Events of Revolt Of 1857???

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Events of Revolt Of 1857???
1857 A Mutiny


The Revolutionary Upheaval of 1857


Although dismissed by some as merely a sepoy's mutiny or revolt, or as a protest against the violation of religious rights by the British, the great uprising of 1857 is slowly gaining recognition as India's first war of independance. And in it's broad sweep it was the greatest armed challenge to colonial rule during the entire course of the nineteenth century. Attracting people from all walks of life - both Hindus and Muslims, it triggered demands for radical social and economic reforms, calling for a new society that would be more democratic and more representative of popular demands.





Early Precedents





Neither was it a bolt out of the blue. Although not very well known, the period between 1763 and 1856 was not a period during which Indians accepted alien rule passively. Numerous uprisings by peasants, tribal communities and princely states confronted the British. Some were sustained - others sporadic - a few were isolated acts of revolutionary resistance - but nevertheless they all challenged colonial rule. Precipitated by the policy of unchecked colonial extraction of agricultural and forest wealth from the region - the period saw tremendous growth in rural poverty, the masses being reduced to a state of utter deprivation.





Even as official taxation was back-breaking enough, British officers routinely used their powers to coerce additional money, produce, and free services from the Indian peasants and artisans. And courts routinely dismissed their pleas for justice. In the first report of the Torture Commission at Madras presented to the British House of Commons in 1856, this was acknowledged along with the admission that officers of the East India Company did not abstain from torture, nor did they discourage its use. That this was a practice not confined to the Madras presidency alone is confirmed by a letter from Lord Dalhousie to the Court of Directors of the East India Company in September , 1855 where he admits that the practice of torture was in use in every British province. Click for more details





Desperate communities had often no choice but to resist to the bitter end. Armed revolts broke out practically every year - only to be brutally suppressed by the British. Lacking the fire power of the British arsenal - they were invariably outgunned. And lacking the means of communication available to the British - individual revolts were also unable to trigger sympathetic rebellions elsewhere. Disadvantageous timing led to crushing defeats. Yet, some of these struggles raged for many years. Click for more details





Amongst the most significant were the Kol Uprising of 1831, the Santhal Uprising of 1855, and the Kutch Rebellion which lasted from 1816 until 1832. There was also a precedence for a soldiers mutiny when Indian soldiers in Vellore (Tamil Nadu, Southern India) mutinied in 1806. Although unsuccessful, it led to the growth of unofficial political committees of soldiers who had several grievances against their British overlords.





Seething Grievances





For instance, in the Bengal Army, the 140,000 Indians who were employed as "Sepoys" were completely subordinate to the roughly 26,000 British officers. These sepoys bore the brunt of the First Britsh-Afghan War (1838-42), the two closely contested Punjab Wars (1845-6, and 1848-9) and the Second Anglo-Burmese War. They were shipped across the seas to fight in the Opium Wars against China (1840-42) and (1856-60) and the Crimean War against Russia (1854). Although at constant risk of death, the Indian sepoy faced very limited opportunities for advancement - since all positions of authority were monopolized by the Europeans.





Many of the sepoys in the Bengal Army came from the Hindi speaking plains of UP where (excluding Oudh) the British had enforced the "Mahalwari" system of taxation which involved constantly increasing revenue demands. In the first half of the 19th century - tax revenues payable to the British increased 70%. This led to mounting agricultural debts with land being mortgaged to traders and moneylenders at a very rapid rate. This inhumane system of taxation was then extended to Oudh where the entire nobility was summarily deposed.





As a result, the dissatisfaction against the British was not confined to the agricultural communities alone. By bankrupting the nobility and the urban middle class - demand for many local goods was almost eliminated. At the same time local producers were confronted with unfair competition from British imports. The consequences of this were summarized by the rebel prince Feroz Shah, in his August 1857 proclamation: "the Europeans by the introduction of English articles into India have thrown the weavers, the cotton dressers, the carpenters, the blacksmiths and the shoe-makers and others out of employ and have engrossed their occupations, so that every description of native artisan has been reduced to beggary."





Contrast this turn of events with the arrival of Mughal rule in India. Babar, in spite of his distaste for the Indian climate and customs, noted the tremendous diversity and skill of Indian craftspeople, and saw in that a great potential for expanding Indian manufacturing. Quite unlike the British, the Mughals built on the manufacturing strengths of the Indian artisan - (already well establish in the earlier Sultanate period) - and took them to dazzling heights in the later periods. But by the mid-19th century, this pre-industrial virtuosity in manufacturing had been virtually choked of by British policies. A British chronicler of the period, Thomas Lowe noted how " the native arts and manufactures as used to raise for India a name and wonder all over the western world are nearly extinguished in the present day; once renowned and great cities are merely heaps of ruins..."





All this inevitably prepared the ground for the far more widespread revolt of 1857. Although concentrated in what is now UP in modern India - the 1857 revolt spread from Dacca and Chittagong (now Bangladesh) in the East to Delhi in the West. Major urban centres in Bengal, Orissa, and Bihar including Cuttack, Sambhalpur, Patna and Ranchi participated. In Central India - the revolt spread to Indore, Jabalpur, Jhansi and Gwalior. Uprisings also took place in Nasirabad in Rajasthan, Aurangabad and Kolhapur in Maharashtra and in Peshawar on the Afghan border. But the main battleground was in the plains of UP - with every major town providing valiant resistance to the British invaders.





Starting out as a revolt of the Sepoys - it was soon accompanied by a rebellion of the civil population, particularly in the North Western Provinces and Oudh. The masses gave vent to their opposition to British rule by attacking government buildings and prisons. They raided the "treasury", charged on barracks and court houses, and threw open the prison gates. The civil rebellion had a broad social base, embracing all sections of society - the territorial magnates, peasants, artisans, religious mendicants and priests, civil servants, shopkeepers and boatmen.





For several months after the uprising began in Meerut on May 10, 1857 - British rule ceased to exist in the northern plains of India. Muslim and Hindu rulers alike joined the rebelling soldiers and militant peasants, and other nationalist fighters. Among the most prominent leaders of the uprising were Nana Sahib, Tantia Tope, Bakht Khan, Azimullah Khan, Rani Laksmi Bai, Begum Hazrat Mahal, Kunwar Singh, Maulvi Ahmadullah, Bahadur Khan and Rao Tula Ram. Former rulers had their own grievances against the British, including the notorious law on succession which gave the British the right to annexe any princely state if it lacked "legitimate male heirs".





Expressions of Popular Will





The rebels established a Court of Administration consisting of ten members - six from the army and four civilians with equal representation of Hindus and Muslims. The rebel government abolished taxes on articles of common consumption, and penalized hoarding. Amongst the provisions of it's charter was the liquidation of the hated 'Zamindari' system imposed by the British and a call for land to the tiller.





