History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v3.c41.s6: §10. Constant fighting with Ahoms.
History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v3.c41.s6
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§10. Constant fighting with Ahoms.
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But there was no repose in the Mughal outposts even from the first. The Ahoms had been scared away and not crushed. They soon resumed the offensive. Throughout the month of April there were frequent skirmishes, mostly night attacks on the outposts. Even Garhgaon was assaulted; but the sleepless vigilance of Mir Murtaza foiled the attempt. On the whole the balance of fighting was in favour of the Mughals, when early in May, the rains came down in torrents, the rivers rose in flood, the movement of troops by land became impossible, and the imperial outposts were isolated. In fact, during the whole rainy season, from the beginning of May to near the end of October, the Mughal army in Assam lived in a state of siege.* Each of its posts stood like an island surrounded by water,—the few raised paths being held by the enemy, and no provision coming from the fleet at Lakhau because the river of Garhgaon was not deep enough for the large armed boats, while the small trading vessels could not safely ply on it so long as the Ahom entrenchments on its banks were not carried.
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∗ Disposition of the rival forces, *Fathiyah*, 69-74; Gait, 135-136. Fighting during the rainy season, *Fathiyah*, 75-118, 119-127 (doings of the fleet at Lakhau), 128-139 (epidemic in Mughal camp); *Buranji* viii. 91-92, *Buranji from Khunlung and Khunlai*, ii. 1-5; Gait, 137-138. I have often borrowed the language of the *Fathiyah*, with or without quotation marks.
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The rain poured down incessantly, turning the fields into lakes and the *nalas* into raging torrents. The Mughal army consisting mainly of cavalry and fighting with cumbrous heavy artillery, could not operate freely when cramped within its cantonments. At times even the tents were flooded, and horse and foot had to stand knee-deep in water. For lack of proper food, cavalry horses and draught cattle perished by the thousand. No supplies of any kind, not even news, could come from the outside world.
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∗ "In no history has it been read that in any age from the advent of Adam to this time a force of 10 or 12 thousand cavalry and many infantry and numberless camp-followers remained for six months powerless and enclosed like the centre of a circle by brooks and streams,—so that nobody could place his foot outside the circumference of the camp." *Fathiyah*, 89. One MS. reads "42,000 cavalry." But 42,000 was the total strength.
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The nights were disturbed by the noisy attacks of the Ahoms.
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§11. Mir Jumla's communication with fleet cut off.
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Early in May, Dewalgaon was attacked by the enemy, but relieved in time. On the 10th, however, the outpost at Gajpur fell, and the Ahoms held the north bank of the Dihing from Trimohani to near Lakhau, cutting off communications between the Mughal army and navy. Mir Jumla sent a detachment under Sarandaz Khan with ten war-boats and several empty merchant vessels under Muhammad Murad to recover Gajpur. But the two commanders quarrelled, the land force returned from the way (23rd May), the flotilla pushed on, but was attacked by the Ahoms from land and water alike and fled in a panic, losing all the material and ships to the enemy. Only the boats of Dilir Khan and his Afghans forced a way through the enemy's lines and reached Dewalgaon in safety.
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This success emboldened the Ahoms. An attack on the *thana* of Deopani was repulsed after desperate fighting, but the place continued to be invested. At Garhgaon, too, the enemy concentrated and kept the garrison in perpetual alarm. The neighbouring peasantry, who had submitted to the Mughals, now began to flee away. To complete the misfortune of the invaders the news arrived that Kuch Bihar had been recovered by its Rajah and the imperial garrison expelled from the country.
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At the end of May, Mir Jumla made a great effort to reopen communications with the fleet. Farhad Khan, the best fighter in the Mughal army, was sent out with a picked force to destroy the enemy's trenches on the way, reinforce the *thanas* of Ramdang and Trimohani, restore that of Gajpur, and fetch supplies from Lakhau.
