 9 August 1848 (E/4/797); Alexander John Beatson of Rossend, Genealogical Account of the Families of Beatson (Edinburgh, 1860), p. 49. 40 GOCC, 17 January 1826; Cardew, p. 115. 41 Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 451, 562–3; GGGO, 20 January 1826; GO No. 184 of 1826; GOs, 10 August 1826; 14 March, 7 May, 9 August 1827. 42 Barat, pp. 111, 224–5; Cardew, pp. 156–63; GOCC, 4 August 1828. 43 BH, August 1828; GGGO, 29 July; GOCC, 20 August; Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, 8 December 1828. 44 BH, 2 November 1829. 45 GOs, 9 October, 9 November, 2 December; GOCC, 5 September 1829; BDAR (1831); EIR (1829). 46 GO, 10 January 1831. 47 ‘Confidential Report of the Inspection of the 54th N Regt of Infy by Brigr Genl White – Benares – Jany 11th 1833’ (NAM 6404-74-3). 48 RWB SR (L/MIL/10/24/93); Asst Surg G. Dodgson to Surg J.A. Clapperton, 21 August; RWB to AG, 22 August 1838 (P/36/28); GOCC, 14 July 1829; ACB SR (L/MIL/10/23/423); BH, 19 May and 22 August 1832; Hodson. 49 GO, 11 September 1832; EIR (1834) (which incorrectly lists the child as a daughter). 50 BH, 4 September 1832; CDAR (1835).



Notes to pages 51–7

355

Chapter 4. Spanish Interlude: With the British Auxiliary Legion 1

MD No. 31, 8 April; No. 66, 8 July (E/4/743); Scotsman, 11 July 1835; Caledonian Mercury, 13 July 1835. 2 C.A. Fyffe, History of Modern Europe, Vol. II (London, 1886); Sir Llewellyn Woodward, The Oxford History of England, Vol. XIII, The Age of Reform, 1815–1870, 2nd edn (Oxford, 1962), pp. 230–2. 3 Alexander Gallardo, ‘Anglo-Spanish relations during the First Carlist War (1833–1839)’, PhD thesis, St John’s University, New York, 1977, p. 7; John Francis Bacon, Six Years in Biscay: Comprising a Personal Narrative of the Sieges of Bilbao, in June 1835, and Oct to Dec 1836, and of the Principal Events which occurred in that City and the Basque Provinces, during the years 1830 to 1837 (London, 1838), pp. 15 and 320; Marek January Chodakiewicz and John Radaikowski (eds), Spanish Carlism and Polish Nationalism: The Borderlands of Europe in the 19th and 20th Centuries (Charlottesville, 2003). 4 Edward M. Spiers, Radical General: Sir George de Lacy Evans, 1787–1870 (Manchester, 1983), pp. 63–5. 5 C.C. Bayley, Mercenaries for the Crimea (Montreal, 1977), p. 146; The Times, 11 June 1835; Edgar Holt, The Carlist Wars in Spain (London, 1967), p. 82. 6 Col Sir de Lacy Evans, Memoranda of the Contest in Spain (London, 1840), p. 26. 7 The Times, 30 July 1835. 8 BAL Army List; WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373). 9 BAL Army List; The Times, 30 July 1835. 10 Alexander Somerville, A Narrative of the British Auxiliary Legion (Glasgow, 1838), p. 8. 11 ODNB; Richard Stevenson, SOTQ, No. 142 (2010), p. 14. 12 The Scotsman, 22 July 1835; Bayley, p. 146; Sir Charles Shaw, Personal Memoirs and Correspondence of Colonel Charles Shaw (London, 1837), p. 412. 13 Edward M. Spiers, The Army and Society 1815–1914 (London, 1980), p. 42; Brigitte Mitchell, JSAHR 83 (2005), p. 215. 14 Somerville, Narrative p. 3; Rutherford Alcock, Notes on the Medical History and Statistics of the British Legion of Spain (London, 1838), p. 5. 15 The Times, 29 June 1835; Anon, A Concise Account of the British Auxiliary Legion Commanded by General Evans in the Expedition Against Don Carlos, in the Civil War of Spain, by a Volunteer in the Queen’s Service (Scarborough, 1837), p. 5. 16 Glasgow Herald, 17 July; The Scotsman, 22 July 1835; Shaw, p. 444. 17 Gallardo, p. 143; Evans, p. 38. 18 Somerville, Narrative, p. 5; Shaw, pp. 534–5. 19 Shaw, p. 412; Somerville, Narrative, p. 6. 20 The Times, 29 June 1835. 21 Maj R. Money Barnes, The Uniforms and History of the Scottish Regiments (London, 1956), p. 270. 22 Alexander Somerville, History of the British Legion and War in Spain (London, 1839), pp. 117, 216, 376; Edward Costello, Adventures of a Soldier; Written by Himself, 2nd edn (London, 1852), p. 242; Conrad Cairns, JSAHR 76 (1998), p. 11; Allan L. Carswell JSAHR 77 (1999), p. 219; Conrad Cairns, The First Carlist War 1833–1840 (Nottingham, 2009), pp. 41–6. 23 Shaw, p. 412; [Capt H. Meller], ‘Recollections of the Campaign in Spain’, The United Service Journal and Naval and Military Magazine, Part I (July 1838), p. 347. 24 Edward M. Brett, The British Auxiliary Legion in the First Carlist War in Spain, 1835–1836: A Forgotten Army (Dublin, 2005), p. 41; The Times, 27 July, 18, 25, 29 August 1835; Shaw, pp. 424, 444. 25 Gallardo, p. 18. 26 Sir Charles Oman, A History of the Peninsular War (Oxford, 1902–30), Vol. 7, p. 522. 27 Gallardo, pp. 96–7, 148. 28 Gallardo, pp. 8–18; John F. Coverdale, The Basque Phase of Spain’s First Carlist War (Princeton, 1984), p. 217.

356

Notes to pages 57–64

29 The Times, 18 August 1835; AR (1835), p. 461; Evans, p. 32. 30 Thompson, pp. 10–11; Gallardo p. 147; Anon, Concise Account p. 24; Ball, Seven Years, p. xiv. 31 Somerville, Narrative, pp. 8–9; Evans, p. 32; WW to VP No. 44, 6 September 1835 (FO72/447). 32 WW to VP No. 45, 7 September 1835 (FO72/447); AR (1835), p. 462; enc No. 2 in WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853 (FO78/974). 33 [Maj-Gen C.W. Thompson], Twelve Months in the British Legion, by an officer of the Ninth Regiment (London, 1836), p. 55; Shaw, p. 425; Costello, p. 228. 34 Brett, p. 51; Meller, Recollections, Pt II (September 1838), p. 91. 35 Thompson, p. 55; Costello, pp. 217–20. 36 Bacon, pp. 278–81; Gallardo, p. 153; Thompson, p. 59; AR (1835), p. 462; WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853 (FO78/974). 37 Bacon, pp. 281–2. 38 The Times, 7 October 1835; NAM 6807-198. 39 WW to VP No. 49, 25 September 1835 (FO72/447); The Times, 31 October 1835; Thompson, pp. 70–2. 40 Bacon, p. 283; Thompson, p. 73; Meller, Recollections Pt II, p. 93; NAM 6807-198; Shaw, p. 509. 41 Spiers, Radical General, pp. 49, 59–60, 112; Mason, pp. 193, 203. 42 Capt Alexander Ball, A Personal Narrative of Seven Years in Spain (London, 1846), p. 8. 43 EoC to VP No. 171, 31 October 1835 (FO72/444); No. 174, 3 November 1835; No. 177, 7 November 1835 (FO72/445); WW to VP No. 53, 16 November 1835 (FO72/447); RCHM, pp. 325–6; AR (1835); Meller, Recollections, Pt II, p. 96; Alcock, p. 10; Costello, pp. 220–4; The Times, 23 November 1835. 44 Bacon, pp. 287–8. 45 Ball, Seven Years, p. 16. 46 NAM 6807-198. 47 The Times, 1 December 1835; Alcock, p. 10. 48 NAM 6807-198; BAL Army List; Meller, Recollections, Pt III (November 1838), p. 362. 49 Brett, pp. 33–7; Meller, Recollections, Pt I, pp. 347–9; Ball, Seven Years, pp. 1–6; Somerville, History, pp. 269–72. 50 Costello, p. 232; Thompson, p. 125; Ball, Seven Years, p. 27. 51 Ball, Seven Years, p. 27; Alcock, p. 15; Arno Karlen, Plague’s Progress: A Social History of Man and Disease (London, 1995), pp. 113–17. 52 Alcock, pp. 2 and 14; R. Henderson, The Soldier of Three Queens (London, 1866), p. 269; The Times, 12 March 1836; Thompson, p. 119; Ball, Seven Years, p. 39; Holt, p. 108; Anon, Concise Account, p. 7. 53 Alcock, pp. 4 and 14–5; Costello, p. 242; NAM 6807-200; Thompson, pp. 123–4. 54 Shaw, p. 527; EoC to VP No. 8, 10 January 1836 (FO72/457); Meller, Recollections, Pt III, p. 360; Costello, p. 235; Thompson, p. 133. 55 Evans, pp. 38–9; EoC to VP No. 8, 10 January 1836; No. 26, 2 February 1836 (FO72/457); Henderson, pp. 252–4. 56 Henderson, p. 257; Shaw, p. 486; Thompson, p. 133; Meller, Recollections, Pt III, pp. 363–5. 57 WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853 (FO78/974). 58 Meller, Recollections Pt III, pp. 364–5; Thompson, pp. 134–8; Ball, Seven Years p. 30; Henderson, p. 258; Shaw, p. 486; WW to EoC, 6 March 1836 (FO72/458); AR (1836). 59 Shaw, pp. 487–9; Meller, Recollections Pt III, p. 366; Ball, Seven Years pp. 30–4; Thompson, pp. 139–41; Henderson, pp. 259–63; AR (1836). 60 WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853 (FO78/974); Costello, p. 237; Thompson, pp. 173–81. 61 EoC to VP No. 26, 2 February 1836 (FO72/457); No. 74, 26 March 1836 (FO72/458); AR (1836); Evans, p. 35; Henderson, p. 291. 62 Thompson, pp. 184–6, 197–210; Shaw, p. 534. 63 Thompson, pp. 210–12; EoC to VP No. 100, 23 April 1836 (FO72/458); The Times, 3 and 4 May 1836. 64 Thompson, pp. 214–16; Henderson, p. 292; Shaw, pp. 552–5. 65 Thompson, pp. 219–20.



Notes to pages 64–72

357

66 Spiers, Radical General, pp. 80–1; NAM 6807-198; Thompson, pp. 223–4; Shaw, pp. 569–70; Ball, Seven Years, pp. 55–63; Henderson, pp. 295–8; Evans, pp. 47–8; Lt-Col J.H. Humfrey, A Concise Review of the Campaigns of the British Legion in Spain (London, 1838), pp. 25–6; WW to VP No. 66, 5 May 1836 (FO72/464); The Times, 12 and 13 May 1836; AR (1836). 67 Henderson, p. 298; AR (1836); RCHM, pp. 433–5; Costello, p. 258–9. 68 Shaw, pp. 576–7; Thompson, pp. 257–8; Oman, Vol. VII. 69 Evans, p. 48; Shaw, pp. 576–7. 70 Somerville, History, p. 46. 71 Somerville, History, pp. 47–8; Evans to (Spanish) Minister of War, 28 May 1836 (FO72/459); WW to VP No. 71, 28 May 1836 (FO72/464); Ball, Seven Years, p. 68; Henderson, pp. 302–4; Hart’s Army List; EoC to VP No. 140, 4 June 1853 (FO72/459); WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853 (FO78/974). 72 AR (1836); Bell, p. 68; Evans, pp. 49–50; Evans to Minister of War, 31 May 1836 (FO72/459); Somerville, History, pp. 80–91; Holt, p. 113; Ball, Seven Years, pp. 68–70. 73 Evans to Minister of War, 9 June 1836 (FO72/459); WW to VP No. 72, 5 June 1836; No. 73, 6 June 1836 (FO72/464); Somerville, History, pp. 93­–5; Evans, p. 49. 74 Online at www.spain.info/en/conoce/monumentos/guipuzcoa/fuerte_de_guadalupe.html. 75 Somerville, History, pp. 110–16; Ball, Seven Years, pp. 70–6; Evans to Córdoba, 12 July 1836 (FO72/464); Courier, 21 and 23 July 1836; AR (1836); Holt, p. 135; Humfrey, p. 28; Evans, p. 50; Shaw, pp. 598–601; WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853 (FO78/974). 76 Evans to Córdoba, 12 July 1836 (FO72/464). 77 Alcock, p. 39; Holt, p. 130; Somerville, History, p. 120; WW to VP No. 79, 13 July 1836 (FO72/464). 78 Alcock, p. 35. 79 WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853, enc. 2 (FO78/974); Somerville, History, p. 679. 80 Holt, p. 131; BAL Army List; Henderson, p. 314; Somerville, History, pp. 134ff; EoC to VP No. 146, 12 June 1836 (FO72/459); Maj Francis Duncan, The English in Spain: or, the Story of the War of Succession Between 1834 and 1840 (London, 1877), p. 44; Spiers, Radical General, pp. 85–97; Charles Shaw et al., A Short Statement of the Case of the Claimants of the British Auxiliary Legion of Spain (London, 1839); The Times, 30 April 1844. 81 A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. 5, pp. 413–14; BAL Army List; LG, 12 September 1837; David Ellison, JSAHR 48 (1970), p. 245; RCHM, pp. 526 and 588. 82 MD No. 13, 17 February 1836 (E/4/746), No. 51, 17 August 1836 (E/4/748), No. 5, 18 January 1837 (IE/4/749).

Chapter 5. First Command: The Bundlecund Legion 1 2 3

4 5 6 7 8 9 10

James Lunt (ed.), From Sepoy to Subedar, Being the Life and Adventures of Subedar Sita Ram (London, 1970), p. 38. BH, 10 July 1837. MD No. 5, 18 January 1837 (E/4/749); Sir John Lawrence and Audrey Woodiwiss (eds), The Journals of Honoria Lawrence: India Observed 1837–1854 (London, 1980); Maud Diver, Honoria Lawrence: A Fragment of Indian History (London, 1936). Lawrence and Woodiwiss, pp. 19–26; Diver (p. 45) has a slightly different version of the 20 April entry, which does not change the sense. Lawrence and Woodiwiss, pp. 26 and 23. BH, 10 July 1837; IN, 15 September 1856. Lawrence and Woodiwiss, pp. 20 and 22; Diver, pp. 54 and 57–8. Lawrence and Woodiwiss, pp. 28 and 33–7. Lawrence and Woodiwiss, p. 29; BH, 10 July 1837; Spankie SR (L/MIL/10/31/127). New Cambridge History of India, Vol. III.5, Science, Technology and Medicine in Colonial India, ed. Wolseley Haig (Cambridge, 2000), p. 103; J.H. Stocqueler, Handbook of India, A Guide to the Stranger and the Traveller, and a Companion to the Resident (London, 1844), Appendix; FM Lord Roberts, Forty-One Years in India (London, 1898), p. 6.

358

Notes to pages 72–9

11 IN, 15 September 1856. 12 EIR (1837); WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373). 13 Sir John Kaye, History of the War in Afghanistan, 4th edn (London, 1874); WFB SR (L/ MIL/10/24/373); BDAR (4th Quarter 1838); WHM to Col C.W. Hamilton 15 August (P/36/25); GGGO, 17 August; MAG to President of the Council, 11 September 1838 (P/36/25). 14 WHM to Hamilton, 15 August 1838 (P/36/25). 15 GGGO, 26 October and 19 November 1838, 7 January 1839. 16 Edward Thornton, A Gazetteer of the Territories under the Government of the East-India Company (London, 1858); Balwant Singh (ed.), Uttar Pradesh District Gazetteers: Jalaun (Lucknow, 1988), p. 9. 17 Lunt, pp. 38 and 46. 18 D.P. Jatar, The Problem of Dacoity in Bundelkhand and the Chambal Valley (New Delhi, 1980), pp. 1–38. 19 Jatar, p. 37; Col James L. Sleeman, Thug, or a Million Murders (London, c.1934); Maj-Gen W.H. Sleeman, A Journey Through the Kingdom of Oude 1849–50 (London, 1858); Lt-Gen Sir Francis Tuker, The Yellow Scarf: The Story of the Life of Thuggee Sleeman (London, 1961). 20 Auckland minute, 24 February 1840 (P/230/22); D.L. Drake-Brockman, Jhansi: A Gazetteer (District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Oude, Vol. XXIV) (Allahabad, 1909), p. 128. 21 Aitchison; Smyth, p. 18. 22 IG; Singh Jalaun. 23 Richard Stevenson SOTQ 2008, No. 134, p. 1; Smyth pp. 63–4; Aitchison p. 70. 24 C.U Aitchison, A Collection of Treaties, Engagements and Sanads Relating to India and Neighbouring Countries, Vol. V: The Treaties &c Relating to Central India (Part II – Bundelkhand and Baghelkhand) and Gwalior (Delhi, 1933); SF to JT, 31 December 1840 (P/230/29). 25 SF to WHM, 10 October 1838 (P/230/15)] 26 Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47); Forrest SR (L/MIL/10/28/151). 27 Calcutta Courier, 7 January 1839; Agra Ukhbar, 22 December 1838; Richard Stevenson, SOTQ no. 134 (2008). 28 SF to THM, 3 March 1839 (P/230/17); SF to WHM, 10 October 1838 (P/230/15). 29 Hodson; Wardroper SR (L/MIL/10/29/317). 30 WHM to SF, 3 November (P/230/15); H. Torrens, A/Sec. to NWP Govt, to Civil Auditor 19 January (P/230/17); GGGO, 7 January 1839 (P/36/39). 31 WC memo, 21 November 1839 (P/230/15, P/36/42); Richard Stevenson, JSAHR 89 (2011), pp. 224–40. 32 Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974), pp. 26, 322–3. 33 Hodson. 34 ‘Promotion roll of the Cavalry Regiment Bundlecund Legion to fill vacancies’, 1 November 1840 (P/230/27); corresp. in P/230/29. 35 WFB to SF, 26 April 1839 (P/230/18, P/36/50); WC to JRL, 2 February 1839 (P/36/42); JS to JRL, 7 June 1839 (P/36/50). 36 ‘Promotion roll of the Light Infantry Regiment Jaloun Legion’, in SF to THM, 31 August 1839; THM to SF, 4 September 1839 (P/230/19). 37 WFB to SF, 26 June 1839; NWP Proceedings, 17 July 1839 (P/230/19); WFB to SF, 7 October 1839; reply 10 October 1839 (P/230/20, P/36/61). 38 WFB to SF, 26 June 1839; SF to THM 28 June 1839 (P/230/19, P/36/54) and subsequent corresp., inc W. Edwards, Asst Sec. to NWP Govt, to SF, 21 January 1841 (P/230/29). 39 Simon Fraser (J/I/34); Charles Fraser (J/1/30); Hugh Fraser (J/1/35); Prinsep, Notes on Services of Bengal Civil Servants (O/6/36); BLG (1886): ‘Grove-Ross of Invercharron’. 40 WFB to SF, 26 August 1839 (P/230/19). 41 WFB to SF, 1 January 1839; Torrens to SF, 19 January 1839 (P/230/17, P/36/42); corresp. with Clothing Bd in P/36/47 and P/36/49. 42 WC to JS, 2 February (P/36/42); Maj W. Cubitt, A/Sec. to Mily Dept, to JS, 20 August 1839 (P/36/55 and P/230/19); Anquetil to THM, 1 April 1840, enc. ‘Confidential Report of the



Notes to pages 80–7

359

Inspection of the Bundelkhund Legion, 4–5 March 1840’ (P/195/38); Capt Arthur Broome, Asst Sec., Ordnance Bd, ‘Statement exhibiting the strength and armaments of the several Corps …’, submitted to GG in 1842 (PRO30/12/31/9); David Harding, Small Arms of the East India Company (London, 1997–9), Vol. 2, pp. 393–4, Vol. 4, pp. 423–4; Richard Stevenson, JSAHR 89 (2011), pp. 291–305. 43 The print, No. 29 in the series Ackermann’s Costumes of the Indian Army (1844-9), drawn by H.J. Martens, was published on 9 August 1847. William Y. Carman, JSAHR 63 (1983), p. 127; Richard Stevenson, JSAHR 89 (2011), p. 291; Robert and Christopher WilkinsonLatham, Cavalry Uniforms of Britain and the Commonwealth (London, 1969), Plate 45. 44 WFB to SF, 27 January and 3 February 1839 (P/230/17); WFB to SF, 30 January and 25 March 1839 (P/230/18); JTk, 22 April 1839 (P/36/47); THM to Sec. NWP Political Dept, 25 April 1839 (P/230/18); GGGO, 10 May 1839. 45 PL No. 72, 9 October 1839 (E/4/169); No. 91, 26 December 1839 (E/4/170); Lt-Col D.G. Crawford, Roll of the Indian Medical Service 1615–1930 (London, 1930). 46 Corresp. in P/230/17–9; PL No. 32, 22 May 1839 (E/4/168); Balwant Singh (ed.), Uttar Pradesh District Gazetteers: Jalaun (Lucknow, 1988), p. 292. 47 Charles James C. Davidson, Diary of Travels and Adventures in Upper India (London, 1843), Vol. 1, pp. 187–8. 48 Corresp. on officers appointed in P/230/17–20; PL No. 32, 22 May 1839 (E/4/168); No. 2, 5 February 1840 (E/4/171); GGGO, 6 September 1839; Oglander to SF, 17 Sep 1839 (P/230/20); Young SR (L/MIL/10/30/459); Ens MacGregor SR (L/MIL/10/29/335). 49 DR to SF, 8 May 1839 (P/230/19); Wardroper to JRL, 10 June 1839, JRL to JS, 3 July 1839 (P/36/54). 50 SF to THM, 13 June 1839; reply, 12 July 1839 (P/230/19, P/36/54); SF to JT, 31 December 1840 (P/230/29). 51 Corresp. on Quin affair in P/230/19; Quin SR (L/MIL/10/30/403). 52 Hodson; BPB: ‘Dick–Lauder’; BL catalogue; GM 1 (1867), p. 670; Lauder SR (L/MIL/10/28/255). 53 WFB to SF, 18 October 1839; THM to SF, 31 October 1839, SF to WFB, 13 November 1839; reply, 18 November 1839; GG’s order, 12 December 1839 (P/230/20); Hodson; BLG (1886): ‘Barry of Ballyclough’; Barry SR (L/MIL/10/28/255). 54 Corresp. on detachments in P/230/19; Maj W. Richmond to SF, 2 November 1839 (P/230/20); WFB to SF, 26 September 1839; Mily Dept memo, 15 October 1839 (P/230/20, P/36/61). 55 Auckland minute (P/230/22); SF to WFB, 31 January 1840 (WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373)). 56 GGGO, 30 January 1840; Hodson; Johnston SR (L/MIL/10/30/303); Surg J. Drummond certificate for Sheetz, 14 February 1840 (P/230/25). 57 Hodson; Anderson; BPG: ‘Verner’; JEV SR (L/MIL/10/29/147). 58 Lt-Col W.H. Sleeman, Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official (London, 1844), chap. 32, note 1; FM Sir Evelyn Wood, From Midshipman to Field Marshal (London, 1906), p. 167. 59 Asst Surg G. Dodgson to Surg J.A. Clapperton, 21 August 1838; RWB to AG, 22 August 1838 (P/36/28); RWB SR (L/MIL/10/24/93); GO, 15 October 1839. 60 Hodson; Anon, A Genealogical Account of the Descendants of James Young, Merchant Burgess of Aberdeen and Rachel Cruickshank his Wife 1697–1893 (Aberdeen, 1894). 61 BDAR (1840); Anon, Genealogical Account. 62 Stocqueler, Handbook, Appendix. 63 Bengal Marriages 1840 (N/1/57). 64 Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), p. 236. 65 Charles Allen (ed.), Plain Tales from the Raj (London, 1976). 66 IG; Maj R.G. Burton, The Revolt in Central India 1857–59 (Simla, 1908), pp. 106–7. 67 Anquetil to THM, 1 April 1840 (P/195/38); WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373). 68 Singh, Jalaun, p. 9; SF to JT, 31 December 1840 (P/230/29) and 14 June 1841 (P/230/30). 69 DR to SF, 5 March 1840; reply, 7 March 1840 (P/230/23); PD NWP No. 10, 28 April 1841 (E/4/765); BH, 24 March 1840. 70 DR to WFB, 7 March 1840 (P/230/23). 71 SF to A/Sec. to NWP Govt, 8 March 1840 (P/230/23); BH, 31 March 1840.

360 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79

Notes to pages 88–95

SF to JT, 14 March 1840 (P/230/23). WFB to SF, DR to SF, 11 March 1840 (P/230/23); Richard Stevenson, SOTQ No. 135 (2009), p. 19. WFB to SF, 1 April 1840; reply, 23 June 1840 (P/230/25). SF to JHM, 31 August 1839 (P/230/19). WFB to SF, 1 April and 9 July 1840; JT to SF, 3 August 1840 (P/230/25). WFB to SF, 11 March 1840 (P/230/23); SF to JT, 11 May 1841 (P/230/30). Ginders, in WFB to SF, 22 June 1840 (P/230/25); Giddings SR (L/MIL/10/122; L/MIL/10/162). DR to SF, 13 March 1840; JT to SF, 21 March 1840 (P/230/23); PL No. 45A, 15 June 1840 (E/4/172); WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373). 80 DR to SF, 13 March 1840; SF to JT, 14 March 1840 (P/230/23). 81 June 1840 corresp. (P/230/24). 82 WFB to SF and JT, 16 October 1840; JT to Torrens, 22 October 1840 (P/230/27); WFB to THM, 7 November 1840 (P/37/21). 83 WFB to JRL, 4 December 1840 (P/37/27); Macdonald to THM, 29 December 1840 (P/37/28); WFB to SF, 4 December 1840; SF to JT, 17 December 1840 and 6 January 1841; JT to SF, 7 January 1841 (P/230/29); GGGO, 6 January 1841. 84 Amiya Barat, The Bengal Infantry, its Organisation and Discipline 1796–1852 (Calcutta, 1962), p. 233; Hodson; EIR (1843); The Times, 5 May 1842. 85 Maj G.F. MacMunn, The Armies of India (London, 1911), p. 26. 86 RWB SR (L/MIL/10/24/93); Hodson; RWB to JRL, 2 September 1840 (P/37/15). 87 DR to SF, 27 November 1840 (P/230/29); SF to JT, 16 December 1840 (P/230/27), DR to SF, 17 December 1840, SF to JT, 21 December 1840 (P/230/29); PD NWP No. 3, 1 February 1842 (E/4/769). 88 SF to JT, 26 December 1840 (P/230/29); SF to JT, 14 June 1841 (P/230/30). 89 Edwards to SF, 25 March 1841; SF to JT, 14 June 1841 (P/230/30); PD No. 13, 17 August 1842 (E/4/771). 90 SF to Lt-Col A. Spiers, Resident at Gwalior; SF to JT, to JTk, and WFB, 10 March 1841 (P/230/29); JTk to SF, 20 March 1841 (P/37/34). 91 DAAG to JTk, 19 March 1841, JTk to SF, 20 March 1841 (P/230/30). 92 SF to WFB, 18 March 1841, JTk to SF, 16 March 1841, JT to SF, 3 April 1841 (P/230/30). 93 WFB to SF, 13 and 21 April 1841; WFB Detachment Order, 14 April 1841 (P/230/30); BH, 4 and 8 May 1841; PD No. 13, 17 August 1842 (E/4/771); Survey of India 1 inch to 1 mile map 54K/14, 1925; Richard Stevenson, SOTQ No. 136 (2009), p. 25. 94 Agra Ukhbar, 8 April 1841; SF to Capt Minto, 12 April 1841 (P/230/30). 95 WFB to SF, 21 April 1841 (P/230/30); BH, 4 and 8 May 1841; Survey of India map 54K/14; Google Earth at 25º 34’ 29.75” N, 78º 48’ 02.58” E. 96 Hodson; TFW SR (L/MIL/10/31/367). 97 WFB Field Detachment Orders; WFB to SF, 21 April 1841 (P/230/30); BH, 8 May 1841. 98 BH, 8 May 1841; WFB to SF, 28 February 1842 (P/38/2); Invalid Roll, 23 September 1842 (P/38/9). 99 WFB to SF, 21 April 1841 (P/230/30). 100 WFB to SF, 4 February (P/230/29); WFB Field Detachment Orders, 21 April 1841; SF to JT, 5 May 1841; WFB to SF, 6 May 1841 (P/230/30); Sweeney SR (L/MIL/10/123, L/MIL/10/162). 101 SF to JTk, 12 May 1841 (P/37/38); JT to JTk, 21 June 1841 (P/230/30), JS to JT, 7 July 1841 (P/230/31). 102 JT to SF, 1 May 1841 (P/230/30); PD No. 13, 17 August 1842 (E/4/771); WFB SR (L/ MIL/10/24/373); Kinglake, Vol. V, note V pp. 414–15. 103 WFB to SF, 11 May 1842 (P/230/36). 104 WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373). 105 WFB to SF, 17 December 1841; reply, 17 December 1841; ‘Proceedings of a European Court of Inquiry held at Jhansi … 18th December 1841’ (P/230/34). 106 Corresp. in P/230/34; Hall SR (L/MIL/10/31/151). 107 PL No. 19, 26 July 1843 (E/4/185); MD No. 8, 16 April 1845 (E/4/783); WFB SR (L/MIL/10/24/373).



Notes to pages 97–101

361

Chapter 6. Following the Elephant 1 2

LdE to HH, 13 November 1844 (PRO30/12/21/7). ODNB; G.E. Cokayne, The Complete Peerage (London, 1910–59); BPB; Sir Llewellyn Woodward, The Oxford History of England, Vol. XIII, The Age of Reform, 1815–1870, 2nd edn (Oxford, 1962); Sir Algernon Law, India under Lord Ellenborough, March 1842­–June 1844 (London, 1926); Anon, India and Lord Ellenborough, 3rd edn (London, 1844). 3 T.C. Anderson, Ubique: War Services of all the Officers of H.M.’s Bengal Army (Calcutta, 1861); Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 4 CF to RNCH, 14 April 1842 (P/230/34); SF to RNCH, 20 April 1842 (P/230/35). 5 Ommaney to CF, 12 April 1842; WFB to SF, 13 April 1842; reply, 18 April 1842, and corresp. in P/230/34 and P/230/35. 6 SF to CF, 23 April 1842; SF to RNCH, 18 and 23 April (P/230/35); CF to THM, 24 April 1842 (P/230/36). 7 CF to RNCH, 14 April 1842 (P/230/34); SF to RNCH, 20 April 1842 (P/230/35); CF to RNCH, 20 June 1842 (P/196/24); JHS to JT, 27 June 1843 (P/196/35); R.V. Russell (ed.), Central Provinces District Gazetteers: Saugor District (Allahabad, 1907), pp. 24–5. 8 Corresp. in P/230/36. 9 Bengal Baptisms 1843, p. 504 (N/1/64/504). 10 LdE to Robertson, 20 April 1842 (PRO30/12/32/12); LdE to HG, 6 November 1843 (PRO30/ 12/53). 11 Maj-Gen Sir Charles Gwynn, Imperial Policing (London, 1934), p. 14. 12 Albert H. Imlah, Lord Ellenborough (London, 1939), pp. 96–7; JN to LdE, 27 April 1842 (PRO30/12/46). 13 LdE to THM, 24 April and 1 May 1842 (PRO30/12/30/1); LdE to JN, 25 April 1842 (PRO30/12/32/6); LdE to Robertson, 25 April 1842 (PRO30/12/30/12); JS to Williams, 24 April 1842; THM to CF, 25 April 1842 (P/230/36); Williams to RNCH, 26 April 1842 (P/230/35); Political Dept, draft letters to local authorities in Kalpi, Hamirpur, Jhansi and Banda, 6 June 1842 (PRO30/12/31/9); Colchester pp. 250–1; JN to LdE 22 June (PRO30/12/46); THM to WHS 29 June 1842 (PRO30/12/87). 14 Law pp. 30-33, 49–52; RNCH to THM 10 June (P/230/36); Lord Colchester (ed.), The Indian Administration of Lord Ellenborough (London, 1874), p. 56. 15 Prinsep, Notes on Services of Bengal Civil Servants (O/6/36); WHS to THM, 14 November 1842 (P/230/39); WHS to LdE, 20 January 1843 (PRO30/12/67); FL No. 1, 15 January 1844 (E/4/188); Law, pp. 50–2. 16 ODNB; Lt-Gen Sir Francis Tuker, The Yellow Scarf: The Story of the Life of Thuggee Sleeman (London, 1961); Lt-Col W.H. Sleeman, Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official (London, 1844); Maj-Gen W.H. Sleeman, A Journey Through the Kingdom of Oude 1849–50 (London, 1858); Col James L. Sleeman, Thug, or a Million Murders (London, c.1934). 17 Col Henry Yule and C.C. Burnell, Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Terms and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymologies, Historical, Geographical and Discursive, 2nd edn (London, 1903). 18 DQMG Cawnpore to WHS, 14 July 1843 (PRO30/12/67); Law, pp. 52–4. 19 Corresp. in P/230/36; Lt F.G. Cardew, A Sketch of the Services of the Bengal Native Army to the Year 1895 (Calcutta, 1903), p. 195; BH, 4 July; The Times, 3 September 1842. 20 WHS to RNCH, 4 July 1842 (P/230/37). 21 Colchester, p. 41. 22 Kochukunju is also rendered as Dhakunjoo. DR to WHS and WHS to THM, 16 August 1842; DR to WHS, 18 August 1842; WHS to RNCH, 22 August 1842 (P/230/37); WHS to RNCH, 7 November 1842 (P/196/33); FL No. 19, 26 July 1843 (E/4/185). 23 WHS to LdE, 21 January 1843 (PRO30/12/67); LdE to Maj J. Ferris, 1 March 1843 (PRO30/12/109); GGGO, 1 March 1843; Judicial and Criminal NWP Letter No. 7, 25 October 1843 (E/4/187).