Although the former princes who joined with the rebels did not go quite as far, several aspects of the proclamations issued by the former rulers are noteworthy. All proclamations were issued in popular languages. Hindi and Urdu texts were provided simultaneously. Proclamations were issued jointly in the name of both Hindus and Muslims. Feroz Shah - in his August 1857 proclamation included some significant points. All trade was to be reserved for Indian merchants only, with free use of Government steam vessels and steam carriages. All public offices were to be given to Indians only and wages of the sepoys were to be revised upwards.





Overpowered by British Might, Betrayed by the Princes





Threatened by such a radical turn of events, the British rulers poured in immense resources in arms and men to suppress the struggle. Although the rebels fought back heroically - the betrayal by a number of rulers such as the Sikh princes, the Rajasthani princes and Maratha rulers like Scindia allowed the British to prevail. Lord Canning (then Governor General) noted that " If Scindia joins the rebels, I will pack off tomorrow". Later he was to comment: " The Princes acted as the breakwaters to the storm which otherwise would have swept us in one great wave". Such was the crucial importance of the betrayal of the princes. The British were also helped by the conservatism of the trading communities who were unwilling to put up with the uncertanties of a long drawn out rebellion.





But equally important was the superior weaponry and brutality of the British in defending their empire. British barbarity in supressing the uprising was unprecedented. After the fall of Lucknow on May 8, 1858 Frederick Engels commented: " The fact is, there is no army in Europe or America with so much brutality as the British. Plundering, violence, massacre - things that everywhere else are strictly and completely banished - are a time honoured privilege, a vested right of the British soldier ..". In Awadh alone 150,000 people were killed - of which 100,000 were civilians. The great Urdu poet, Mirza Ghalib wrote from Delhi, " In front of me, I see today rivers of blood". He went on to describe how the victorious army went on a killing spree - killing every one in sight - looting peoples property as they advanced.





Bahadur Shah's three sons were publicly executed at "Khooni Darwaaza" in Delhi and Bahadur Shah himself was blinded and exiled to Rangoon where he died in 1862. Refusing to plead for mercy from the British, he courageously retorted: " The power of India will one day shake London if the glory of self-respect remains undimmed in the hearts of the rebels". Thomas Lowe wrote: "To live in India now was like standing on the verge of a volcanic crater, the sides of which were fast crumbling away from our feet, while the boiling lava was ready to erupt and consume us"





The 1857 revolt which had forged an unshakable unity amongst Hindus and Muslims alike, was an important milestone in our freedom struggle - providing hope and inspiration for future generations of freedom lovers. However, the aftermath of the 1857 revolt also brought about dramatic changes in colonial rule. After the defeat of the 1857 national revolt - the British embarked on a furious policy of "Divide and Rule", fomenting religious hatred as never before. Resorting to rumors and falsehoods, they deliberately recast Indian history in highly communal colors and practised pernicious communal politics to divide the Indian masses. That legacy continues to plague the sub-continent today. However, if more people become aware of the colonial roots of this divisive communal gulf - it is possible that some of the damage done to Hindu-Muslim unity could be reversed. If Hindus and Muslims could rejoin and collaborate in the spirit of 1857, the sub-continent may yet be able to unshackle itself from it's colonial past.
Reply:The British East India Company won the power of Diwani in Bengal after winning the Battle of Plassey in 1757, under Robert Clive. Their victory in the Battle of Buxar in 1764 won them the Nizamat of Bengal as well. Following the Permanent Settlement of Bengal shortly thereafter, the Company began to vigorously expand its area of control in India.





In 1845 the Company managed to extend its control over Sindh province after a gruelling and bloody campaign (of Napier's 'Peccavi' fame). In 1848 the Second Anglo-Sikh War took place and the Company gained control of the Punjab as well in 1849, after the British India Army won a hard-fought victory against the Khalsa Army, who were betrayed by the Kashmiri Dogra Ministers Lal Singh and Gulab Singh (who were not Sikhs). Lal Singh was a Sikh and not a Dogra while Gulab Singh was not a minister of the Lahore government but hereditary ruler of Jammu, an allied princely state. None of the other Sikh princely rulers assisted the Lahore government. To show their appreciation the British made Gulab Singh the Maharaja of Kashmir which was part of Punjab. Gulab Singh was already a maharaja of Jammu and Ladakh and the British sold him the province of Kashmir for 75 lakhs. In 1853 the adopted son of Baji Rao the last Maratha Peshwa, Nana Sahib was denied his titles and his pension was stopped.





In 1854 Berar was annexed into the Company's domains. In 1856 the state of Awadh/Oudh was also annexed by the Company.








[edit] Causes


The rebellion or the war for independence had diverse political, economic, military, religious and social causes.





The sepoys (from shepai, Bengali for soldier, used for native Indian soldiers) of the Bengal Army had their own list of grievances against the Company Raj, mainly caused by the ethnic gulf between the British officers and their Indian troops. The British had issued new gunpowder cartridges that had cow and pig fat on them, which insulted both Hindus and Muslims.[1] Other than Indian units of the British East India Company's army, much of the resistance came from the old aristocracy, who were seeing their power steadily eroded under the British.








[edit] Frictions


Some Indians came to believe that the British intended to convert them either by force or by deception (e.g., by causing them to lose caste) to Christianity. The British religious fashion of the time was Evangelism, and many East India Company officers took it upon themselves to try to convert their Sepoys. This was strongly discouraged by the Company, which was aware of the potential for religion to become a flashpoint.





The Doctrine of Lapse, part of the British policy of expansionism, was also greatly resented. If a feudal ruler did not leave a male heir through natural process, i.e., his own child, not an adopted one, the land became the property of the British East India Company. In eight years, Lord Dalhousie, the then Governor-General of India, annexed many kingdoms including Jhansi, Awadh or Oudh, Satara, Nagpur and Sambalpur, adding up to a quarter of a million square miles (650,000 km²) of land to the Company's territory. Nobility, feudal landholders, and royal armies found themselves unemployed and humiliated. Even the jewels of the royal family of Nagpur were publicly auctioned in Calcutta, a move that was seen as a sign of abject disrespect by the remnants of the Indian aristocracy. In addition the Bengal army of the East India Company drew many recruits from Awadh; they could not remain unaffected by the discontent back home.





The justice system was considered inherently unfair to the Indians. In 1853, the British Prime Minister Lord Aberdeen opened the Indian Civil Service to native Indians; however, this was viewed by some of educated India as an insufficient reform. The official Blue Books — entitled East India (Torture) 1855–1857 — that were laid before the House of Commons during the sessions of 1856 and 1857 revealed that Company officers were allowed an extended series of appeals if convicted or accused of brutality or crimes against Indians. The Company also practised financial extortion through heavy taxation. Failure to pay these taxes almost invariably resulted in appropriation of property.





