History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c74.s12: § 16. Zulfiqar abandons the siege trenches.
History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c74.s12
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§ 16. Zulfiqar abandons the siege trenches.
v5.c74.s12.1
But every project and every step of Kam Bakhsh was reported to Asad Khan by his spies. In extreme alarm and distraction at this division in their own ranks and the immense preponderance of the enemy outside, Asad Khan and Zulfiqar consulted the leading officers of the imperial army; they urged with one voice that the prince should be strictly guarded, the trenches abandoned, and the entire army concentrated in the rear lines round Asad Khan and the prince.
v5.c74.s12.2
But the withdrawal from the siege lines was not to be effected without a severe fight. Zulfiqar burst his big guns* by firing excessive charges of powder and abandoned them where they stood. Then, as he started from the trenches with his men drawn up in compact order and carrying away whatever materials he could, the exultant Marathas fell upon him. The base-camp was four miles in his rear and the fort-walls only half a mile in front; the garrison made a sortie, joined their brethren outside under Dhana Jadav, and hemmed the Mughal army on all sides. "The audacity of the infidels passed all bounds, and death stared the Muslims in the face." (M. A. 357.) The Khan had only 2,000 troopers with him, but they cut their way through "a hundred thousand (!) enemy horsemen and infantry." Zulfiqar and his lieutenants fought, as men fight for dear life. He made a counter-attack, urging his elephant up to the fort-gate and driving away the Marathas on that side. They fled within and shut the gate, losing about a thousand infantry in killed and abandoning in their flight about a thousand mares as spoils to the Mughals. In the whole battle 3000 foot and 300 cavalry are said to have fallen on the Maratha side. The imperialists lost 400 troopers, 400 horses and 8 elephants, mostly killed by artillery fire; and "few of them remained unwounded." At the close of the day they reached Asad Khan's camp. [M. A. 358, Dil. 107 b.]
v5.c74.s12.3
∗ Including some brass artillery purchased at Madras. They were burst, according to Bhimsen and the English soldier Lewis Terrill who had gone six months earlier to serve Zulfiqar. [Madras Diary, 30 Jan. 1693.] But M. A. 357 says that nails were driven into their touch-holes.