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It was a formidable task, doomed to failure from the outset, by reason of his lack of boats. Leaving Garhgaon in the night of 27th May, he waded through mud and ditches to the village of Tiok* between Trimohani and Gajpur, where his further progress was rendered impossible by flood.† Farhad Khan in despair tried to return to Trimohani, but found his path barred by Ahom entrenchments and wet ditches. The enemy's boats surrounded his force and began to gall him with artillery fire. He had no boats and no provisions, and his fate seemed hopeless. For a week he was besieged where he stood, unable to fetch provisions or counter-attack the enemy for want of boats.
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∗ Different from Tiok of Gait's map. The *Buranji Khunlung* mentions this name. The Persian MS. reads *Batak* or *Tik*.
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† "The field looked like a larger river than the Dihing itself. No road was visible in any direction. The rain fell from the sky and water swelled up from the ground; the flood spread over the encampment; the tents looked like bubbles on the surface of the water; the horsemen sat all night on their chargers, and the infantry stood on their legs [in water]." *Fathiyah*, 82.
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A relieving force under Muhammad Mumin Beg was held up on the way by a rise in the flood. Dilir Khan's proposal to send a column on elephants to the rescue of Farhad Khan, was rejected as likely to involve only additional loss. Consternation and despair reigned at the Mughal head-quarters and Farhad Khan's force was given up for lost.
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But that commander's firmness and military skill triumphed over difficulties which would have overwhelmed a lesser man. After being beleaguered for a week, during which he ate up his oxen and horses, he seized some Ahom boats by a clever feint, and early next morning crossed the *nala*, surprised the negligent Ahom force on the other bank, and put it to utter rout. The Mughals now returned to Trimohani in safety (about 6th June).
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§12. Garhgaon completely invested.
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"After the return of Farhad Khan the roads were all closed, and the audacity of the Ahoms passed all bounds." It became impossible to issue from any outpost or send support to it. Mir Jumla, therefore, withdrew all his *thanas*. The Ahom king recovered all his country east of Lakhau. The Mughals held only Garhgaon and Mathurapur, and so close was the enemy's investment that even between these two camps traffic was not safe without a strong escort. The beleaguered Mughals despaired of ever returning to Hindustan, and at Delhi "funeral rites were performed for the Assam expeditionary force."
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The vigour of Ahom attack was now redoubled. Their king himself came out of Namrup and took post at Solaguri, only four days' march from Garhgaon. The Baduli Phukan was appointed prime minister and Commander-in-Chief and sent to destroy the invaders. Orders were issued to all the nobles and people of the kingdom to assist and obey him implicitly.
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The Phukan ran up six miles of walls—broad, high, turretted and strong,—on the bank of the Dilli, east of Mathurapur, connecting the southern hills with the Dihing. But a severe defeat at the hands of Dilir Khan put an end to his night attacks on Mathurapur. A detachment under Sujan Singh chastised the Rajah of Sairing, who was meditating an attack on Garhgaon. The minor encounters that took place almost daily are beyond count. The well-bred cavaliers of Delhi fought without heeding how they were blistered by the sun, or soaked in water and bespattered with mud,—but ever vigilant and ever ready to repel the enemy. "The saddles were never bare of the riders; the horses' backs were never stripped of the saddles; servants ceased to attend on their masters, but each and all, at the least alarm, leaped up from his post and wielded his sword with both hands.”
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§13. The fight for Garhgaon.
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After his failure to take Mathurapur, the Ahom general turned against Garhgaon and attacked it every night. He burnt down all the houses of the Rajah and the nobles outside the bamboo palisade of the city and in its environs. But Mir Jumla strengthened the defence by sending Farhad Khan (14th June) there. The fortifications of the city were improved and rearranged. Vigorous sorties were made to dislodge the enemy from the gardens and stockades in the neighbourhood.
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After almost daily attacks and alarms, an assault in force was delivered on Garhgaon in the night of 8th July. The Ahoms broke down the bamboo railing on the north side of the palace enclosure, routed the Buxari matchlock-men posted there, and seized half the enclosure, which was the citadel of Garhgaon. “Great confusion and tumult arose.” The darkness of the night added to the confusion as the advancing Mughals could not tell friend from foe. Happily, some of the Ahoms set fire to the thatched roof of a mansion and the blaze enabled the Mughals to charge and expel the enemy. A heroic onset by Farhad Khan cleared even the embankment outside the fencing, but he was wounded in the fight.