362

Notes to pages 101–5

24 WHS to THM, 6 September 1842 (P/230/39); PD No. 32, 1 October 1845 (E/4/785); D.L. Drake-Brockman, Jhansi: A Gazetteer (District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Oude, Vol. XXIV) (Allahabad, 1909), pp. 131 and 204; C.U Aitchison, A Collection of Treaties, Engagements and Sanads Relating to India and Neighbouring Countries, Vol. V: The Treaties &c Relating to Central India (Part II – Bundelkhand and Baghelkhand) and Gwalior (Delhi, 1933), p. 70. 25 Gangadhar Rao to WHS (n.d.); WHS to WFB 18 August 1842; reply, 19 August 1842 (P/230/37); WHS to THM, 6 September 1842 (P/230/39). 26 WFB to WHS, 20 September 1842 (P/196/24, P/230/39). 27 WHS to RNCH, 21 September 1842 (P/230/39). 28 George Dodd, The History of the Indian Revolt and the Expeditions to Persia, China and Japan, 1856–7–8 (London, 1858), p. 179; Saul David, The Indian Mutiny 1857 (London, 2002), p. 356. 29 WHS to RNCH, 21 September 1842 (P/196/24, P/230/39). 30 Brig Sir John Smyth, The Rebellious Rani (London, 1966). 31 THM to WHS, 29 June, 25 July, 1 November 1842 (PRO30/12/87); JN to LdE, 7 July 1842 (PRO30/12/46); LdE to Governor of Madras, 8 July 1842 (PRO30/12/76); JS to WHMS, 25, 26 July 1842 (P/38/6); GGGO, 14 and 22 October 1842. 32 THM to WHS, 2 August 1842 (PRO30/12/87); JTk to WHS, 30 July 1842; WFB to WHS, 4 August 1842 (P/230/37); JN to LdE, 28 July and 7 September 1842 (PRO30/12/46). 33 WHS to THM, 9 August 1842 (P/196/24, P/230/37); WFB to WHS, 20 September 1842 (P/230/39); BH, 12 September 1842; D.L. Drake-Brockman, Hamirpur: A Gazetteer (District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra & Oudh, Vol. XXII) (Allahabad, 1909), p. 177–9; Tuker, p. 125. 34 Hall and Lt S.J. Becher were both appointed to the same vacancy in 1841: corresp. in P/37/43, P/37/58, P/230/31–2 and PL No. 48, 23 December 1842 (E/4/182). Lts H.A. Adlam and J.P. Caulfield were both appointed to the same vacancy in the 2nd Bn in 1845: corresp. in P/39/44. 35 WFB Legion Orders, 9 September 1842 (P/230/37); Wardroper to WFB, 3 November 1842; WFB to WHS, 24 November 1842 (P/230/39); LdE to Lt Sale, 8 October 1842 (PRO30/12/31/9). 36 Cardew pp. 195–6; GGGO 14 February; WHS to Sec. Mily Bd, 1 and 18 February 1843 (P/38/25); ML No. 5, 20 January 1844 (E/4/188); corresp. on new cantonment in P/196/33. 37 WFB to WHS, 4 August 1842; WHS to THM, 5 August 1842 (P/230/37); WHS to Sec. Mily Bd, 1 February 1843 (P/38/25); the formal indents are in P/38/32. 38 WFB to WHS, 10 September 1842; WHS to RNCH, 12 September 1842; reply, 17 October 1842; WFB to WHS, 24 October 1842 (P/230/39); FL No. 19, 26 July 1843 (E/4/185); MD No. 8, 10 April 1845 (E/4/783). 39 W.Y. Carman, Indian Army Uniforms Under the British from the 18th Century to 1947: Artillery, Engineers and Infantry (London, 1969), p. 100. 40 WHS to THM, 5 December 1842; A/Sec. with GG to WHS, 18 June 1843 (P/196/33); DG, 24 June 1843. 41 GGGO, 14 February 1843; WHS to JT, 23 June 1843; WFB to WHS, 13 July 1843 (P/196/35); DG, 24 and 28 June 1843. 42 Ginders to WHS, 10 July 1843 (P/196/35). 43 WHS to JT, 10 July 1843 (P/196/35); Drummond to WHS, 14 July 1843 (PRO30/12/67); BH, 19 September 1842. 44 JT to WHS, 20 July 1843 (PRO30/12/87 and P/196/35). 45 Cokayne; ODNB. 46 Corresp. on Ginders’s accusations, medical reports, etc. in P/196/35. 47 WHS to WFB, 24 June 1843 (P/196/35); Lt-Col D.G. Crawford, Roll of the Indian Medical Service 1615–1930 (London, 1930). 48 Drummond to WHS, 14 July 1843 (PRO30/12/67); LdE to WHS, 1 September 1843 (PRO30/12/87); LdE to WC, 11 September 1843 (PRO30/12/109); MD No. 30, 22 April 1843 (E/4/787); No. 64, 30 September 1846 (E/4/789); Hodson. 49 THM to WHS, 20 July 1843 (PRO30/12/87); LdE to THM, 11 September 1843 (PRO30/12/109).

50 51

Notes to pages 105–11

363

Bengal Baptisms 1843 (N/1/64/504); BAAD (1844). Henry Steinbach, The Punjaub, Being a Brief Account of the Country of the Sikhs (London, 1845; and several modern reprints). 52 Stocqueler, Handbook p. 472. 53 LdE to WHS, 27 February 1843; JT to WHS, 8 March 1843 (P/196/29); WHS to JT, 11 July 1843 (P/196/36); LdE to Maj-Gen J.H. Littler, 13 August 1843 (PRO30/12/109); Stubbs Vol. 3, p. 87; Hunter Gazetteer Vol. III, pp. 49; Luard Gwalior Vol. 1 Part 1; Krishnan Gwalior pp. 34–5. 54 WHS to LdE 28 Sep. 1843 (PRO30/12/67). 55 Maj-Gen Francis W. Stubbs, History and Organization, Equipment, and War Services of the Regiment of Bengal Artillery, 2nd edn (London, 1895), pp. 87–91; BAAD (1844). 56 Law, pp. 125–6; HG to Spiers, 13 November 1843 (PRO30/12/46); HG to LdE, 15 November 1843 (P/38/46). 57 Stubbs, p. 102; Colchester, pp. 412–20. 58 WFB to CJN, 3 January 1846 (BL Add Mss 54554 fo 186). 59 Stubbs, p. 105; TEMC, 17 January 1844; GGGO, 7 March 1844; MAG to LdE, 8 May 1844; JS to Macgregor, 24 May 1844 (P/39/3). 60 Stubbs pp. 91–104; Hugh Murray, History of British India: Continued to the close of the year 1854 (London, 1857), pp. 625–6; Robert S. Rait, The Life and Campaigns of Hugh, 1st Viscount Gough (London, 1903), Vol. 2, pp. 302–41; DG, 9 and 10 January 1844. 61 DG, 27 January 1844; HG to LdE, 16, 19, 20 January 1844 (PRO30/12/46); LdE to WHS, 17 January 1844 (PRO30/12/17). 62 LdE to HG, 28 January 1844 (PRO30/12/53). 63 V.S. Krishnan (ed.), Madhya Pradesh District Gazetteers: Gwalior (Bhopal, 1965). 64 WFB to Durand, 29 January 1844 (PRO30/12/54); LdE to HG, 11 and 28 January 1844 (PRO30/12/53); WHS to WFB, 22 January 1844 (PRO30/12/87); IN, 12 February 1844. 65 LdE to HG (two letters), 28 January 1844 (PRO30/12/53); JS to OC 67th BNI at Kalpi, 28 January 1844 (P38/55); WHS to Brig O. Stubbs, CO Gwalior Contingent, 28 January 1844; WFB to Durand, 29 January 1844 (PRO30/12/54); LdE to WFB, 29 January 1844; LdE to Brig Riley, 30 January 1844 (PRO30/12/109). 66 WFB to LdE, 30 January 1844 (PRO30/12/54); FC to WHS, 4 February 1844 (PRO30/12/87); WHS to Stubbs, 28 January 1844 (PRO30/12/54); JS to CO Cawnpore, 9 February 1844 (PRO30/12/59). 67 Calcutta Star (quoted in Scotsman, 8 May 1844); WFB to CJN, 3 January 1846 (BL Add Mss 54554 fo 186); Colchester, pp. 112–16; A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. V, p. 415. 68 LdE to WFB, 29 January 1844 (PRO30/12/109); JS to WHMS, 31 January 1844 (P/38/55); LdE to Lt-Col Powney, 27 March 1844 (PRO30/12/109). 69 Governor of Bombay to LdE, 15 February 1844 (PRO30/12/41); HG to LdE, 17 February 1844 (PRO30/12/46); Colchester, pp. 116–22 and 427–31; Amiya Barat, The Bengal Infantry, its Organisation and Discipline 1796–1852 (Calcutta, 1962), pp. 237–64; Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974), pp. 225–8, 257–8. 70 Richard F. Burton, Sind Revisited (London, 1877),Vol. II, p. 211. 71 LdE to HG, 11 March 1844 (PRO30/12/83); JS to LdE, 27 March 1844 (PRO30/12/58). 72 HG to LdE, 22 and 25 February 1844 (PRO30/12/46); LdE to CJN (two letters), 6 March 1844 (PRO30/12/14, PRO30/12/101); Barat, pp. 253–9. 73 WFB to Legion, 17 March 1844; WFB to WHS, 18 March 1844 (P/38/63); WHS to LdE, 17 March 1844 (PRO30/12/54). 74 WHS to LdE, 17 March 1844 (PRO30/12/54); LdE to WFB, 25 March 1844 (PRO30/12/109). 75 LdE to HG, 25 March 1844 (PRO30/12/83); LdE to CJN, 25 March 1844 (PRO30/12/14 and 101). 76 LdE to WFB, 25 March 1844 (PRO30/12/109); FC to WHS, 25 March 1844 (PRO30/12/87). 77 GGGO, 1 April 1844. 78 GGGO, 4 April 1844; WHS to LdE, 17 March 1844 (PRO30/12/54). 79 LdE to Waterfield, 8 April 1844 (PRO30/12/109); LdE to WHS, 29 April 1844 (PRO30/12/87); Waterfield SR (L/MlL10/29/225, L/MIL/10/36/301).

364

Notes to pages 111–17

80

WFB to LdE, 3 April 1844 (PRO30/12/72); JS to JRL, 4 April 1844 (P/38/63); JS to JRL, 13 April 1844 (P/38/65). 81 WHS to LdE, 29 May 1844 (PRO30/12/54); FC to JS, 13 June 1844 (P/39/5); LdE to WFB, 14 June 1844 (PRO30/12/109); FC to Medical Bd, 29 June 1844 (P/39/8); JS to JRL, 25 October 1844 (P/30/15); Beatson SR (L/MIL/10/36/145). 82 LdE to WFB, 14 June 1844 (PRO30/12/109); Hodson. 83 Crawford; WFB Legion Orders, 5 August 1844 (P/39/15). 84 WFB to LdE, 21 February 1844 (PRO30/12/72); FC to JS, 13 June 1844 (P/39/5). 85 WFB to LdE, 18 April 1844 (PRO30/12/72); FC to JS, 13 June 1844 (P/39/5); LdE to WFB, 14 June 1844 (PRO30/12/109); Hayes SR (L/MIL/30/421; L/MIL/10/37/342). 86 WHS to LdE, 17 March 1844 (PRO30/12/54); W. Edwards, Under-Sec. to Indian Govt, to WOp, 27 April 1844 (P/39/2); ODNB; Memoirs of General Sir William Olpherts VC & KCB (H/814); Anderson. 87 JS to JRL, 7 June 1844 (P/39/4). 88 Olpherts, Memoirs p. 396. 89 LdE to HG, 6 May 1844 (PRO30/12/83); HG to LdE, 18 May 1844 (PRO30/12/46). 90 FC to WHS, 9 April 1844 (P/38/65, P/39/4, P/39/5, PRO30/12/87). 91 WOp to WFB, 3 May 1844 (P/39/4); WFB and WOp indent, 8 May 1844 (P/39/5); Olpherts, Memoirs p. 393. 92 WOp to WFB, 2 May 1844 (P/39/2). 93 Mily Bd to LdE, 14 May (P/39/3) and 27 May 1844 (P/39/7); JS to Mily Bd ,14 June 1844 (P/39/5); LdE to WFB, 14 June 1844 (PRO30/12/109); JRL to JS, 24 July 1844 (P/39/9). 94 JS to JRL, 10 May 1844 (P/39/1); JRL to JS, 7 November (P/39/17) and 30 November 1844 (P/39/26). 95 SF to RNCH, 14 May 1842 (P/230/36). 96 Mily Bd to THM, 27 June 1847 (P/40/39). 97 Mily Bd to LdE, 11 August 1843 (P/38/38) and 22 April 1844 (P/39/2); WHS to LdE, 17 March 1844 (PRO30/12/54). 98 ODNB. 99 LdE to HH, 13 November 1844 (PRO30/12/21/7). 100 WFB to LdE, 24 June 1844 (PRO30/12/72). 101 WFB to WHS, 26 August 1844; WHS to FC, 30 August 1844 (P/39/15); WHS to LdE, 17 March 1844 (PRO30/12/54); LdE to HH, 13 November 1844 (PRO30/12/21/7). 102 FC to WFB, 9 July 1844; FC to WHS, 9 July 1844 (P/39/8 and P/39/10); WHS to THM, 9 August 1842 (P/230/37); WFB to Lt Col J.F. Parsons, Dep Commissary Gen, 18 July 1844; Parsons to Capt Greene, Sec. Mily Bd, 22 July 1844 (P/39/10). 103 FC to WFB, 16 July 1844 (P/39/8); HG to GG, 17 August 1844 (P/39/12). 104 WOp to WFB, 8 July 1844; WHS to FC, 10 July 1844 (P/39/10); WOp to WHS, 13 August 1844 (P/39/12); Mily Bd to HH, 17 August (P/39/11) and 18 September 1844 (P/39/12). 105 BPB. 106 WFB to WHS, 24 September 1844; WFB to Legion, 21 September 1844; JEV to FWr, 21 September 1844 (P/39/17). 107 WFB to WHS, 24 September 1844 (P/39/17). 108 WHS to FC, 26 September 1844; JS to JRL, 15 November 1844 (P/39/17).

Chapter 7. The Heights of Trukki 1 2

3

Lt-Gen Sir William Napier, History of General Sir Charles Napier’s Administration of Scinde, and Campaign in the Cutchee Hills (London, 1851), p. 201. Memoirs of General Sir William Olpherts VC & KCB (H/814); WFB commissariat accounts, 16 October–22 December 1844 in JRL to JS, 28 February 1845 (P/39/32); JEV to FWr, 30 September 1845 (P/39/59). WFB to LdE, 16 April 1845 (PRO30/12/25/6–8). The QMG’s ‘Route’ of 52 stages from Karnal to Sukkur in the Ellenborough papers (PRO30/12/11, fo 2807) was probably taken by the other Bengal troops; it includes the stages from Bahawalpur to Subzulkote and Sukkur.

4

Notes to pages 117–22

365

WFB commissariat accounts, ibid.; JEV to FWr, ibid.; Col Henry Yule and C.C. Burnell, HobsonJobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Terms and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymologies, Historical, Geographical and Discursive, 2nd edn (London, 1903). 5 WFB to QMG, 23 December 1844 (P/39/27); Edward Thornton, A Gazetteer of the Territories under the Government of the East-India Company (London, 1858). 6 Col E. Maude, Oriental Campaigns and European Furloughs: The Autobiography of a Veteran of the Indian Mutiny (London, 1900), p. 37; J.W. Smyth, Gazetteer of the Province of Sind, ‘B’ Vol. III, Sukkur District (Bombay, 1919), p. 55; Richard F. Burton, Scinde, or The Unhappy Valley (London, 1851), Vol. II, pp. 255–8; Richard F. Burton, Sind Revisited (London, 1877), Vol. II, p. 242; Archibald Forbes, The Afghan Wars, 1839–42 and 1878–80 (London, 1892), pp. 17–19. 7 H.B. Eaton, JSAHR 62 (1984), pp. 74–89. 8 Napier, Administration, pp. 148 and 159–62; Smyth, Sukkur, p. 55; Eaton, ibid.; James MacVeigh, The Historical Records of the 78th Highlanders or Ross-shire Buffs (now 2nd Battalion Seaforth Highlanders), from 1793 to 1887 (Dumfries, 1887), pp. 153–5. 9 Napier, Administration, pp. 159–62; The Times, 24 March 1845. 10 WFB to LdE, 3 April 1844 (PRO30/12/72). 11 ODNB; Priscilla Napier, I Have Sind: Charles Napier in India 1841–1844 (Salisbury, 1990); Richard Stevenson, SOTQ No. 142 (2010), p. 14. 12 Napier, I Have Sind, pp. 48 and 57. 13 Maude, p. 33. 14 Napier, Administration, pp. 103–4, 165–9 and 199–200. 15 HH to LdE, 8 March 1845 (PRO30/12/21/7); Napier, Administration, pp. 171­–2. 16 ODNB. 17 Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 18 Lt-Gen Sir William Napier, The Life and Opinions of General Sir Charles James Napier (London, 1857), Vol. III, p. 235; Priscilla Napier, Raven Castle: Charles Napier in India 1844–1851 (Salisbury, 1991), p. 68. 19 Napier, Administration, p. 202; Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 237; Napier, Raven Castle, p. 56; Sir George Douglas and Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay (eds), The Panmure Papers (London, 1908), Vol. I, p. 297. 20 Napier, Raven Castle, p. 19. 21 Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 260. 22 Hodson, Index; Olpherts, Memoirs. 23 Alexander Innes Shand, General John Jacob (London, 1901); G.W. Forrest, Sepoy Generals, Wellington to Roberts (Edinburgh, 1901); Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974); Maj John Jacob, Remarks on the Native Troops of the Indian Army and Notes on Certain Passages in Sir C. Napier’s Posthumous Work on the Defects of the Indian Army, with Some Account of the Scinde Camel Baggage Corps (Bombay, 1854); Maj-Gen W.F. Beatson, The War Department and the Bashi-Buzouks (London, 1856), p. 98. 24 CJN to LdE 30 December 1843 (PRO30/12/63); Napier, Administration p. 70; Eaton, ibid.; Shand, Jacob, p. 119. 25 Amiya Barat, The Bengal Infantry, its Organisation and Discipline 1796–1852 (Calcutta, 1962), pp. 237–49; Napier, Administration, pp. 174–6; Lt-Col A.C.M. Urwick, JSAHR 64 (1966), p. 191. 26 EIR. 27 RWB to JRL, 20 December 1844, and certificate of service, 20 January 1845 (P/39/27). 28 Napier, Administration, pp. 182–3; C.F. Minchin, Baluchistan District Gazetteer Series, Vol. VIA, Kachhi (Bombay, 1907). pp. 1–12; Burton, Sind Revisited, Vol. II, p. 239; LG, 20 May 1845. 29 Napier, Administration, pp. 181–2; LdE to CJN, 11 June 1844 (PRO30/12/101); IG. 30 Napier, Administration, pp. 172–5; CJN to LdE, 10 August 1843 (PRO30/12/61) and 6 February 1844 (PRO30/12/63); Napier, Life, Vol. II, pp. 207 and 277. 31 Napier, Raven Castle, p. 284. 32 Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 255; LG, 27 May 1845. 33 Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 195; Napier, Administration, pp. 178 and 199. 34 Napier, Life, pp. 217–18 and 259; Napier, Administration, pp. 177–8 and 193–7.

366

Notes to pages 122–31

35 Napier, Administration, pp. 197–8; JEV to FWr, ibid. 36 Anon, Record Book of the Scinde Irregular Horse (London, 1856), Vol. 1, p. 68; Calcutta Star, 26 February 1845; Bombay Monthly Times, March 1845. 37 JEV to FWr, ibid. 38 JEV to FWr, ibid.; Napier, Life, Vol. III, pp. 226, 240; Napier, Administration, p. 228. 39 McConaghey, Sibi, p. 293; LG 20 and 27 May 1845; Napier, Administration, pp. 195–7 and 209; Anon, Scinde Horse, Vol. 1, pp. 68–70; Napier, Life, Vol. III, pp. 234, 242. 40 Napier, Life, Vol. III, pp. 237, 262. 41 Napier, Administration, pp. 208–9; Calcutta Star, 26 February 1845; Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 237. 42 Napier, Life, Vol. III, pp. 249 and 253; Napier, Administration, pp. 209 and 215; McConaghey, Sibi, p. 288; ‘Notes by Major Beatson, on his Separate Operations, and March to blockade the Northern Entrance of Trukkee, 1845’ (Napier, Administration, Appendix XIX, pp. 403–10, hereafter ‘Beatson Notes’). 43 Olpherts, Memoirs; Beatson Notes. 44 Beatson Notes. 45 Napier, Administration, pp. 220–3; Napier, Life Vol. III, pp. 255–7. 46 Beatson Notes; Napier Administration p. 222. 47 Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 255; Napier, Administration, p. 208. 48 Napier, Life, Vol. III, pp. 263–4; Napier, Administration, pp. 226–7. 49 Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 264; Napier, Administration, p. 228; Anon, Scinde Horse, p. 71; Beatson Notes; WFB to LdE, 16 April 1845 (PRO30/12/25/6–8); Bombay Monthly Times, March 1845. 50 Beatson Notes. 51 Beatson Notes; FWr to JEV, 11 April 1845 (P/39/40); Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 265. 52 Napier, Life, pp. 264–9, 271; Olpherts, Memoirs; Bombay Monthly Times, March 1845. 53 Eaton, ibid.; Napier, Life, p. 268–9; Beatson Notes. 54 Beatson Notes; Napier, Life, p. 272; Urwick, ibid. 55 Napier, Administration, Appendix XI, pp. 389–90; Eaton, ibid.; Beatson Notes. 56 Beatson Notes; Napier, Administration, p. 233. 57 Eaton, ibid.; Beatson Notes. 58 Beatson Notes; Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 275, Vol. IV, p. 395; Napier, Administration, Appendix XI, pp. 389–90; Urwick, ibid.; Maj Gen Sir Henry Everett, History of the Somerset Light Infantry (Prince Albert’s), 1685–1914 (London, 1934), pp. 215–18. 59 Urwick, ibid. 60 Beatson Notes; Napier, Life, Vol. III, p. 265; Napier, Administration, p. 272; Julius Caesar, African War 47. 61 LG, 27 May 1845; LdE to HH, 7 May 1845 (PRO30/12/21/7); Hunter to AAG Sind, 25 September 1845 (P/39/49). 62 Beatson Notes; WFB to LdE, 16 April 1845 (PRO30/12/25/6–8); H.T. Lambrick, Sir Charles Napier and Scinde (Oxford, 1952), p. 294; Napier, Administration, p. 254. 63 WFB to LdE, 16 April 1845 (PRO30/12/25/6–8); Burton, Sind Revisited, Vol. II, pp. 239–47; Olpherts, Memoirs; Maude, p. 38; IG. 64 FWr to JEV, 11 April 1845; Moffatt to JEV, 13 April 1845 (P/39/40); MAG to HH, 16 July 1845 (P/39/41); JEV to FWr, ibid.; The Times, 1 September 1845. 65 Minchin, p. 23; McConaghey, p. 289; Napier, Administration, p. 255; The Times, 1 September 1845; Anon, Scinde Horse, p. 79; Lambrick, pp. 302–3. 66 K.W. Kirk, Medical Topography of Upper Sindh, 1847. William Napier quoted from this book but, unlike Burton’s efforts, Kirk’s monograph does not appear in the British Library catalogue. 67 WFB to LdE, 16 April 1845 (PRO30/12/25/6–8). 68 LdE to WFB, 7 June 1845 (PRO30/12/25). 69 Marian Beatson to LdE, 26 and 30 August 1845; LdE to Marian Beatson, 28 August 1845; WFB to LdE, 15 August 1845 (PRO30/12/25). 70 Napier Papers (BL Mss 54554 fo 186 and 192); CJN GO, 26 December 1845 (Compilation of the General Orders &c Issued in 1842–47, by Sir Charles James Napier G.C.B., Major-



Notes to pages 131–9

367

General, Governor of Scinde, to the Army under his Command [Bombay, 1850]); A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. V, Note V, p. 415. 71 Napier described his plans in a letter to his brother on 30 January, which William forwarded to LdE on 4 April 1846 (PRO30/12/32/12); Napier, Administration, pp. 277–90; Byron Farwell, Burton: A Biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton (London, 1963), p. 36; Napier, Raven Castle, pp. 116–17 and 127–31; Beatson Notes. 72 P/39/62; The Bengal Obituary (Calcutta, 1848). 73 Anon, Scinde Horse, p. 83; Maj-Gen Sir Henry Green, A Short Memoir of the Services of Colonel Malcolm Green, CB, and of Major-General Sir Henry Green (Bexhill-on-Sea, c.1906). 74 EIR; L/MIL/10/117. 75 Farwell, pp. 29–38; Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893); Georgiana M. Stisted, The True Life of Capt Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1896); Napier, Raven Castle, p. 178. 76 Lambrick, p. 303. 77 Olpherts, Memoirs; Hayes to AAG Sind, 18 March 1846 (P/40/2); ‘Route from Kurnaul to Sukkur’ (PRO30/12/11, fo 2,807); WFB Legion Orders and other corresp. in P/40/4 and P/40/8. 78 Olpherts, Memoirs; corresp. in P/40/3 and P/40/8. 79 GGGO, 4 July 1846. 80 Lt-Col H.F. Salter to PG, 20 July 1846 (P/40/11). 81 Lt-Col W.H. Marshall to PG, 15 August 1846; JS to PG, 2 September 1846 (P/40/12); Marshall to PG, 23 September 1846 (P/40/15); EIR. 82 GGGO, 25 August 1846 (P/40/12); WFB to PG, 3 September 1846; JS to PG, 17 September 1846 (P/40/13). 83 GGGO, 5 October, GOCC, 30 October and 26 November 1846. 84 GGGO, 5 October 1846; ML No. 65, 11 May 1847 (E/4/201). 85 MD No. 26, 18 November 1846 (E/4/790) and No. 103, 15 September 1847 (E/4/793, L/ MIL/3/2083). 86 Kinglake, Vol. V, Note V, p. 415; Laurie, Anglo-Indians, p. 22. 87 Hodson; Bengal Army SRs 1846–7 (L/MIL/10/40–3); Olpherts, Memoirs; GGGO, 15 June 1847. 88 Napier Papers (BL Mss 54554 fo 186); Maj George A. Vetch, The Gong: or, Reminiscences of India (Edinburgh, 1852), p. 222; Hodson. 89 BAAD (1847); India Bd to DoW, 9 November 1846 (WO31/912); WFB SR (L/MIL/10/40). 90 HH to MoD, undated (apparently July 1851) (L/MIL/3/ 509); GGGO, 25 January 1847; FC to WFB, FC to JSF, 25 January 1847 (P/197/54). 91 First published in Adelaide Anne Proctor (ed.), Victoria Regia: A Volume of Original Contributions in Poetry and Prose (London, 1861); reprinted in Sir Francis Hastings Doyle, The Return of the Guards and Other Poems (London, 1866).

Chapter 8. In the Nizam’s Dominions 1

2

Dalhousie used the phrase at least twice: in a minute of 7 April 1851 (P/199/34), and in a letter to Sir George Coupar, 18 August 1851 (G.G.A. Baird (ed.), Private Letters of the Marquess of Dalhousie [Edinburgh, 1910], p. 172), but virtually identical words can be found in an official document by Col R.J. Birch (WO33/3A No. 55), in DN (26 March 1855), and attributed to Lord Gough in evidence to a parliamentary committee (e.g., W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished Anglo-Indians [London, 1875]; Maj R.G. Burton, A History of the Hyderabad Contingent [Calcutta, 1905]; Maj E.A.W. Stotherd, History of the Thirtieth Lancers, Gordon’s Horse [Aldershot, 1911], p. 25), though I cannot find the actual words in the evidence printed in Parliamentary Papers 31 (1852­–3), (627). JSF to HME, 24 July 1847 (P/40/41); Sec. to Madras Govt, to JSF, 10 September 1847 (P/40/47); J.H. Stocqueler, Handbook of India, A Guide to the Stranger and the Traveller, and a Companion to the Resident (London, 1844), p. 554.

368 3

Notes to pages 139–46

W.W. Hunter, Imperial Gazetteer of India (London, 1881); P. Veera Raghavalu Naidu, A Short History of Hyderabad (Hyderabad, 1909), p. 70; The Times, 19 October 1850, 16 February and 21 March 1851; JSF to HME, 14 May (P/197/59); JSF to WHMS, 7 August 1847 (P/40/43). 4 JSF to HME, 10 November 1846 (P/197/54). 5 FC to JSF, 25 January 1847; ‘List of Officers attached to the service of His Highness the Nizam’, 6 February 1847 (P/197/54). 6 IG; Maj E. Napier, Scenes and Sports in Foreign Lands (London, 1840). 7 Bombay Baptisms 1848 (N/3/22/85). 8 Laurie was at Secunderabad, 1844–7 (EIR); Olpherts was in Hyderabad, June–September 1847 (GGGO, 12 June; W. Edwards, Under-Sec. to Indian Govt, to WOp, 12 June 1847 (P/197/62); JSF GO, 22 December 1847 (P/198/18)). 9 Mily Sec. to GG, 18 October 1848, quoted by Laurie; Edwards to WFB, 16 October 1847; JSF to HME 21 July, 17 November (P/198/8) and 20 December 1847; WFB to HME, 5 January 1848; HME, 14 January 1848 (P/198/19); Laurie, p. 21. 10 Thornton; IG. 11 Stocqueler, Handbook pp. 554–6. 12 Anon, History of the 1st Lancers, Hyderabad Contingent, from 1816 to 1903 (Bombay, c.1903); Syed Hossain Bilgrami and C. Willmott, Historical and Descriptive Sketch of His Highness the Nizam’s Dominions (Bombay, 1883); Henry George Briggs, The Nizam: His History and Relations with the British Government, (London, 1861); Burton, Contingent; H.G. Rawlinson, History of the 8th King George V’s Own Light Cavalry (Aldershot, 1948); Stocqueler, Handbook; Stotherd. 13 The Times, 26 December 1856. 14 JSF to HME, 24 July 1847 (P/40/41); ‘List of Officers …’, 6 February 1847 (P/197/54). 15 JSF to HME, 5 August 1848; GJ to WFB, 5 August 1848 (P/198/32); JSF to HME, 8 December 1848 (P/198/39); FL No. 15, 7 August 1849 (E/4/210). 16 The Times, 26 December 1856. 17 Stocqueler, Handbook, pp. 554–5; The Times, 26 December 1856; W.Y. Carman, Indian Army Uniforms Under the British from the 18th Century to 1947: Cavalry (London, 1961), p. 106; Boris Mollo, The Indian Army (Poole, 1981), pp. 55 and 60–1; Briggs, p. 155. 18 Capt L.E. Nolan, Cavalry: Its History and Tactics (London, 1853), pp. 106–7; The Times, 26 December 1856. 19 Stocqueler, Handbook, p. 559; Stotherd, p. 21; JSF to HME, 19 February 1848 (P/198/21). 20 JSF to HME, 27 March 1847 (P/198/8); Col Mountain to Col J. Low, A/Resident, 23 May 1848 (P/198/27); Hastings Fraser, Memoir and Correspondence of General James Stuart Fraser (London, 1885), pp. 231–2. 21 Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47), Index; Stotherd, pp. 182–3. 22 IG; JSF to HME, 14 May 1847 (P/197/59); JSF to WHMS, 7 August 1847 (P/40/43); JSF to Arthur Malet, Chief Sec. to Bombay Govt, 13 January 1848 (P/392/39); H.B.C. Frere, Resident at Sattara, to Malet, 3 February 1849 (P/393/5); JSF to HME, 7 May 1849 (P/198/48); James Lunt (ed.), From Sepoy to Subedar, Being the Life and Adventures of Subedar Sita Ram (London, 1970), p. 52; Birch (WO33/3A No. 55). 23 P. Setu Madhava Rao, Maharashtra State Gazetteers: Bhir District (Bombay, 1969); JSF to HME, 15 January 1848 (enc. corresp. with Blair and RS) (P/198/22). 24 Jagirdar and Talukdar of Bhir to WFB (P/198/27); WFB to GJ, 16 April 1848 (P/198/22); Richard Spooner, Magistrate at Ahmadnagar, to Low, 17 April 1848; Low to Spooner, 24 April 1848 (P/198/30); GJ to WFB, Nos 32 and 33, 18 April 1848; Low to HME, 19 and 20 April 1848 (P/198/27). 25 Anon, 1st Lancers, p. 6; WFB proclamations, 21 and 25 April 1848; WFB to GJ, 23, 24 and 25 April 1848 (P/198/27). 26 Low to HME, 28 April 1848; reply, 13 May 1848 (P/198/27); Low to HME, 30 June 1848; reply, 22 July 1848 (P/198/31). 27 Low GO, 31 May 1848 (P/198/30); Col E. Maude, Oriental Campaigns and European Furloughs: The Autobiography of a Veteran of the Indian Mutiny (London, 1900), p. 127; IG; Thornton; Bombay Baptisms 1848 (N/3/22/85).

