Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c56.s25: § 14. Reflections on the destruction of De Boigne's army
Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c56.s25
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§ 14. Reflections on the destruction of De Boigne's army
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The battle of Laswari ended in "the annihilation of the whole of the regular forces in Sindhia's service commanded by French officers," as Lake justly claimed after his victory. But a heavy price had to be paid for it. On the British side 822 men were "killed and wounded out of a total force on the ground of about 8,000 men". Three officers of the highest rank and ten lower ones were killed, while about 40 others were wounded. The eight cavalry regiments lost 553 horses. But this battle showed the wonderful power of endurance, daring and cohesion of the British army. Their infantry went into the action after marching 65 miles in 48 hours; the cavalry covered 42 miles in 24 hours, and flung themselves on the enemy's unsubdued artillery immediately on reaching the field. Their horses were not watered or fed for twenty hours, during which they had been kept saddled and fighting. No wonder, when the end of it came, the victors had no breath left for pursuit. [Pearse, 241. Kharé, xiv. p. 7938.]
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The glory of the British arms was heightened by the staunchness and bravery of the enemy whom they subdued.
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De Boigne’s old brigades were annihilated but not disgraced. Their conqueror himself paid the highest compliment when he reported to the Governor-General, “All the sepoys of the enemy behaved exceedingly well, and if they had been commanded by French officers the event would have been extremely doubtful. I never was in so serious a business in my life, or anything like it. Their gunners stood to their guns until killed by the bayonet. These fellows fought like devils, or rather heroes.” Captain Grant Duff confirms this praise, “The hardy veterans of De Boigne, determined to die where they could not conquer, fought on with brave though unavailing obstinacy, and except about 2000, who were broken, surrounded and made prisoners, they fell with their arms in their hand.” [ Pearse, 249. Duff, iii. 256.]*
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At Laswari sepoys of the same race and province with equality of armament, fought on the opposite sides. It is the historian’s duty to explain why “the bravery and obstinacy of Sindhia’s trained brigades were unavailing” on that day. The first and foremost handicap of the campoo was their being suddenly deprived of the heads to whose guidance they had been accustomed ever since their formation fourteen years ago. Now, when the storm of war burst upon Sindhia, no Indian higher officers could take the places of the mercenary foreign captains who had deserted their men in the hour of need. The campoo could not improvise a general staff for co-ordinating the action of the different parts of the same army, after being deserted by their European chiefs. Thus, at Patparganj and Laswari, each battalion fought on the initiative of its own Indian commandant, with no generalissimo to link their tactics together, in the way that Lake or Arthur Wellesley made his army one compact fighting machine. Our n.c.o.’s and privates usually fought to the death, but the higher Indian officers were often a disgrace to their race.
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∗ Skinner, who was now on the British side near Delhi, adds, “As Lord Lake was returning from the battle, some of the Europeans cheered him. He took off his hat and thanked them, but told them to despise death, as these brave fellows had done, pointing to the Marāthas who were lying thick around their guns.” (Fraser, i. 306).
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The rot was worst in the head of this campoo. Ambāji Inglé, who had come to take Perron’s place as the supreme General, was the worst sinner. At the first sign of the battle turning against him at Laswari, he took to flight on a richly caparisoned elephant, but as the pursuit grew hotter he changed to a swift horse and escaped, without making one attempt to retrieve the day or save the remnant of his men by conducting an orderly retreat.*
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Contrast the Marātha generalissimo’s conduct with his British opponent’s. Lake personally headed every charge of his infantry. On that eventful afternoon, while the British column was being deployed for the attack, General Lake, as ever riding in the front rank, had his horse shot under him (the second time in one day) and his coat burnt by an enemy bullet which missed his breast by the merest chance. His son George dismounted, gave his own charger to his father, and mounted a riderless horse found there. Just then a shot struck him and the gallant youth fell down senseless. The agonised father turned to look at his dying son, but it was for a moment only. At the stern call of duty natural feelings were suppressed. The General left his son’s quivering body, and instantly jumping into the saddle, rode away to lead his infantry to the charge on the right of the 76th British Foot. The scene inspired all who saw it with an indescribable ardour to be worthy of such a leader.