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Finally, by the exertion of every man in the garrison the fort was completely recovered, and the night of crisis passed away.
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A mud wall was rapidly run up in the place of the bamboo fencing, and the ground in front of it was cleared of houses and trees. This wall, in fact, saved Garhgaon. Thereafter the night attacks continued, no doubt, and the grandest of all the assaults was delivered on 12th July by the entire Ahom army in four divisions from four sides at the same time; but they all failed, and never again was the enclosure penetrated by the enemy. Moreover, from the middle of July the garrison began to make vigorous reprisals. Under the new commandant, Rashid Khan, they repeatedly sallied out and dispersed the enemy from the banks of the three streams that lie between Garhgaon and Mathurapur. "In short, repose and peace visited the inmates of the city and fort of Garhgaon." And on 7th July couriers brought the happy news that the fleet at Lakhau had kept communication with Bengal open and was more than holding its own in the encounters with the Ahoms of Majuli island.
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§14. Pestilence and famine in Mughal camp.
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But man is the least of the enemies that an invader of Assam has to dread. In August a terrible epidemic broke out at Mathurapur. From the hill immediately south of it, bearing the appropriate name of Fever Mountain (*Jwar Parbat*) blew pestilential airs and from the foot of the hill rolled down streams of putrid water. In the Mughal camp fever and flux carried off hundreds daily. Medicine had no effect, and the dead could not be given a decent burial on account of their vast number. Dilir Khan's corps was reduced from 1,500 troopers to about 450. The whole of Assam was infected, and two hundred and thirty thousand of its people died of disease that year, according to the Baduli Phukan's estimate.
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In the Mughal camp no suitable diet or comfort was available for the sick; all had to live on coarse rice; no wheat, no pulse, no *ghee*, no sugar, and no opium or tobacco except a little at fabulous prices. A pipe of tobacco sold at Rs. 3, a *tola* of opium at a gold *mohar*, a *seer* of mung-dal at Rs. 10, and salt also at the same rate as the last. The Hindustani and Turki soldiers languished for want of wheaten bread; the horses perished from eating rice. For a time the Muslim soldiers and camp-followers lived on the meat of the lean and worn out draught oxen, till these too came to an end. The soldiers,—Rajput and Muslim alike, were opium-eaters to a man, and they underwent unspeakable agony at being deprived of the accustomed drug.
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At last life at Mathurapur became unbearable, and on 17th August the army returned to Garhgaon. Much of the stored rice and many of the sick were left behind for want of transport. "It is not known what fate overtook them when the Ahoms reoccupied Mathurapur."
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The exultant Ahoms renewed their attacks on Garhgaon and there was fighting every night outside the fort. A grand attack on 15th September was defeated and the victorious Mughals chased the enemy for miles with heavy slaughter. Thereafter the Ahoms grew quiet and shrank from again provoking the Mughal army. But the pestilence now reached its extreme. The refugees from Mathurapur had infected the garrison of Garhgaon, and diverse and mutually opposed diseases broke out. "All kinds of food-stuffs disappeared except coarse red rice, without salt, and the fruit of the lime tree. Poor men did not spare the leaves on the trees, the grass on the ground or the herbs on the riverside in the pang of hunger." Mir Jumla lived and ate like the common soldiers, though he had a good store of delicacies. Much heroic self-sacrifice and social service* were rendered by some other Muslim officers too, in that dreadful period.
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By the third week of September, the worst was over. The rain began to decrease, the flood went down, the roads reappeared, "pleasant breezes began to blow, and flowers to blossom." A few days earlier cheering news had come from the fleet at Lakhau. which had restored the *thana* at Dewalgaon.
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∗ *Fathiyah*, 130-132 and 137-138 (famine and epidemic in consequence of eating coarse food); 130 and 131 (agonies of habitual opium-eaters); 131 (Mahmud Beg, paymaster, makes a gift of his store of tobacco); 138 (Muhammad Mumin Tabrizi, historiographer, nurses the sick, till he dies of disease).