28

Notes to pages 147–53

369

IG; Lunt, p. 5; Onslow to JSF, 28 February 1849 and subsequent corresp; Hampton to WFB, 1 March 1849; reply, 2 March 1849; WFB to GJ, 2 March 1849; reply, 5 March 1849 (P/198/46); Hampton to GJ, 23 April 1849 (P/198/48). 29 GJ to Hampton, 28 April 1849; reply, 7 May 1849; JSF to HME, 7 and 10 May 1849 (P/198/48), 3 July 1849 (P/198/54); Burton, Contingent, pp. 131–4; O.S. Crofton, List of Inscriptions on Tombs or Monuments in H.E.H. the Nizam’s Dominions (Hyderabad, 1941), p. xiii. 30 Frere to Malet, 3 February 1849 (P/393/5); JSF to Malet, 15 March 1849 (P/393/8); corresp. April–May 1849 (P/198/48). 31 GT to WFB, 11 May 1849; GT to GJ, 11 May 1849 (P/198/48); GT to Hampton, 13 May 1849; GT to GJ, 14 May 1849; GT to WFB, 15 May 1849 (P/198/49); Burton, Contingent, p. 134. 32 JSF to HME, 12 May 1849 (P/198/48); GJ to GT, 19 May 1849 (P/198/49). 33 JSF GO, 10 March 1851 (P/199/34). 34 WFB to GJ, 16 and 17 May 1849; GT Field Detachment Orders, 21 May 1849; GT to GJ, 22 May 1849 (P/198/49); BTC, 25 June 1849. 35 WFB to GJ, 18 and 21 May 1849 (P/198/49); BTC, 25 June 1849; Burton, Contingent, p. 131; Anon, 1st Lancers, p. 6; Stotherd, p. 43. 36 GJ to WFB, 21 May 1849 (P/198/49). 37 WFB to GJ, 26 May 1849 (P/198/49); Sir John Fortescue, History of the British Army (London, 1899–1930), Vol. V. 38 Burton, Contingent, p. 131; Anon, 1st Lancers, p. 6; Stotherd, p. 43; Bombay Times, 14 July 1849. 39 WFB to GJ, 19 September (P/198/57) and corresp. in P/198/57–P/199/17; CD to WFB, 14 November 1849 (P/198/61); Maj P. Craigie AAG to DAAG Cawnpore, undated; JTk to Craigie, 26 May; JS to JT, 9 June 1841 (P230/31). 40 JSF GO, 15 December 1849 (P/198/65); BCGD (1851); ML No. 202, 30 October 1849 (E/4/211). 41 HME to HOM, 24 August 1849 (P/198/54); JSF to HME, 10 May 1850 (P/199/8); HME to JSF, 4 June 1850 (P/199/6); JSF to HME ,17 June 1850 (P/199/9); A. McKenzie Annand (ed.), Cavalry Surgeon: The Recollections of Deputy Surgeon-General John Henry Sylvester (London, 1971), p. 60; EIR (1844–53); BAAD (1844–50); L/MIL/9/187, fo 266–73; Frederic Boase, Modern English Biography (London, 1965). 42 ODNB; Roger T. Stearn, SOTQ No. 81 (1995), p. 2; MoD Minute, 27 November 1849 (P/198/60). 43 GO, 30 November 1849; Foreign Dept Notification, 3 July 1850 (P/199/15). 44 Corresp. on the Mackenzie affair in P/199/15. 45 JSF to HME, 3 October 1850 and other corresp. (P/199/18); Fraser, p. 318; JSF to HME, 21 November 1850; CM to GJ, 25 November 1850; HME to JSF, 14 December 1850 (P/199/22); CM to GJ, 28 December 1850 (P/199/29); JSF GO, 28 November 1850 (P/199/26); ODNB; Anon, Narrative of the Mutiny at Bolarum in September 1855, for the Information of Brigadier Colin Mackenzie’s Family and Private Friends, Drawn up from Memoranda Taken at the Time, by An Eye-Witness (Edinburgh, 1857). 46 The Times, 4 and 21 October, 19 November, 3 December 1850; JSF to HME, 4 January 1851 (P/199/29). 47 Letter from Rayamoh to Umaid Mul, 25 September 1850; WFB to GJ, 29 September 1850 (P/199/17); Burton, Contingent, p. 135. 48 Fyze Singh Bahadur to JSF, 16 November 1850; GJ to WFB, 18 November 1850; WFB to GJ, 20 November 1850; Brig Johnston to GJ, 21 November 1850 (P/199/21); Burton, Contingent, Appendix I, p. xxxiii. 49 WFB to GJ, 23 November 1850 (P/199/22); BTC, 7 December 1850. 50 Corresp. in P/199/22; BTC, 7 December 1850. 51 GJ to WFB, 26 November 1850 (P/199/21); corresp. in P/199/22. 52 WFB to GJ, 5 December 1850 (P/199/26); BTC, 7 December 1850. 53 Balmaine to Abbott, 30 November 1850; WFB to GJ, 30 November 1850 (P/199/22). 54 Boase; ILN, 11 August 1888, p. 154; AG recommendation, 3 and 6 July 1860 (P/365/84); Mansfield recommendation in C.U. Atkinson, Dep Sec. Mily Dept to AG, 28 September 1860 (P/191/42); www.mumbaipolice.org/aboutus/history.htm.

370

Notes to pages 153–60

55 WFB Field Detachment Orders, 4 December 1850; WFB to GJ, 4 and 5 December 1850 (P/199/26). 56 WFB to GJ, 2 and 3 December 1850 (P/199/22); 4, 5 and 14 December 1850 (P/199/26); Capt J.W. Auld to Spooner, 4 December 1850 (P/393/53); Burton, Contingent, Appendix I, p. xxxiii; Stotherd, p. 43. 57 Corresp. in P/199/26; BTC, 16 December 1850. 58 WFB to GJ, 14 December 1850; GJ to WFB, 18 December 1850 (P/199/26); BTC, 7 and 16 December 1850; ODNB, ‘Nolan’; MA (1850–1); Nolan, Cavalry, pp. 106–7. 59 BTC, 16 December 1850 and 31 January 1851; corresp. in P/199/31. 60 Daud Khan to Macintire (two letters), 9 January 1851; Macintire to GJ, 10 January 1851; Zulfikar Ali Beg to Macintire, 11 January 1851 (P/199/30). 61 WFB to Macintire, 13 January 1851; WFB to GJ (two letters), 13 January 1851 (P/199/30). 62 CD to WFB, 14 January 1851; JSF to HME ,15 January 1851 (P/199/30); BTC, 11 February 1851. 63 B.G. Kunte, Maharashtra State Gazetteers: History Part II – Medieval Period (Bombay, 1972), pp. 106–8; Loyd to Abbott, 26 January 1851 (P/199/31); Burton, Contingent, p. 135; Stotherd, p. 43; Rawlinson, p. 74. Google Earth at 18˚ 49’ 7.44” N, 76˚ 6’ 14.57” E. 64 WFB to GJ, 15 January 1851 and corresp. in P/199/31. 65 GT to GJ, 19 January 1851; GJ to WFB, 20 and 23 January 1851; GJ to Capt Parker, CO 6th Infantry, 20 January 1851 (P/199/31); The Times, 21 March 1851. 66 WFB to GJ, 19 January 1851; A/Staff Surgeon R. Riddell to WFB, 25 January 1851; reply, 25 January 1851; Riddell to Johnston, 25 January 1851 (P/199/31). 67 Loyd to Abbott, 26 January 1851; WFB to GJ, 26 January 1851 (P/199/31); GT Divisional Movement Order, 27 January 1851; GT to WFB, 28 January 1851 (P/199/32). 68 WFB to GJ No. 1, 28 January 1851; Loyd to Abbott, 28 January 1851; Loyd memo, 30 January 1851; Orr to Abbott, February 1851 (P/199/32). 69 CD to WFB, 29 January 1851 (P/199/31) and corresp. in P/199/32. 71 BTC, 11 February 1851. 72 Loyd memo, 3 and 4 February 1851 (P/199/32). 73 Loyd memo, 4 February 1851; Loyd to Abbott, 5 February 1851; WFB to GJ, 4 February 1851 (P/199/32); Burton, Contingent, p. 135; Stotherd, p. 43; Rawlinson, p. 74; BTC (two reports), 12 February; The Times, 21 March 1851. 74 Orr to Abbott, 5 February 1851; WFB to Mil Sec., undated (apparently 6 February) and 7 February 1851 (P/199/32); BTC, 12 February 1851. 75 WFB to GJ, 4 February 1851; WFB Field Force Orders, 4 February; WFB to CD, 5 February 1851; JSF GO, 17 February 1851 (P/199/32). 76 CD to WFB, 7 February 1851; JSF to HME, 31 January and 7 February 1851 (P/199/32); MoD minute, 6 March 1851 (P/198/48). 77 WFB Field Force Orders, 4 February 1851 (P/199/32); BTC 10 February 1851. 78 Corresp. on Rissaldar Zulfikar Ali Beg’s court martial in P/199/51. 79 JSF to HME, 8 and 10 October 1851 (P/199/49) and corresp. in P/199/51; Stotherd, p. 72. 80 Fraser, p. 327; MoD minute, 7 April 1851 (P/199/34); BTC, 10 February 1851; ODNB; DN, 26 March 1855. 81 JSF GO, 17 February 1851 (P/199/32); WFB to GJ, 4 March 1851; JSF GO, 10 March 1851; JSF to HME, 10 March 1851 (P/199/34); HME to JSF, 10 April 1851; GJ to WFB, 26 April 1851 (P/48/26); Laurie, pp. 16 and 22; A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. V, Note V, p. 416. 82 WFB to GJ, 18 March 1851 (P/199/35); JSF GO, 22 March 1851 (P/199/34); Fraser, p. 335. 83 Fraser, pp. 335–6. 84 MoD minutes, 7 and 10 April 1851 (P/199/34); Fraser, p. 336–7; Rawlinson, p. 75. 85 BCGD (1852); J.H. Stocqueler, The Overland Companion, being a Guide for the Traveller to India via Egypt (London, 1850); Maude, pp. 64–6; FM Lord Roberts, Forty-One Years in India (London, 1898), p. 1.



Notes to pages 161–5

371

Chapter 9. Shemshi Pasha on the Danube 1

N.A. Woods, The Past Campaign: A Sketch of the War in the East, from the Departure of Lord Raglan to the Capture of Sevastopol (London, 1855), Vol. 1, p. 163. 2 1851 Census. 3 Byron Farwell, Burton: A Biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton (London, 1963), pp. 50–60; Georgiana M. Stisted, The True Life of Capt Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1896), pp. 58–71; Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), pp. 164–8; Priscilla Napier, Raven Castle: Charles Napier in India 1844–1851 (Salisbury, 1991), pp. 178–80; Alfred Bate Richards, A Sketch of the Career of Richard F. Burton (London, 1886), p. 5; Richard F. Burton, A Complete System of Bayonet Exercise (London, 1853); Richard F. Burton, Sindh and the Races that Inhabit the Valley of the Indus (London, 1851); Richard F. Burton, Scinde, or The Unhappy Valley (London, 1851). 4 Stisted; Bombay Times, 7 February 1852; W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished AngloIndians (London, 1875). 5 HH to MoD (undated, apparently July 1851); WFB to Mily Sec., to GG, 12 July 1851 (L/ MIL/8/509); WFB to Directors, 13 August 1851 (L/MIL/10/51/145); MoD minutes, 1 September and 28 November 1851; Sec. Mily Dept to AG, 29 September 1851; reply, 28 October 1851 (L/ MIL/3/ 509); MoD to Directors, 2 December 1851 (E/4/225, L/MIL/3/61). 6 DoW to India Bd, 16 February 1852, quoted in WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807-2931, PRO30/12/18/3). 7 AG to GG, 19 October 1853, enc. in WFB to AG, 13 April 1861 (P/191/57). 8 Virginia H. Aksan, Ottoman Wars 1700–1870: An Empire Besieged (London, 2007); Winfried Baumgart, The Crimean War 1853–1856 (London, 1999); Col Richard Airey, Mily Sec., to WFB, 25 June 1853 (FO78/974). 9 WFB to EoC, 1 July 1853; MacDougall to EoC, 14 July 1853 (FO78/794). Beatson’s SR enc.with this application is the only source for much of his career with the BAL. 10 WFB to EoC, 11 October 1853; Airey to Hon Spencer Ponsonby, 12 October 1853; EoC to SdeR, 12 October 1853 (FO78/795). 11 WFB to EoC, 17 October 1853 (FO78/795). 12 ODNB; Stanley Lane-Poole, The Life of the Right Honourable Stratford Canning, Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe (London, 1888); James Henry Skene, With Lord Stratford in the Crimean War (London, 1883). 13 SdeR to LdE, 14 November 1853 (PRO30/12/18); WFB to SdeR, 21 November 1853 (FO352/40/1); WFB to LdE, 24 November 1853 (PRO30/12/18). 14 AR (1853), p. 203; Robert B. Edgerton, Death or Glory: The Legacy of the Crimean War (Oxford, 1999), pp. 70–1; Aksan, pp. 427–8. 15 WFB to SdeR, 21 November 1853 (FO352/40/1); WFB to LdE, 24 November 1853 (PRO30/12/18). 16 EIR; Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 17 WFB to SdeR, 9, 23 and 25 December 1853, 3 January 1854 (FO352/40/1). 18 WFB to LdE, 17 January 1854; SdeR to LdE, 4 January 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); SdeR to EoC No. 54, 3 February 1854 (FO78/990). 19 E.H. Nolan, History of the Russian War (London, 1857), p. 589; A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. II, pp. 207–11; MG (quoting USG), 14 December 1853. 20 WFB to SdeR, 3 June 1854 (FO195/453); EoC to Sir Charles Wood, 17 March 1854 (FO78/1050, L&PS/3/42); J.L. Melville to WFB, 18 March 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); Wood to EoC, WFB to EoC, 20 March 1854 (FO78/1050); MD No. 28, 22 March 1854 (IOR E/4/824, L/MIL/3/2086). 21 Stephen Wheeler (ed.), Annals of the Oriental Club 1824–1858 (London, 1925), p. xi and members’ list; WFB to LdE, 19 March 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). 22 EoC to LdE, 13 March 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); EoC to HH, 13 April 1854; FO to Horse Guards, 20 April 1854 (FO78/1051); Army List (1855).

372

Notes to pages 165–72

23 Maj-Gen Sir Henry Green, A Short Memoir of the Services of Colonel Malcolm Green, CB, and of Major-General Sir Henry Green (Bexhill-on-Sea, c.1906); MG (quoting USG), 14 December 1853; Green SR (FO78/1137), originally enc. in WFB to EH, 26 April 1854 (FO78/1051); LdE to DoN, 8 April 1854 (PRO30/12/15/5). 24 EH to India Bd, 21 April 1854; W. Leach to EH, 24 April 1854; WFB to EH, 25 April 1854; EoC to Horse Guards, 27 April 1854; CY to FO, 29 April 1854 (FO78/1051). 25 H.M. Vibart, Addiscombe: Its Heroes and Men of Note (London, 1894). 26 Brig-Gen A.E.A. Holland, Memoir of Major General Sir Henry Tombs (Woolwich, 1913); Hart’s Army List; ILN, 25 February; WFB to EH 26 April 1854 (FO78/1043); EH to India Bd, 27 April 1854 (FO78/1051); Tombs to EH, 2 May 1854 (FO78/1052); WFB to EoC, 2 May 1854 (FO78/1043). 27 ILN, 18 and 25 February 1854; Punch I (1854), p. 187. 28 The Times, 23 February 1854. 29 FCM to LdW, 7 April 1855 (WO6/78); FP to LdW, 7 April 1855 with FO endorsement 16 April 1855 (FO78/1146). 30 Corresp. with Admiralty in FO78/1051; EH to WFB, 25 April 1854 (FO78/1043). 31 Corresp. with General Post Office in FO78/1052. 32 WFB to EH, 30 April and 2 May 1854 (FO78/1043); EoC to WFB No. 1, 1 May 1854 (FO78/1043, NAM 6807-281-2); EoC to SdeR No. 214, 1 May 1854 (FO78/981, FO 195/420); EoC to WFB, 1 May 1854 (FO78/981). 33 WFB to EoC, 2 May 1854 (FO78/1043). 34 Lane-Poole, pp. 344 and 359; EStJN to SdeR No. 39, 8 April 1854 (FO195/438); Simmons to SdeR, 9 April 1854 (FO352/39/4); SdeR to EoC No. 171, 14 April 1854 (FO78/992); SdeR to EoC No. 229, 15 May 1854 (FO78/994); The Times, 3 May 1854; SdeR memos to Porte, 9 April 1854 (FO352/40/2) and undated (apparently 20 April) (FO352/40/6); Porte to Governor of Adrianople, 18 April 1854, enc. in SdeR to EoC No. 184, 20 April 1854 (FO78/993); SdeR to EoC No. 227, 13 May 1854 (FO78/994); copy (in French) of the penal code for irregulars drawn up by the Sultan, May 1854 (NAM6807-293-1); William Howard Russell, The War: From the Landing at Gallipoli to the Death of Lord Raglan (London, 1855), pp. 111–15. 35 Christopher Duffy, Russia’s Military Way to the West: Origins and Nature of Russian Military Power, 1700–1800 (London, 1981), p. 163. 36 Humphry Sandwith, A Narrative of the Siege of Kars (London, 1856), p. 158; Isabel Burton, p. 240; James J. Reid, Crisis of the Ottoman Empire: Prelude to Collapse 1839–1878 (Stuttgart, 2000), pp. 269–78 and 445. 37 William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part 2, Act 3, Scene 2. 38 Sandwith, pp. 155–6. 39 Rassam to SdeR, 17 February 1855 (FO 78/1115). 40 Sandwith, pp. 156–7. 41 ILN, 28 January, 11 March, 15 March, 17 June 1854; George Palmer Evelyn, A Diary of the Crimea, ed. Cyril Falls (London, 1954). 42 Morning Herald, 28 June 1854. 43 DoN to LdR No. 1, 10 April 1854 (WO6/69). 44 P&O Notice, 1 May 1859 (FO78/1052); GCM to WFB, 4 May 1859 (WO6/75); Wheeler, p. x and members’ list; Steinbach to The Times, 27 April 1859; C. Grey, European Adventurers in Northern India 1785 to 1849, ed. H.L.O. Garrett (Lahore, 1929); Henry Steinbach, The Punjaub, Being a Brief Account of the Country of the Sikhs (London, 1845; and several modern reprints). 45 WFB to GCM, 5 May 1854 (FO78/1052); GCM to EH, 15 May 1854 (WO6/75); EH to GCM, 18 May 1854; EoC to Steinbach, 18 May 1854; Steinbach to EH, 20 May 1854 (FO78/1052). 46 Alexander Somerville, History of the British Legion and War in Spain (London, 1839); Hart’s; Creagh’s divorce by Private Act 9 and 10 Victoria I, c45; Creagh to EH, 1 May 1854; EH to CY, 8 May 1854; reply, 10 May 1854 (FO78/1052); Creagh SR, enc. in WFB to EoC, 6 May 1854; EoC to WFB, 12 May 1854; EH to WFB, 13 May 1854 (FO78/1043). 47 Harriet S. Wantage, Lord Wantage, VC, KCB (London, 1907), p. 18. 48 WFB to EH, 12 May 1854 (FO78/1043).

49

50 51

52 53 54 55 56

57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65

66 67 68 69

70 71 72 73 74 75 76

Notes to pages 172–6

373

BPB, ‘Orford’; Navy List; Hart’s; Frederic Boase, Modern English Biography (London, 1965); Frederick Walpole, The Ansayrii (or Assassins) with Travels in the Further East in 1850–51 Including a Visit to Nineveh (London, 1851); Austen H. Layard, Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon (London, 1853); Skene, Stratford; WFB to EH, 12 May 1854 (FO78/1043); EH to Admiralty, 27 May, reply, 29 May, EH to WD, 31 May, EoC to Fwe, 31 May 1854 (FO78/1052). Morning Herald, 29 May 1854; Green to EH, 6 May 1854 (FO78/1052); WFB to LdE, 19 June 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). SdeR to EoC No. 240, 19 May 1854 (FO78/995); SdeR to EoC No. 264, 25 May 1854; WFB to EH, 25 May and 4 June 1854 (FO78/1043); Omer to Seraskier, 15 August 1854, enc. with SdeR to EoC No. 501, 20 September 1854 (FO78/1001). BPB; Loch memo enc. with draft of EH to India Bd, 20 June 1854 (FO78/1053); Loch SR L/ MIL/10/117. WFB to EH, 4 June 1854 (FO78/1043); EH to WD, 22 June 1854 (FO78/1053); BLG (1894): ‘Lane Fox’; BPB (1894): ‘Conyers’; G.E. Cokayne, The Complete Peerage (London, 1910–59), ‘Conyers’. ODNB; Layard; Sandwith; WFB to SdeR, 3 June 1854; WFB to EoC, 8 June 1854 (FO195/453); EoC to WFB, 23 June 1854 (FO78/1043); EoC to Sandwith, 23 June 1854 (FO78/1044). WFB to EH, 4 June 1854 (FO78/1043); WFB to SdeR No. 1, 31 May 1854, undated (June 1854), and No. 5, 9 June 1854 (FO195/453). Kinglake, Vol. II, pp. 202–8; Aksan, pp. 450–6; Baumgart, pp. 98–101; Ian Fletcher and Natalia Ishchenko, The Crimean War; Clash of Empires (Staplehurst, 2004), pp. 33–6; Alastair Massie (ed.), A Most Desperate Undertaking: The British Army in the Crimea, 1854–56 (London, 2003), p. 52; Trevor Royle, Crimea: The Great Crimean War 1854–1856 (London, 1999), pp. 146–8. WFB to SdeR, 12 June 1854 (FO195/453); WFB to EH, 15 June 1854 (FO78/1043); WFB to LdE, 19 June 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). BPB: ‘Napier and Ettrick’. WFB to LdE, 19 June 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). William Forbes Skene, Memorials of the Family of Skene of Skene (Aberdeen, 1887), p. 141; BLG (1886). WFB to EoC No. 3, 30 May 1854 (FO78/1043); WFB to SdeR ,11 June 1854 (FO195/453); WFB to LdE, 19 June 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). EoC to WFB No. 3, 13 June 1854, enc. undated EH minute; WFB to EH, 6 August 1854 (FO78/1043). WFB to SdeR, 3 June 1854 (FO195/453). Kinglake, Vol. II, pp. 185–7; Royle, pp. 141–2. Louis Arnaud, ‘Les deux rues du Général Yusuf’, available at http://bone.piednoir.net/titre_ rubrique/rues/ruesyusuf.html); Col C.E. Callwell, Small Wars, Their Principles and Practice, 3rd edn (London, 1906), pp. 246, 466; Hugh Mulleneux Walmsley, Sketches of Algeria during the Kabyle War (London, 1858), pp. 28–33. HHR to LdR, 10 June 1854 (FO78/1039). Royle, pp. 172–3. WFB to EoC, 5 June 1854 (FO78/1043; FO195/453); SdeR to EoC No. 315, 15 June 1854 (FO78/996). EoC to Lord Cowley, Ambassador to Paris, No. 583, 20 June 1854 (FO146/511); Cowley to EoC No. 805, 26 June 1854 (FO146/536); decree for raising irregular cavalry, signed by St Arnaud, 9 June 1854, Napoleon III and Marshal Vaillant, 24 June 1854 (NAM 6807-293-1). ILN, 17 June 1854; HHR to EoC No. 28, 28 June 1854 (FO78/1039). WFB to EoC, 15 June 1854 (FO78/1043); WFB to LdE, 19 June 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). WFB to SdeR, 20 June 1854 (FO195/453). Seraskier to Omer Pasha, 23 June 1854 (translation in FO78/997, FO78/1241). WFB to SdeR, 23 June 1854 (FO352/40/1) and 24 June 1854 (FO195/453). WFB to LdE, 22 July 1854 (PRO30/12/18). SdeR to EoC No. 309, 25 June 1854 (FO78/997); SdeR to WFB, 23 June 1854 (FO196/46, FO78/1241); The Times, 2 August 1854.

374

Notes to pages 177–82

77 Sir Charles Shaw, Personal Memoirs and Correspondence of Colonel Charles Shaw (London, 1837), Vol. 2, p. 412; Charles Shaw et al., A Short Statement of the Case of the Claimants of the British Auxiliary Legion of Spain (London, 1839); SdeR to EoC No. 311, 22 October 1853 (FO78/1076); ILN, 3 June 1854, p. 518; Evelyn; Foreign Office List. 78 Edward M. Spiers, Radical General: Sir George de Lacy Evans, 1787–1870 (Manchester, 1983), pp. 143–50. 79 Frederick Robinson, Diary of the Crimean War (London, 1856), pp. 53–4. 80 Lt Hugh Hibbert, 7th Royal Fusiliers, to his mother, 9 and 10 May 1854 (DHB/4). 81 Virtually every writer who came into contact with the Bashi-Bazouks has left a description of their appearance and weaponry, e.g., Green; Edward Money, Twelve Months with the BashiBazouks (London 1857); Sandwith; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk; Woods; Russell, War, p. 125; Anon, ‘Bashi-Bazouks’, Household Words (28 March 1857), pp. 306–12, the author of which has been identified as Staff Surgeon Robert Brudenell Carter (Anne Lohrli, Household Words: A Weekly Journal 1850–1859 [Toronto, 1973], p. 225). 82 Woods, Vol. 1, p. 170. 83 Russell, War, p. 100; Spiers, Radical General; Kinglake, Vol. II, p. 209. 84 WFB to EoC, 28 June 1854 (FO78/1043). This is the first time he signs himself ‘Lt-Gen in the Turkish Army’. 85 WFB to LdR, 2 July 1854 (NAM 6807-293-1); EStJN to SdeR, 8 July 1854 (FO78/998); Green, p. 7. Green’s chronology is unreliable: the man with the discharge certificate may have served during Green’s second spell with the Bashi-Bazouks in the winter of 1855–6. 86 EStJN to SdeR, 8 July 1854 (FO78/998). 87 Russell, War, p. 113. 88 V.D.G., NQ 11th Ser. Vol. VII (1913), p. 237. ‘V.D.G.’ is probably an abbreviation for the 5th Dragoon Guards rather than a personal name. 89 Russell, War, p. 121. 90 WFB to EoC, 16 July 1854 (FO78/1043, FO195/453); Steinbach to EoC, 24 July 1854; EoC to WFB No. 7, 7 September 1854; WFB to EoC, 4 December 1854 (FO78/1043); GCM to WFB, 8 September 1854 (WO6/76). 91 WFB to SdeR, 16 July 1854 (FO195/453); SdeR to WFB, 30 June 1854 (FO196/46). Creagh became brevet Lt-Col on 20 June 1854 (Army List) and was placed on full pay of the 67th Foot (Foreign Office List [1863]; WFB to EoC, 20 July 1854 (FO78/1043); GCM to CY, 5 September 1854 (WO6/75)). 92 WFB to SdeR, 26 July 1854 (FO195/453). 93 SdeR to WFB, 9 August 1854; WFB to SdeR, 21 August 1854 (FO352/40/1). 94 Omer to WFB, 15 July 1854 (FO195/499). 95 WFB to LdE, 22 July 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). 96 WFB to EoC, 26 January 1857 (FO78/1324); Falstaff’s ‘Honour’ speech is in Henry IV, Part 1, Act 5, scene 1. 97 WFB to LdE, 22 July 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); ODNB: ‘Sandwith’. 98 Simmons to SdeR, 26 July 1854 (FO352/39/4); HHR to EoC No. 84, 24 August 1854 (FO78/1039); WFB to LdR, 21 July 1854 (WO1/369). 99 The Times, 15 September 1854. 100 WFB to LdE, 22 July 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); Williams to SdeR, 28 July 1854 (FO352/39/3); Williams’s italics. 101 The Times, 28 August 1854. 102 ‘From our Poet at Varna’, dated 23 August 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2: draft fo 502–4; fair copy, fo 506–7). 103 ILN, 19 August 1854. 104 EH to WD, 21 June, GCM to EH, 24 June 1854 (FO78/1053); Henry Roberts to Attorney General and Solicitor General, 7 July 1854 (WO6/76); DoN to LdR, 8 July 1854 (WO6/69); copied to SdeR in EoC to SdeR No. 388, 8 July 1854 (FO78/983); EH to GCM, 12 July 1854 (FO78/1054); GCM to EH and WFB, 13 July, DoN to LdR, 17 July 1854 (WO6/69, FO78/1054); EoC to SdeR No. 417, 13 July 1854 (FO78/983).



Notes to pages 182–9

375

105 WFB to EoC No. 14, 5 August 1854 (FO78/1043); GCM to Ordnance Bd, 8 June 1854 (WO6/75); EH to GCM, 30 June (FO78/1053) and 13 July 1854 (FO78/1054); GCM to EH, 5 July 1854; GCM to Wood, 5, 18 and 31 July 1854 (WO6/76); Donald Featherstone, Weapons and Equipment of the Victorian Soldier (Poole, 1978), p. 41; Robert and Christopher Wilkinson-Latham, Cavalry Uniforms of Britain and the Commonwealth (London, 1969), pp. 138, 142 and 163. 106 EoC to WFB Nos 4 and 5, 13 July 1854 (FO78/1043); SdeR to WFB, 31 July 1854 (FO352/40/1); Chief Dragoman to SdeR, 1 August 1854 (NAM 6807-293-1, FO78/999); SdeR to EoC No. 425, 4 August 1854 (FO78/999). 107 WFB to LdE, 22 July 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); Beatson’s italics. 108 SdeR to LdR, 4 July 1854 (FO352/38/4); LdR to DoN, 19 July 1854 (NAM 6807-282-1); WFB to LdR, 21 July 1854, referring to a missing letter from LdR of 13 July 1854 (WO1/369); LdR to DoN No. 39, 24 July 1854 (WO1/368). 109 Kinglake, Vol. II, pp. 218–20; Christopher Hibbert, The Destruction of Lord Raglan (London, 1961), p. 29. 110 Royle, p. 171–2; Fletcher and Ishchenko, p. 46; Baumgart, 110–12; C.E. Vulliamy, Crimea: The Campaign of 1854–56 (London, 1939), p. 78; Lt-Col Somerset Calthorpe, Cadogan’s Crimea (London, 1979; reprint of Letters from Headquarters by a Staff Officer (London, 1856), p. 18; Maj E.H. Claremont, Asst Mily Commissioner, to HHR, 21 July 1854; HHR to EoC No. 50, 21 July 1854; No. 52, 28 July 1854; No. 62, 4 August 1854 (FO78/1039); Russell, War, p. 151. 111 Nolan, Russian War, pp. 204–5; HHR to EoC No. 60, 3 August; No. 63, 4 August ; No. 67, 9 August 1854 (FO78/1039); EStJN to SdeR No. 96, 9 August 1854 (FO195/438); Woods, p. 186; Russell, War, pp. 133–4. 112 HHR to EoC No. 65, 8 August; No. 69, 9 August; No. 84, 24 August 1854 (FO78/1039); EoC to LdE, 22 August 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2). 113 WFB to EoC, 26 January 1857 (FO78/1324); Omer to WFB, undated (FO195/499); WFB to LdR, 6 August (NAM 6807-293-1, WO1/369) and 7 August 1854 (WO1/369). 114 GCM to EH and WFB, 13 July 1854 (FO78/1043, NAM 6807-293-1); LdR to WFB, 13 August 1854 (NAM 6807-293-1). 115 Calthorpe, p. 19; LdR to DoN No. 53, 16 August 1854 (WO1/369, NAM 6807-282-1). 116 LdR to WFB (second letter), 13 August (FO352/40/1) and 16 August 1854 (FO78/1043); LdR to DoN No. 53, 16 August 1854 (WO1/369, NAM 6807-282-1); EStJN to SdeR, 19 August 1854 (FO195/438). 117 WFB to SdeR, 21 August 1854 (FO352/40/1); WFB to EH, 21 August 1854 (FO78/1043). 118 Lt-Col M.E.S. Laws, Army Quarterly 71 (1955), 80. 119 WFB to LdR, 21 August 1854 (FO352/40/1, FO 78/1043, NAM 6807-293-1). 120 HHR to EoC No. 84, 24 August 1854 (FO78/1039); LdR to WFB, 18 August 1854 (NAM 6807293-1); LdR to DoN No. 54, 18 August 1854 (WO1/369). 121 Omer to WFB, 30 August 1854 (FO195/499); Omer to Seraskier, 15 August 1854 (translation FO78/1001). 122 Russell, War, p. 151. 123 Hiley Addington, JSAHR 46 (1968), p. 156. 124 SdeR to EoC, 27 August 1854 (FO352/38/3). 125 Punch 27 (1854), p. 21.

Chapter 10. ‘The Most Glorious Thing I Ever Saw’ 1 2

First published in Macmillan’s Magazine (March 1882) and afterwards in Alfred Lord Tennyson, Tiresias and Other Poems (London, 1885). Cornet E.R. Fisher, 17 and 20 September 1854, in Maj L.R. Fisher-Rowe (ed.), Extracts from Letters of E.R. Fisher-Rowe (late Captain 4th Dragoon Guards) During the Crimean War 1854– 55 (Godalming, 1907); EStJN to SdeR, 19 August 1854 (FO195/438); WFB to SdeR, 7 September 1854 (FO352/40/1); WFB to EoC, 7 September 1854 (FO78/1043); WFB to LdE, 7 September 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137).