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Three British officers, next in rank to Lake only, fell in this battle, besides ten others of less exalted rank ; but no colonel captain or even lieutenant in Sindhia’s army, because these offices in the campoo had been hitherto filled by Europeans only. The hard-pressed British troops were kept in heart by the example of their European officers in the Royal and the Company's services alike, who fearlessly sacrificed themselves in front of their men. As Lake himself wrote after one of these battles, "You may perceive by the loss of European officers in sepoy regiments how necessary it is for them to expose themselves—in short, everything has been done by the example and exertions of the officers. . . . . The sepoys have behaved exceedingly well. but from my observation this day as well as on every other, it is impossible to do great things in a gallant and quick style without Europeans" (*i.e.*, European regiments). (Pearse, 214.)
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∗ Ambāji’s cowardly duplicity did not end with the battle of Laswari. On 16 Dec. he made a treaty agreeing to give up the fort of Gwalior to the English. But when a British detachment went to the place, its qiladar refused to yield it, and letters from Ambaji were intercepted in which he directed the garrison never to surrender to the English and promised them further supplies of men and money immediately. Thorn, 246 Pester 237.
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The infantry of Oudhmen in Sindhia's service were no doubt brave and disciplined; but there was no regular cavalry in their brigades. Sindhia's horsemen were indigenous troopers, mostly Marathas with a proportion of Pathan and other North Indian races; their equipment and tactics fitted them for light raiding only. Cavalry has always been the weakest arm of the Indian army ever since our encounter with Alexander's horsemen on the bank of the Jhelam more than two thousand years ago. The Indian troopers mounted on light horses, were never trained to deliver shock charges like a battering ram, but used to whirl round and try to throw into disorder a stationary enemy. They shrank from meeting breast to breast any heavy cavalry in compact serried ranks like the Turks or the British. In fact, in the campoo the cavalry did not count; they waited for the success of the regular infantry before making any move of their own. Hence, they could never come to the aid of their hard-pressed brethren of the foot regiments.
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In their tactics, the campoo had become obsessed with the belief that fire-power was everything in war, and that battles were won by mere superiority in the number of guns and the supply of munitions. This lesson had been impressed on them by their European trainers again and again.* They had never been prepared for the manly test of the push of the pike or the crossing of bayonets; and therefore, when their guns failed to check the British advance, the infantrymen could make no stand before the line of glittering steel in the hands of British musketeers and even of British-led sepoys. The campoo’s guns fell undefended into the hands of the charging British lines, who cut down such gunners as stood by their pieces, while their own infantry guards made no stand before the on-rushing foe.
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The perfect co-ordination of action between cavalry and infantry and the advance of artillery in close support of a moving infantry, were never learnt by Sindhia’s campoo, or if once learnt they had been forgotten after the departure of De Boigne. Perron had no galloper guns attached to his Regular Cavalry, but only to the Hindustan horse,—none of the latter were present at Laswari. [PRC. ix. p. 112.] Thus Sarwar Khan had nothing but his guns of position to oppose Lake’s moving batteries (four in number) in the decisive fighting of the afternoon, and his infantry became helpless targets on leaving their trenches.
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Even as regards musketry, it is evident that the campoo sepoys were behind the British sepoys in the accuracy and rapidity of their fire. Their French and mestizo officers, bent solely on making their private fortunes, not only stole the money in the regimental chests—as Lestenneau and Bourquien had done,—but peculated the funds allotted for buying powder and shot for their men’s target practice. Hence most of Sindhia’s soldiers were poor marksmen, who shot wildly and could not stop the British advance with bullets.
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∗ Pester testifies to it at five places in his diary of this war: “All the officers lately in Sindhia’s employ [and now come over to the English] assure us that they depend entirely on the formidable train of artillery to defeat us.” [War and Sport, 159, 171, 187, 217 &c.] See Col. Dawes’s assurance to the Peshwa before the battle of Hadapsar. (Ch. 45 § 6.) Wellington’s view, Gur. ii.