However, some historians have suggested that the impact of these reforms has been greatly exaggerated, as the British did not have the resources to enforce them, meaning that away from Calcutta their effect was negligible.[2]





This was not the view taken by the British themselves after 1857: instead they scaled down their programme of reform, increased the racial distance between Europeans and native Indians, and also sought to appease the gentry and princely families, especially Muslim, who had been major instigators of the 1857 revolt. After 1857, Zamindari (regional feudal officials) became more oppressive, the Caste System became more pronounced, and the communal divide between Hindus and Muslims became marked and visible, which some historians argue was due in great part to British efforts to keep Indian society divided. This tactic has become known as Divide and rule.





Another important reason for the rebellion was the unfair attitude towards the Mughal emperor, Bahadur Shah Zafar. Lord Dalhousie, the governor-general of India at the time, had insulted the Emperor by asking him and his successors to leave the Red Fort, the palace in Delhi. Later, Lord Canning, the next governor-general of India, announced in 1856 that Bahadur Shah's successors would not even be allowed to use the title of the king. Such discourtesies were resented by the people and the Indian rulers.








[edit] Economics


The British East India Company was a massive export company that was the force behind much of the colonization of India. The power of the Company took nearly 150 years to build. As early as 1693, the annual expenditure in political "gifts" to men in power reached nearly 90,000 pounds. In bribing the Government, the Company was allowed to operate in overseas markets despite the fact that the cheap imports of South Asian silk, cotton, and other products hurt domestic business. By 1767, the Company was forced into an agreement to pay 400,000 pounds into the National Exchequer annually.





By 1848, however, the Company's financial difficulties had reached a point where expanding revenue required expanding British territories in South Asia massively. The Company began to set aside adoption rights of native princes and began the process of annexation of more than a dozen independent Rajas between 1848 and 1854. In an article published in The New York Daily Tribune on July 28, 1857, Karl Marx notes that "... in 1854 the Raj of Berar, which comprise 80,000 square miles of land, a population from four to five million, and enormous treasures, was forcibly seized".





By 1857, the last vestiges of independent Indian states had disappeared and the Company exported untold quantities of gold, jewels, silver, silk, cotton, and a host of other precious materials back to England every year. This extraordinary quantity of wealth, much of it collected as 'taxes', was absolutely critical in expanding public and private infrastructure in Britain and in financing British expansionism elsewhere in Asia and Africa. In no uncertain terms, this very wealth funded, in large part, the Industrial Revolution.





The land was reorganised under the comparatively harsh Zamindari system to facilitate the collection of taxes. In certain areas farmers were forced to switch from subsistence farming to commercial crops such as indigo, jute, coffee and tea. This resulted in hardship to the farmers and increases in food prices.





Local industry, specifically the famous weavers of Bengal and elsewhere, also suffered under British rule. Import tariffs were kept low, according to traditional British free-market sentiments, and thus the Indian market was flooded with cheap clothing from Britain. Indigenous industry simply could not compete, and where once India had produced much of England's luxury cloth, the country was now reduced to growing cotton which was shipped to Britain to be manufactured into clothing, which was subsequently shipped back to India to be purchased by Indians.





The Indians felt that the British were levying very heavy taxation on the locals. This included an increase in the taxation on land.








[edit] Sepoys


In order to consolidate and control British territory, the East India Company maintained a well-established army of 257,000 Sepoys (native Indian soldiers, also called Sowars in cavalry units), commanded by 40,000 British officers trained at the East India Company College at Addiscombe, the company's own military school in England. The presidencies of Bombay, Madras and Bengal maintained their own army each with its own commander-in-chief. Together, they fielded more troops than the official army of the British Empire.





Unlike the Bombay and Madras Armies, which were far more diverse, the Bengal Army recruited its regular soldiers almost exclusively amongst the landowning Bhumihar Brahmins and Rajputs of the Ganges Valley. Partly owing to this, Bengal Sepoys were not subject to the penalty of flogging as were the British soldiers. Caste privileges and customs within the Bengal Army were not merely tolerated but encouraged in the early years of the Company's Rule. This meant that when they came to be threatened by modernising regimes in Calcutta from the 1840s onwards, the sepoys had become accustomed to very high ritual status, and were extremely sensitive to suggestions that their caste might be polluted.[3] In 1851-2 sepoys were required to serve overseas during a war in Burma. The Sepoys were sometimes aggravated when asked to complete tasks outside their caste.





The sepoys gradually became dissatisfied with various aspects of army life. Their pay was relatively low and after Awadh and the Punjab were annexed, the soldiers no longer received extra pay (batta) for service there, because they were no longer considered "foreign missions". Finally, officers of an evangelical persuasion in the Company's Army (such as Herbert Edwardes and Colonel S.G. Wheeler) had taken to preaching to their Sepoys in the hope of converting them to Christianity.[4] The controversy over the new Enfield Rifle, in the eyes of many Sepoys, added substance to the alarming rumours circulating about their imminent forced conversion to Christianity.





In 1857, the Bengal Army contained 10 regiments of Indian cavalry and 74 of infantry. All the cavalry units and 45 of the infantry units rebelled at some point; and all but 5 of the infantry units which did not rebel (or were disarmed before they could do so) had to be disbanded. Once the first rebellions took place, it was clear to most British commanders that the grievances which led to them were felt throughout the Bengal army and no Indian unit could wholly be trusted. Whether a unit mutinied or not mainly depended on opportunity.





The Bengal Army also administered, sometimes loosely, 29 regiments of irregular horse and 42 of irregular infantry. Some of these units belonged to states allied to the British or recently absorbed into British-administered territory, and of these, two large contingents from the states of Awadh and Gwalior readily joined the growing rebellion. Other irregular units were raised in frontier areas from communities such as Assamese or Pakhtuns to maintain order locally. Few of these participated in the rebellion, and one contingent in particular (the recently raised Punjab Irregular Force) actively participated on the British side. [5]





The Bengal Army also contained three "European" regiments of infantry, and many artillery units manned by white personnel. Due to the need for technical specialists, the artillery units generally had a higher proportion of British personnel. Although the armies of many Rajas or states which rebelled contained large numbers of guns, the British superiority in artillery was to be decisive in a number of engagements.





There were also a number of units from the British Army (referred to in India as Queen's troops) stationed in India, but in 1857 several of these had been withdrawn to take part in the Crimean War. The moment at which the sepoys' grievances led them openly to defy British authority also happened to be the most favourable opportunity to do so.