376 3 4

Notes to pages 189–95

WFB to EoC, 26 January 1857 (FO78/1324). Alfred Green to EH, 9 September 1854 (FO78/1056); Green to CY, 12 June 1855 (L/PandS/3/42); Maj-Gen Sir Henry Green, A Short Memoir of the Services of Colonel Malcolm Green, CB, and of Major-General Sir Henry Green (Bexhill-on-Sea, c.1906), pp. 3–4; FM Viscount Wolseley, The Story of a Soldier’s Life (London, 1903), Vol. I, p. 116; WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137). 5 Humphry Sandwith, A Narrative of the Siege of Kars (London, 1856); ODNB; J.B. Conacher, JSAHR 68 (1990), p. 169; FO to SdeR, 18 September 1854 (FO78/984). 6 M.W. Thompson, General Pitt-Rivers: Evolution and Archaeology in the Nineteenth Century (Bradford-on-Avon, 1977), p. 25; WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137). 7 Creagh to EoC, 24 February and September 1855 (FO78/1134); WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137). 8 MA, 14 January 1860; WFB to LdE, 7 September 1854 (PRO30/12/18/2); WFB to SdeR, 7 September 1854 (FO352/40/1); WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807-293-1); Morning Herald, 28 June 1854; William Howard Russell, The War: From the Landing at Gallipoli to the Death of Lord Raglan (London, 1855), pp. 152–64 and 171. 9 WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807-293-1, PRO30/12/18/3); Cecil Woodham-Smith, The Reason Why (London, 1953), pp. 176–7 and 221; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 26–7. 10 Times 4 May; ILN 5 May; Punch I (1855), p. 184). 11 Woodham-Smith, Reason Why; Capt L.E. Nolan, Cavalry: Its History and Tactics (London, 1853). 12 WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137). 13 A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. V, pp. 3–11; WoodhamSmith, Reason Why. 14 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 11–19; Gen Lord George Paget, The Light Cavalry Brigade in the Crimea (London, 1881), p. 57. 15 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 25–7; Woodham-Smith, Reason Why, p. 221; E.H. Nolan, History of the Russian War (London, 1857), p. 393. 16 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 2 and 43. 17 Fisher, 21 and 25 September 1854, in Fisher-Rowe; William Cattell, Bygone Days and Reminiscences by the Way (RAMC 391/1), Chap. 1, p. 53; Sjt-Maj Henry Franks, Leaves from a Soldier’s Note Book (Colchester, c.1907), p. 64; Marquess of Anglesey (ed.), ‘Little Hodge’: Being Extracts from the Diaries and Letters of Colonel Edward Cooper Hodge Written During the Crimean War, 1854–1856 (London, 1971), p. 28. 18 Anglesey, p. 25; FO to WFB, 1 May 1854 (FO78/1043); Creagh to EoC, September 1855 (FO78/1134). 19 Cattell, Chap. 1, p. 53; Philip Warner (ed.), The Fields of War: A Young Cavalryman’s Crimean Campaign (London, 1977), p. 58; Anglesey, p. 29. 20 EoL to Chelsea Bd, 9 April 1856 (Parliamentary Papers 21 [1856], p. 47). 21 Cattell, Chap. 1, pp. 53–4; Franks, pp. 64–5; Fisher, 30 September 1854, in Fisher-Rowe; Warner, p. 58. 22 Cattell, Chap. 2, p. 2; Fisher, 8 and 12 October 1854, in Fisher-Rowe. 23 Paget, pp. 62–8; Anglesey, p. 56. 24 FM Sir Evelyn Wood, From Midshipman to Field Marshal (London, 1906), Vol. 1, p. 160; WFB to SdeR, 12 March 1855 (FO195/453). 25 Paget, pp. 161–2; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 48–52; Cattell, Chap. 2, p. 13. 26 EoL statement, in Kinglake, Vol. V, Appendix Note II, p. 403; JYS to EoL, 27 October 1854 in Kinglake, Vol. V, Appendix Note VI, p. 416; copy in WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137)); Paget, pp. 162–4; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 52–8. 27 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 58–67; LdR to DoN No. 85, 26 October 1854 (The Times, 13 November 1854); LdR to DoN, 28 October 1854 (NeC 9894/1–2); Kinglake’s questions to EoL, enc. with Elcho to Kinglake, 11 April 1868, in Ben Smyth/Kinglake Archive, available at http://crimeantexts. russianwar.co.uk/sources/bsk.html; Cattell, Chap. 2, p. 1. 28 Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 192; Ian Fletcher and Natalia Ishchenko, The Crimean War; Clash of Empires (Staplehurst, 2004), p. 168.



Notes to pages 195–202

377

29 Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 72. 30 Fletcher and Ishchenko, p. 168; JYS to EoL, 27 October 1854, ibid.; Anglesey, p. 44. 31 Lt-Gen I.I. Ryzhov, Russkii Vestnik (1870), Vol. 86, pp. 463–9, cited in Albert Seaton, The Crimean War: A Russian Chronicle (London, 1977); also translated by Mark Conrad, 1999, available at http://marksrussianmilitaryhistory.info/Ryzhov.htm; Fletcher and Ishchenko, p. 169; Hamley p. 113; Hibbert Destruction p. 137; Clifford p. 71. 32 Ryzhov, ibid.; Kinglake Vol. V, pp. 75–84. 33 Gen Sir Edward Hamley, The War in the Crimea (London, 1891), p. 114; Seaton, pp. 144–5; Fletcher and Ishchenko, pp. 169–70; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 77–84; Lt-Col Anthony Sterling, The Highland Brigade in the Crimea (London, 1895), pp. 63–4; Russell, War, p. 227. 34 W. Baring Pemberton, Battles of the Crimean War (London, 1962), p. 88. 35 Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 90. 36 Hamley, p. 114; Paget, p. 174; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 91–3 and 102–5; Sjt Timothy Gowing, Voice from the Ranks, ed. Kenneth Fenwick (London, 1954), p. 30; Ryzhov, ibid.; Pemberton, pp. 88–9. 37 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 100–1; Ryzhov, ibid.; Russell, War, p. 228; Warner, p. 75. 38 Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 97 and Appendix Note VII, pp. 418–21; Warner, p. 75; Fletcher and Ishchenko, pp. 168–72. 39 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 93–8 and 102–3; Alastair Massie (ed.), A Most Desperate Undertaking: The British Army in the Crimea, 1854–56 (London, 2003), p. 119. 40 Hamley, p. 113; Henry Clifford, His Letters and Sketches from the Crimea (London, 1956), p. 71; Gowing, p. 29; Russell, War, p. 228. 41 NQ (1913), 11th Ser., Vol. VII, p. 237; Roy Dutton, Forgotten Heroes: The Charge of the Heavy Brigade (Oxton, 2008), pp. 22–3; Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 294. 42 Alexander John Beatson of Rossend, Genealogical Account of the Families of Beatson (Edinburgh, 1860), p. 51; W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished Anglo-Indians (London, 1875), p. 15. 43 Russell, War, pp. 228–9; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 105–16; JYS to EoL, 27 October 1854 (in WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 [FO78/1137]). 44 Paget, pp. 174–5; Clifford, p. 71; Warner, p. 78; Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 116; Franks, p. 70. 45 Russell, War, pp. 228–9; Gowing, p. 30; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 102 and 150–5; Anglesey, p. 45; Warner, p. 75; 46 Fletcher and Ishchenko, p. 173 (quoting Arbuzov in Voenniy sbornik No. 4 (April 1874), p. 400). 47 Kinglake. Vol. V, pp. 158–60; Warner, p. 75; Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine (January 1855), pp. 112–22; Anglesey, p. 46; Gowing, p. 31. 48 Warner, p. 75; Franks, p. 70; Ryzhov, ibid.; Maj-Gen Sir Edward S. May, Changes & Chances of a Soldier’s Life (London, 1925), p. 184. 49 Cattell, Chap. 2, pp. 10 and 15; Featherstone, p. 41; Gen Sir Evelyn Wood, The Crimea in 1854 and 1894 (London, 1895), p. 113; Gowing, p. 31. 50 Franks, p. 71; Gowing, p. 32; Maj E.S. May, Guns and Cavalry (London, 1896), p. 94; Warner, p. 75. 51 Gowing, p. 32; Frank and Andrea Cook, Casualty Roll for the Crimea (London, c.1976); Ryzhov, ibid. 52 Henry IV, Part 1, Act 5. 53 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 133–4. 54 Russell, War, p. 229; Franks, pp. 71–2; Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 163–4. 55 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 165–71, 185–92. 56 Many sources give the text of the 4th Order, including Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 198; for Beatson’s copy, see Note 63 below. 57 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 198–203, 214 and 289; JYS to EoL, 27 October 1854 (FO78/1137); H(L), 2 March 1855. 58 Franks, p. 71; Kinglake, Vol. V p. 290–3; H(L), 2 March 1855; Cattell, Chap. 2 p. 21. 59 ODNB: ‘Scarlett’; Kinglake, Vol. V pp. 293–4; Cattell, Chap. 2, p. 21; Laurie, Anglo-Indians, p. 15. 60 Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 265 and 292–3; Anglesey, p. 50; Cattell, Chap. 2, p. 21; JYS to EoL, 27 October 1854 (FO78/1137). 61 WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807-293-1, PRO30/12/18/3); WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137); Kinglake, Vol. V, pp. 332–5 and 337–8.

378 62 63 64 65

66 67 68

69 70 71 72 73

74

75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82

Notes to pages 202–8 H(L), 2 March 1855. WFB to SdeR, 23 November 1854 (FO352/40/1). WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137). Col Willoughby Verner, Military Life of HRH George, Duke of Cambridge (London, 1905), Vol. 1, pp. 73 and 85; Anglesey, p. 58; Robert B. Edgerton, Death or Glory: The Legacy of the Crimean War (Oxford, 1999), pp. 242–3; Giles St Aubyn, The Royal George 1819–1904: The Life of HRH Prince George Duke of Cambridge (London, 1962), pp. 81–2. Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 349, Vol. VI, p. 13; Cattell, Chap. 3, p. 5. BPB (1953); Rachel de Salis, Hillingdon Through Eleven Centuries (Uxbridge, 1926); Rachel de Salis, De Salis Family: English Branch (Henley-on-Thames, 1934). Canon W.M. Lummis, Honour the Light Brigade, ed. Kenneth G. Wynn (London, 1973); Terry Brighton, Hell Riders: The Truth About the Charge of the Light Brigade (London, 2004); Daily Telegraph, 10 April 2004. Mrs Henry Duberly, Journal Kept during the Russian War (London, 1855); E.E.P. Tisdall, Mrs Duberly’s Campaigns (London, 1963). Fisher, 31 October, in Fisher-Rowe; Cattell, Chap. 3, 27 October 1854. Paget, pp. 222–31; Warner, p. 82; Cook; Franks, p. 84; JYS to EoL, 7 January 1855 (WO28/161); WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807-293-1, PRO30/12/18/3); Beatson of Rossend, p. 51. Kinglake, Vol. V, Appendix Note VI, p. 417; WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137). WFB to LdE, 21 December 1854 (PRO30/12/18); WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807293-1, PRO30/12/18/3); Kinglake, Vol. V, p. 418; Laurie, Anglo-Indians, p. 16; WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137). WFB to LdR, 21 July (WO1/369); DoN to WFB, 19 October 1854 (WO6/77); LdR to DoN, 28 October (Ne C 9894/1-2); WFB to Steele, 13 November 1854, in Maj-Gen W.F. Beatson, The War Department and the Bashi-Buzouks (London, 1856), p. 4. WFB to SdeR, 8 November 1854 (DE1274/2, p. 258). Cattell, Chap. 3, pp. 5–6; Anglesey, p. 56. Cattell, Chap. 3, p. 6; WFB to SdeR, 8 November 1854 (DE1274/2, p. 258). Cattell, Chap, 3, pp. 7–8; Anglesey, pp. 57–8; Clifford, p. 99; Fisher, 17 November 1854, in FisherRowe; Hamley, pp. 166–7. Clifford, pp. 105–6. Cattell, Chap. 3, p. 9; Hamley, p. 169. WFB to LdE, 21 December 1854 (PRO30/12/18). SdeR to WFB, 15 November 1854 (FO352/40/1); WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807293-1, PRO30/12/18/3); MG, 9 December 1854; Beatson later told Clarendon that he left on 20 November, but this was probably the date of his arrival at Constantinople (WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137)).

Chapter 11. Dardanelles Camp 1 2 3

4 5 6 7

WFB to SdeR, 22 June 1855 (FO195/453). SdeR to EoC, 10 September 1854 (FO78/1001); FWe to LdE, 2 October 1854 (PRO30/12/18); EH to WD, 21 September (FO78/1056), 9 October 1854 (FO78/1057). O’Reilly to EoC, 16 November 1854 (FO78/1058); DoN to WFB, 1 October 1854 (FO 195/453), 1 February 1855 (WO6/79); George Palmer Evelyn, A Diary of the Crimea, ed. Cyril Falls (London, 1954), pp. 35–43; The Times, 4 and 24 March 1854. LdR to DoN No. 103, 14 November 1854 (WO1/370, NAM 6807-282-1). GCM to EH, 12 October 1854; GCM to BH, 14 October 1854 (WO6/76); DoN to WFB, 19 October 1854 (WO6/77); LdR to DoN No. 103, ibid.; SdeR to WFB, 8 November 1854 (FO352/40/1). LdR to DoN No. 103, ibid.; EoC to SdeR, 12 October 1854 (FO78/985). WFB to SdeR, 8 November 1854 (DE1274/2 p. 258); WFB to SdeR, 23 and 27 November 1854 (FO352/40/1); Maj-Gen W.F. Beatson, The War Department and the Bashi-Buzouks (London, 1856), pp. 113–16; MA, 21 July 1856.

8

Notes to pages 208–12

379

Corresp. over many weeks in FO78/1043, FO78/1058, FO78/1137, FO78/1143, FO78/1146, FO195/453, FO195/488, WO6/78–9 and WO32/7511. 9 WFB to SdeR, 12 December 1854 (FO195/453). 10 WFB to LdR, 10 January 1855 (NAM 6807-293-1, PRO30/12/18/3). 11 Stopford corresp. in FO78/1058–60. 12 GCM to Lt-Gov Addiscombe, 6 November 1854 (WO6/77); Col Atwell Lake, Kars and our Captivity in Russia, 2nd edn (London, 1856), pp. 31–4; FP to WFB, 1 August 1855 (WO6/80); WOp to SdeR, 2 October 1855 (FO352/42A/2); H.M. Vibart, Addiscombe: Its Heroes and Men of Note (London, 1894), pp. 499–500. 13 WFB to EoC, 4 December 1854 (FO78/1043); WFB to Steel, 5 February 1855 (NAM 6807-2931); Creagh to EoC, 24 February 1855 (FO78/1134); WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137); Green to CY, 12 June 1855 (L/P&S/3/42); Humphry Sandwith, A Narrative of the Siege of Kars (London, 1856); Maj-Gen Sir Henry Green, A Short Memoir of the Services of Colonel Malcolm Green, CB, and of Major-General Sir Henry Green (Bexhill-on-Sea, c.1906). 14 BPB: ‘Havelock-Allan’, ‘Wemyss & March’; Hart’s Army List; Rev William Brock, A Biographical Sketch of Sir Henry Havelock, 6th edn (London, 1858); J.C. Pollock, Way to Glory: The Life of Havelock of Lucknow (London, 1957); WFB to SdeR, 9 and 12 December 1854 (FO195/453); Court of Inquiry (FO195/488 and WO32/7511) (hereafter CoI 2). 15 Capt G. Rhodes, A Personal Narrative of a Tour of Military Inspection in Various Parts of European Turkey (London, 1854). 16 WFB to SdeR, 7, 14 and 24 December 1854; Skene to WFB, 23 and 24 December 1854 (FO195/453). 17 GCM to LdW, 16 November 1854; FO to GCM, 20 November 1854 (FO78/1058); WD corresp. with these officers in WO6/76–8. 18 ‘Paper of Information’, 1 January 1855 (FO78/1143); L/MIL/10/117. 19 Blakely to SdeR, 13 April 1854 (FO352/39/1); Blakely’s references in FO78/1144; GCM to WFB, 17 January 1855 (WO6/79); WFB to DoN, 16 February 1855 (FO78/1137, FO195/453). 20 WFB to SdeR, 26 January 1855 (FO195/453). 21 WFB to SdeR, 12 December 1854 (FO195/453); WFB to EoC, 24 January 1855; FO minutes, 18 February 1855; EoC to WFB 21 February 1855 and marginal notes on draft; WFB to EoC, 10 March 1855 (FO78/1137); LdW to GCM, 21 February 1855; GCM to LdW, 26 February 1855 (FO78/1144). 22 ‘Note relative à l’organisation, à la solde et aux rations de quatre mille cavaliers qui seront levés dans les diverses provinces de Roumélia et d’Anatolie …’; WFB, ‘Observations on the note of the Seraskier regarding the organization of 4,000 cavalry’, 3 January 1855 (FO195/453); extract from undated letter from FWC (FO195/475). 23 DoN to WFB, 1 February 1855 (WO6/79, FO195/453). 24 Hodson, Index; L/MIL/10/117; NQ 147 (1924), p. 497. 25 Army List; WO31/1094. 26 WFB to DoN, 16 February 1855 (FO78/1137, FO195/453); GCM to CY, 17 February 1855 (WO6/68, WO31/1072); LdP to WFB, 23 March 1855 (WO6/70); L/MIL/10/117. 27 SdeR to consuls at Monastir, Salonika, Beirut, Damascus, Aleppo and Jerusalem, 5 and 9 February 1855 (FO352/41B/6, FO78/1072); Commissariat to SdeR, 8 February 1855 (FO78/1072); WFB to DoN 16 February 1855 (FO78/1137, FO195/453). 28 The Times; DN, 24 March 1855; SdeR to Ali Pasha, 3 February 1855 (FO78/1072); SdeR to consuls, 12 February–1 March 1855 (FO352/41B); Blunt to SdeR, 15 February and 18 April 1855 (FO195/476); Consul-General Niven Moore, Beirut, to FWe, 22 March and 7 April 1855 (FO78/1116); FWe and Brett to WFB, 22 February 1855; O’Reilly to WFB, 7 March 1855; Havelock to WFB, 7 April 1855; WFB to SdeR, 20 January, 1, 4 and 20 April 1855 (FO195/453) 29 WFB to SdeR, 5 February 1855; FWe and Brett to WFB, 22 February 1855; Rhodes to WFB, 26 February 1855; Wood to FWe, 18 April 1855 (FO195/453); Rhodes to WFB, 15 February 1855 (FO78/1074); Longworth to SdeR, 4, 10 and 18 March 1855 (FO78/1106); SdeR to EoC No. 108, 12 February 1855 (FO78/1072). 30 Rhodes to WFB, 15 February (FO78/1074), 16 and 26 February 1855 (FO195/453).

380 31 32 33 34

35

36 37

38 39 40 41 42

43 44

45

46 47

48

49 50

Notes to pages 212–16 Wood to EoC, 17 February 1855; EoC to Wood, 8 March 1855 (FO78/1118). WFB to SdeR, 11 July 1855 (FO195/453). Havelock to WFB, 30 April 1855; WFB to SdeR, 23 February 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to SdeR, 17 May 1855 (FO352/42A/2). Sir George Douglas and Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay (eds), The Panmure Papers (London, 1908), Vol. I, pp. 1–46; Hugh Mulleneux Walmsley, The Life of Sir Joshua Walmsley by his Son (London, 1879), pp. 296–7; ODNB: ‘Roebuck’; Cecil Woodham-Smith, Florence Nightingale (London, 1950), p. 203; John Sweetman, War and Administration: The Significance of the Crimean War for the British Army (Edinburgh, 1984), pp. 124–6. J.B. Conacher, Britain and the Crimea 1855–56: Problems of War and Peace (London, 1987), pp. 83, 89–90; LdP to WFB, 15 and 19 February, 23 March 1855 (WO6/70, FO195/453); GCM to LdW, 26 February 1855 (FO78/1144). WFB to DoN, 16 February 1855 (FO78/1137); WFB to LdP, 1 March 1855 (FO195/453); LdP to WFB, 9, 10 and 23 March 1855; LdP to LdR, 23 March 1855 (WO6/70). GCM to LdW, 8 March; reply, 8 March 1855 (FO78/1145); GCM to CY, 10 March 1855 (WO6/78); FP to WFB, 12 March and 30 April 1855; LdP to WFB, 30 March 1855 (WO6/79); FP to CY, 30 April 1855 (WO31/1081). LdP to WFB, 23 March 1855; LdP to LdWP No. 27, 23 March 1855 (WO6/70); GCM to LdW, 23 March 1855 (FO78/1145). EoC to SdeR No. 768, 4 December 1854 (FO78/987); FP to India Bd, 17 March 1855 (WO43/976); LdP to LdR, 23 March 1855 (WO6/70). WFB to LdP, 27 February 1855 (FO195/453); GCM to Crofton, 28 April, 8 and 21 May 1855; GCM to WFB, 8 June 1855 (WO6/79); Hart’s. WFB to SdeR, 4 April 1855; LdP to WFB, 13 April 1855; WFB to LdP No. 43, 25 April 1855 (FO195/453). WFB to SdeR, 12 and 14 March, 4 April 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to EoC, 10 July 1855 (FO352/42B/7); Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. 1, p. 71; IN, 30 June 1856, p. 347; see also corresp. between ‘Expertus’ (Capt Thomas Spankie) and ‘G.R.L.’ in MA (September 1856), and IN, 15 September 1856. WFB to SdeR, 14 March 1855 (FO195/453). SdeR to EoC No. 262, 5 April 1855 (FO78/1076); WFB to SdeR, 6 April 1855 (FO195/453); EoC to SdeR, No. 316, 20 April and No. 345, 1 May 1855 (FO78/1063); GCM to WFB, 23 April 1855 (WO6/79); GCM to LdW, 28 April 1855 (FO78/1146); JC to WFB, 4 June 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 57). GCM to CY, 19 March 1855 (WO6/78); LdP to WFB, 30 March 1855; FP to WFB, 8 June 1855 (WO6/79); GCM to CY, 17 May 1855 (WO31/1083); Neill to SdeR, 20 August 1855 (FO195/488); WFB to SdeR, 25 March 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to WFB, 27 March 1855 (FO196/46); WFB to EoC, 12 July 1855 (FO78/1137); CoI 2; Edward Money, Twelve Months with the Bashi-Bazouks (London 1857), pp. 20–5. GCM to WFB, 6 and 23 June 1855 (WO6/79); WFB to SdeR, 14 June 1855 (FO195/453). LdP to WFB, 23 March 1855 (WO6/70); JC to CY, 21 May 1855 (WO31/1084);WFB to LdWP, 7 April 1855; Steele to LdWP, 23 April 1855; Airey to LdWP, 7 July 1855; LdWP to WFB, 11 July 1855 (FO195/453); GCM to WFB, 11 June 1855; GCM to Cockburn, 28 June 1855 (WO6/79); LdP to LdWP No. 75, 6 August 1855 (WO6/71). WFB to SdeR, 28 March and 4 May 1855; Steele to WFB, 28 April 1855 (FO195/453); FP to WFB, 16 April 1855; GCM to WFB, 18 May 1855; LdP to LdWP, 18 May 1855 (WO6/79); AG to Cardigan, 19 May 1855 (WO3/117); FP to John Wilkinson, Principal Veterinary Surgeon, 16 April 1855; GCM to Wilkinson, 15 May 1855 (WO6/79). WFB to SdeR, 6 April and 13 May 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to SdeR, 8 May 1855 (FO352/42A/2); JC to WFB, 4 June 1855, (Beatson, WD, p. 57). WFB to SdeR, 12 and 24 December 1854; Rhodes to WFB, 19, 26 February, 15 April, 27 May 1855; Blunt certificate for Osman Aga, 17 February 1855; Foord to WFB, 7 and 19 April 1855; WFB to Rhodes, 10 April 1855 (FO195/453); Longworth to SdeR, 18 and 25 March, 7 and 21 April 1855; Longworth to EoC, 31 March 1855 (FO78/1106); Longworth certificate for Adem



51

52

53 54

55

56 57 58

59

60

61 62 63 64

65 66 67 68

69

Notes to pages 216–19

381

Aga, 31 March 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 105); Blunt to SdeR No. 25, 6 April 1855; Blunt to Foord, 13 and 24 April 1855 (FO196/46); Hughes to SdeR No. 14, 26 May 1855 (FO195/495). Brett to Ismail Pasha, 8 April 1856; Brett to WFB, 9 April and 1 May 1856; Wood to FWe, 28 April 1856; FWe to WFB, 28 April 1856 (FO195/453); O’Reilly to AAG, 30 August 1856 (FO195/488); Money, pp. 71 and 75. Foord to Rhodes, 23 April 1855; WFB to SdeR, 3 May 1856 (FO195/453); Beatson, WD, p. 110; The Times, 30 December 1856; IN, 1 January 1857; Blunt to SdeR No. 30, 26 April 1855; Blunt to Foord, 10 May 1855 (FO195/476); Hughes to SdeR, undated (Beatson, WD, p. 109); WFB to SdeR, 17 and 21 May 1855 (FO195/453). FP to WFB, 4 June 1855 (WO6/79); WFB to GCM, 19 June 1855 (FO195/453); FP to WFB, 14 July 1855 (WO6/80). Blunt to SdeR No. 32, 2 May 1855 (FO195/476); Rhodes to WFB No. 16, 27 May 1855; WFB to SdeR, 11 and 27 May 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to Grey, 14 May 1855 (FO78/1078); SdeR to EoC No. 387, 29 May 1855 (FO78/1079); SdeR to EoC No. 431, 14 June 1855 (FO78/1081). WFB to SdeR, 21 (third letter) and 23 May, 5 June 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to WFB, 30 May and 14 June 1855 (FO196/46); GCM to EH, 4 July 1855 (FO78/1149); EoC to SdeR No. 540, 5 July 1855 (FO78/1065); SdeR to EoC, 10 June (FO352/42B/7) and No. 424, 11 June 1855 (FO78/1080). WFB to SdeR, 10 April and 9 May 1855 (FO195/453); Blunt to Rhodes No. 4, 14 May 1855 (FO195/476); Foord to WFB, 23 May 1855 (FO195/453, FO78/1079). Blunt to SdeR No. 38, 16 May 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to SdeR (two letters) and WFB to Rhodes, 21 May 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to Blunt No. 10, 21 May 1855 (FO352/41B/6, FO196/46). Blunt to SdeR, 6 April 1855; Blunt to Foord, 24 April 1855 (FO195/476); Osman Pasha to Constantinople, 9 May 1855 (FO195/475); SdeR to Blunt and WFB, 16 May 1855 (FO352/41B/6); Blunt to SdeR No. 39, 23 May 1855 (FO78/1079); Longworth to SdeR, 18 May 1855; Rhodes to WFB No. 19, 2 June 1855 (FO195/453). WFB to SdeR, 17 May 1855 (FO195/453; Beatson, WD, p. 111; The Times, 30 December 1856; IN, 1 January 1857); Foord to WFB, 23 May 1855; WFB to SdeR, 29 May 1855 (FO195/453, FO78/1079); SdeR to Fouad Pasha, 30 May 1855; SdeR to EoC No. 393, 31 May 1855 (FO78/1080); SdeR to EoC No. 431, 14 June 1855 (FO78/1081); EoC to SdeR No. 460, 15 June, No. 502, 26 June 1855 (FO78/1064). Wamick Pasha to FWe, 15–16 May 1855; Wood to SdeR, 23, 26 and 30 May, 5 June 1855; Wood to EoC, 15 June 1855 (FO78/1118); Moore to SdeR, 28 May and 18 June 1855 (FO78/1116); FWe to WFB, 26 May 1855 (FO195/453). Hugh Mulleneux Walmsley, Journal of a Bashi Bazouk (London, 1857), pp. 68 and 78; Moore to SdeR No. 37, 28 May 1855 (FO78/1116); Havelock to EStJN, 3 June 1855 (FO195/453). SdeR to EoC No. 294, 16 April 1855 (FO78/1077); corresp. on transport, May–June 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to WFB, 8 May 1855 (FO196/42); WFB to SdeR, 8 May 1855 (FO352/42A/2). SdeR to EoC, 24 May 1855 (FO352/42B/7). WFB to SdeR, 25 and 28 March, 3 and 19 April, 14 May 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to WFB, 15 May 1855 (FO195/476); SdeR to WFB, 30 May 1855 (FO196/46); SdeR to EoC, 31 May and 4 June 1855 (FO352/42B/7); CoI 2. Blunt to SdeR No. 44, 7 June 1855 (FO195/476); WFB to SdeR, 9 and 15 June 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to EoC No. 431, 14 June 1855 (FO78/1081); SdeR to WFB, 14 June 1855 (FO196/46); Rhodes to WFB, 2 June 1855; Foord to Bruce, 8 June 1855; WFB to SdeR, 14 and 21 June 1855; WFB to GCM, 19 June 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to WFB, 16 June 1855 (FO196/42). EStJN to SdeR, 6 June 1855 (FO78/1080); CoI 2; DN, 22 July 1855; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 20. Moore to SdeR, 5 and 12 June 1855 (FO78/1116); A/Consul E.B.B. Barker, Aleppo, to Moore No. 24, 5 June 1855; Barker to SdeR 3 July 1855 (FO78/1118); WFB to SdeR, 15 (two letters), 23 and 24 June 1855; Brett to WFB 30 June 1855 (FO195/453). WFB to SdeR, 15 and 24 June 1855 (FO195/453); Hughes to SdeR, 17 June 1855 (FO195/495); Blunt to SdeR, 16 August 1855 (FO195/476); WFB to LdP, 12 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 59); CoI 2; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 78.

382

Notes to pages 219–31

70 Michael Grant and John Hazel, Who’s Who in Classical Mythology (London, 1974). 71 SdeR to JHS, 8 July 1855 (FO195/488). 72 Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 20; Money, p. 41; ILN, 15 July 1854; Calvert, undated (bound with February 1855 corresp. in FO195/453); Asst Commissary-Gen H. Hawley Jones to FWC, 11 July 1855 (FO195/492). 73 Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), p. 235; Money pp. 6–8 and 27. 74 WFB to SdeR, 6 June 1855 (FO352/42A/2); WFB to SdeR, 12 and 23 June 1855 (FO195/453); CoI 2; corresp. about the house in FO195/492. 75 Isabel Burton, p. 23; WFB to SdeR, 6 June 1855 (FO352/42A/2); WFB to SdeR, 15 June 1855 (FO195/453); DN, 22 July 1855. 76 WFB to SdeR, 15 and 18 June 1855 (FO195/453); Creagh to EoC, 24 February; reply, 1 March 1855 (FO78/1134); LdW to WD, 28 February 1855 (FO78/1144); GCM to CY, 8 March 1855 (WO6/78); GCM to WFB, 21 and 25 May, 5 July 1855 (WO6/79); CoI 2. 77 WFB to SdeR, 12, 18 and 23 June 1855 (FO195/453); LdP to RJHV, 6 September 1855 WO6/80). 78 WFB to SdeR, 13 June 1855; LdWP to WFB, 11 July 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to WFB, 14 June 1855 (FO196/46); LdWP to WRM, 14 July 1855 (FO78/1082); DN, 22 July 1855. 79 JHS to SdeR, 14 July 1855 (FO78/1083, WO32/7510); Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, pp. 78–9. 80 Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 117. 81 Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 112. 82 Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, pp. 116–17; WFB GO, 10 July 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 107). 83 Money, p. 36. 84 Money, pp. 8–13, 42, 62–3. 85 Money, p. 42; Chris Flaherty, SOTQ No. 150 (2012), pp. 16–19. 86 Observer, 29 April 1855, quoting Constitutionnel. 87 Isabel Burton, pp. 235–6; Beatson, WD, p. 98. 88 Money, pp. 40–7, 59–60, 78. 89 Foord to WFB, 21 June 1855; CoI 22 June (CoI 1); WFB to SdeR, 22 June 1855 (FO195/453); CoI 2. 90 WFB to SdeR, 22, 23 and 24 June 1855; GO Nos 87 and 88, 23 June 1855; 24 June 1855 (FO195/453; Beatson, WD, pp. 107–8 and 113). 91 CoI 2; WFB GO, 29 June 1855 (FO195/453; Beatson, WD, p. 107). 92 CoI 2; ILN, 4 August 1855; Illustrated Times, 15 September 1855; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 80. 93 CoI 2; Bruce to WFB, 6 July 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to SdeR, 7 July 1855 (FO78/1082, FO195/453, WO32/7511, WO32/7512); Ward to FWC, 18 July 1855 (FO195/488); ILN, 4 August 1855; Illustrated Times, 4 August 1855; DN, 24 August 1855; Beatson, WD, pp. 15–21.

Chapter 12. The Grand Bozook 1 2 3 4

5 6 7

SdeR to EoC, 25 July 1855 (FO352/42B/7). The Times, 3 August 1855; Scotsman; ILN; Illustrated Times, 4 August 1855. Maj-Gen Alexander Beatson, Tracts Relative to the Island of St Helena (London, 1816), pp. 220–1. CoI 2; Ward to FWC, 18 July 1855 (FO195/488); WFB to SdeR, 7 July (WO32/7511, WO32/7512, FO78/1082, FO195/453), 25 August 1855 (FO78/1088); DN, 24 August 1855; Maj-Gen W.F. Beatson, The War Department and the Bashi-Buzouks (London, 1856), pp. 17–20; Hugh Mulleneux Walmsley, Journal of a Bashi Bazouk (London, 1857), pp. 80–1. CoI 2; Bruce to WFB, 6 July (Beatson WD, p. 16); DN, 24 August 1855. WFB to SdeR, 7 July (WO32/7511, WO32/7512, FO78/1082, FO195/453); CoI 2; WFB to SdeR, 25 August 1855 (FO78/1088); DN, 24 August 1855; Beatson, WD, pp. 19–20. CoI 2; FWC to SdeR, 7 July 1855 (WO32/7512); ILN, 4 August 1855; DN, 24 August 1855; WFB to SdeR, 25 August 1855 (FO78/1088).

