Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c56.s10.3

v4.c56.s10.3

The Wellingtonian tactics, familiar to students of his Peninsular campaigns, were absent from his Indian battles. Here was no employment of the line against the column, no sheltering of his infantry under cover while the enemy’s tumultuous attack spent itself in vain by advancing over broken ground. At Assaye and Argaon, Wellington himself had to advance and attack before the enemy's fire could be subdued and the enemy columns thrown into disorder. Above all, he had no adequate staff; everywhere the general had to go in person to set a tactical move in operation, instead of sending a staff officer to see it done; at Assaye, a civilian like Mountstuart Elphinstone was practically his aide-de-camp throughout the fighting. The planned cohesion of the parts that characterized his battles in Europe was impossible under Indian conditions; every tactical move on his side had to be improvised then and there under the stress of the actual circumstances. And the smallness of his force, especially in cavalry, made pursuit impossible and robbed him of the chance of gaining the fullest fruits from his victory in the stricken field.