[edit] The Enfield Rifle


The rebellion was, literally, started over a gun. Sepoys throughout India were issued with a new rifle, the Pattern 1853 Enfield rifled musket - a more powerful and accurate weapon than the old smoothbore Brown Bess they had been using for the previous decades. The rifling inside the musket barrel ensured accuracy at much greater distances than was possible with old muskets. One thing did not change in this new weapon - the loading process, which did not improve significantly until the introduction of breech loaders and metallic, one-piece cartridges a few decades later.





To load both the old musket and the new rifle, soldiers had to bite the cartridge open and pour the gunpowder it contained into the rifle's muzzle, then stuff the cartridge case, which was typically paper coated with some kind of grease to make it waterproof, into the musket as wadding, before loading it with a ball.





It was believed that the cartridges that were standard issue with this rifle were greased with lard (pork fat) which was regarded as unclean by Muslims, or tallow (beef fat), regarded as sacred to Hindus. A Hindu who ate cows' flesh would lose caste, with dreadful consequences both in the present life and the next. The sepoys' British officers dismissed these claims as rumours, and suggested that the sepoys make a batch of fresh cartridges, and grease these with beeswax or mutton fat. This, not too surprisingly, reinforced the belief that the original issue cartridges were indeed greased with lard and tallow.





Another suggestion they put forward was to introduce a new drill, in which the cartridge was not bitten with the teeth but torn open with the hand. The sepoys rejected this, pointing out that they might very well forget and bite the cartridge, not surprising given the extensive drilling that allowed 19th century British troops to fire three to four rounds per minute. An integral part of the loading procedure involved biting off the bullet from the cartridge so that one hand could hold the musket steady whilst the other hand poured the charge of powder into the barrel. This meant that biting a musket cartridge was second nature to the Sepoys, some of whom had decades of service in the Company's army, and who had been doing Musket drill for every day of their service.





The Commander in Chief in India, General George Anson reacted to this crisis by saying, "I'll never give in to their beastly prejudices", and despite the pleas of his junior officers he did not compromise.








[edit] Prophecies, omens and signs


Another rumour that spread was an old prophecy that the Company's rule would end after a hundred years. Their rule in India had begun with the Battle of Plassey in 1757. Chapaties and Lotus Flowers began to circulate around large parts of India, quoting the famous line "Sub lal hogea hai." (Everything has become Red.), passed around by people from town to town and village to village, as a symbol of the prophecy and a sign of the coming revolt.[citation needed]








[edit] Start of the war


Several months of increasing tension and inflammatory incidents preceded the actual rebellion. Fires, possibly the result of arson, broke out near Calcutta on 24 January 1857. On February 26, 1857 the 19th Bengal Native Infantry (BNI) regiment came to know about new cartridges and refused to use them. Their Colonel confronted them angrily with artillery and cavalry on the parade ground, but then accepted their demand to withdraw the artillery, and cancel the next morning's parade.[6]








[edit] Mangal Pandey


Main article: Mangal Pandey


On March 29, 1857 at the Barrackpore (now Barrackpur) parade ground, near Calcutta, Mangal Pandey of the 34th BNI attacked and injured the adjutant Lt. Baugh with a sword after shooting at him, but instead hitting his horse.





General John Hearsey came out to see him on the parade ground, and claimed later that Mangal Pandey was in some kind of "religious frenzy". He ordered a Jemadar Ishwari Prasad to arrest Mangal Pandey, but the Jemadar refused. The whole regiment with the single exception of a soldier called Shaikh Paltu drew back from restraining or arresting Mangal Pandey.





Mangal Pandey, after failing to incite his comrades into an open and active rebellion, tried to take his own life by placing his musket to his chest, and pulling the trigger with his toe. He only managed to wound himself, and was court-martialled on April 6. He was hanged on April 8.





The Jemadar Ishwari Prasad too was sentenced to death and hanged on April 22. The whole regiment was disbanded - stripped of their uniforms because it was felt that they harboured ill-feelings towards their superiors, particularly after this incident. Shaikh Paltu was, however, promoted to the rank of Jemadar in the Bengal Army.





Sepoys in other regiments thought this a very harsh punishment. The show of disgrace while disbanding contributed to the extent of the rebellion in view of some historians, as disgruntled ex-sepoys returned home back to Awadh with a desire to inflict revenge, as and when the opportunity arose.





April saw fires at Agra, Allahabad and Ambala.








[edit] 3rd Light Cavalry at Meerut


On 9 May, 85 troopers of the 3rd Bengal Light Cavalry at Meerut refused to use their cartridges. They were imprisoned, sentenced to ten years of hard labour, and stripped of their uniforms in public. Malleson records that the troops were constantly berated by their imprisoned comrades while processing on a long and humiliating march to the jail. It was this insult by their own comrades which provoked the rebellion. The sepoys knew it was very likely that they would also be asked to use the new cartridges and they too would have to refuse in order to save their caste, religion and social status. Since their comrades had acted only in deference to their religious beliefs the punishment meted out by the British colonial rulers was perceived as unjust by many.





When the 11th and 20th native cavalry of the Bengal Army assembled in Meerut on 10 May, they broke rank and turned on their commanding officers. They then liberated the 3rd Regiment and attacked the European cantonment where they are reported to have killed all the Europeans they could find, including women and children, and burned their houses. There are however some contemporary British accounts that suggest that some sepoys escorted their officers to safety and then rejoined their mutinous comrades. In Malleson's words: "It is due to some of them [sepoys] to state that they did not quit Meerut before they had seen to a place of safety those officers whom they most respected. This remark applies specially to the men of the 11th N.I., who had gone most reluctantly into the movement. Before they left, two sipáhís of that regiment had escorted two ladies with their children to the carabineer barracks. They had then rejoined their comrades".[7] Some officers and their families escaped to Rampur, where they found refuge with the Nawab. Despite this, at the time wild rumours circulated about the complete massacre of all Europeans and native Christians at Meerut, the first of many such stories which would lead British forces to extremely violent reprisals against innocent civilians and mutinous sepoys alike during the later suppression of the Revolt.





The rebellious forces were then engaged by the remaining British forces in Meerut. Meerut had the largest percentage of British troops of any station in India: 2,038 European troops with twelve field guns versus 2,357 sepoys lacking artillery. Some commentators believe that the British forces could have stopped the sepoys from marching on Delhi, but the British commanders of the Meerut garrison were extraordinarily slow in reacting to the crisis. They did not even send immediate word to other British cantonments that a rebellion was in process. It seems likely that they believed they would be able to contain the Indians by themselves. This misjudgment would cost them dearly.