8 9 10

11 12 13

14 15

16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23 24

25 26 27 28 29 30

31

32

33

Notes to pages 231–7

383

Susan Heuck Allen, Finding the Walls of Troy: Frank Calvert and Heinrich Schliemann at Hisarlik (Berkeley, c.1999). CoI 2. CoI 2; WFB to SdeR, 7 July 1855 (FO78/1082, FO195/453, WO32/7511, WO32/7512); FWC to SdeR, 8 and 10 July 1855 (FO78/1082); Edward Money, Twelve Months with the Bashi-Bazouks (London 1857), p. 82; Beatson, WD, pp. 15–21. WFB to SdeR, 24 July (FO195/453) and 28 July 1855 (WO32/7512, FO78/1083, FO195/453, Beatson, WD, pp. 26–8); DN, 27 July 1855; MG, 25 July 1855; Observer, 29 July 1855. Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), p. 238; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 81. DN, 3 August 1855; The Times, 7 August and 22 September 1855; Illustrated Times, 18 August and 15 September 1855; Scotsman, 25 August 1855; Sir George Douglas and Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay (eds), The Panmure Papers (London, 1908), Vol. 1, p. 315. Scotsman, 8 August 1855; Illustrated Times, 11 August 1855; DN, 24 August 1855. WFB to SdeR, 7 July 1855 (WO32/7511, WO32/7512, FO 78/1082, FO195/453); FWe to WFB, 6 July 1855; WFB to SdeR, 9 July 1855 (FO195/453); FWC to SdeR, 9 and 10 July 1855 (FO78/1082); Money, p. 71. JHS to SdeR, 3 August 1855 (two letters, FO78/1084 and FO195/488). WFB to SdeR, 18 July 1855 (FO195/453); JSp to SdeR, 17 August 1855 (FO78/1085). FWC to SdeR No. 33, 11 July; Nos 35 and 36, 15 July 1855 (FO195/492); JHS to WFB 12 July 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to SdeR No. 93, 13 July 1855 (FO195/488); SdeR to FWC No. 11, 13 July 1855 (FO78/1082). WFB to SdeR, 15 July (two letters FO195/453) and 17 July 1855 (WO32/7512). WFB GOs, 15 July (FO195/453), 16 and 17 July 1855 (Beatson, WD, pp. 108–9). SdeR to EoC, 12 July 1855 (FO352/42B/7); WRM memo, 28 July 1855 (FO78/1083); SdeR to JHS, 8 July 1855 (FO195/453). JHS to SdeR, 10 and 21 July (FO195/488), 14 July 1855 (WO32/7510, FO78/1083). WFB to EoC, 12 July 1855; WFB to LdP, 12 July 1855 (FO78/1137); WFB to SdeR, 14 July 1855 (FO195/453); JHS to SdeR, 10 and 21 July 1855 (FO195/488). SdeR to EoC No. 532, 23 July 1855 (FO78/1083, WO32/7510); SdeR to WFB, 24 July 1855 (WO32/7510, WO32/7512, FO78/1083, FO352/42A/2, Beatson, WD, pp. 24–6); WFB to LdWP, 3 August 1855 (FO195/453); Steele to WRM, 31 July 1855 (FO78/1083); GCM to EH, 1 August 1855 (FO78/1150). LdP to Meade, 16 July 1855; LdP to WFB, 21 July 1855 (WO6/80). WFB Morning Order No. 162, 15 July 1855; WFB to SdeR, 20 July 1855 (FO195/453). JHS to SdeR, 19 and 27 July 1855; JGN to SdeR No. 19, 20 August 1855 (FO195/488); Money, pp. 20–4. Creagh et al. to WFB, 18 July 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 21); JHS to SdeR, 27 July 1855 (FO195/488); Money, p. 58. FP to WFB, 14 July 1855 (WO6/80); ODNB: ‘Walmsley’; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk; Money. GCM to WFB, 16 August 1855; FP to WFB, 10 September 1855 (WO6/80); BPB; Maj-Gen Sir Henry Green, A Short Memoir of the Services of Colonel Malcolm Green, CB, and of Major-General Sir Henry Green (Bexhill-on-Sea, c.1906), p. 6; Richard Stevenson, SOTQ No. 122 (2008), p. 8. Isabel Burton, pp. 235–40; Georgiana M. Stisted, The True Life of Capt Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1896), p. 165; Byron Farwell, Burton: A Biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton (London, 1963), pp. 127–9; Burton to JGN, 21 August 1855 (FO195/488, FO78/1085); Burton to WFB, 28 May 1856 (MA, 21 July 1856; A.D. Harvey, NQ 55 [2008], p. 476). FWC to SdeR No. 38, 20 July 1855 (FO195/492); JHS to SdeR, 20 July 1855; SdeR Memo, 19 July 1855 (FO195/488); SdeR to EoC No. 520, 16 July 1855 (FO78/1082); No. 532, 23 July 1855 (FO78/1083; WO32/7510); 23 and 25 July 1855 (FO352/42B). SdeR to WFB, 21 July 1855 (WO32/7511, WO32/7512, Beatson, WD, p. 23); SdeR to JHS, 24 July (WO32/7510, FO78/1083, FO352/41B/6); SdeR to FWC No. 11, 24 July 1855 (WO32/7510); WFB to SdeR, 24 July 1855 (FO78/1083, WO32/7512); JHS to SdeR, 25 July 1855 (FO195/488); FWC to SdeR, No. 40, 26 July 1855 (FO78/1083).

384

Notes to pages 237–43

34 JHS to WRM, 22 July, in WRM memo, 28 July 1855 (FO78/1083); JHS to SdeR, 25 July 1855 (FO195/488). 35 SdeR to EoC, 23 July 1855 (FO352/42B/7); JHS to SdeR, 19, 23 and 27 July 1855 (FO195/488); Battus to French Chargé d’Affaires, 24 July 1855 (FO195/453); FWC to SdeR No. 39, 25 July 1855 (FO78/1083); No. 41, 28 July 1855 (FO195/492); WFB to SdeR, 28 July 1855 (WO32/7512, FO78/1083, FO19/453, Beatson, WD, pp. 26–8). 36 WFB to SdeR, 24 July 1855 (FO78/1083, FO195/453, WO32/7512); JHS to SdeR, 23 July 1855 (FO195/488); JHS to WRM, 22 July, in WRM memo, 28 July 1855 (FO78/1083). 37 SdeR to WFB, 24 July 1855 (WO32/7510, WO32/7512, FO78/1083, FO352/42A/2, Beatson, WD, pp. 24–6); 24 July 1855 (WO32/7510, WO32/7512). 38 WFB to SdeR, 24 July 1855 (FO78/1083, FO195/453, WO32/7512). 39 JHS to SdeR, 28 July 1855 (FO78/1083). 40 WFB to SdeR, 28 July 1855 (WO32/7512, FO78/1083, FO19/453, Beatson, WD, pp. 26–8). 41 SdeR to WFB, 29 July 1855 (FO78/1083, WO32/7512, FO352/42A/2). 42 ODNB; SdeR to EoC, 23 July 1855 (FO352/42B/7). 43 WRM to SdeR 24 July 1855; SdeR to WRM, 24 July 1855 (FO352/42A/2); WRM to WFB, 26 July 1855 (WO32/7512). 44 ODNB; Isabel Burton, p. 239; J.C. Pollock, Way to Glory: The Life of Havelock of Lucknow (London, 1957), p. 201; Money, p. 107. 45 WRM to JGN, 26 July 1855 (FO78/1083); JGN to SdeR, 28 July 1855 (FO195/488). 46 WFB to SdeR, 30 July 1855 (FO78/1084, FO195/453, WO32/7512, The Times, 30 December 1856); WFB to SdeR, 31 July 1855 (FO195/453, WO32/7512, Beatson, WD, p. 29–30). 47 JHS to SdeR, 25 and 29 July 1855 (FO195/488); JGN to SdeR, 30 July 1855 (FO78/1084). 48 Court martial, 29 July 1855 (FO195/453); JGN to SdeR, 30 July 1855 (FO78/1084); WFB to SdeR, 30 July 1855 (FO78/1084, FO195/453, WO32/7512, extract, The Times, 30 December 1856); JHS to SdeR, 29 July 1855 (FO195/488). 49 Mixed Commission, 31 July (FO78/1084), 4 and 6 August 1855 (FO195/488); JGN to SdeR, 31 July 1855; JGN to WFB, 2 August 1855; JHS to SdeR No. 9, 8 August 1855 (FO78/1084). 50 Army Lists. 51 JGN to WFB, 1 and 2 August 1855; WFB to SdeR, 3 August 1855 (FO78/1084); Maj R.W. Lowry, A/DAG, to JGN, 2 August 1855 (FO195/453); JHS to SdeR, No. 3, 3 August 1855 (FO195/488); WFB to LdWP, 3 August 1855; WFB to SdeR, 4 August 1855 (FO195/453). 52 JGN to SdeR, 28 and 31 July 1855 (FO78/1084). 53 JGN to WFB, 1 August; reply, 1 August 1855; JGN to SdeR, 1 August 1855 (FO78/1084); WFB GO No. 262, 2 August 1855 (FO195/453); ‘ES’ to The Times, 26 December 1856; Beatson, WD, p. 106; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, pp. 71 and 83–5. 54 WFB to JGN, 1 August 1855; JGN to WFB, 2 August 1855; JGN to SdeR, 2 August 1855; WFB to JGN, 2 August 1855 (two letters); WFB to SdeR, 3 August 1855 (FO78/1084); WFB GO, 4 August 1855 (FO195/453). 55 WRM to WFB No. 74, 8 August 1855 (FO78/1084); WFB to SdeR, 4 August 1855 (FO78/1084, FO195/488, WO32/7512, Beatson, WD, p. 42); Isabel Burton, p. 239. 56 SdeR to EoC No. 557, 30 July 1855; No. 577, 4 August 1855 (FO78/1083); SdeR to EoC, 2 August 1855 (FO352/42B/7). 57 WRM to WFB No. 61, 5 August, and No. 68, 7 August 1855; SdeR to EoC No. 578, 7 August 1855 (FO78/1084); WFB to LdP, 5 August 1855 (WO32/7512, Beatson, WD, pp. 48–9); The Times, 12 September 1855; MG, 13 September; Scotsman, 15 September 1855. 58 CoI 2; WFB to SdeR, 6 August 1855; JGN, FWC and JHS to Djemel Pasha, 6 August 1855 (FO195/453); JHS to SdeR, 6 August 1855; WFB to JGN, 7 August 1855; JGN to SdeR, 8 August, enc. JGN to Lowry, 8 August 1855 (FO78/1084). 59 WRM to WFB No. 61, 5 August and No. 78, 11 August 1855; WRM to JGN No. 66, 6 August and No. 79, 11 August 1855 (FO78/1084); The Times, 22 September 1855. 60 CoI 2; SdeR to EoC No. 553, 30 July 1855 (FO78/1082); Pasha and council of Salonika, 7 August 1855; Blunt to SdeR No. 58, 8 August 1855 (FO195/476); Hughes to SdeR No. 16, 18 August 1855 (FO195/495).



Notes to pages 243–8

385

61 CoI 2; JGN to SdeR No. 19, 20 August 1855 (FO195/488). 62 JHS to SdeR No. 12, 11 August 1855 (FO195/488); JGN to SdeR No. 12, 13 August 1855 (FO78/1085); WFB to JGN, 13 August 1855; JGN to SdeR No. 13, 14 August 1855; JGN to WFB, 14 August 1855 (FO78/1085); SdeR to JSp, 13 August 1855; SdeR to EoC No. 610, 15 August 1855 (FO78/1084); SdeR to EoC, 16 August 1855 (FO352/42B/7). 63 WFB to SdeR, 14 August 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 113, The Times, 30 December 1856, IN, 1 January 1857); WFB to WRM, 14 August 1855 (FO195/453, FO78/1085); WFB to JGN, 14 and 16 August 1855; JGN to WFB Nos 16 and 17, 15 August 1855; No. 18, 16 August; No. 19, 17 August 1855; JGN to SdeR No. 17, 18 August; No. 18, 20 August 1855 (FO78/1085, FO195/488). 64 Burton to JGN, 21 August 1855 (FO78/1085). 65 JHS to SdeR, No. 12, 11 August 1855 (FO195/488). 66 ODNB: ‘Burton’; Isabel Burton, p. 239. 67 JHS to SdeR, 17 August 1855; JGN to SdeR No. 16, 17 August 1855 (FO78/1085). 68 Mixed Commission, 15 August 1855; JGN to SdeR, 5 August and No. 14, 14 August 1855 (FO195/488); No. 16, 17 August; No. 12, 13 August 1855; SdeR to EoC No. 602, 16 August 1855; WFB to SdeR, 18 August 1855 (FO78/1085); WFB to LdP, 26 August 1855 (Beatson, WD, pp. 39–40). 69 WFB to SdeR, 25 August 1855 (FO78/1088). 70 WFB to SdeR, 8 August 1855 (FO78/1084); COs to Brett, 14 August 1855; Brett to WFB, 14 August 1855; WFB to WRM, 14 August 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to Gentlemen at the Dardanelles, Civil and Military, 11 August 1855, with replies (FO78/1085, FO195/488); WFB to SdeR, 18 August 1855 (FO78/1085). 71 JGN to SdeR, No. 20, 22 August 1855 (FO78/1085, FO195/488); JHS to SdeR, 30 July 1855 (FO78/1084). 72 ODNB.

Chapter 13. Descent into Farce 1

2 3 4 5

6 7 8

JHS and FWC to SdeR, 27 September 1855 – hereafter ‘JHS and FWC report’ (WO32/7295, FO78/1088, FO195/488, Maj-Gen R.J.H. Vivian, Narrative of Circumstances which led to Major-General Beatson being Removed from the Command of the Turkish Irregular Cavalty, and the Transfer of that Force to the Turkish Contingent [London, 1856; reprinted in full in Morning Advertiser, 30 January 1857], Appendix 4B). Sir George Douglas and Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay (eds), The Panmure Papers (London, 1908), Vol. I, p. 325. Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, pp. 345–6 and 351; EoC to SdeR No. 657, 13 August 1855 (FO78/1065). JSp to LdP, 16 August 1855; JSp to SdeR, 17 August 1855; SdeR to EoC No. 621, 20 August (FO78/1085); Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, p. 358. JHS to SdeR, 20 July 1855 (FO195/488); JSp to SdeR, 21 July 1855; SdeR to EoC No. 533, 23 July 1855 (WO32/7510, FO78/1083); SdeR to EoC No. 578, 7 August 1855; Gen J.E. Larchey to Gen Pélissier, 7 August 1855; JHS to SdeR No. 9, 8 August 1855 (FO78/1084); Battus to Chargé d’Affaires, 22 and 26 July 1855; Maj Neville and Capt Garcia to SdeR (after 22 September 1855) (FO195/453) – hereafter ‘Neville and Garcia’; Brogniart to FWC, 26 August 1855; WFB to SdeR, 30 August 1855 (FO195/488); Hugh Mulleneux Walmsley, Journal of a Bashi Bazouk (London, 1857), p. 82; Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), p. 240. Neville and Garcia; Brett to AAG Beatson’s Horse, 22 August 1855; WFB to SdeR, 23 August 1855 (FO78/1085); Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, p. 83. Edward Money, Twelve Months with the Bashi-Bazouks (London, 1857), pp. 87–100; Neville and Garcia; CoI 2; Burton to FWC, 28 August 1855 (FO195/488). M. Fisean to Battus, 27 and 28 August 1855; Battus to Djemel Pasha, 27 and 28 August 1855; Battus to FWC, 28 August 1855; Djemel Pasha to Battus, 30 August 1855; Djemel Pasha to WFB,

386

Notes to pages 248–52

30 August 1855 (FO195/488); WRM to WFB, 3 September 1855 (Maj-Gen W.F. Beatson, The War Department and the Bashi-Buzouks [London, 1856], p. 117). 9 JGN to WFB, 21 August 1855 (FO78/1085); JGN to SdeR No. 20, 22 August 1855 (FO78/1085, FO195/488); JHS to SdeR No. 15, 26 August; No. 18, 28 August; No. 20, 30 August 1855; WFB to SdeR, 30 August and 3 September 1855 (FO195/488); The Times, 26 September 1855; Illustrated Times, 1 December 1855. 10 JGN to SdeR No. 21, 23 August; No. 22, 24 August; No. 23, 24 August 1855 (FO78/1085); WFB to LdP, 26 August 1855 (Beatson WD pp. 39–40). 11 WFB to SdeR, 5 August 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to SdeR, 12 August 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 43); Isabel Burton, p. 238; Susan Heuck Allen, Finding the Walls of Troy: Frank Calvert and Heinrich Schliemann at Hisarlik (Berkeley, c.1999), pp. 88–94. 12 Blakely to JHS, 30 August 1855 (FO195/488). 13 WFB to LdP, 10 August 1855 (Beatson, WD, pp. 49–51). 14 FP to EH Nos 025/491 and 025/493, 15 September 1855 (FO78/1151); JC to WFB, 3 September 1855 (WO6/80); LdP to WFB, 25 August 1855 (WO6/80; Beatson, WD, pp. 51–2; Vivian, pp. 3–4; MA, 30 January 1857); EH to GCM, 30 August 1855 (WO32/7511); EoC to SdeR No. 678, 30 August 1855 (FO78/1066). 15 Douglas and Ramsay, pp. 372–3; LdP to JSp, 8 September 1855 (WO6/71). 16 WO31/1094; Hart’s Army List. 17 JC to Watt, 31 August 1855; F. Eppel to Watt, 11 September 1855 (WO6/80); LG, 9 October 1855; Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 18 WFB to Mily Sec., India House, 20 September 1855; Burton to same, 21 September 1855; Sir James Melville to WFB, 5 October 1855 (L/P&S/3/43). 19 FP to WFB, 10 September 1855 (WO6/80); WFB to LdP, 23 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 85). 20 WFB to RJHV, 21 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 84). 21 SdeR to FWC No. 12, 13 July 1855 (FO78/1082, FO352/41B/6); LdWP to WRM, 14 July 1855 (FO78/1082); FWC to WFB, 15 July 1855; WFB to SdeR, 15 July 1855 (FO195/453); FWC to SdeR No. 38, 20 July 1855 (FO195/492); LdP to WFB, 4 August 1855; GCM to Crofton, 14 August 1855 (WO6/80). 22 GCM to Crofton, 14 August 1855; GCM to WFB, 18 August 1855 (WO6/80); WFB to Capt Young, 4 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 83); WFB to SdeR, 5 September (FO195/488), 6 September 1855 (FO195/453); SdeR to EoC, 6 September 1855 (FO352/42B/7); The Times, 26 September 1855. 23 WFB to LdP, 12 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, pp. 59–61); Kiraly to SdeR, 3 September 1855 (FO195/488); EStJN to SdeR, 8 September 1855 (FO195/496); Barker to Moore, 27 August 1855 (FO78/1118); Moore to EoC No. 52, 3 September; No. 55, 17 September 1855 (FO78/1116); JC to FO, 15 September 1855 (FO78/1151); FP to WFB, 15 September 1855 (FO78/1151 and (as 16 September) WO6/80). 24 Maj-Gen Sir Henry Green, A Short Memoir of the Services of Colonel Malcolm Green, CB, and of Major-General Sir Henry Green (Bexhill-on-Sea, c.1906), p. 5; L/MIL/10/117 fo 19; WFB to LdP, 12 September (Beatson, WD, p. 59); FP to WFB, 1 August 1855 (WO6/80); WOp to SdeR, 2 October 1855 (FO352/42A/2); H.M. Vibart, Addiscombe: Its Heroes and Men of Note (London, 1894), pp. 499–500. 25 WFB to WRM, 14 August 1855 (FO195/453); WFB to LdP, 12 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 59); Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, pp. 311, 337–8. 26 WFB to LdP, 9 September 1855 (FO195/453, Beatson, WD, pp. 57–8). 27 WFB to RJHV, 9 September 1855 (FO195/453); RJHV to WFB, 13 September 1855; RJHV to LdP No. 155, 29 September 1855 (WO32/7295). 28 WFB to LdP, 9 September (FO195/453, Beatson, WD, pp. 57–8), 12 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, pp. 59–61). 29 1st Regt to WFB, 14 September (Beatson, WD, Appendix 10); 5th Regt to WFB, 14 September 1855 (French translation in WO32/7515; English translation in Beatson, WD, Appendix 11 and MA, 21 July 1856). 30 JSp to RJHV, 25 September 1855 (FO78/1089).



Notes to pages 252–9

387

31

Isabel Burton, p. 241; corresp. between Burton and Stanley Lane-Poole (Athenaeum, 25 August, 1 September, 8 September 1888; Richard F. Burton, Supplemental Nights to the Thousand and One Nights, Vol. 6 [London, 1888], fn 450). 32 Henry Rose to WFB, 12 September 1855; FWC to WFB (two letters), 12 September 1855; Burton to FWC, 12 September 1855; FWC to SdeR, 12 and 28 September 1855; Burton to FWC, 13 September 1855; JHS to Burton, 14 September 1855 (FO195/492); SdeR to FWC, 22 September 1855 (FO352/41B/6, FO196/49). 33 W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished Anglo-Indians (London, 1875), p. 20. 34 SdeR to EoC, 6 and 12 September 1855 (FO352/42B/7); SdeR to EoC No. 671, 8 September, No. 695, 15 September 1855 (FO78/1086). 35 RJHV to LdP, 29 September 1855 (WO32/7295). 36 FP to EH, 22 September 1855 (FO78/1151). 37 Beatson, WD, pp. 86–90; Money, p. 107; JHS and FWC report; WFB Morning Order, 26 September 1855; WFB to SdeR, 27 September 1855 (FO78/1088, FO195/453; Beatson, WD, pp. 86–8). 38 Money, pp. 107–10; WFB to SdeR, 27 September 1855 (FO78/1088, FO195/453, Beatson, WD, pp. 86–8). 39 Rod Robinson, The War Correspondent 20 (2002), p. 44; The Times, 20 October 1855. 40 JHS and FWC report; Money, p. 110. 41 Presse d’Orient quoted in MG, 12 October 1855. 42 WFB to SdeR, 27 September 1855 (FO78/1088, FO195/453, Beatson, WD, pp. 86–8). 43 Beatson, WD, pp. 89–90. 44 The Times, 9 October 1855. 45 SdeR to EoC No. 749, 27 September 1855 (FO78/1088); RJHV to SdeR, 27 September 1855 (WO32/7295); JM to WFB, 27 September 1855; TC GO, 27 September 1855 (WO32/7515, Beatson, WD, p. 90); JM to WFB, 27 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, p. 90). 46 FWC to SdeR No. 56, 30 September 1855 (FO195/492); IN, 4 October 1856. 47 MWS to WFB, 30 September; reply, 30 September 1855 (WO32/7512. WO32/7515, WO32/7295; Vivian, Appendixes 3C and 3D; MA, 21 July 1856); MWS to RJHV, 4 October 1855; MWS to JM, 6 October 1855 (WO32/7295); Beatson, WD, pp. 90–2. 48 MA, 14 January 1860; O’Reilly to MWS, 28 March 1856 (WO32/7515, Vivian, MA, 21 July 1856). 49 O’Reilly and Shelley to MWS, 28 March 1856 (WO32/7515, Vivian, MA, 21 July 1856); Morgan and Sankey in MWS to LdP, 14 June 1856 (WO32/7515, Vivian); ‘Present State of the Osmanli Horse Artillery in Camp at the Dardanelles 1st October 1855’ (WO32/7295). 50 The Times, 12 October 1855; Beatson, WD, p. 102; Isabel Burton, p. 248. 51 SdeR to EoC No. 387, 29 May 1855 (FO78/1079). 52 WFB to LdP, 1 October 1855 (WO32/7512, Beatson, WD, pp. 92–3). 53 Beatson, WD, pp. 93, 102; Isabel Burton, p. 248; SdeR to EoC No. 766, 1 October 1855 (FO78/1088). 54 Beatson, WD, p. 102; Isabel Burton, p. 248. 55 The Times, 2nd edn, 11 October 1855. 56 MWS to JM, 3 and 6 October 1855; MWS to RJHV, 4 October 1855; JHS to SdeR No. 26, 3 October 1855 (WO32/7295). 57 LdP to RJHV (two letters), 29 September 1855; LdP to WFB, 29 September 1855 (WO6/80); LdP to JSp, 29 September (WO6/71); Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, p. 408. 58 Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, pp. 434 and 447; LdP to RJHV, 29 September 1855 (WO6/80 fo 265–9). 59 Beatson, WD, p. 103; Isabel Burton, p. 246; WFB to LdP, 4 June 1855 (MA, 21 July 1856); Turkish Minister to WFB, 22 November 1855 (Beatson, WD, Appendix 16).

Chapter 14. The Man in the Golden Coat 1 2

LdP minute, 10 May 1856 (WO32/7515). Sir George Douglas and Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay (eds), The Panmure Papers (London, 1908), Vol. I, p. 452.

388 3

Notes to pages 259–63

Maj-Gen W.F. Beatson, The War Department and the Bashi-Buzouks (London, 1856), p. 103; Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), pp. 243–4. 4 RJHV to LdP No. 162, 9 October 1855 (WO32/7295); LdP to RJHV, 27 October 1855 (FO78/1152); LdP to RJHV, 30 November (sic - probably drafted 30 October and sent 1 November) 1855 (WO32/7295). 5 Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, p. 468. 6 MWS to JM, 3 October 1855 (WO32/7295); ‘Present State Late Beatson’s Horse [in] Camp at the Dardanelles’ and ‘Present State of the Osmanli Horse Artillery in Camp at the Dardanelles, 1 October 1855’ (WO32/7205); Beatson, WD, pp. 94–5; The Times, 29 November 1855. 7 Hugh Mulleneux Walmsley, Journal of a Bashi Bazouk (London, 1857), p. 119; USG, 18 October 1855; GCM minute, 28 February 1856 (WO32/7513); WRM to SdeR, 4 January 1856 (FO78/1170); James Henry Skene, With Lord Stratford in the Crimean War (London, 1883), p. 57. 8 Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, p. 433; SdeR to EoC, 8 October 1855 (FO352/42B/7); SdeR to EoC, No. 808, 9 October 1855; WRM to SdeR, 10 October 1855 (FO78/1089); SdeR to EoC No. 882, 30 October 1855 (FO78/1090); FWC to SdeR No. 60, 1 November 1855 (FO195/492); No. 61, 15 November 1855 (FO78/1092); FWC to EoC No. 90, 16 November 1855 (FO78/1105); Illustrated Times, 1 December 1855. 9 RJHV to Shirley, 14 January 1856; RJHV to Shirley, 14 January 1856 (WO32/7513, Maj-Gen R.J.H. Vivian, Narrative of Circumstances which led to Major-General Beatson being Removed from the Command of the Turkish Irregular Cavalty, and the Transfer of that Force to the Turkish Contingent [London, 1856; reprinted in full in Morning Advertiser, 30 January 1857], Appendix 5A and 5b); RJHV to LdP No. 254, 14 January 1856; Shirley to LdP, 26 January 1856 (WO32/7513). Copies of Shirley’s report of 4 February 1856 on the OIC – without the allegation about Beatson – are in WO32/7513 and the Codrington papers (NAM 6907-380-35). 10 RJHV to Watt, 5 March 1856 (WO32/7515, MA, 21 July, H(C), 22 July, The Times, 23 July, MG, 23 July 1856); Vivian, pp. 21–4. 11 Addresses from their correspondence. 12 Burton to The Times, 6 December 1855. 13 Isabel Burton, p. 244; Humphry Sandwith, A Narrative of the Siege of Kars (London, 1856); Ian Hernon, Blood in the Sand: More Forgotten Wars of the 19th Century (Stroud, 2001); J.B. Conacher, JSAHR 68 (1990), p. 169; DN, 6 March 1856. 14 Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. II, pp. 21–2; Beatson, WD, p. 100; Coates p. 46; Isabel Burton pp. 243–4; Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk p. 137; Observer 27 January 1856. 15 Olive Anderson, Victorian Studies (March 1965), p. 222; Isabel Burton, Vol. II, p. 10; Observer, 27 January 1856; Tim Coates (ed.), The Siege of Kars 1855 (London, 2000; reprint of Papers Relative to Military Affairs in Asiatic Turkey, and the Defence and Capitulation of Kars (London, 1856 [the ‘Kars Blue Book’])); MG, 7 March 1856; H(C), 28–29 April, 1 May 1856. 16 Alastair Massie (ed.), A Most Desperate Undertaking: The British Army in the Crimea, 1854–56 (London, 2003), p. 57. 17 WFB to EoC, 5 February 1856; EoC to SdeR No. 166, 11 February 1856 (FO195/499); SdeR to EoC, 12 March 1856 (FO78/1175); GCM to WFB, 15 May 1856; LdP to WFB, Creagh, Lane Fox and Sandwith, 21 May 1856 (WO6/80); MD No. 90, 11 June 1856 (E/4/836; L/MIL/3/2088); Laurie, Anglo-Indians, p. 23; Anderson; Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 18 Massie, pp. 57 and 103. 19 FP to Creagh, 15 October 1855; FP to JSp, 15 October 1855; FP to Creagh, 16 November 1855; FP to Loch, 14 January 1856 (WO6/80); Hart’s Army List later shows Creagh as holding the medal; AAG to WFB, 14 February 1856 (WO3/118); WFB to DAG, Bengal Army, 9 October 1857 (P/47/37). 20 LG, 5 December 1856; WFB to EoC, 6 December 1856; EH to WD, 18 December 1856; JC to EH, 24 December 1856 (FO78/1241); FO to WFB, 2 January 1857 (FO78/1324); WFB to EoC, 26 January 1857 (FO78/1324). 21 Sir James Melvill, Sec. to Court of Directors, to W. Leach. East India House, 17 October 1856; Leach to WFB (draft), 23 October 1856 (L/P&S/3/44, pp. 377A and 399); Anderson. 22 James J. Reid, Crisis of the Ottoman Empire: Prelude to Collapse 1839–1878 (Stuttgart, 2000).



Notes to pages 263–9

389

23 Beatson, WD, p. 98. 24 E.H. Nolan, History of the Russian War (London, 1857); Helmut and Alison Gernsheim, The History of Photography, 2nd edn (London, 1969); Basil Hunnisett, A Dictionary of British Steel Engravers (Leigh-on-Sea, 1980). 25 Illustrated Times, 8 March 1856. 26 The Times, 31 March 1856; Punch (12 April 1856). 27 EoC to SdeR No. 321, 25 March; No. 340, 3 April; No. 364, 7 April 1856 (FO78/1161); Bruce to MWS, 24 March 1856; British Consulate, Damascus, 30 March 1856; FP to Bruce, 22 April 1856 (FO195/453). 28 LdP to MWS, 26 May 1856 (WO33/2A, FO195/44); EoC to SdeR, Nos 575 and 577, 27 May, No. 584, 30 May 1856 (FO78/1163); MWS to WRM, 10 June 1856; MWS GO, 12 June 1856 (FO195/488). Certificates of good behaviour submitted by COs June–August 1856 in FO195/488; see also Stratford’s TS memoirs (FO352/37A/2); Walmsley, Bashi Bazouk, pp. 125–7; Money, pp. 212–15; ‘Spur’ to USG, 23 October 1856; ‘Soldat’ to USG, 21 March 1857. 29 Lt-Col M.E.S. Laws, Army Quarterly 71 (1955), p. 80. 30 A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. VII, pp. 322–31; Edward M. Spiers, The Army and Society 1815–1914 (London, 1980), pp. 113–14; Cecil WoodhamSmith, Florence Nightingale (London, 1950), pp. 204, 244; Douglas and Ramsay, Vol. I, pp. 71–2; Vol. II, pp. 105–6, 107–110. 31 Scarlett to WFB, 17 February 1855 (PRO30/12/18); H(L) 19 March 1855; H(C) 29 March 1855; The Times, 9 and 20 March 1855; Punch I (1855), p. 101; Cecil Woodham-Smith, The Reason Why (London, 1953), p. 276. 32 Punch (19 April, 3 and 31 May 1856). 33 Villiers to WFB and five others, 10 April 1856 (WO81/101); The Times, 14 April 1856; Illustrated Times, 26 April 1856. 34 Parliamentary Papers 21 (1856), pp. 73–7; JYS to WFB, 17 February 1855 (PRO30/12/18). 35 The Times, 14 April 1856; MG, 14 April 1856; USG, 19 April 1856; Illustrated Times, 26 April 1856; Parliamentary Papers 21 (1856). 36 Woodham-Smith, Nightingale, pp. 244, 278. USG printed weekly reports on the Chelsea Board, 5 April–24 May and 26 July 1856; corresp. on Lucan’s arguments with Panmure, McNeill and Tulloch, and the drafting of the reports, in WO32/7581 and WO32/7582. 37 RJHV to Watt, 5 March 1856; this appears, with minor variations, many times (WO32/7515, MA, 21 July, H(C), 22 July, The Times, 23 July, MG, 23 July 1856, Vivian, pp. 21–4); this is the final form as read out in court (The Times, 14 January 1860). 38 Anon and FP minutes, 3 April 1856 (WO32/7515); Watt to WFB, 29 August 1856 (IN, 15 September 1856). 39 O’Reilly to MWS, 28 March 1856 (WO32/7515, MA, 21 July, H(C), 22 July, The Times, 23 July, MG, 23 July 1856, Vivian); The Times, 14 January 1860. 40 WFB to MA, 30 January 1857; IN, 15 February 1857; Isabel Burton, pp. 236–7; Maj-Gen Sir Henry Green, A Short Memoir of the Services of Colonel Malcolm Green, CB, and of MajorGeneral Sir Henry Green (Bexhill-on-Sea, c.1906), p. 6; The Times, 4 March 1854. 41 Shelley to MWS, 28 March 1856; MWS to LdP, 5 April 1856 (WO32/7515, MA, 21 July, H(C), 22 July, The Times, 23 July, MG, 23 July 1856, Vivian); 5th Regt to WFB, 14 September 1855 (Beatson, WD, Appendix 10; MA, 21 July 1856); MA, 16 January 1860. 42 JC minute 26 April 1856; GCM undated minute; LdP minute, 10 May 1856 (WO32/7515). 43 Vivian, p. 24; H(C), 22 July 1856; MA, 14 January 1860. 44 ‘A Brevet Major’, Charges and penalties with reference to the Mutiny Act and Articles of War, 12th & 13th Vict Cap 43, Existing Regulations, and instructions from the Horse Guards (Bombay, 1852). 45 E.B. Ramsay to WFB, 26 April 1856; FP to FB, 28 May 1856; H(C), 22 July 1856; LdP to WFB, 17 May 1856; WFB to LdP, 18 and 20 May 1856; FP to WFB, 26 May 1856 (WO32/7515, MA, 21 July, H(C), 22 July, The Times, 23 July 1856). 46 Burton to WFB, 28 May 1856, Berkeley to WFB, 19 June 1856 (MA, 21 July 1856); A.D. Harvey, NQ 55 (2008), p. 476.

390 47

Notes to pages 269–76

IN, 30 June 1856; Byron Farwell, Burton: A Biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton (London, 1963), pp. 132–9; Isabel Burton, Vol. 1, pp. 249–57. 48 Charles Malouf Samaha, NQ 57 (2010), p. 226. 49 WFB to LdP, 4 June 1856; WFB to LdP, 14 June 1856; Gaskoin to WFB, 14 June 1856; GCM to WFB, 28 June 1856 (MA, 21 July, H(C), 22 July, The Times, 23 July 1856); MWS to LdP, 14 June 1856 (WO32/7515). 50 IN, 30 June 1856; WFB to The Times, 2 July 1856; WFB to LdP, 8 July 1856 (MA, 21 July 1856). 51 MWS to LdP, 14 June 1856, enc. Morgan, Shelley and Sankey replies to his questions dated 26 May (WO32/7515; Vivian); Shirley to Under-Sec., 2 July 1856 (Vivian, Appendix 6). 52 D. Robinson minute, 1 July; FP minute 2 July; Ld P minute 3 July 1856 (WO32/7515). 53 Observer, 14 July 1856. 54 The Times, 4 July; MG, 4 July; IN, 30 July 1856. 55 The Times, 16 July; MA, 16 July; IN, 17 July; Morning Herald, 19 July; Observer, 20 July 1856. 56 Morning Herald, 19 July 1856; RJHV to LdP, 21 July 1856 (Vivian, p. 44). 57 LdE to Roebuck, 17 July 1856; MA, 21 July 1856. 58 H(C), 22 July; The Times, 23 July; Morning Herald, 23 July; H(C), 29 July 1856. 59 IN, 30 July 1856. 60 WFB to Guernsey, 30 July 1856 (BL Add MSS 43382 fo 108); IN, 4 October 1856; FP to CY, 17 April 1855 (WO31/1079); Old Bailey Proceedings, 15 December 1858. 61 Spankie to MA, 4 and 6 September 1856; ‘G.R.L.’ to MA, 5 and 9 September 1856; IN, 15 September 1856. 62 Vivian; MA, 30 January 1857. 63 IN, 15 and 30 August; USG, 23 August; MA, 4 September 1856. 64 A.D. Harvey, NQ 55 (2008), p. 476. 65 WFB to FP, 5 August 1856 (The Times, 15 August, USG, 16 August 1856). 66 DJAG to HH, 10 March 1855 (WO93/15); also EoL letters in same file, and Parliamentary debates (H(L), 6 and 19 March 1855; H(C), 29 March, The Times, 20 and 30 March 1855). 67 USG, 7 March 1857. 68 IN, 15 November 1856; USG, 8 November 1856; 7 March 1857. 69 The Times, 12 November 1856; IN, 14 and 30 October 1856; FWC to EoC No. 96, 24 October 1856 (FO78/1208); WFB to MA, 31 January 1857; IN, 16 February 1857; EoC to SdeR No. 76, 24 January 1857 (FO195/537). 70 Farwell, pp. 138–72; Alan Moorehead, The White Nile (London, 1960), pp. 23–54; G. Graham WD, to India Bd, 20 October 1856; Burton to Mily Sec., India House, 14 November 1856; Melvill to Sir George Clark, India Bd, 22 December 1856 (L/P&S/3/44); IN, 30 October 1856 and 1 January 1857. 71 Edward Money, Twelve Months with the Bashi-Bazouks (London, 1857), p. 112; MG, 10 and 28 November; IN 30 October; 15 November and 1 December 1856. 72 GCM to Clark, 15 November 1856; Melvill to Clark, 27 November 1856 (L/&/3/44); Observer, 24 November; MG, 28 November; IN, 1 December 1856. 73 MG 11 and 28 November 1856; WFB to CY, 8 December 1856; CY to WFB, 9 December 1856 (PRO30/12/15/5). 74 WFB to MA, 30 December 1856; The Times, 30 December 1856; Money to MA, 31 December 1856; The Times, 31 December 1856; WFB to The Times, 1 January 1857; IN, 1 January 1857. 75 MA, 30 January 1857; WFB to MA, 31 January 1857; IN, 16 February 1857. 76 WFB to MA, 6 February 1857; IN, 16 February 1857. 77 Watt to WFB, 29 August 1856; WFB to Morning News, 2 September 1856; IN, 15 September 1856. 78 Giraud to MA, 6 February 1857; IN, 16 February 1857. 79 USG, 17 January 1857; MA, 22 and 30 January 1857. 80 WFB to Sec. RGS, 8 February 1857 (RGS/CB4/127). 81 Court of Directors to GG, 4 March 1857 (E/4/842, L/MIL/3/2089); DAG to RJHB, 23 March 1857 (P/47/13).



Notes to pages 277–82

391

82

Melvill to Clark, 23 February 1857 (L/P&S/3/44); H(C), 24 February 1857; The Times, 28 February 1857; USG, 7 March 1857; Beatson to The Times, 21 April 1857; IN, 28 April 1857; WO32/7526. 83 Villiers to Shirley, 15 June 1857 (WO81/103). 84 Army Lists; The Times, MA, 14 January 1860. 85 The Times, 20 April 1857; USG, 20 April 1857. 86 TNA catalogue: WO71. 87 The Times, 11 August 1857. 88 Gray, 29 June 1858, in WFB to RJHB, 7 May 1859 (P/48/67). 89 Gray, 16 May 1857 in WFB to EoC, 22 May 1857 (WO32/7517); WFB to CY, 7 April 1857; Graham to Storks, 8 April 1857; LdP minute, 14 April 1857 (WO32/7518). 90 CY to Shirley, 30 March 1857; Shirley to The Times, 20 April 1857; USG, 20 April 1857; IN, 28 April 1857. 91 WFB to The Times, 21 April 1857; IN, 28 April 1857. 92 WO32/7516 consists of corresp. on Beatson’s letter to The Times. 93 Gray, 16 May 1857 in WFB to EoC, 22 May 1857; D. Robinson minute, 2 June 1857; J.D. Harding, Advocate General, to EoC, 17 June 1857; EH to BH, 19 June 1857 (WO32/7517). WO32/7517 and WO7518 are corresp. on Beatson versus Skene. 94 WFB to EoC, 26 June 1857 (WO32/7518). 95 USG, 6 December 1856; Woodham-Smith, Reason Why, pp. 276–7; Lt-Col Somerset Calthorpe, Cadogan’s Crimea (London, 1979; reprint of Letters from Headquarters by a Staff Officer (London, 1856)). 96 WFB to EoC, 26 June 1857; EH to BH, 17 July 1857; Robinson minute, 21 July 1857; H.R. Drewry, Chief Clerk, minute to Storks, 22 July 1857; Storks minute to LdP, 23 July 1857; LdP to EoC, 30 July 1857 (WO32/7518). WO32/7518 is corresp. on WD liability to produce documents for Beatson versus Skene. 97 EH to BH, 7 September 1857; BH to EH, 14 September 1857 (WO32/7518); JHS to EoC, 28 October 1857, and minutes thereon (WO32/7517). 98 WO32/7516.

Chapter 15. Return to India 1 2 3

4 5

6

7 8

Michael Edwardes, Red Year: The Indian Rebellion of 1857 (London, 1973), p. 25. G.W. Forrest, The Indian Mutiny: Selections from State Papers Preserved in the Military Department 1857–58 (Calcutta, 1893), Vol. 1, pp. 163–4. IN, 14 April 1857; Saul David, The Indian Mutiny 1857 (London, 2002), pp. 69–72, 389; Edwardes, pp. 25–6; Lt-Col G.H.D. Gimlette, A Postscript to the Records of the Indian Mutiny: An Attempt to Trace the Subsequent Careers and Fate of the Rebel Bengal Regiments 1857–1858 (London, 1927); Christopher Hibbert, The Great Mutiny: India 1857 (London, 1978), pp. 68–72; Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974), pp. 271–2; William Howard Russell, My Indian Mutiny Diary (London, 1860), p. 67; FM Sir Evelyn Wood, The Revolt in Hindustan 1857–59 (London, 1906), p. 9; VC minute, 9 April 1857 (P/47/15). RJHB to Maj-Gen J. Hearsey and to Maj W.A.A. Thompson, 3 April 1857 (P/47/11); VC minute, 10 April 1857 (P/47/12). AG to RJHB, 7 February 1857; Wheler to AAG, 4 April (P/47/12) and 15 April 1857; James Dorin, vice-president, minute, 9 May 1857 (P/47/15); Canning’s minutes on Wheler are collected in F/4/2713, No. 195403. The Times, 8, 9, 10 June 1857; Charles Ball, The History of the Indian Mutiny (London, 1858–9), Vol. 1, p. 605; George Dodd, The History of the Indian Revolt and the Expeditions to Persia, China and Japan, 1856–7–8 (London, 1858), p. 218; W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished Anglo-Indians (London, 1875). The Times, 27, 29, 30 June 1857; IN, 29 June 1857. IN, 4 and 14 July 1857; The Times, 6 July 1857; J.H. Stocqueler, The Overland Companion, being a Guide for the Traveller to India via Egypt (London, 1850).

392 9

Notes to pages 283–8

Lt-Gen Shadwell, The Life of Colin Campbell, Lord Clyde (Edinburgh, 1881); The Times, 14 and 25 (2nd edn) July 1857. 10 Richardson Papers, p. 92 (NAM 8207-94-1); TEMC, 14 August 1857. 11 BH, 13 and 15 August 1857; TEMC, 14 August 1857; Shadwell; GO No. 1049, 18 August 1857; FDA to DAG, 18 August 1857 (P/47/25). 12 Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 13 David, pp. 101–3; Hibbert, Mutiny, pp. 92–3. 14 [T.F. Wilson], The Defence of Lucknow (London, 1858; reprinted as The Defence of Lucknow: T.F. Wilson’s Memoir of the Indian Mutiny, 1857 (London, 2007)), pp. 45, 48. 15 David, p. 180; Wilson, pp. 48, 51, 167. 16 Brig Sir John Smyth, The Rebellious Rani (London, 1966); Edwardes, pp. 113–16. 17 William Forbes Skene, Memorials of the Family of Skene of Skene (Aberdeen, 1887), p. 74. 18 Lt-Col D.G. Crawford, Roll of the Indian Medical Service 1615–1930 (London, 1930). 19 Kirk Letters (MSS Eur B268); Sir John Kaye and Col G.B. Malleson, History of the Indian Mutiny of 1857–8, 2nd edn (London, 1889–93), Vol. III, pp. 113–16. 20 Gimlette; Chris Kempton, A Register of Titles of the Units of the HEIC and Indian Armies 1666– 1947 (Bristol, 1997); Boris Mollo, The Indian Army (Poole, 1981), pp. 54, 64; David, pp. 72, 269; Hibbert, Mutiny, pp. 96–9; F/4/2700 No. 191963. 21 GO, 2 September 1857; L/MIL/10/64/145; Kempton, Register; EIR. 22 W.T. Groom, With Havelock from Allahabad to Lucknow 1857 (London, 1894), pp. 36, 40; Forrest, Selections, Vol. 3, p. 98; Sir Edward Blunt, List of Inscriptions on Christian Tombs and Tablets of Historical Interest in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh (Allahabad, 1911), No. 436. 23 Groom, p. 103; LG, 18 June 1858. 24 David, p. 316; Edwardes, pp. 80–9; Hibbert, Mutiny, pp. 200–11, 265. 25 FM Viscount Wolseley, The Story of a Soldier’s Life (London, 1903), Vol. 1, p. 258; Bruce Watson, The Great Indian Mutiny: Colin Campbell and the Campaign at Lucknow (New York, 1991), pp. 55–6, 85. 26 WFB to RJHB, 20 January 1858 (P/47/56); TEMC, 23 January 1858; Maj G.F. MacMunn, The Armies of India (London, 1911), p. 104; Mollo, pp. 93–6. 27 ODNB; The Times, 13 August 1857. 28 Corresp. between WFB, WAJM and RJHB, October–November 1857 (P/47/37). 29 David, pp. 323–31; Edwardes, p. 105; Hibbert, Mutiny, pp. 336–51; FM Lord Roberts, FortyOne Years in India (London, 1898), pp. 164–98; Wolseley, Vol. 1, pp. 280–320. 30 NCD, 1857. 31 David, p. 333; Russell, Mutiny, p. 17. 32 WFB ‘Memorandum for Irregular Cavalry’, 18 January 1858 (P/47/56). 33 WFB to RJHB, 20 January; reply, 22 January 1858 (P/47/56); EIR. 34 WFB ‘Memorandum’; RJHB to WFB 22 January (P/47/56); reply, 23 January 1858 (P/47/58); FDA to WFB, 29 January 1858 (P/47/58, P/48/60). 35 RJHB to A/Superintendent of Marine, 19 January 1858 (P/47/56); WFB to RJHB, 23 January 1858 (P/47/58). 36 Russell, Mutiny, p. 120; Wolseley, Vol. I, p. 327. 37 Hodson. 38 WFB to Dunkellin, 17 January 1858; RJHB to CGB and TFW, 21 January 1858; RJHB to Mily Depts Madras and Bombay, 22 January 1858; CGB to RJHB, 22 January 1858 (P/47/56); TFW to RJHB 27 January 1858; FDA to WFB, 29 January 1858 (P/47/58). 39 WFB to RJHB, 19 February 1858; FDA to RJHB, 3 March 1858 (P/47/63); FDA to WFB, 31 March 1858 (P/47/67); EIR. 40 BO, 13 February 1858 (P/47/67); WFB to FDA, 22 February 1858; FDA to AAG HM Forces, 18 March 1858 (P/47/65); CD to FDA, 13 March 1858 (P/47/68). 41 Bombay Mily Dept to RJHB, 24 February 1858 (P/47/67); A. McKenzie Annand (ed.), Cavalry Surgeon: The Recollections of Deputy Surgeon-General John Henry Sylvester (London, 1971), pp. 126–7.



Notes to pages 289–93

393

42 Syed Hossain Bilgrami and C. Willmott, Historical and Descriptive Sketch of His Highness the Nizam’s Dominions (Bombay, 1883), p. 210; Maj R.G. Burton, A History of the Hyderabad Contingent (Calcutta, 1905); Maj R.G. Burton, The Revolt in Central India 1857–59 (Simla, 1908), p. 171; V.D. Divekar, South India in 1857: War of Independence (Pune, 1993), pp. 20, 103–14; Forrest, Selections, Vol. 4, p. 74; P. Veera Raghavalu Naidu, A Short History of Hyderabad (Hyderabad, 1909), pp. 73–6; H.G. Rawlinson, History of the 8th King George V’s Own Light Cavalry (Aldershot, 1948), pp. 75–6; Maj E.A.W. Stotherd, History of the Thirtieth Lancers, Gordon’s Horse (Aldershot, 1911), p. 65; Wood, Revolt, pp. 290–1. 43 Maj-Gen W.A. Watson, King George’s Own Central India Horse: The Story of a Local Corps (Edinburgh, 1930), pp. 45, 51; WFB to RJHB, 14 February 1858 (P47/62); BO, 13 February in WFB to RJHB, 15 February 1858 (P/47/67). 44 WFB to CD, 19 February 1858; Maj S.C. Briggs, Mily Sec. to the Resident, to Brig Hill, 19 February 1858 (P47/65). 45 Briggs to WFB, 23 February 1858; WFB to FDA, 24 February 1858 (P/47/65); WFB to FDA, 24 February 1858 (P/47/63); WFB ‘Memorandum’ (P/47/56); FM Sir Evelyn Wood, From Midshipman to Field Marshal (London, 1906), Vol. 1, p. 172. 46 BO, 13 February 1858 in WFB to RJHB, 15 February 1858 (P/47/67); BO, 2 April 1858 in WFB to FDA, 2 April 1858 (P/48/11); Watson, CIH, p. 47. 47 BO, 15 March 1858; WFB to RJHB, 7 May 1858 (P/48/6); E.G. Wood to AAG Malwa 15 July 1859; WFB to AG, 25 July 1859; HWN to RJHB, 27 August 1859; GGGO No. 1282, 13 September 1859 (P/191/29); HOM to RS, 22 May 1860 (P/191/39); WFB to WAJM, 13 April 1861 (P/191/57); Watson, CIH, p. 54. 48 BO, 13 and 14 June, 30 August 1859; Capt E.W. Dun, A/CO 2nd Regt, to E.G. Wood, 9 November 1859; Wood to WAJM, 24 November 1859; AAG to RJHB, 11 December 1859 (P/191/43); BO, 20 June 1859; HEW Regimental Orders, 22 March 1860; HEW to WAJM, 26 March 1860 (P/191/57); HOM to RS, 22 May 1860 (P/191/39). 49 Watson, CIH, p. 50; Annand, pp. 174–5. 50 ODNB: ‘Ellenborough’. 51 WFB to LdE, 3 April 1858 (PRO30/12/9). 52 Donald Featherstone, Weapons and Equipment of the Victorian Soldier (Poole, 1978), p. 20. 53 FDA to WFB, 8 March 1858 (P/47/64); RJHB to WFB, 6 April 1858; WFB to LdE, 18 April 1858 (PRO30/12/9). 54 WFB to RJHB, 19 March 1858; FDA to Lt-Col Edward Scott, 22 March 1858 (P/47/67); WFB to LdE, 3 and 18 April 1858 (PRO30/12/9). 55 Corresp. between WFB, FDA, Scott, and Grindlay and Co, May 1858 (P/48/5–6). 56 WFB to LdE, 18 April 1858 (PRO30/12/9); BO, 6 May 1858; WFB to FDA, 7 May 1858 (P/48/6); TFW to E.G. Wood, 13 July 1858; WFB to RJHB, 22 July 1858 (P/48/26). 57 BO, 30 March 1858 (WFB to FDA, 7 May); WFB to Maj-Gen Coffin, Hyderabad Subsidiary Force, 8 April 1858; Coffin to WFB, 9 April 1858; WFB to RJHB, 10 April 1858; WFB to FDA, 13 and 15 May 1858; J. Forsyth, Director-Gen Medical Dept, to Capt H.K. Burne, Asst Sec., Mily Dept, 18 May 1858 (P/48/6). 58 RJHB to FDA, 8 April 1858 (P/47/67); BO, 14 and 19 April, 2 May 1858; WFB to RJHB, 5 May 1858; WFB to FDA, 7 and 16 May 1858 (P/48/6); BO, 16 May 1858; WFB to FDA, 16 May 1858 (P/48/8); RJHB to FDA, 29 May 1858 (P/48/9); WFB to RJHB, 5 July 1858 (P/48/16). 59 E.G. Wood to RJHB, 18 April 1858; Col Stuart, Mily Sec., memo to RJHB, 28 April 1858; RJHB to WFB, 10 May 1858; FDA to George Plowden, Commissioner of Nagpur, 17 May 1858; WFB to RJHB, 18 May 1858 (P/48/6); Plowden to FDA, 25 May 1858; RJHB to FDA, 29 May 1858 (P/48/9); Capt G.A. Harrison to Lt Thompson, 18 June; reply, 18 June 1858; BO, 21 June 1858; WFB to RJHB, 21 June 1858 (P/48/14); WFB to RJHB, 5 July 1858 (P/48/16). 60 Watson, CIH, p. 51. 61 WFB to CD, 13 May; reply, 14 May 1858; WFB to FDA, 14 May 1858 (P/48/8); Annand, pp. 126–7; Watson, CIH, p. 51. 62 Annand.

394

Notes to pages 294–303

63 Watson, CIH, p. 50; Marquess of Cambridge, JSAHR 47 (1969), p. 23; W.Y. Carman, Indian Army Uniforms Under the British from the 18th Century to 1947: Cavalry (London, 1961), p. 169; Annand, p. 126; Sylvester, Diary (Mss Eur C241/1), p. 98; BO, 13 May 1858; WFB to FDA, 16 May 1858 (P/48/8); RJHB to FDA, 29 May 1858 (P/48/9). 64 Annand, pp. 171, 175, 198. 65 WFB to RJHB, 22 July 1858; FDA to RJHB, 18 September 1858; FDA to WFB, 22 September 1858 (P/48/26); RJHB to WFB, 14 October 1858 (P/48/34); RJHB to FDA, 21 December 1858 (P/48/51); MD No. 273, 11 August 1859 (L/MIL/3/2093). 66 Isabel Burton, The Life of Captain Sir Richard F. Burton (London, 1893), p. 235; Wood, Midshipman, Vol. 1 p. 167; Sylvester, Diary, p. 97. 67 Annand; Wood, Midshipman, Vol. 1, p. 174; Crawford, ‘William Henry Bradley’. 68 Annand, pp. 171–2; Sylvester, Diary, p. 97–8. 69 Watson, CIH, p. 48; Munir Nawaz Jang, Gazetteers of the Nizam’s Dominions: Aurungabad (Hyderabad, 1884), Chap. 7; MAG to RJHB, 7 May 1859 (P/48/71). 70 Sylvester, Diary, p. 98; Watson, CIH, p. 48. 71 Sylvester, Diary, p. 99; Annand, pp. 172–5.

Chapter 16. Hunting Tantya Tope 1

CJN after Bugti Hill campaign, quoted in WFB to JMac, 16 February 1859 (in WFB to WAJM 26 October 1861 (P/191/65), hereafter ‘1861 papers’). 2 Brig Sir John Smyth, The Rebellious Rani (London, 1966); Saul David, The Indian Mutiny 1857 (London, 2002), pp. 366–5; Michael Edwardes, Red Year: The Indian Rebellion of 1857 (London, 1973), pp. 113–26; Christopher Hibbert, The Great Mutiny: India 1857 (London, 1978), p. 385; E.E.P. Tisdall, Mrs Duberly’s Campaigns (London, 1963), pp. 194–5. 3 Maj R.G. Burton, The Revolt in Central India 1857–59 (Simla, 1908), p. 235. 4 RJHB to WFB, 23 August (1861 papers); MG, 16 October 1858; A. McKenzie Annand (ed.), Cavalry Surgeon: The Recollections of Deputy Surgeon-General John Henry Sylvester (London, 1971), p. 179; Sylvester, Diary (Mss Eur C241/1), p. 110. 5 G.W. Forrest, The Indian Mutiny: Selections from State Papers Preserved in the Military Department 1857–58 (Calcutta, 1893), pp. 592–7; Annand, pp. 193–4; Maj-Gen W.A. Watson, King George’s Own Central India Horse: The Story of a Local Corps (Edinburgh, 1930), pp. 33–4; FM Sir Evelyn Wood, The Revolt in Hindustan 1857–59 (London, 1906), p. 334. 6 AG Bombay to WFB, 16 November 1858 (1861 papers). 7 Annand, pp. 177–8. 8 CGB to RJHB, 12 September 1858 (P/48/32). 9 DG, 1 February 1859; CGB to AAG Malwa, 24 January 1859; JM to WAJM, 25 January 1859; BO, 22 March, 23 May, 17 June 1858 (in WFB to WAJM, 15 February 1859); WAJM to JM, 22 February1859; CGB to AAG Malwa, 17 March 1859; Burne to HWN, 4 August 1859 (P/191/28); HWN to RJHB, 6 June 1859 (P/191/27); Annand, p. 222. 10 Sylvester, Diary, p. 98; P.M. Melvill to RJHB, 19 October 1858 (P/48/33); WFB to RJHB, 6 December 1858; RJHB to WFB, 20 January 1859 (P/48/55); Lt-Gen Sir William Napier, The Life and Opinions of General Sir Charles James Napier (London, 1857), Vol. III, p. 260. 11 Annand, pp. 175 and 225; Sylvester, Diary, p. 99; Maj A. McK. Annand, JSAHR 45 (1967), p. 24; FM Sir Evelyn Wood, From Midshipman to Field Marshal (London, 1906), Vol. 1, p. 174; Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47), Index. 12 Sylvester, Diary, p. 99. 13 Hodson, Index. 14 Wood, Midshipman; Stephen Manning, Evelyn Wood, VC: Pillar of Empire (Barnsley, 2007). 15 Annand, p. 172. 16 Wood, Midshipman, Vol. 1, p. 167; Joseph Lehman, The First Boer War (London, 1972), p. 224. 17 W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished Anglo-Indians (London, 1875). 18 T.H. Bullock, Commissioner, to WFB, 18 November 1858 (1861 papers).

19 20 21 22

Notes to pages 303–11

395

WFB to WAJM, 15 February 1859 (P191/28). IG. R.V. Russell (ed.), Central Provinces District Gazetteers: Nimar District (Allahabad, 1908), p. 213. Lt-Col G. Le M. Gretton, The Campaigns and History of the Royal Irish Regiment from 1684 to 1902 (Edinburgh, 1911), pp. 189–91. 23 BTC, 26 November 1858. 24 Annand, p. 202; Burton, Central India, pp. 217–18; Sir John Kaye and Col G.B. Malleson, History of the Indian Mutiny of 1857–8, 2nd edn (London, 1889–93), Vol. V, pp. 241–4; Wood, Revolt, p. 334; BTC, 22, 24, 30 November, 2 and 4 December 1858; TEMC, 3 December 1858. 25 RNCH to Col Le Messurier, received 29 November 1858 (1861 papers). 26 Le Messurier to WFB, 29 November 1858; WFB to CGB, 29 November 1858; WFB to JM, 29 November 1858 (1861 papers). 27 WFB to JM, 1 December 1858 (1861 papers); Annand, p. 177. 28 A/AQMG Malwa to WFB, 3 December 1858; WFB to JMac, 16 February 1859 (1861 papers). 29 IG; Capt. C.E. Luard, Indore State Gazetteer (Calcutta, 1908); Capt C.E. Luard, Western States Gazetteer, Vol. V (Bombay, 1908); P.N. Shrivastav, Madhya Pradesh District Gazetteers: West Nimar (Bhopal, 1970). 30 WFB to JMac, 16 February 1858 (1861 papers). 31 Hart’s Army List (1859). 32 WFB to AQMG with Rose, 16 December 1858 (1861 papers). 33 WFB to JMac, 16 February 1858 (1861 papers). 34 WFB to AQMG with Rose, 16 December 1859 (1861 papers); de Salis to family, 25 December 1858 (Mss Photo Eur 134). 35 WFB to RNCH, 24 December 1858; WFB to HHR, 25 December 1858; WFB to JMac, 16 February 1859 (1861 papers). 36 BO, 25 December 1858; WFB to HHR, 26 December 1858; WFB to JMac, 16 February 1859 (1861 papers). 37 De Salis to family, 25 December 1858 (Mss Photo Eur 134); Rachel de Salis, De Salis Family: English Branch (Henley-on-Thames, 1934), pp. 253–5. 38 Mrs Henry Duberly, Campaigning Experiences in Rajpootana and Central India During the Suppression of the Mutiny (London, 1859), p. 234. 39 Watson, CIH, p. 53; Hodson, Index. 40 WFB to JMac, 16 February 1859 (1861 papers); BTC, 26 December 1858; Annand, p. 178. 41 Luard, Indore; Shrivastav. 42 WFB to JMac, 4 January and 16 February 1859 (1861 papers); Bombay Times, 14 and 17 January 1859; Gretton, p. 191. 43 DG, 1 February 1859; Bombay Times, 1, 5 and 11 January 1859. 44 WFB to JMac, 16 February 1859 (1861 papers). 45 JMac to WFB, 24 February 1859 (1861 papers). 46 T.C. Anderson, Ubique: War Services of all the Officers of H.M.’s Bengal Army (Calcutta, 1861); E.C. Joslin, A.R. Litherland and B.T. Simpkins, British Battles and Medals (London, 1988), p. 139. 47 BO, 29 July and 27 August 1858; Capt W.C. Clarke, A/Paymaster, to WFB, 17 February 1859; WFB to Clarke, 24 February 1859; WFB to RJHB, 25 February and 7 March 1859 (P/48/60). 48 WFB to WAJM, 13 April 1859 (P/191/57); MAG to RJHB, 21 April and 7 May 1859 (P/48/71). 49 HEW to AAG, 15 December 1859 (P/191/57); FL No. 15, 7 August 1849 (E/4/210); Sec. to the Chief Commissioner of the Punjab, to Sec. to Foreign Dept, 30 June 1857 (F/4/2700 No. 191963). 50 Wood, Midshipman; FM Sir Evelyn Wood, Winnowed Memories (London, 1918); Manning. 51 Wood, Midshipman, Vol. 1, p. 167. 52 Telegrams, March–May 1859 in P/48/62, P/48/63, P/48/67; George O’Donnell, Dep. Superintendent, Electric Telegraph, Bengal, to FDA, 21 May and 8 July 1859 (P/191/27); Burne to O’Donnell, 4 June 1859 (P/191/24). 53 WFB to RJHB, 7 May 1859 (P/48/67). 54 Telegrams and GOs (P/48/64, P/48/65, P/48/67); WFB to RJHB, 13 June 1859 (P/191/27).

396

Notes to pages 311–25

55 Wood, Revolt, p. 336. 56 WFB to QMG Bengal, 21 June 1859 (P/191/28). 57 WFB to RJHB, 28 June 1859; RJHB to HWN, 7 July 1859 (P/191/27); RJHB to Sec. Bombay Govt, 22 August 1859; A/QMG to RJHB, 7 July 1859 (P/191/28); Watson, CIH, p. 58. 58 RJHB to Sec. Madras Mily Dept, 17 September 1859 (P/191/29); LG, 4 September 1860; Chris Kempton, Valour & Gallantry: HEIC and Indian Army Victoria Crosses and George Crosses 1856–1946 (Milton Keynes, 2001); Wood, Midshipman, Vol. 1, pp. 176–81; Manning, pp. 45–8. 59 Bombay Times, 10 September 1859. 60 HWN to RJHB, 10 September (P/191/30); ML No. 221, 7 October 1859 (L/MIL/3/81). 61 RS to CB, 6 November 1859 (L/MIL/5/435); Sylvester Diary (Mss Eur C241/1), p. 139; Annand, p. 60; W.Y. Carman, Indian Army Uniforms Under the British from the 18th Century to 1947: Cavalry (London, 1961), p. 169; Maj-Gen S. Shahid Hamid, So They Rode and Fought (Tunbridge Wells, 1983), pp. 155–6; Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974), pp. 375–8; Watson, CIH, pp. 58–89. 62 Wood, Midshipman, pp. 172–5, 194; HEW to AG, 26 March 1860 (P/191/57).

Chapter 17. Talk of the Town 1 2

Gray, 29 June 1858, enc. with WFB to RJHB, 7 May 1859 (P/48/67). CY to BH, 3 April 1858; BH to DJAG, 10 April 1858; JAG to BH, 19 April 1858, and minutes thereon (WO32/7518). 3 DN, 12 November 1858; Old Bailey Proceedings, 15 December 1858. 4 Subpoena, 25 November 1859 (WO32/7518). 5 The Times, 21 October 1819. 6 Internal corresp. in WO32/7518. 7 ODNB: ‘Bramwell’, ‘Bovill’, ‘Garth’, ‘Gray’, ‘Lush’, ‘Hawkins’, ‘James’; Spectator, 8 February 1862. 8 The Times, MA, 14 January; internal corresp. in WO32/7518. 9 E.T. Hurlstone and J.P. Norman, The Exchequer Reports, Vol. V, Michaelmas Term, 23 Vict., to Trinity Term, 23 Vict. (London, 1861); The Times; MA 14 January 1860. 10 Alan Moorehead, The White Nile (London, 1960), pp. 39–54; Byron Farwell, Burton: A Biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton (London, 1963), pp. 131–2; 157–77; Isabel Burton, Vol. 1, pp. 328–30. 11 Farwell, pp. 292–6; ODNB. 12 Speke to Shaw, 16 January 1860 (JHS/1/20); the handwriting is hard to decipher, but the reference is clearly to O’Reilly. 13 Hurlstone and Norman; The Times, 14 January 1860. 14 Susan Heuck Allen, Finding the Walls of Troy: Frank Calvert and Heinrich Schliemann at Hisarlik (Berkeley, c.1999), pp. 89–90. 15 Hurlstone and Norman; Observer, 15 January 1860; The Times, MA, Scotsman, 16 January, ILN, 21 January 1860. 16 Speke to Shaw, 16 January 1860 (JHS/1/20). 17 MA; MG, 16 January 1860; Naval and Military Gazette, 21 January 1860. 18 Hurlstone and Norman; Observer, 22 January and 5 February 1860; The Times, 23 January 1860. 19 MD No. 88, 1 March 1860 (L/MIL/3/2094). 20 The Times, 26 March 1860. 21 The Times, 8 May 1860; ODNB. 22 Hurlstone and Norman; The Times, 25 May 1860. 23 MG, 7 June 1860. 24 Hurlstone and Norman; The Times, 4 June 1860. 25 RS to CB, 22 March 1860 (L/MIL/5/435); HOM to RS, 22 May; reply, 26 May 1860 (P/191/39); further corresp. on the merger in P/191/40 and 43; Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47). 26 Gavin to Wood and reply, 2 August 1860 (1861 papers).



Notes to pages 325–31

397

27

George Macaulay Trevelyan, Garibaldi and the Making of Italy (London, 1912), pp. 64–5, 235, 269; ILN, 11 August; Caledonian Mercury, 29 August; All the Year Round, 10 November 1860; Richard Stevenson SOTQ 2012, No. 149, pp. 3–10. 28 Trevelyan, pp. 164, 179, 190; ILN, 13 October 1860. 29 Trevelyan, pp. 259–60; Richard Stevenson SOTQ 2012, No. 151, pp. 3–10. 30 Ian F.W. Beckett, Riflemen Form: A Study of the Rifle Volunteer Movement 1859–1980 (Aldershot, 1982), pp. 13–19, 277; B.L. Crapster, JSAHR 41 (1960), pp. 94–7. 31 Hodson; ILN, 22 September 1860. 32 Beckett, p. 61; C. Digby Planck, The Shiny Seventh: History of the 7th (City of London) Battalion The London Regiment (London, 1946). 33 ILN, 22 September 1860; MA, The Times, 24 September 1860; Volunteer Services Gazette, 29 September; BH, 31 October 1860. 34 Beckett, p. 95; Planck. 35 W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished Anglo-Indians (London, 1875). 36 ODNB; W. Wesley Pue, Law and Social Inquiry 15 (1990), pp. 49–118. 37 Calcutta Gazette, 23 November 1860.