[edit] Support and opposition





States during the rebellionThe rebellion now spread beyond the armed forces, but it did not result in a complete popular uprising as its leaders hoped. The Indian side was not completely unified. While Bahadur Shah Zafar was restored to the imperial throne there was a faction that wanted the Maratha rulers to be enthroned as well, and the Awadhis wanted to retain the powers that their Nawab used to have.





The war was mainly centred in northern and central areas of India. Delhi, Lucknow, Cawnpore, Jhansi, Bareilly, Arrah and Jagdishpur were the main centres of conflict. The Bhojpurias of Arrah and Jagdishpur supported the Marathas. The Marathas, Rohillas and the Awadhis supported Bahadur Shah Zafar and were against the British.





There were calls for jihad by some leaders including the millenarian Ahmedullah Shah, taken up by the Muslims, particularly Muslim artisans, which caused the British to think that the Muslims were the main force behind this event. In Awadh, Sunni Muslims did not want to see a return to Shiite rule, so they often refused to join what they perceived to be a Shia rebellion.





In Thana Bhawan, the Sunnis declared Haji Imdadullah their Ameer. In May 1857 the famous Battle of Shamli took place between the forces of Haji Imdadullah and the British.





The Sikhs and Pathans of the Punjab and North-West Frontier Province supported the British and helped in the capture of Delhi. The Sikhs wanted to avenge the annexation of Punjab 8 years earlier by the British with the help of Purbhais (Bengali's and Marathi's - Easterner) who helped the British.





Most of southern India remained passive with only sporadic and haphazard outbreaks of violence. Most of the states did not take part in the war as many parts of the region were ruled by the Nizams or the Mysore royalty and were thus not directly under British rule.








[edit] Initial stages


Bahadur Shah Zafar proclaimed himself the Emperor of the whole of India. Most contemporary and modern accounts however suggest that he was coerced by the sepoys and his courtiers - against his own will - to sign the proclamation. The civilians, nobility and other dignitaries took the oath of allegiance to the Emperor. The Emperor issued coins in his name, one of the oldest ways of asserting Imperial status, and his name was added to the Khutbah, the acceptance by Muslims that he is their King.





Initially, the Indian soldiers were able to significantly push back Company forces, and captured several important towns in Haryana, Bihar, Central Provinces and the United Provinces. When the British were reinforced and began to counterattack, the sepoys who mutinied were especially handicapped by their lack of a centralised command and control system. Although they produced some natural leaders such as Bakht Khan (whom the Emperor later nominated as commander-in-chief after his son Mirza Mughal proved ineffectual), for the most part they were forced to look for leadership to rajahs and princes. Some of these were to prove dedicated leaders, but others were self-interested or inept.





Rao Tularam of Haryana along with Pran Sukh Yadav fought with the British Army at Nasibpur and then went to collect arms from Russia which had just been in a war with the British in the Crimea, but he died on the way. When a tribal leader from Peshawar sent a letter offering help, the king replied that he should not come to Delhi because the treasury was empty and the army had become uncontrollable.[8]








[edit] Delhi


Main article: Siege of Delhi


The British were slow to strike back at first. It would take time for troops stationed in Britain to make their way to India by sea, although some regiments moved overland through Persia from the Crimean War, and some regiments already en route for China were diverted to India.





It took time to organise the British troops already in India into field forces, but eventually two columns left Meerut and Simla. They proceeded slowly towards Delhi and fought, killed, and hanged numerous Indians along the way. Eventually, two months after the first outbreak of rebellion at Meerut, the two forces met near Karnal. The combined force (which included two Gurkha units serving in the Bengal Army under contract from the Kingdom of Nepal), fought the main army of the rebels at Badli-ke-Serai and drove them back to Delhi.





The British established a base on the Delhi ridge to the north of the city and the Siege of Delhi began. The siege lasted roughly from July 1 to September 21. However, the encirclement was hardly complete and the rebels could easily receive resources and reinforcements. For several weeks, it seemed that disease, exhaustion and continuous sorties by rebels from Delhi would force the British to withdraw, but the outbreaks of rebellion in the Punjab were forestalled or suppressed, allowing the Punjab Movable Column of British, Sikh and Pakhtun soldiers under John Nicholson to reinforce the besiegers on the Ridge on August 14.





An eagerly-awaited heavy siege train also joined the besieging force, and from September 7, the siege guns battered breaches in the walls and silenced the rebels' artillery. An attempt to storm the city through the breaches and the Kashmiri gate gate was launched on September 14. The attackers gained a foothold within the city but suffered heavy casualties, including John Nicholson. The British commander wished to withdraw, but was persuaded to hold on by his junior officers. After a week of street fighting, the British reached the Red Fort. Bahadur Shah had already fled to Humayun's tomb. The British had retaken the city.





The troops of the besieging force proceeded to loot and pillage the city. A large number of the citizens were slaughtered in retaliation for the Europeans and Indian 'collaborators' that had been killed by the rebel sepoys. Artillery was set up in the main mosque in the city and the neighbourhoods within the range of artillery were bombarded. These included the homes of the Muslim nobility from all over India, and contained innumerable cultural, artistic, literary and monetary riches. An example would be the loss of most of the works of Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib, thought of as the greatest Indian poet of that era.[citation needed]





The British soon arrested Bahadur Shah, and the next day British officer William Hodson shot his sons Mirza Mughal, Mirza Khizr Sultan, and Mirza Abu Bakr under his own authority at the Khooni Darwaza (the bloody gate) near Delhi Gate. Their heads were reportedly presented to their father the next day.[citation needed]





Shortly after the fall of Delhi, the victorious attackers organised a column which relieved another besieged British force in Agra, and then pressed on to Cawnpore, which had also recently been recaptured. This gave the British a continuous, although still tenuous, line of communication from the east to west of India.








[edit] Cawnpore (Kanpur)





A memorial erected (circa 1860) by the British after the Mutiny was crushed at the Bibi Ghar Well. After India's independence the statue was moved to the Memorial Church, Cawnpore. Albumen silver print by Samuel Bourne, 1860.In June, sepoys under General Wheeler in Cawnpore, (now known as Kanpur) rebelled and besieged the European entrenchment. Wheeler was not only a veteran and respected soldier, but also married to a high-caste Indian lady. He had relied on his own prestige, and his cordial relations with the Nana Sahib to thwart rebellion, and took comparatively few measures to prepare fortifications and lay in supplies and ammunition.





The British endured three weeks of the Siege of Cawnpore with little water or food, suffering continuous casualties to men, women and children. On June 25 the Nana Sahib offered fairly generous surrender terms, and Wheeler had little choice but to accept. The Nana Sahib agreed to let them have safe passage to Allahabad but on June 27 when the British left their fortified barrack buildings to board the promised riverboats, firing broke out. Who fired first has remained a matter of debate.