Chapter 18. Soldiering On: A Military Impresario 1 2 3

BG, 3 April 1869. Calcutta Gazette, 7 November 1860. T.A. Heathcote, The Indian Army: The Garrison of British Imperial India 1822–1922 (Newton Abbot, 1974), pp. 87–104; Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (London, 1974), pp. 313–20. 4 Chris Kempton, A Register of Titles of the Units of the HEIC and Indian Armies 1666–1947 (Bristol, 1997); EIR. 5 Maj V.C.P. Hodson, List of the Officers of the Bengal Army 1758–1834 (London, 1927–47), Index. 6 W.F.B. Laurie, Sketches of Some Distinguished Anglo-Indians (London, 1875); H.M. Vibart, Addiscombe: Its Heroes and Men of Note (London, 1894), p. 498; Priscilla Napier, I Have Sind: Charles Napier in India 1841–1844 (Salisbury, 1990), p. 44. 7 LG, 28 May, 13 August 1861; MA, 1862, Appendix. 8 T.C. Anderson, Ubique: War Services of all the Officers of H.M.’s Bengal Army (Calcutta, 1861); A.W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, 6th edn (London, 1877), Vol. V, pp. 27, 163, 293–4, Notes V and VI; Alexander John Beatson of Rossend, Genealogical Account of the Families of Beatson (Edinburgh, 1860). 9 Available at www.burntisland.net/jlm/jlm-4.htm; www.scottishcastlesassociation.com, accessed 29 November 2011. 10 Surg-Gen W.B. Beatson, Story of the Surname of Beatson (London, 1900); Table of the Fifeshire Family of BEATSON… (NAM 6311-53); E. Walford, County Families of the United Kingdom (London, 1870). 11 AG to HWN, 23 March, in ML No. 292, 15 July 1865 (L/MIL/3/759). 12 IG. 13 De Salis to family, 21 December 1861 (Mss Photo Eur 134). 14 Mrs Henry Duberly, Journal Kept during the Russian War (London, 1855); Mrs Henry Duberly, Campaigning Experiences in Rajpootana and Central India During the Suppression of the Mutiny (London, 1859). 15 E.E.P. Tisdall, Mrs Duberly’s Campaigns (London, 1963), p. 210. 16 Fanny Duberly to Selina Marx, 30 March 1861 (Add Mss 47218). 17 Michael Grant and John Hazel, Who’s Who in Classical Mythology (London, 1974). 18 Duberly Diary, 2 May 1861 (Add MSS 47218 E). 19 Tisdall, pp. 210–11; de Salis to family, 21 December 1861 (Mss Photo Eur 134). 20 Fanny Duberly to Selina Marx, 4 February 1862 (Add MSS 47218 D). 21 IOR photos 780/(22) and (23). 22 WAJM to RJHB, 23 March 1861 (P/191/51).

398

Notes to pages 331–6

23 FDA to WAJM, 1 April 1861 (P/191/51). 24 Lt W.P. Connolly to Brigade Major, CIH, 16 February 1861; Col J. Travers, CO CIH, to RS, 18 and 20 February 1861; RS to A.B. Young, Sec. to Foreign Dept, 23 February 1861 (P/191/51). 25 WFB to WAJM, 13 April 1861 (P/151/57). 26 RJHB to WAJM, 10 June 1861 (P/151/52); HWN to RJHB 25 July 1861 (P/151/57). 27 Hodson. 28 Young to WFB, 28 October 1861 (P/191/67). 29 WFB to WAJM, 26 October 1861 (P/191/65). 30 Hodson; WFB to WAJM, 13 November 1861; JAG to DAG, 3 December 1861 (P/191/65). 31 Corresp. of Lt H.D. Daly, CO CIH, and Maj R.J. Meade, GG’s Agent for Central India, in P/191/68. 32 WFB to HWN, 1 July; reply, 28 July 1862 (P/191/67). 33 A/AG to HWN, 16 August (P/191/69) and 4 December 1862 (P/192/4); AG to HWN, 23 March, in ML No. 292, 15 July 1865 (L/MIL/3/759). 34 Hodson. 35 Certificate, 1 April 1865, in ML No. 94 of 1866 (L/MIL/3/765). 36 A/AG to HWN, 4 December 1862 (P/192/4). 37 AG to WHN, 1 February 1863; Maj B.E. Bacon, Asst Sec. to Mily Dept, 4 February 1863 (P/192/3); Burne to AG, 7 March 1863 (P/192/4); letters 148–9 of July 1863 (P/192/8 Table B). 38 Certificate, 1 April 1865, ibid.; WFB to HWN, 30 April; reply, 10 May 1864 (P/192/19). 39 WFB to DAQMG Meerut, 27 September 1864 (P/192/26). 40 Bengal Marriages (N/1/110 fo 130). 41 Hodson. 42 Application for Queen’s Cadetship, 30 April 1881 (L/MIL/9/295), hereafter ‘Cadetship’. 43 Cadetship. 44 Bengal Baptisms (N/1/116 fo 41). 45 Cadetship. 46 WFB to AG, 10 December 1865; AG to HWN, 7 February 1866; ML No. 94, 22 March 1866 (L/MIL/3/765); MD No. 118, 31 May 1866 (L/MIL/2101). 47 EIR, Hodson, Gazette of India, 23 July 1863, 27 May 1865. 48 ODNB. 49 WRM to SdeR, 4 January 1856 (FO78/1170). 50 AG to HWN, 4 September 1866; Burne to AG, 20 September 1866 (P/435/31). 51 GO No. 840, 1866 (Gazette of India, 6 October 1866); Hodson; EIR. 52 EIR, July 1866; Thacker’s Bengal Directory, 1866–8; Kempton, Register. 53 Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 54 IG; Edward Thornton, A Gazetteer of the Territories under the Government of the East-India Company (London, 1858). 55 Cadetship; EIR; Roberts, p. 295. 56 Roberts Diary (NAM 7101-23-92); Bengal Burials 1866 (N/1/118/136); Laurie, Anglo-Indians; EIR, January 1866. 57 GO No. 98, 25 January 1867. 58 Cavaye, Diary (Mss Eur 378), February 1867; W.F.B. Laurie, in Col E.S. Rivett-Carnac, The Presidential Armies of India, ed. W.F.B. Laurie (London, 1890), p. xvii. 59 WFB and CinC corresp. March–June (P/435/39); WFB, QMG and engineers’ corresp. August– September 1867 (P/435/43). 60 FM Sir Evelyn Wood, From Midshipman to Field Marshal (London, 1906), Vol. 1, p. 167; Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 61 Cavaye, Diary, January–March 1867. 62 Beatson, Surname. 63 Roberts, Diary, 1866. 64 Cavaye, Diary, 1867; Hodson. 65 Cavaye, Diary, 1867. 66 The Pioneer, 15 and 22 April 1867.



Notes to pages 336–42

399

67 Roberts, p. 295; Cavaye, Diary. 68 Cavaye, Diary, 25 August 1867. 69 Col C.J. Hodgson, NWP Public Works Dept, to Col H.A. Dickens, Govt of India Public Works Dept, 1 December 1868 (P/435/60). 70 Roberts, p. 296; W.F.B. Laurie, in Rivett-Carnac, p. xvii. 71 Cavaye, Diary, 29 November 1867. 72 ODNB. 73 Corresp. on state prisoners in P/435/44; Cavaye, Diary, 11 November 1867. 74 Cavaye, Diary, 20 November 1867. 75 Pioneer, 10 February, 3 and 10 March 1869; Hodson. 76 Anon, Punjab District Gazetteers, Vol. VII, Pt A: Ambala District, 1922–24 (Lahore, 1922); IG. 77 EIR; BG, 3 April 1869. 78 QMG to HWN, 2 March (P/435/62); BG, 4 March 1869. 79 Charles Miller, Khyber: British India’s North West Frontier, the Story of an Imperial Migraine (London, 1977), p. 158; Roberts, p. 307. 80 Mofussilite, 18 and 20 March, 1 April 1869; BG, 24 March 1869. 81 Laurie, Anglo-Indians; BG, 12 March and 3 April 1869. 82 Mofussilite, 1 April 1869; BG, 3 April 1869. 83 Miller, p. 160; Roberts, pp. 330, 343, 484. 84 BG, 3 April 1869; H.M. Durand, Life of Major-General Sir Henry Marion Durand (London, 1883), Vol. II, p. 385. 85 BG 24 March, 3 April 1869; Miller, p. 159; Ted Herbert SOTQ 1975, No. 1, p. 4. 86 Mofussilite, 1 April; BG, 3 April 1869. 87 Durand, Vol. II, p. 385; Gazette of India, 3 April; BG, 3 April 1869. 88 BG, 17 and 18 March 1869; Miller, pp. 159–60; Roberts, p. 308. 89 BG, 3 April 1869; the India Office Records include three copies of Taylor’s photos from different collections. 90 Durand; BG, 3 April 1869; Mofussilite, 15 April 1869. 91 Miller, pp. 159–60; Roberts, p. 308. 92 TFW to RJHB, 2 August 1869 (P/436/5); Cadetship. 93 1871 Census; Devizes and Wiltshire Gazette, 10 July 1879; Swindon Advertiser, 12 July 1879. 94 Nikolaus Pevsner, The Buildings of England: Wiltshire, 2nd edn, ed. Bridget Cherry (London, 2002); Crockford’s Clerical Directory. 95 1881 Census. 96 EIR; Hart’s Army List; ODNB. 97 ODNB. 98 Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 99 Order, 12 March 1870 (P/436/12); GO 415 (Gazette of India, 9 April 1870). 100 BG, 26 March 1870. 101 Death certificate, registered at Leamington, Warwickshire, 2 June 1870 (GRO). 102 WFB Will dated 24 April 1870, proved at Swindon, 23 March 1872 (GRO). 103 Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 104 Gazette of India, 8 November 1870. 105 Bengal Wills and Administration 1871, Vol. 3, p. 144 (L/AG/34/29/116); Bengal Army List, 1871; EIR 1871 (II); Cadetship; Burials at Umballa 1871 (N/1/135 fo 165). 106 Bengal Army List, 1872. 107 Morning Post, 7 February 1872; AR, 1872; Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 108 Death certificate, registered at Highworth, Wiltshire, 6 February 1872 (GRO). 109 Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 110 Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 111 WFB Will. 112 Accession No. NAM 6311-11-31; Journal of the Royal United Services Institute 83/531 (1938); Alastair Massie (ed.), A Most Desperate Undertaking: The British Army in the Crimea, 1854–56 (London, 2003), pp. 57, 387.

400

Notes to pages 343–6

113 1881 Census; Hart’s, 1875; EIR, 1882; Cadetship. 114 Hugh Thomas, The Story of Sandhurst (London, 1961), pp. 110, 126, 131; Edward M. Spiers, The Army and Society 1815–1914 (London, 1980), p. 154. 115 Edward M. Spiers, The Late Victorian Army 1868–1902 (Manchester, 1992), p. 93. 116 LG, 24 July 1883. 117 Monthly Army List, June 1888. 118 1891 and 1901 Censuses. 119 UK Incoming Passenger Lists 1878–1960 (available at: www.Findyourancestor.com). 120 Index to beneficiaries of Lord Clive’s Fund (L/AG/23/6/1-3). 121 Beatson, Surname. 122 Col C.E. Callwell, Small Wars, Their Principles and Practice, 3rd edn (London, 1906), pp. 401–28. 123 Spiers, Late Victorian Army, pp. 256–9; Stephen Manning, Evelyn Wood, VC: Pillar of Empire (Barnsley, 2007), pp. 187–90, 198–206. 124 James Henry Skene, With Lord Stratford in the Crimean War (London, 1883), p. 50. 125 Laurie, Anglo-Indians. 126 C.N. Elvin (revised R. Pincher), Elvin’s Handbook of Mottoes (London, 1971).

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INDEX

Ranks given are usually the highest achieved Abbott, Maj Henry 145, 162, 289, 296, 305 Abdullah Mulazim 226 Abdullah Jan 338 Aberdeen 6, 83 Abyssinia Campaign 337, 340 Addiscombe, HEIC Military Seminary 14, 166, 209 Adem Aga, Colassi 216, 227–33, 241 Aden 160, 283, 312, 341 Administrative Reform Association 261 Admiralty, see Board of Admiralty Afghanistan 73, 112, 340 Amir of 73, 338–40 Afghan Wars 1st 89, 97, 102fn, 109, 111, 121, 150, 209 2nd 338fn Agra 31, 114, 117, 284 Ahmadabad 311 Ahmadnagar 145–6, 311 Ajanta 308–11 Ajmer 32–3, 146 Alam Bagh, see Lucknow Álava, Gen de 52–3 Albert, Prince Consort 261, 322 Alcock, Dr Rutherford 54, 60–1, 69 Alexandria 71, 160, 172, 283 Ali Beg, Naib Duffadar Walid 147

Ali Beg, Rissaldar Zulfikar 153–4, 157–8, 289 Ali Murad, Amir of Khairpur 121–7 Alice, Princess 322–3 Allahabad 30, 44–5, 72, 79, 83–5, 286 Division, see Bengal Army Alma, Battle of the 189, 193, 202, 206 Alza, Battle of 66 Ametza 65–6 Ambala 337–41 Anatolia 180, 210–12, 216, 219, 250 Anquetil, Brig-Gen Thomas 86 Appa Sahib 147 Arakan 45–8, 134, 341 Arbuzov, Staff-Capt Evgeny 198 Arlaban, Battle of 61–2 Arni, Skirmish at 148–9 Arundell, Isabel, Lady Burton 161, 269, 319, 321 Asirgarh 304 Assaye, Battle of 149 Auckland, Lord 73–82, 89, 97, 119, 286 Aurangabad 142, 146–52, 155, 296 Division, see Hyderabad Contingent Ayete, Battle of 64–5 Bagrode, Engagement at 300, 344

Baird of Camelon, Eliza 50 Balaklava 193, 203, 205–6, 252 Battle of 190, 194–204, 270, 279, 317, 344 medal clasp 262, 342fn Balakwara 305 Balkhar 306 Ball, Lt Alexander 60, 68–9 Balmaine, Capt James 152–3, 156 Baluchistan, see Sind Province Banda 75–6, 98, 284 Bangalore, Siege of 9 Banker, Mahomed 290 Bareilly 47–8 Barrackpore xxii, 22, 33, 45, 281, 284 mutiny (1824) 46–7, 79, 109 mutiny (1857) 281 Barry, Capt Henry 81–2, 88, 94, 111, 114, 124, 134 Barwani 306 Bashi-Bazouks atrocities 168, 183–4, 186, 226–31, 237, 243, 248, 252, 255, 261, 318 British, see Beatson’s Horse (Crimean War) dress, traditions and weapons 16, 168–70,175, 177–82, 215, 222, 252 French, see Spahis d’Orient Turkish 170, 175, 180, 185 yataghan 177 Basques 56–7

414 Batta mutiny 109, 120 Battus, M. 231, 248 Beatson family history 5–15, 329, 343 motto 2, 5, 346 Beatson, Maj-Gen Albert Balcombe 336 Beatson, Maj-Gen Alexander 8–14, 40, 51, 229, 336 Beatson of Rossend, Capt Alexander Campbell 10, 12, 14, 24, 29–30, 43–6, 50 Beatson, Cdt Alexander David 49 Beatson of Rossend, Alexander John 50, 329 Beatson, Barbara, Mrs Broughton 12, 19, 49 Beatson, Lt Douglas Turing 131–2 Beatson of Kilrie, James 5 Beatson, Harriet Oakeley, Mrs Laurie 10 Beatson, Helena, Lady Oakeley 8–10, 51, 329 Beatson, Jane 342 Beatson, Surg-Maj John Fullarton 336 Beatson, Margaret Helena 10 Beatson, Margaret Maria 141, 146, 331, 335, 341 Beatson, Margaret Marian Humfrays, Mrs 44, 83–6, 90, 94, 105, 131, 141, 149– 50, 159, 161, 209, 226, 261, 285, 288, 302, 321–3, 327, 335, 344 Beatson, Marian Jane ‘May’, Mrs McMullin 98, 105, 225, 276, 322–3, 331, 333, 335, 340–3 Beatson of Kilrie, Robert 6–10, 12 Beatson of Pitteadie, Robert 7–8 Beatson of Vicarsgrange, Robert 5–8 Beatson, Robert Campbell 10 Beatson, Robert Wedderburn 10, 14, 24, 29–30, 50, 83, 85, 90, 121 Beatson, Surg-Gen William Burns 343 Beatson, Maj-Gen William Ferguson 2/25th BNI 33–44

Beatson’s Mutiny 54th BNI 44, 48–50, 72–3, Mameluke sword 134, 223, 89–90 263, 265, 331 accused of mutiny 266–9 march to Sind 114–17 Allahabad command 334–7 marriage and family life 83–6, Ambala command 337 98, 146, 161, 220, 225, Bashi-Bazouk command 260, 322–3, 330–1, 335, 207–55 341, 342 Beatson versus Skene 1, 279, Meerut 330–4 315–6, 311, 315–25, 328, meets Ellenborough 107–8 341 mission to Bashi-Bazouks bedroom ‘mutiny’ 255–6 165–86 British Auxiliary Legion Nizam’s army 139–59 51–70 nom de guerre of Shemshi builds fort at Jhansi 101–2 Pasha 176 Bundlecund Legion 73–82 Parliamentary campaign Burma Campaign 45–8 271–2 Calcutta 285–8 physical appearance 161, 223, campaigns for promotion 236, 311, 340 130–1, 162, 174, 204, print campaign 261–4, 269–7 276, 326–32 raises Beatson’s Horse 287–97 Chelsea Board 265–6 Rayamoh 145–6, 151–4 Chirgong 90–4 retrospect 343–6 court martial threat 278–9 returns to London 257 Crimea 189–206 Shah Suja’s Contingent 73 Danube 178–86 Sind 110–17 death 342 superseded 25 designs uniforms 79–80, 103, travels to Boulogne 161–3 113, 179, 223–4, 293–4 travels to Danube 163–4 Dharur 154–8 travels to India 17–21, 70–2, disbands Legion 133–4 281–3 327, 341 dispute with Neill 239–49 travels to New South Wales 48 doorstep mutiny 227–30 travels up-country 22–32, 72 ‘durbar’ 224–5 Trukki 127–9 early life 5, 10–3 unemployment 326–32 financial dealings 310–13, Waruni and Arni 147–9 331–2 Whitehall Yard inquiry 274–8 frontier command 129–32 Working Men’s Rifle Ginders affair 103–5 Volunteers 325–6 Gwalior 105–7 wounded 69 Hall–Quin affair 94–5 Beatson of Glassmount, Lt-Col handwriting 14, 49, 108, 182, William Stuart 21, 29, 44, 83 215, 311 Beatson, Capt William Stuart Heavy Brigade 195–200 285 HEIC 14–5 Beatson’s Horse (Crimean War) home leave 50, 158–63, 315– 207–56 26, 341, 342 1st Regiment 216, 218, hunts Tantya Tope 300–9 226–7, 230 Hyde Park parade 270–1 2nd Regiment 216, 218, 227, Hyderabad 289–93 230 insults Stratford 242 3rd Regiment 218, 257 Jalna 293–97 4th Regiment 232, 248 Jigni 87–9 5th Regiment 232, 248 Kachhi Hills 121–9 6th Regiment 219, 250 Mackenzie affair 150–1 7th Regiment 219, 250

8th (Mosul) Regiment 212, 218, 264 Osmanli Irregular Cavalry 259–60, 264, 276, 299, 334 swords 182, 189, 213, 232, 250 uniform 179, 223–4 Beatson’s Horse (Indian Mutiny) 287–313, 324, 327, 331, 344 1st Regiment, 290, 296, 299– 303, 310–12 2nd Regiment 290, 293, 300–9 uniform 293–4, 300–1 weapons 291–2, 296, 300 Becher, Lt-Col Charles 288, 292, 293, 296, 299–305, 308, 310, 347 ‘Bedroom incident’ 255–6, 263, 266, 269–70, 275–8 Beja Khan 119, 122–6, 129 Bellew, Capt Francis 36 Benares 24–5, 29–30, 48–9, 334 Bengal 14, 22, 27, 37, 39, 45, 47, 51, 112, 283 Bengal Army 14, 21–2, 30, 37– 8, 46, 48–9, 70, 77, 87, 103, 108–10, 120, 132, 281–5, 292, 327, 337, 341, 345–6 uniforms 23–4, 29, 38 Bengal Army divisions Allahabad 334–7, 342, 345 Meerut 72, 330, 333 Sirhind 337–42 Bengal Artillery 77, 78, 79, 89, 107, 111–12, 133 Bengal Cavalry regiments 5th Bengal Cavalry 337 7th Bengal Cavalry 337 10th Bengal Cavalry 337 12th Bengal Cavalry 337 8th Bengal Irregular Cavalry 106, 288, 303 9th Bengal Irregular Cavalry 110 10th Bengal Irregular Cavalry 133, 284, 310 3rd Bengal Light Cavalry 282 5th Bengal Light Cavalry 288 7th Bengal Light Cavalry 129 8th Bengal Light Cavalry 90, 106, 191

Index Governor General’s Body Guard 107, 158, 338–9 Hodson’s Horse 285, 313 Skinner’s Horse 172 Bengal Club 286 Bengal Engineers 49, 83 Bengal European regiments 1st Bengal Europeans 24, 28–9 2nd Bengal Europeans 121 3rd Bengal European Light Infantry 164, 334 4th Bengal Europeans 284, 327, 334 Bengal Military Board 79, 112, 292 Bengal Native Infantry regiments Bareilly Provincial Bttn 47–8 1st Bengal Native Infantry 24, 29, 43–4, 284 7th Bengal Native Infantry 337 11th Bengal Native Infantry 24, 29 13th Bengal Native Infantry 90, 93, 98 21st Bengal Native Infantry 337 25th Bengal Native Infantry 29, 33, 40–4, 114, 223 26th Bengal Native Infantry 337 27th Bengal Native Infantry 44–5 29th Bengal Native Infantry 76 33rd Bengal Native Infantry 76, 82 34th Bengal Native Infantry 109, 133, 281–4, 333 43rd Bengal Native Light Infantry 284 44th Bengal Native Infantry 87–8 47th Bengal Native Infantry 45–6 52nd Bengal Native Infantry 90–2 54th Bengal Native Infantry 45–9, 72, 89, 121, 134, 284, 303 64th Bengal Native Infantry 121

415 65th Bengal Native Infantry 164 72nd Bengal Native Infantry 50 2nd Grenadier Bttn 46–7 2nd Gurkhas 337 Kelat-i-Ghilzai Regiment 90, 110 2nd Invalid Bttn 50 2nd Light Bttn 46 15th Ludhiana Sikhs 337 28th Punjabis 333 Bengal Hurkaru 92, 283 Bennett St, London 260 Benson, Col Henry 309 Berar Horse 300 Berhampore 27, 50 Berkeley, Lt-Gen Sir George 154 Berkeley, Maj Lennox 236, 249–50, 254–6, 259, 267–70, 319, 325 Betwa River 74, 76 Bhils 305, 307 Bhir 146, 148–9 Bhopal, Begum of 294 Bidassoa River 67–8 Bilbao 57–9, 61, 63 Bilheri 87, 89 Birch, Maj-Gen Sir Richard 286–7, 292–3, 311, 332, 347 Blacklin, Lt-Col Richard 237, 240 Blair, Brig James 141–2, 144 Blakely, Capt Alexander 209–10, 244, 249–50 Blunt, Charles 211, 216–17 Board of Admiralty 53, 166, 172, 209 Board of Agriculture 6–7 Board of Control for India 53, 97, 278, 291 Board of Ordnance 53, 182, 213 Bolarum 146, 292 Division, see Hyderabad Contingent Bombay Army 38, 109, 161, 309, 312 Ahmadnagar Division 145–6 Artillery 303, 306, 309 Light Cavalry 310 Native Infantry 303, 307

416 Bombay City 14, 47–8, 71, 110, 149, 153, 159–60, 282, 286, 288–92, 299, 311, 327, 341 Bombay Telegraph & Courier 157 Bombay Times 309 Borrow, Maj John 305–8 Boulogne 161–3, 333 Bovill, William, QC, MP 316–23 Brahmaputra River 47 Bramwell, Sir George 316–24 Brenan, Lt-Col Edward 215, 260 Brett, Brig De Renzi 211–12, 216–18, 232, 235, 242–5, 248, 253–6, 260, 267–8, 288, 307, 310, 328 Bristol 54, 340, 342 British Army 13, 28, 37–8, 40, 53–5, 103, 106, 162, 165–6, 179, 182, 190–3, 209–10, 213, 243, 264, 275, 285, 327–9 British Army formations Cavalry Division 190–5, 201–3, 206, 265–6 Guards Brigade 171, 189, 270 Light Cavalry Brigade 190–1, 200–3, 265 Heavy Cavalry Brigade 189– 206, 265 British cavalry regiments 4th Dragoon Guards 191 5th Dragoon Guards 191–2, 197–8, 204 1st Dragoons 191 2nd Dragoons 191 6th Dragoons 191 4th Hussars 337–9 8th Hussars 203, 299, 307, 330 10th Hussars 207 11th Hussars 79, 249 21st Hussars 337 16th Lancers 211 17th Lancers 192, 309–10 British Foot Guard regiments Grenadier Guards 120, 173 Scots Fusilier Guards 209 British line infantry regiments 3rd Foot (Buffs) 106, 337 13th Foot (Light Infantry) 121, 126–9, 190

Beatson’s Mutiny 18th Foot (Royal Irish) 303–9 23rd Foot (Royal Welch Fusiliers) 54 35th Foot 236 37th Foot 337 40th Foot 107 41st Foot 337 44th Foot 153, 236, 241, 288 55th Foot 337 63rd Foot 236 73rd Foot (Perthshire) 174 78th Highlanders 118, 121 79th Highlanders 212, 337–8 93rd Highlanders 196 94th Highlanders 209 106th Light Infantry 337 107th Foot 334–7 Rifle Brigade 179 British Land Transport Corps 219, 244, 249, 263 British militia regiments 1st Warwick 343 British ordnance units Chestnut Troop 338–9 Royal Artillery 53, 174, 176, 214, 250, 325, 334 Royal Horse Artillery 194, 200, 337–8 Royal Engineers 6–7 British volunteer regiments 3rd City of London 326 Leith 13, 54 London Irish 326 11th Wiltshire 340 British Auxiliary Legion 53–70 uniform 55–6 British Auxiliary Legion brigades Chichester’s 65–6 English 61 Light 58 Irish 61–3, 68–9 Scotch 54–8, 61 British Auxiliary Legion cavalry 1st Lancers 66, 69, 250 British Auxiliary Legion infantry 1st Infantry Regiment 55, 58, 61–2, 64–6 2nd Infantry Regiment 6 3rd Westminster Grenadiers 61 5th Highland Light Infantry 54–5, 61 6th Scotch Grenadiers 53, 55–8, 64, 68

8th Highlanders 54, 56, 66 9th Irish Grenadiers 58 10th Munster Light Infantry 59–60, 62, 64–8, 70 Rifle Regiment 58, 65 British Crimean medal 203–4, 262, 264, 342fn Briviesca 60 Broughton, Maj-Gen Edward Swift 12–14, 49 Broughton, Lt-Col Robert 14 Bruce, Brig J. Forbes 132, 211, 218, 227, 230–2, 251, 260 Bucharest 185, 204 Buckingham Palace 260, 270 Bugti tribe xxii, 119, 121–8, 130 Bukkur 109, 118 Bulgaria 176, 211–12, 224, 260 Bulgarians 177, 210, 218, 237– 8, 243, 250 Bundelas 75, 97, 100–7, 284 Bundlecund Legion 76–134 Artillery 76, 78–9, 86–8, 90, 93, 102–3, 107–12, 124–6, 132–3 Cavalry 76–80, 86–8, 92, 98, 101–2, 106–7, 122–3, 132–3 Infantry: 1st Bttn 76–80, 86–8, 92, 101, 106–7, 111–13, 132–3 Infantry: 2nd Bttn 94, 110–14, 133 uniform 79–80, 103, 113 weapons 79, 112–13 Bundlecund Military Police 101–3, 133 Bundelkhand (Bundlecund) 30, 33, 73–83, 87–110; 132–5; 284, 288, 293, 299, 307, 327–8 Burhanpur 303–4 Burma 45–8, 109, 134, 303 Burnett, Lt Robert 49, 89 Burntisland 5, 7, 10, 329 Burton, Capt Sir Richard xxi, 38, 85, 108–9, 121, 132, 168, 220, 224, 236, 239–71, 274–8, 319, 322, 325, 330, 345–6 explorations 132, 236, 250, 259, 275, 295, 319 meets Beatson 161

writings 108, 161, 252, 261, 263–4, 274 Buxar, Battle of 27

Index

Chambal River 74, 106 Chamberlain, Maj-Gen Sir Neville 334 Chanak-Kalessi 219 Café, Gen Sir William 340, 345 Chapelgorris 57, 62–7 Cairo 160, 275, 283 Chasseurs d’Afrique 202 Calcutta xxii, 14, 17, 20–5, ‘Chelsea Board’ 265–6, 279 30–2, 45–50, 71–2, 83–5, Chelsea Royal Hospital 265, 90, 100, 105, 134, 279–92, 277 327, 329–35, 338; see also Chichester, Brig-Gen Charles Clubs 65–6 Calvert, Frederick 220, 230–3, Chikalda 307 237–40, 244, 248–9, 263, Chirgong 267, 273, 279, 320, 344, Rao of, 90–3, 98, 100, 103 347 siege of, 89–91, 94, 100–2, 107, Cambridge, Duke of 162, 187, 149, 171, 284, 288, 328 202, 261, 274–9, 283, 302, Chittagong 45, 47, 333 318 Chunar 30, 50, 337 Campbell, FM Colin, Lord Clagett, Capt Thomas 148, 152, Clyde 194, 196, 200, 239, 211, 289 273, 275, 278, 283–6, 297– Clarendon, George Villiers, 301, 312, 334 Earl of 52–3, 63–4, 163–7, Campbell, Rev George 340–2 171–3, 176, 182, 189, 191, Campbell of Rossend, Jean 7, 204, 207–14, 229, 234, 237, 10, 12 242, 265, 278–9, 286, 317, Canning, Earl 282, 283, 286–8, 345, 347 291, 293, 312, 335, 345, Clive, Lord 39, 43 347 Clode, Charles 316 Canning, Stratford, see Stratford Colclough, Maj-Gen George de Redcliffe 256, 270 Cannington 335 Commons, House of, see Cannon, Lt-Gen Robert 165, Parliament 173, 262 Compton, Ens Herbert 17, 21, Cape Colony rebellion 159 23–4 Cape of Good Hope 20, 71–2, Connolly, Bde-Maj 196, 198, 204 150, 273, 286, 341 Constantinople xxii, 163–5, Cardigan, Earl of 79, 190–1, 172–6, 206–10, 217, 220, 194, 200–2, 263, 265–6, 223–6, 229, 233–9, 244–5, 270, 279 252, 256–9, 273, 344 Carlists 52, 56–69, 163, 214 Bosphorus 256 Carlos, Don, Spanish pretender British Embassy 172–3, 189, 52, 56–7, 66 236–7, 249, 251 Carnac, Col Edward RivettBuyukdéré 256 335–7 Pankalde 215 Cary, Ens Henry 39 Pera 263 Casian, Pierre 227, 229 Córdoba, Gen Luis Fernandez Causeway Heights 193–6, 59, 61–3, 67 200–2, 206 Cornwallis, Marquis of 9, 43 Cavaye, Lt William 336–7 Court of Directors, see HEIC Cawnpore xxii, 25, 47, 78, 90, Creagh, Capt James 336 102, 108, 282, 284, 286, Creagh, Lt-Gen Jasper Byng 292, 337 171–3, 176, 179, 185–93, Battle of 285 209, 220, 227, 230, 235–6, Central India Horse 312, 331 262, 336

417 Cristinos xv, 52, 54, 56–63 Crofton, Col Edward 214 Curling, Capt Henry 122, 129 Dacca 46 Daily News 236, 279, 315 Dalhousie, Marquis of 139, 145, 150–1, 157–9, 162, 212, 284, 347 Damascus 180, 212, 216–18 Danube 164, 170, 173, 178–84, 194, 207, 209, 216, 223, 252, 262, 329 Dardanelles 10, 12, 207, 211, 216–19, 229–38, 244–7, 250–63, 266, 269, 272–4, 277–9, 287–8, 293–5, 301–2, 318, 323, 331, 344–5 mutiny 229–32, 239, 254 Datia 100, 107–8 Datwari 305 Davidson, Lt-Col Cuthbert 289 De Bathe, Sir William 326 Deccan 45, 139–43, 155, 287, 293, 303 Dee, QMS John 78, 88 Delhi 30–1, 103, 117, 282–5, 335, 337, 340 Delhi Gazette 308–9 Dera Bugti 123 Dera Khan 129 Derby, Earl of 291 Derby, The (horserace) 196, 323 De Salis, Lt-Gen Count Rodolph 203, 299, 306–7, 310, 330, 341 Dhana Bai 151 Dharur 147, 154 siege of 155–8 Dhurumraj 307 Dictionary of National Biography xxii, 6–7, 343 Digby, Jane, Lady Ellenborough 104 Dinapore 27, 50, 83 Dinajpur 45 disease 36 ‘Arakan fever’ 46–8 cholera 183–4, 190, 221, 283, 285, 330, 336 ‘Jhansi fever’ 76, 141 typhus 60, 221 ‘Vitoria fever’ 209 Djemel Pasha 230, 242, 248

418 ‘Doab, The’ xv, 30, 73, 83, 282 Dobrudja 183–4, 341 Domki tribe 119, 121 Doyle, Sir Francis 129, 135 Drysdale, Capt James 29, 33–4 Duberly, Fanny xxi, 203, 299, 330–1 Dunne, Col Francis, MP 271–2, 345 Dunne, Col John 236, 325 Dunkellin, Lord 286, 288 Durand, Maj-Gen Sir Henry 339 East India Company, see Honourable East India Company (HEIC) East India House 14, 18, 70, 262, 268, 283 East India United Service Club 261 Eaton Square 260 Edinburgh 6–7, 10, 13, 30, 51, 54, 81, 219 Elbasan 216, 226 Ellenborough, Earl of 129–35, 164–6, 180–2, 189, 206–7, 260, 286, 300, 329, 347 Governor General 95, 97– 114, 118–19 in Parliament 212–14, 259, 272, 282, 345 India Board, 97, 291–2, 327 private life 97, 104 Ellichpur 151 Division, see Hyderabad Contingent Elliot, Capt Alexander 191-2, 194, 195–8, 200–1, 204 ‘El Pastor’, see Jauregui, BrigGen Gaspar de Engleheart, Capt George 44, 47 Espartero, Gen Baldomero 57–8, 61 Eupatoria 247, 251–2 Evans, Gen Sir George de Lacy, MP 325, 345 in Crimean War 177, 187, 189, 193 in Parliament 52 in Spain 52–69 Exchequer Court 1, 316–23