During the march to the boats, loyal sepoys were removed by the mutineers and lynched along with any British officer or soldier that attempted to help them, although these attacks were ignored in an attempt to reach the boats safely[citation needed]. After firing began the boats' pilots fled, setting fire to the boats, and the rebellious sepoys opened fire on the British soldiers and civilians. One boat with over a dozen wounded men initially escaped, but later grounded, was caught by mutineers and pushed back down the river towards the carnage at Cawnpore. The female occupants were removed and taken away as hostages and the men, including the wounded and elderly, were hastily put against a wall and shot. Only four men eventually escaped alive from Cawnpore on one of the boats: two privates (both of whom died later during the Rebellion), a Lieutenant, and Captain Mowbray Thomson, who wrote a firsthand account of his experiences entitled The Story of Cawnpore (London) 1859.





The history sections of Cawnpore based college libraries with mainly native literature (printed clandestinely by nationalist press during British rule and inducted into institutions after independence) however, explain it differently. They say that the British had already boarded the boats and Tatya Tope raised his right hand to signal their departure. That very moment someone from the crowd blew a loud bugle which created disorder and in the ongoing bewilderment, the boatmen jumped off the boats. British soldiers and officers still had their arms and ammunition and they fired shots at these boatmen. The rebels lost all patience and started shooting indiscriminately. Nana Sahib, who was momentarily staying in Savada Kothi (Bungalow) nearby, got the message and immediately came to stop it. The remaining men were, however, killed to ensure no further unrest. [6]





The surviving women and children from the massacre by the river were led to the Bibi-Ghar (the House of the Ladies) in Cawnpore. On the July 15, with British forces approaching Cawnpore and believing that they would not advance if there were no hostages to save, their murders were ordered. Another motive for these killings was to ensure that no information was leaked to the British after the fall of Cawnpore. After the sepoys refused to carry out this order, four butchers from the local market went into the Bibi-Ghar where they proceeded to hack the hostages down with cleavers and hatchets[citation needed]. The victims' bodies were thrown down a well.





The killing of the women and children proved to be a mistake. The British public was aghast and the pro-Indian proponents lost all their support. Cawnpore became a war cry for the British and their allies for the rest of the conflict. The Nana Sahib disappeared near the end of the Rebellion and was never heard of again.





The misinterpretation that British retaliation was ghastly only after the events of Cawnpore and the Bibi Ghar is deliberate in some accounts. Other British accounts [9][10][11] state that indiscriminate punitive measures were taken in early June, two weeks before the murders at the Bibi-Ghar, specifically by Lieutenant Colonel James George Smith Neill of the Madras Fusiliers (a European unit), commanding at Allahabad while moving towards Cawnpore. At the nearby town of Fatehpur, a mob had murdered the local British population. On this pretext, Neill explicitly ordered all villages beside the Grand Trunk Road to be burned, and their inhabitants to be hanged. Neill's methods were "ruthless and horrible" [12] and may well have induced previously undecided sepoys and communities to revolt.





Neill was killed in action at Lucknow on September 26 and was never called to account for his punitive measures, though contemporary British sources lionised Neill and his "gallant blue caps". By contrast with the actions of soldiers under Neill, the behaviour of most rebel soldiers was creditable. "Our creed does not permit us to kill a bound prisoner", one of the matchlockmen explained, "though we can slay our enemy in battle." [10][13]





When the British retook Cawnpore later, the soldiers took their sepoy prisoners to the Bibi-Ghar and forced them to lick the bloodstains from the walls and floor[citation needed]. They then hanged or "blew from the cannon" the majority of the sepoy prisoners. Although some claimed the sepoys took no actual part in the killings themselves, they did not act to stop it and this was acknowledged by Captain Thompson after the British departed Cawnpore for a second time.








[edit] Lucknow


Main article: Siege of Lucknow





Secundra Bagh after the slaughter of 2,000 Rebels by the 93rd Highlanders and 4th Punjab Regiment. Albumen silver print by Felice Beato, 1858.Rebellion erupted in the state of Awadh (also known as Oudh, in modern-day Uttar Pradesh), which had been annexed barely a year before, very soon after the events in Meerut. The British Commissioner resident at Lucknow, Sir Henry Lawrence, had enough time to fortify his position inside the Residency compound. The British forces numbered some 1700 men, including loyal sepoys. The rebels' initial assaults were unsuccessful, and so they began a barrage of artillery and musket fire into the compound. Lawrence was one of the first casualties. The rebels tried to breach the walls with explosives and bypass them via underground tunnels that led to underground close combat. After 90 days of siege, numbers of British were reduced to 300 loyal sepoys, 350 British soldiers and 550 non-combatants.





On September 25 a relief column under the command of Sir Henry Havelock and accompanied by Sir James Outram (who in theory was his superior) fought its way from Cawnpore to Lucknow in a brief campaign in which the numerically small column defeated rebel forces in a series of increasingly large battles. This became known as 'The First Relief of Lucknow', as this force was not strong enough to break the siege or extricate themselves, and so was forced to join the garrison. In October another, larger, army under the new Commander-in-Chief, Sir Colin Campbell, was finally able to relieve the garrison and on the November 18, they evacuated the defended enclave within the city, the women and children leaving first. They then conducted an orderly withdrawal to Cawnpore, where they defeated an attempt by Tatya Tope to recapture Cawnpore.





Early in 1858, Campbell once again advanced on Lucknow with a large army, this time seeking to suppress the rebellion in Awadh. He was aided by a large Nepalese contingent advancing from the north under Jang Bahadur, who had remained allied to Britain throughout the rebellion in India. Campbell's advance was slow and methodical, and drove the large but disorganised rebel army from Lucknow with few casualties to his own troops. This nevertheless allowed large numbers of the rebels to disperse into Awadh, and Campbell was forced to spend the summer and autumn dealing with scattered pockets of resistance while losing men to heat, disease and guerilla actions.








[edit] Jhansi


Jhansi was a Maratha-ruled princely state in Bundelkhand. When the Raja of Jhansi died without a male heir in 1853, it was annexed to the British Raj by the Governor-General of India under the Doctrine of Lapse. His widow, Rani Lakshmi Bai, protested that she had not been allowed to adopt a successor, as per Indian custom.





When war broke out, Jhansi quickly became a centre of the rebellion. A small group of British officials and their families took refuge in Jhansi's fort, and the Rani negotiated their evacuation. However, when they left the fort, they were massacred by the rebels. Although the treachery might have occurred without the Rani's consent, the British suspected her of complicity, despite her protestations of innocence.





In September and October 1857, the Rani led the successful defence of Jhansi from the invading armies of the neighbouring rajas of Datia and Orchha. In March 1858, the Central India Field Force, led by Sir Hugh Rose, advanced on and laid siege to Jhansi. The British captured the city, but the Rani fled in disguise.





These events, with significant embellishments, form the basis of John Masters' book, Nightrunners of Bengal.








[edit] Other areas


On 1 June 1858, Rani Lakshmi Bai and a group of Maratha rebels captured the fortress city of Gwalior from the Scindia rulers, who were British allies. The Rani died on the 17th of June, the second day of the Battle of Gwalior probably by a carbine shot flying from the 8th Hussars, according to the account of three independent Indian representatives. The British captured Gwalior within the next three days. In descriptions of the scene of her last battle, she was compared to Joan Of Arc by some commentators.[citation needed]





The Rohillas centred in Bareilly were also very active in the war and this area was amongst the last to be recaptured by the British, after Campbell had finally quelled resistance in Awadh.








[edit] Retaliation — "The Devil's Wind"


From the end of 1857, the British had begun to gain ground again. Lucknow was retaken in March 1858. On 8 July 1858, a peace treaty was signed and the war ended. The last rebels were defeated in Gwalior on 20 June 1858. By 1859, rebel leaders Bakht Khan and Nana Sahib had either been slain or had fled. The British adopted the old Mughal (often rendered Mogul in English) punishment for mutiny and sentenced rebels were lashed to the mouth of cannons and blown to pieces. It was a crude and brutal war, with both sides resorting to what would now be described as war crimes. In the end, however, in terms of sheer numbers, the casualties were significantly higher on the Indian side. A letter published after the fall of Delhi in the "Bombay Telegraph" and subsequently reproduced in the British press testified to the scale and nature of the retaliation:





".... All the city people found within the walls (of the city of Delhi) when our troops entered were bayoneted on the spot, and the number was considerable, as you may suppose, when I tell you that in some houses forty and fifty people were hiding. These were not mutineers but residents of the city, who trusted to our well-known mild rule for pardon. I am glad to say they were disappointed".





Another brief letter from General Montgomery to Captain Hodson, the conqueror of Delhi exposes how the British military high command approved of the cold blooded massacre of Delhites: "All honour to you for catching the king and slaying his sons. I hope you will bag many more!"





Another comment on the conduct of the British soldiers after the fall of Delhi is of Captain Hodson himself in his book, Twelve years in India: "With all my love for the army, I must confess, the conduct of professed Christians, on this occasion, was one of the most humiliating facts connected with the siege." (Hodson was killed during the recapture of Lucknow in early 1858).





Edward Vibart, a nineteen year-old officer, also recorded his experience: "It was literally murder... I have seen many bloody and awful sights lately but such a one as I witnessed yesterday I pray I never see again. The women were all spared but their screams on seeing their husbands and sons butchered, were most painful... Heaven knows I feel no pity, but when some old grey bearded man is brought and shot before your very eyes, hard must be that man's heart I think who can look on with indifference..."





As a result, the end of the war was followed by the execution of a vast majority of combatants from the Indian side as well as large numbers of civilians perceived to be sympathetic to the rebel cause. The British press and British government did not advocate clemency of any kind, though Governor General Canning tried to be sympathetic to native sensibilities, earning the scornful sobriquet "Clemency Canning". Soldiers took very few prisoners and often executed them later. Whole villages were wiped out for apparent pro-rebel sympathies. The Indians called this retaliation "the Devil's Wind."[citation needed]








[edit] Reorganisation





Bahadur Shah Zafar exiled in Rangoon. Photograph by Robert Tytler and Charles Shepherd, May 1858.The rebellion saw the end of the British East India Company's rule in India. In August, by the Government of India Act 1858, the company was formally dissolved and its ruling powers over India were transferred to the British Crown. A new British government department, the India Office, was created to handle the governance of India, and its head, the Secretary of State for India, was entrusted with formulating Indian policy. The Governor-General of India gained a new title (Viceroy of India), and implemented the policies devised by the India Office. The British colonial administration embarked on a program of reform, trying to integrate Indian higher castes and rulers into the government and abolishing attempts at Westernization. The Viceroy stopped land grabs, decreed religious tolerance and admitted Indians into civil service, albeit mainly as subordinates.





Militarily, the rebellion transformed both the "native" and European armies of British India. The British increased the ratio of British to Indian soldiers. Regiments which had remained loyal to the British were retained, and the number of Gurkha units, which had been crucial in the Delhi campaign, was increased. The inefficiencies of the old organisation, which had estranged sepoys from their British officers, were addressed, and the post-1857 units were mainly organised on the "irregular" system. (Before the rebellion, Bengal Infantry units had 26 British officers, who held every position of authority down to the second-in-command of each company. In Irregular units, there were only six or seven or even fewer British officers, who associated themselves far more closely with their soldiers, while more trust and responsibility was given to the Indian officers.) Most new units were raised from among the so-called "Martial Races", which were not part of mainstream Indian culture.





Sepoy artillery was abolished also, leaving all artillery (except some small detachments of mountain guns) in British hands. The post-rebellion changes formed the basis of the military organisation of British India until the early twentieth century.





Bahadur Shah was tried for treason by a military commission assembled at Delhi, and exiled to Rangoon where he died in 1862, finally bringing the Mughal dynasty to an end. In 1877 Queen Victoria took the title of Empress of India on the advice of her Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli.








[edit] Debate over name of conflict


There is no agreed name for the events of this period,





In India and the rest of South Asia it is commonly termed the "War of Independence of 1857", and "First War of Independence" (Hindi: १८५७ का प्रथम भारतीय स्वतंत्रता संग्राम)


In Britain, it is commonly called the "Indian Mutiny", but other terms such as "Great Indian Mutiny", the "Sepoy Mutiny", the "Sepoy Rebellion", the "Great Mutiny", the "Rebellion of 1857" and the "Revolt of 1857" have also been used. William Dalrymple, in his recent work on the event, The Last Mughal, refers to it as "the Uprising".


Although many Indian historians do term it as mutiny as well, on the Indian subcontinent it is commonly referred to as a "War of Independence", and the use of the term "Indian Mutiny" is considered by many as unacceptable and offensive, as it is perceived to belittle what they see as a "First War of Independence" and therefore reflecting a biased, imperialistic attitude of the erstwhile colonists.[citation needed]





For example, in October, 2006, the Speaker of the Lok Sabha, the lower house of Indian Parliament said:





“ The War of 1857 was undoubtedly an epoch-making event in India’s struggle for freedom. For what the British sought to deride as a mere sepoy mutiny was India’s First War of Independence in a very true sense, when people from all walks of life, irrespective of their caste, creed, religion and language, rose against the British rule.