Beatson’s Mutiny Fardella, Col 215, 243, 250, 254, 260, 334 Ferdinand VII, King of Spain 52, 56 Ferguson of Raith, Sir Ronald 13 Ferguson of Raith, William 8, 10 Ferozepore 132, 338 Ferozeshah, Battle of 131, 191 Fisher, Capt E.R. 193 Fitzgerald, Capt Robert 120, 123–6, 129, 132 Foord, Capt Henry 209, 211–12, 216–18, 227, 230, 235, 243 Foreign Enlistment Act 53, 325 Foreign Office 56, 163–8, 171, 174–8, 182, 185, 207–10 Forrest, Lt William 76, 80 Forth, Firth of 5, 8, 10, 22, 219 Fort William, Calcutta 14, 20–3, 41, 44, 72, 83 105, 283, 289 Franks, TSM Henry 199, 201, 203 Fraser, Dr Allen 215, 217–18, 220–1 Fraser, Charles 78, 97–9, 104, 284, 347 Fraser, Hastings 289 Fraser, Hugh 78, 99 Fraser of Ardachy, Maj-Gen Sir James 139–59, 289, 310, 347 Fraser, Simon 75–81, 87–94, 97–99, 100, 135, 141, 284, 347 Fuenterrabía, Battle of 67–9, 346

Glasgow 54–5, 63 Godman, Lt Richard 199 Goi River 306 Gomm, FM Sir William 162 Gough, FM Hugh, Viscount 106–7, 109, 114, 347 Gravesend 15, 17, 23 Gray, John, QC 278, 315–19, 322–3 Green, Maj-Gen Henry 132, 165–6, 171, 174–8, 184–6, 189, 209, 236, 251, 260, 267, 345 Green, Col Malcolm 165, 251, 260 Greenock 55 Grey, Lt-Gen Sir John 106, 114, 159 Guernsey 119, 161 Guernsey, Wellington 273, 315 Guevara, Castle 61–2 Gujru Pass 122, 124–6 Gulbarga 151–5 Gurri, Engagement at 147, 154 Gwalior 43, 78, 97, 103, 117, 145 Campaign 105–7, 114, 191, 288, 340 City 105, 324 Contingent, see Sindhia’s Reformed Contingent Maharaja, see Sindhia medal 106 Mutiny 284, 295, 299

Hackett, Maj-Gen John 241–2, 277–8, 288, 293, 318, 324 Hall, Lt Edward 94, 97, 103, 111, 235, 346 Gallipoli 216, 250 Hamilton, Sir Robert 304–6, Gangadhar Rao, Raja of Jhansi 347 101–2 Hamirpur 75, 80, 85 Ganges, River 20–30, 47, 72, 85 Hampton, Brig 147 Garth, Robert 316, 320, 323 Hanover Square 165 Gavin, Maj George, MP 325, Hardinge, FM Henry, Lord 345 113–15, 120, 129–35, 162, Ghazipore xxii, 24–5, 28, 32–3, 165–6, 347 121 Harris, Capt Junius 215, 227, Gibraltar 160, 171, 282 229, 243 Ginders, Asst-Surg Thomas 80, Havelock, Brig Charles 209–11, 82, 94, 103–5, 111, 252 217–18, 250–1, 260, 269– Ginders, Mrs 80, 85, 104 70, 285 Giraud, Lt-Col 215, 243, 254, Havelock, Maj-Gen Henry 209, 267, 274, 276 239, 285–6, 335

Hawkins, Henry, QC 316, 318–19, 323 Haworth, Capt Humphrey 149 Hay, Cmdre Lord John 63, 67–8 Hayes, Lt Fletcher 111, 124 Hayes, Capt William 46–7 Heanley, Miss C.R. 342 Honourable East India Company (HEIC) 5, 8, 13, 17, 27–8, 31, 35, 37, 40, 51–3, 72, 75, 78, 97, 109, 131, 134, 139, 142, 151, 159, 165, 209, 235, 241, 250, 262, 268, 270, 275–6, 279, 308, 327, 343 Directors 9, 12, 14, 17, 32, 40, 51–3, 65, 90, 94, 113, 118, 131–3, 162, 165, 250, 274–5, 283, 291 see also Bengal Army, Bombay Army, Madras Army Hellespont, see Dardanelles Hely, Capt Joseph 66, 69, 249 Herbert, Lt Richard 104–5 Herbert, Hon Sidney, MP 316– 18, 345 Hernani 57, 68 Battle of 57 Hervey, Capt Albert 42–3 Heyman, Lt-Col Henry 221, 230 Hindustan 27, 46, 293, 297, 300, 303 Hingoli, Division, see Hyderabad Contingent Holkar, Maharaja of Indore xv, 305 Horse Guards 131, 162–3, 166, 171, 174, 183, 191, 204, 264, 274, 277–8 Hughes, Consul T.F. 216 Hugli, River 20, 27 Humfrays, Capt Alexander 83, 85, 106, 150 Humfrays, Eliza, Mrs Young 83 Humfrays, Emma, Mrs Stuart Beatson 21, 44, 83 Humfrays, Margaret Marian, see Marian Beatson Humfrays, Maj Samuel 44, 83 Hunter, Maj-Gen George 120, 125, 129 Hussein Effendi, Hadji 230 Hussein, A/Subadar Sheikh Gholam 88

Index Hussein Mulazim 227, 229–30 Hyde Park 22, 166, 182, 260, 271, 326 Hyderabad 139, 147, 150, 157, 285–9, 327 City, 141, 150, 154, 289, 292 Line-wallahs 139 Nizam 139 Residency 139, 141, 289 Hyderabad Contingent (‘Nizam’s Army’) 135, 139, 159, 286, 298, 303–4, 312 Hyderabad Contingent Artillery 141, 147 Hingoli Battery 152, 155 Hyderabad Contingent Cavalry 142–5, 158, 241, 288, 310, 312 1st Regiment 144, 146, 148– 9, 289, 296, 308 2nd Regiment 147, 151–4, 158 3rd Regiment 151 4th Regiment 145, 151–2, 155, 160 5th Regiment (Ellichpur Horse) 142–3, 148, 158, 288 uniform 143, 161, 166, 179, 265, 293–4 weapons 144, 154, 296 Hyderabad Contingent divisions Aurangabad 142, 146–9, 152 Bolarum 141–2, 152, 155 Ellichpur 147, 150 Hingoli 141–2, 146–7, 151–2 Hyderabad Continent Infantry Hill Rangers 139, 157 4th Regiment 153 6th Regiment 152, 155 Hyderabad Subsidiary Force 139, 141, 147, 154, 292 India Board, see Board of Control for India Indian Mutiny 153, 239, 264, 279, 281–315, 327, 330–5, 340, 344–5 medal 309, 342fn Indian News 214, 269, 272–5, 282 Indian Order of Merit 290 Indore 304–6

419 Inkerman, Battle of 189, 202–6, 249, 317 medal clasp 203, 262, 342 Isabella, Queen of Spain 52 Jacob, Brig-Gen John 40, 120, 123–4, 132, 224, 263, 291, 294 Jaitpur 102–4 Jaizkibel, Mte 67 Jakrani tribe 119, 121, 129 Jalaun, 73–82, 100, 110 Legion, see Bundlecund Legion Jalna 293, 295, 299, 302, 312 Field Force 303–8 James, Edwin, QC 1, 316–26, 346 Jamieson, Maj-Gen James 92–3 Jauregui, Brig-Gen Gaspar de, ‘El Pastor’ 57, 65 Jellalabad, Siege of 121, 158 Jhansi 75, 82, 85–7, 90, 94, 100–1, 110 fort, 76, 101, 284 Legion, see Bundlecund Legion Mutiny 284 Raja 75, 101–2, 139 Rani, see Lakshmi Bai and Saku Bai siege of 76, 80 star fort 101–2, 107, 284 Jigni, Siege of 87–9, 93–4, 107, 149 Johnston, Brig James 151–2, 158, 347 Johnstone, Lt John 82, 85, 92 Journal de Constantinople 231, 238 Jummuck Pass 123 Jumna, River 30–1, 73–5, 335 Junior United Service Club 260 Kabul 89, 97, 150, 153, 338 Kachhi Hills 119, 122 Kalat, Khan of 119 Kamgaon, Action at 148, 159 Karera 100 Kars, Siege of 165, 189, 209, 232, 251–2, 261–3 Kawalpur 107 Kelat-i-Ghilzai, Regiment 110 siege of 90 Kelso, Capt William 17–19, 24, 72 Kerashera, Kochukunju 100–1

420 Khalsa xvi, 105, 171 Khan, Rissaldar Imam 290 Khan, Kareem ud-din Hussein 145, 151 Khan, Rissaldar Kullundur 30 Khan, Rissaldar Lall 98 Khan, Rissaldar Rustum Ali 290, 332, 345 Khan, Rissaldar Umer 157 Khanghur 122 Khartoum, Siege of 308 Kilmarnock bonnet 56, 103, 343, 346 Kilrie 1, 7–8, 10, 219, 329, 343 Kinghorn 5, 7 Kinglake, Alexander 183, 191–2, 197, 329, 343 Kiraly, Lt-Col Francis 215, 219, 243, 250, 260 Kirk, Surg Kinloch 111, 130, 132, 284 Kirkcaldy 29, 33, 329fn Kuchwargurh, 107, 111, 130 Kunch 89

Beatson’s Mutiny Longworth, John 211, 216, 218, 230 Lords, House of, see Parliament Loti 125 Lower Grosvenor Place 260 Loyd, Capt W.K. 156–7 Lucan, Earl of 190–205, 265–6, 273–4, 279, 347 Lucknow 282 Alam Bagh 286, 288 sieges of 239, 284–91 Ludhiana 29, 31, 73, 89, 132 Lush, Robert, QC 316, 320, 323

Malta 166, 171–2, 282–3, 329, 342 Malwa Field Force 299 Mama Sahib 106 Manchester Guardian 324 Mansfield, Gen William, Lord Sandhurst 239–49, 260, 263, 286, 320, 334–40, 347 Margate 166 Maria, Queen of Portugal 51 Maria Cristina, Queen, Regent of Spain 52 Markham, 2/Lt W.T. x, 179 Marri tribe 119, 121 Macdonald, Capt Allan, 77, 89 Marseilles 160, 163, 165, 274, MacDougall, Gen Sir Duncan 283, 312, 341 53, 59, 68–70, 73, 163, 262, Marshall, Honoria, see Honoria 291 Lawrence MacEgan, Asst-Surg William Marshall, Lt-Gen William 133 147, 149, 153, 157, 284 Mayall, J.J.E. 263 Macintire, Capt 154–5 Mayne, Maj Henry 150–1, 313, Mackenzie, Brig Colin 150–1, 324–5, 332, 348 313, 345, 347 Mayne, Brig William 158, 262 McKenzie, Maj Kenneth 23–4, Mayne’s Horse 312, 324 29–31, 121 Mayo, Earl of 338–40 Laing, Asst-Surg Patrick 118, McMullin, Alexander Campbell Meade, Lt John 215, 217, 235 127–8 340 Meade’s Horse 311–12, 324 Lakshmi Bai, Rani of Jhansi McMullin, Maj Charles Noble Medjidie medal 262 102, 284, 299fn 333, 335, 340–1 Meerut 333–7 Lalli Pass 123 McMullin, Charlie Beatson Division, see Bengal Army Lane Fox, Lt-Col Charles 173, 342 mutiny 282, 284, 289; 176, 178–81, 189, 209, 223 McMullin, Clara Seymore 333 Mehmet Aga (Mehmet Bey), Larkana 121, 129 McMullin, Maria Marian 333 Bimbashi 179, 189, 192, Lauder, Lt Sir John Dick 81–2, McMullin, Mrs, see Marian Jane 205, 209, 211, 216, 227, 92–4, 100, 104, 346 Beatson 230, 274 Laurie, William 51, 329 McNeill, Sir John 265–6, 271 Meller, Capt H. 60 Laurie, Lt-Col William Ferguson Madras Army 8, 14, 47, 108–9, Mendijur 61–2 Beatson 51, 141, 330, 335, 139, 142–3, 154, 165, 209, Mendizábal, Juan 53 336 214, 285–8, 292, 334 Mhow 304–5, 308 Lawrence, Henry 71, 284 Madras Artillery 17, 141, Michel, Maj-Gen John 237, Lawrence, Honoria xxi, 71–2, 157, 330 299–304, 310, 324, 332, 348 85, 160, 284 1st Madras Europeans Miguel, Dom, Portuguese Layard, Sir Austen 172–3, 212, (Fusiliers) 285 pretender 51–2 261, 265 3rd Madras Europeans 211, Moipura 305 Leith 10, 13 288 Mominabad 142, 145, 147–55 Volunteer Rifles, see British Madras City xxii, 9, 14, 24, 35, Money, Capt Edward 223–5, Army 72, 293, 296 236, 239, 248, 253–4, 263, Lennox, Lt-Col Charles 288, Mahabaleshwar Hills 146, 159 275, 295 302 Maharajpore, Battle of 106–7, Monks, Trumpeter 197 Liprandi, Lt-Gen Pavel 194–7 Mahrattas 13, 33, 43, 74, 77, Monghyr 27 Loch, Lt Henry, Lord 172, 176, 105, 144, 299, Morgan, Lt-Col George 215, 185, 189, 209–10, 262, 345 Malet, Capt George 122, 124 230, 250, 256, 260, 270 Lockhart, Gen Sir William 340, Mall 264, 338 Morning Advertiser 271, 273, 345 Mallouf, Nassif 267, 269, 274 276, 279, 322, 326

Morning Herald 161, 178, 271 Mornington, Earl of 9 Morris, Capt William 192, 200 Mosul 169, 172, 212, 218 Muheiddin Bey, Col 254, 276 Mul, Umaid 151 Mundy, Col G.C. 268, 348 Mussorie 72, 333 Mutiny Act 245, 268, 274 Mysore 9

Index

Oakeley, Sir Charles 8–10, 13 O’Connell, Lt-Col Maurice 60, 67 Olpherts, Gen Sir William ‘Billy’ 107, 111–14, 120, 124, 132, 134, 141, 166, 209, 211, 252, 260, 285, 288, 328, 345, 348 Omer Pasha 164–70, 175, 207–8, 247, 262–3 Ommaney, Manaton 97–101, Nabi Bux Khan, Naib Risaldar 284 77, 114, 345 Onslow, Brig 147, 150 Nagara Hospital 248, 253, 255 Oorcha 93, 98, 100 Nagpur 147 Raja of 90 Irregular Cavalry 293 Rani of 98 Nana Sahib 299, 304 Oporto, Siege of 52 Napier, Gen Sir Charles 109–10, Orai 82 113, 118–35, 173, 181, 206, Ordnance, see Board of 217, 293, 299, 301, 309, Ordnance 328–9, 345, 348 Oriental Club 165, 170 Napier, Lt-Gen Sir George 119 O’Reilly, Lt-Col Eugene 207, Napier, Lord 173, 243 211–12, 216–19, 250, 255– Napier, Gen Sir William 119, 6, 260, 266–76, 319–20, 345 123, 125, 129 Orr, Capt William 156 Nasirabad 32–3, 41 Osman Aga, Bimbashi 212 Nasirullah, Sidi 151–2 Osman Aga, Interpreter 216, National Army Museum 185, 228–9 262, 309, 342 Osman Pasha 211–12, 217 Naval & Military Gazette 322 Osmanli Horse Artillery 214, Naylor, Capt Christopher 17, 250, 256, 270 23, 29–30, 121 Osmanli Irregular Cavalry, see Neale, Lt-Col Edward St John Beatson’s Horse 54, 176, 189, 211, 348 O’Sullivan, Sjt-Maj Jeremiah 88 Neill, Brig-Gen James 239–45, Ottoman Empire, see Turkey 249, 252, 261, 263, 285, Oude 29, 30, 37, 43, 46, 282, 317, 335, 348 327 Nerbudda River 289, 300, Auxiliary Force, 77, 79, 89 303–9, 312 3rd Oude Cavalry 292 Newbery, Maj Charles 104–5 Newcastle, Duke of 165, 167, Paget, Gen Sir Edward 46 170, 174, 182–5, 204, 207, Pahuj River 74, 91 210–14, 286, 345, 348 Pall Mall 260, 264, 270 New South Wales 48, 112, 245 Parichhat, Raja of Jaitpur 102–3 Nicholls, Lt-Gen Gen Sir Jasper Paris 187, 199, 224, 232, 264, 99, 348 283 Nightingale, Florence 212, 266, Palmerston, Viscount 52–3, 316, 330 212–13, 247, 251, 272, 291, Nimach 41, 43–7, 83 325, 348 Nishan-i-Iftihar medal 262, 264 Pande, Sepoy Mangal 281, 284 Nolan, Capt Louis 144, 154, Panmure, Lord 212–16, 220–1, 190, 201–2 229, 235–6, 239, 242, 245– Nonere 87 53, 256–79, 283, 315–20, Nowgong 103, 132, 284 345, 348

421 Panwari, Action at 100 Parliament 52, 202, 212–13, 259, 271, 282, 291, 321, 326, 345 House of Commons 177, 212, 262, 265, 271–2, 325 House of Lords 212–13, 229, 265 Parsons, Lt-Gen James 33–4, 44, 114 Pasajes 67, 69 Battle of 65–6, 249 Patiala, Maharaja of 339 Patna 27 Paulet, Maj-Gen Lord William 213, 215, 221, 235–6, 241, 348 Pedro, Dom, Regent of Portugal 51–2, 171 Peel, Frederick, MP 270–4, 277, 348 Peel, Sir Robert 97, 113 Pemberton & Meynall 315–16 Peshawar 146, 179, 216 Peshwa, The 299, 303 Phuleji 113, 119, 121, 123 Pindaris 33–4, 74 Pioneer, The 337 Plassey, Battle of 27 Pollock, Sir Frederick 322–4 Pondicherry, Sieges of 9 Portugal, Liberating Army of 54, 81, 171 Portugalete 57–9 Power, Sjt 127–9, 135 Principalities, The, see Wallachia and Moldavia Punch 182, 187–8, 265 Puente Nueva, Battle of 58 Punjab 29, 31, 105, 109, 132, 134, 141, 171, 285, 327, 337–9 Punniar, Battle of 106–7, 111, 166 Purbiyas xvi, 37, 281, 327 Quin, Lt Thomas 76, 80–1, 111, 235 Raglan, Lord 167, 170, 173–86, 190–6, 200–8, 214–15, 232–3, 263, 279, 348 Raitt of Carphin, Helen 50

422 Rajputana 29, 32, 39, 41, 43, 307 Field Force 33 Ram, Subadar Sita 35–6, 71, 74 Rassam, Christian 169, 173, 212, 250 Rayamoh, Sieges of 145–6, 151–9 Red Sea 282–3 Reid, Lt Henry 111 Reid, Brig-Gen William 68 Rhodes, Lt-Col Godfrey 209, 211–12, 216–17, 230, 243 Richards, Alfred Bate 261, 325–6, 345 Roberts, FM Frederick, Earl 29, 160, 335–7, 340, 345 Roebuck, John, MP 212, 265, 271–3, 345 Rohillas 145–51, 154–8, 180, 302, 307, 309–11 Rohri 109, 118 Rose, FM Hugh, Lord Strathnairn 175, 184, 299, 308–9, 331–3 Ross, Capt David 78, 81, 87–8, 94, 102, 348 Rossend Castle 5, 7–10, 12, 50, 219, 329 Royal Artillery, see British Army ordnance units Royal Marines 65–6, 69, 189 Royal Navy 53, 63, 66, 172–3, 218 Russell, William 168, 179, 186–7, 196 Russian Army 162, 164, 168, 170, 173, 177–84, 193, 198–204, 247, 261 Russian Army formations 12th Infantry Division 194 6th Hussar Brigade 194–6 Russian Army cavalry regiments 11th Kiev Hussars 195–6 12th Ingermanland Hussars 195–6, 198 Russian Army irregular cavalry regiments 1st Ural Cossacks 195 53rd Don Cossacks 195 Rustchuk 179–80 Ryzhov, Lt-Gen Ivan 194–203

Beatson’s Mutiny Said Effendi 227, 230 St Arnaud, Marshal 174–5, 178, 182–5 St Helena 12, 19 mutiny 12, 229 St James’s 166, 260–1, 270, 322 St Martin-in-the-Fields 264 Saku Bai, Rani of Jhansi 75–6 Sale, Maj-Gen Sir Robert 102, 158 Sale, Lt Robert 102 Salonika 211–12, 216–19, 243, 275 Sandhurst, Royal Military College 13, 171, 239, 241, 342–3 Sandwith, Dr Humphry xxi, 168–70, 173, 176–80, 189, 201, 212, 261, 345 Sankey, Lt-Col Francis 215, 235, 237, 243, 245, 250, 256, 260, 270 San Fernando, Order of, 70, 264, 342fn San Sebastian 55, 57, 59, 61, 63–9 Santander 55, 57, 63 Sapounè Heights 193–7, 201–2 sati (suttee) 35 Satpura Hills 303, 305 Saugor 78, 97–100, 103–4, 13, 284, 332 Savandroog, Siege of 9 Scarlett, Gen Sir James 190– 206, 262, 266, 279, 329 Scutari 213, 215, 221, 235–6, 250 Secunderabad 139, 154 Seraskier 164, 172–3, 176, 186, 208, 210–11, 214, 218, 238 Seringapatam, Sieges of 9, 12–13 servants 21, 25–7, 31, 39, 41–3, 86, 149, 166–7, 173, 192, 209, 288 Sevastopol, Siege of 183, 189, 193–4, 205–6, 232, 252 medal clasp 262, 342fn Sewpersad, Gomasta 117 Shahpur 122–4, 129 Shakespear, Maj Henry 293 Shakespear, Col Sir Richmond 324, 331–2, 348

Shakespear, William 14, 169, 180, 200 Shaw, Brig-Gen Sir Charles 54–8, 62–4, 68–70, 81, 119, 176, 348 Sheetz, Apothecary James 82, 171 Shegog, Sjt 197 Shelley, Lt-Col Edward 211–12, 256, 260, 266–7, 269, 272, 274, 320 Shemshi Pasha, see Beatson, William Ferguson Sher Ali, Amir of Afghanistan 338–40 Shikarpur 121, 129–30 shipping lines Cunard 209 P&O 71, 160, 166, 172, 283, 312, 341 ships Adelaide 250–1 Banshee 176 Baroda 341 Bengal 283, 288 Charity 218 Colombo 282–3 Columbian 312 Cumberland 56 Deva 219 Earl of Hardwicke 150 Ellenborough 105 Fergusson 50 Fingall 56 Gladiator 274, 276 Harpy 231 Husky 226 Jason 192 Killarney 55 Leander 189 Midas 48 Oberon 233, 253 Prince of Wales 134 Redpole 231, 255–6 Reliance 71–2 Seringapatam 83 Simla 166, 170–2, 192–3 Tisiphone 231 Trent 172 Vectis 283 Victoria 160 Waterloo 15, 17–20, 23 Shirley, Maj-Gen Arthur 260, 266–8, 272–8, 283, 315–24

Shore 124–5 Shumla 173–4, 178, 260, 267–9, 277 Sikh State 105, 109 Army, see Khalsa Sikh Wars 131 Silistria 184–5, 218 siege of 173, 178, 181, 187, 262 Sillidar system 77, 79, 212, 290, 331 Silaod 306 Simla 73, 94, 99, 162, 311, 330, 337, 340 Simmons, FM Sir John 184, Simpson, Gen Sir James 120–5, 232–3, 236, 242–52, 257, 260, 348 Sind Camel Corps 120–1, 129, 132, 211 Sind Horse 120–1, 132, 165, 178, 224, 251 Sind Province 30, 108–21, 129–35, 141, 161, 217, 233, 236, 250, 332, 341 Sind River 74, 106, 108 Sindhia, Maharaja of Gwalior 43, 105–6, 139, 145, 305 Sindhia’s Reformed Contingent (Gwalior Contingent) 78, 80, 87–93 106 Sindwa, Engagement at 300, 310, 312 Singh, Rao Bahadur Burkut 90–1, 93, 98, 100, 103 Singh, Duffadar Burmadin 289 Singh, Dewan Duleep 88–90, 103 Singh, Jowakir 101 Singh, Dewan Khet 103 Singh, Pertab 107 Sinope 211–12, 218 Sirhind Division, see Bengal Army Skene, Capt Alexander 72, 284 Skene, James xxi, 1–2, 174, 209, 215, 234–54, 260, 267, 269, 273–9, 311–24, 344, 348 Skinner, Col James 224, 263 Skinner’s Horse, see Bengal Army Sleeman, Maj-Gen Sir William ‘Thuggee’ xxi, 35, 75, 99– 115, 135, 141, 324, 348

Index Smith, Maj-Gen Michael 255– 77, 299, 316–17, 320, 348 Smyrna 215, 254 Souter, A/Cornet Frank 153, 157 Southampton 166, 171, 282–3, 341 Spahis d’Orient 174–5, 183–4 Spain 1, 51–70, 73, 163, 171, 202, 325, 345 Spankie, Capt Thomas 72, 273, 284 Steinbach, Col Henry 170–1, 174, 176, 179, 252, 325 Stewart, Maj-Gen Sir Herbert 337, 340–1, 345 Stratford de Redcliffe, Viscount 165–8, 172–6, 180–6, 189, 202, 206–20, 224, 234, 236, 239–43, 247–9, 256, 261, 264, 282, 286, 320, 323, 334, 344, 346, 348 early career 164–4 insulted by Beatson 242 meets Beatson 163 orders Beatson’s supersession 255, 267 rejects Burton’s plan 252 Sublime Porte, see Turkey Subzulkote 117, 121 Suez 71, 149, 160, 283, 312, 341 Suffolk Place 260 Suja-ul-Mulk, Shah 73, 90, 101 Contingent: 1st Cavalry 110 Contingent: 3rd Cavalry 73, 90, 110 Sukkur 109, 118, 120–2, 132 Suleiman Pasha 230–1, 233 Sweeney, Cpl 93, Swindon 340, 342 Sylvester, Surg John 288, 290, 293–6, 299–304 Tantya Tope 299–311, 327 Tapti River 303–4 Taylor, Maj Clarence 340 Tehri 98 Thackwell, Maj-Gen Sir Joseph 90, 348 thagi (thuggee) 35, 75, 100 Therapia 234, 256 Thikri 305

423 Thompson, Robert 317–18 Thornhill, Lt 199 Thurburn, Capt Henry 288, 293, 301 Times, The xxi, 55, 89, 178, 181, 185, 187, 203, 229, 243, 259, 261, 265, 270–1, 278–9, 323 Todd, Sjt 129 Tombs, Maj-Gen Sir Harry 107, 166 Tonge Valley 123 transport: dâk xv, xxii, 31–2, 47, 72–3, 89–92, 99, 122–3, 147, 283 doolie xv, 20, 22, 31–2, 41–4, 117, 132, 300 Grand Trunk Road 24, 286, 305, 338 hackery xv, 31, 41–4, 106, 114–17, 286 Trevino 63 Troy 231 Tudor, Lt James Becher 301 Tulloch, Col Alexander 265–6, 271 Tupper, Lt-Col William le Mesurier 54, 56, 64 Turkey (Ottoman Empire) 162, 168, 172–3, 187, 208, 216– 8, 239, 244, 249, 259 Turkish Army 162–8, 174–84, 208–11, 213–17, 245, 250, 253–4 Artillery 193, 214–15, 219, 230, 233, 253 Bashi-Bazouks 164–70, 174–7; 1st, 5th, 10th Regiments 180 Cavalry 164, 167, 190, 207, 215, 253 Imperial Guards 233 legal system 226, 234, 238, 240 Turkish Contingent 209, 213–14, 217, 224, 236–7, 249–55, 269, 273, 284, 286, 294, 299, 315, 330 Turkish Crimean medal 262, 342fn Twemlow, Brig George 147–8, 152, 156, 158, 348

424

Beatson’s Mutiny

Uch 123 Wardroper, Ens Edwin 336 United Service Club (the Wardroper, Capt Frederick 76, ‘Senior’) 261–2 81, 85, 88, 102, 104, 336 United Service Gazette 273, 279 Waruni, Action at 147–9, 152, Uskub 216, 218 15 Waterfield, Capt John 111, 134, Varna 173, 175–9, 182–6, 189, 283 192–3, 211, 217–19, 250 Waterloo, Battle of 13, 28, 72, Verner, Maj James 82, 85, 90–1, 193, 214 97, 111–17, 122–4, 133, Waterloo Place 261 326, 348 Watt, Brig Edward 250, 260, Vetch, Maj George 134 264, 267–8, 276, 319 Vetch, Maj-Gen Hamilton 46–7 weapons: Victoria, Queen 70, 82, 100, boar-spear 43, 296, 300 162, 166, 181, 213, 232, Enfield rifled carbine 292, 296 247, 262, 270, 283, 322–3 Enfield rifled musket 281, Victoria Cross 153, 204, 285, 292, 296 312, 335, 340 flintlock carbine 144, 176 Villiers, Hon Charles 265, flintlock musket 101, 113–14, 277–9 144 Villiers, Hon George, see Jacob rifled musket 291 Clarendon, Earl of jezail musket xv, 79, 101 Vindhya Hills 305 lance 79, 144, 177, 251, 296 Vitoria 57–63, 70, 209, 341 Mameluke sword 134, 223, Vivian, Lt-Gen Sir Robert 214, 263, 265, 331 218, 220, 234, 237–42, matchlock musket 79, 86–9, 247–60, 263, 266–73, 93, 101, 113, 119, 152–3, 276–9, 299, 315–20, 323, 157, 289, 296 334, 344, 348 Minié rifled carbine 176 Minié rifled musket 180, 291 Wallachia and Moldavia 162, percussion carbine 114, 176, 183 213, 232, 234, 250 Walmsley, Capt Hugh 236 percussion musket 112–13 Walmsley, Sir Joshua 236, 279 Sharps breechloading carbine Walpole, Lt-Col Hon Frederick 291–2 172–3, 179, 189, 207–18, swords 55, 112, 119, 144, 223, 232, 251, 260–1, 345, 182, 189, 199–200, 213, 348 232, 250, 292, 296, 310 Wamick Pasha 217 tulwar 27, 79 War Department (later War Victoria carbine 182 Office) 2, 166, 171, 184, yataghan 177 208–10, 214, 238, 242, Yeomanry carbine 182 250–1, 260, 262, 266–79, Wellington, Duke of, 13, 52–3, 345 56, 60–5, 97, 106, 129, 131, Ward, George 220, 227–8 162–5, 289, 348

Wemyss, Maj Charles 209–11, 218, 248, 260 Westminster Hall 1–2, 316, 318 Wheler, Lt-Gen Sir Francis 333–4 Wheler, Maj-Gen Stephen 109, 281–2, 333, 345 White, Henry 315–17, 341 Whitehall 264 Whitehall Yard Inquiry 277, 315, 319, 324 Whiteside, James, MP 262–3 Whittall, Frederick 244–5, 263 William IV, King 53, 70 Williams, Gen Sir William Fenwick 181, 189, 209, 211, 251, 261 Wilson, Maj-Gen Thomas 284, 288, 291–3, 296, 301, 303, 345 Winter, Capt Francis 111, 124– 6, 130–4, 348 Wood, Capt Edmund 293, 295, 301, 310 Wood, FM Sir Evelyn 295, 301– 2, 310–15, 336, 343–5, 348 Wood, Richard 212, 217 Wood, Sir Charles, MP 325 Woolwich, Royal Military Academy 7, 14 Wylde, Lt-Col William 58, 62, 348 Yates, Capt 58 Young, Brig-Gen Frederick 103 Young, Maj Gavin 83 Young, Ens Hastings 80–1 Young, Col Keith 332 Young, Maria 83–5 Yusuf, Gen (Joseph Valentini) 174–5, 178–9, 183–6 Zadorra, River 61–2 Zuri-Kushta 123

Plate A: D.J. Pound, General Beatson. Beatson as he appeared in London in 1856, wearing his ‘gold coat’ that ‘stood up by force of embroidery alone’, with the Turkish Contingent helmet at his side

Plate B: Captain Francis Bellew, Griffin on Landing besieged by Baboos

Plate C: Captain Francis Bellew, Griffin Marching to Join

Plate D: Ackermann’s print of a British officer (probably James Verner) of the Bundlecund Legion Cavalry in review order

Plate E: Ackermann’s print (after a drawing by Capt F. Ainslie) of the native officers’ uniform of the Hyderabad Contingent Cavalry, also adopted by the British officers

Plate F: Rossend Castle.

Plate G: Sir George de Lacy Evans

Plate H: The British Auxiliary Legion

Plate I: Brig-Gen the Hon James Scarlett, wearing his heavy cavalry helmet

Plate J: ‘Satan’s Brother’: Sir Charles Napier, with the hills of Baluchistan behind

Plate K: Camel Gunner of the Hyderabad Contingent Cavalry (Ackermann print after Capt. F. Ainslie)

Plate L: Sowars of the Hyderabad Contingent Cavalry (Ackermann print after Capt. F. Ainslie)

Plate M: D.J. Pound, Omar Pasha

Plate N: Sir Robert Vivian

Plate O: Arab and Kurdish Bashi-Bazouks, sketched by 2/Lt Markham at Varna

Plate P: A Circassian (front) and other Bashi-Bazouks, sketched by 2/Lt Markham at Varna

Plate Q: G.D. Giles, The Charge of the Heavy Brigade

Plate R: Charles Lane Fox as ‘Bimbashi Yussuf Bey’, sketched by 2/Lt Markham at Varna

Plate S: Albert Letchford, Captain Sir Richard F. Burton, KCMG, FRGS, Maître d’Armes France 1852

Plate T: William Stewart Watson, Portrait of Sir John Dick-Lauder. Lauder wears the cavalry uniform of the Bundlecund Legion

Plate U: Bashi-Bazouks in country resembling the Dobrudja

Plate V: Officer and trooper of the British Bashi-Bazouks

Plate W: Lord Raglan, commanding the British ‘Army of the East’

Plate X: ‘The Misses Beatson’ photographed in the 1860s

Plate Y: Beatson photographed in the 1860s in his trademark uniform

Plate Z: Sir Colin Campbell (right) and Sir William Mansfield

Plate AA: Major Clarence Taylor’s photograph of the Ambala Durbar. Seated centre is Lord Mayo, on his right hand (left as viewed) is Amir Sher Ali, on his left Prince Abdullah Jan. Beatson, with beard and medals, stands behind the prince, holding his feathered cocked hat. The Maharaja of Patiala is seated next to the Amir