...





Not only did these martyrs give up their lives for the sake of the country’s freedom but also left a message for the future generations --- a message of sacrifice, courage of conviction, a strong belief in the ultimate victory of the people in their war against oppression.





...





With these words, I once again pay my humble tributes to the martyrs of the 1857 War of Independence...


”


— Chaterjee, Somnath - Office of the Speaker of the Lok Sabha [14]








[edit] Debate over the national character of the rebellion


Historians remain divided on whether the rebellion can properly be considered a war of Indian independence or not, although it is popularly considered to be one in India. Arguments against include:





A united India did not exist at that time in political terms;


The rebellion was put down with the help of other Indian soldiers drawn from the Madras Army, the Bombay Army and the Sikh regiments;


A second school of thought while acknowledging the validity of the above-mentioned arguments opines that this rebellion may indeed be called a war of India's independence. The reasons advanced are:





Even though the rebellion had various causes (e.g. sepoy grievances, British high-handedness, the Doctrine of Lapse etc.), most of the rebel sepoys set out to revive the old Mughal empire, that signified a national symbol for them, instead of heading home or joining services of their regional principalities, which would not have been unreasonable if their revolt were only inspired by grievances;


The hanging of two participants in the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Albumen silver print by Felice Beato, 1858There was a widespread popular revolt in many areas such as Awadh, Bundelkhand and Rohilkhand. The rebellion was therefore more than just a military rebellion, and it spanned more than one region;


The sepoys did not seek to revive small kingdoms in their regions, instead they repeatedly proclaimed a "country-wide rule" of the Moghuls and vowed to drive out the British from "India", as they knew it then. (The sepoys ignored local princes and proclaimed in cities they took over: Khalq Khuda Ki, Mulk Badshah Ka, Hukm Subahdar Sipahi Bahadur Ka - i.e. the world belongs to God, the country to the Emperor and executive powers to the Sepoy Commandant in the city). The objective of driving out "foreigners" from not only one's own area but from their conception of the entirety of "India", signifies a nationalist sentiment;


The troops of the Bengal Army were used extensively in warfare by the British and had therefore travelled extensively across the Indian subcontinent, leading them perhaps to develop some notion of a nation-state called India. They displayed for the first time in this rebellion, some contemporary British accounts (Malleson) suggest, patriotic sentiments in the modern sense.


Besides this, a contemporary British chronicler, Thomas Lowe, in Central India during the rebellion, wrote in 1860: “To live in India, now, was like standing on the verge of a volcanic crater, the sides of which were fast crumbling away from our feet, while the boiling lava was ready to erupt and consume us.” Further, he exclaimed: “The infanticide Rajput, the bigoted Brahmin, the fanatic Mussalman, had joined together in the cause; cow-killer and the cow-worshipper, the pig-hater and the pig-eater… had revolted together.” - [15]





In short, we may summarise the discussion in following terms.





If the criterion of a National War of Independence is set as "a war (or numerous conflicts) spread all over the nation cutting across regional lines", the rebellion in that case does not qualify as a war of India's independence.


If the criterion for a National War of Independence is set as "a war, which even if geographically confined to certain regions, is waged with the intention of driving out from the complete national area a power perceived to be foreign", then it was a war of national independence.


This discussion shows that the term "national war" is subject to individual opinions and cannot be answered decisively.








[edit] In Popular Culture


Plans are afoot by the Government of India to celebrate 2007 as the 150th anniversary of what Indians term as "India's First War of Independence". In the Union Budget of 2007, an amount of Rs. 10 crore was set aside for the celebration. The (British) National Army Museum in London is mounting a display to mark the 150th anniversary on 10 May,[16] and there is also an online exhibition called "India Rising".[17]





The 2005 Bollywood film "Mangal Pandey: The Rising" is set immediately prior to the outbreak of the Rebellion.


The 1981 Bollywood film "Kranti" is set during these times.


In the 1984 Hollywood film "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom," the Rebellion is referenced by Captain Philip Blumburtt while discussing the Thuggees at a dinner hosted by the Maharajah of the fictitious princely state of Pankot


The film "King of the Khyber Rifles" is set during this time (although the book is set during World War I).


The book "Flashman in the Great Game" (5th book in the Flashman series) is a historical novel by George MacDonald Fraser set in India during the rebellion and involves many of the locations and persons involved.





[edit] References


^ Victorian Web 1857 Indian Rebellion


^ Eric Stokes “The First Century of British Colonial Rule in India: Social Revolution or Social Stagnation?” Past and Present №.58 (Feb. 1973) pp136-160


^ Seema Alavi The Sepoys and the Company (Delhi: Oxford University Press) 1998 p5


^ Christopher Hibbert The Great Mutiny (London: Allen Lane) 1978 pp51-4


^ Figures on Bengal Army from Major A.H. Amin, orbat.com


^ Memorandum from Lieutenant-Colonel W. St. L. Mitchell (CO of the 19th BNI) to Major A. H. Ross about his troop's refusal to accept the Enfield cartridges, 27 February 1857, Archives of Project South Asia, South Dakota State University and Missouri Southern State University


^ Sir John Kaye %26amp; G.B. Malleson.: The Indian Mutiny of 1857, (Delhi: Rupa %26amp; Co.) reprint 2005 p49


^ Qizilbash, Basharat Hussain (30th June 2006) The tragicomic hero. The Nation. Nawai-e-Waqt Group. [1]


^ J.W. Sherer, Daily Life during the Indian Mutiny, 1858, p. 56


^ a b Andrew Ward, Our bones are scattered - The Cawnpore massacres and the Indian Mutiny of 1757, John Murray, 1996


^ Ramson, Martin %26amp; Ramson, Edward, The Indian Empire, 1858


^ Michael Edwardes, Battles of the Indian Mutiny, Pan, 1963 ISBN 330-02524-4


^ [2]


^ Somnath Chatterjee - Office of the Speaker of the Lok Sabha on the name of the conflict, October 2006 [3]


^ Sitaram Yechury - Hindustan Times Jan 2006 - The Empire Strikes Back - [4]


^ India Rising, National Army Museum


^ [5], National Army Museum





[edit] Further reading


Raikes, Charles: Notes on the Revolt in the North-Western Provinces of India, Longman, London, 1858.


Russell, William Howard, My Diary in India in the years 1858-9, Routledge, London, 1860, (2 vols.)


Trevelyan, Sir George Otto, Cawnpore, Indus, Delhi, (first edition 1865), reprint 2002.


Khan, Sir Syed Ahmad, Asbab-e Baghawat-e Hind 1859; Translated as The Causes of the Indian Revolt, Allahabad, 1873.


Kaye, Sir John %26amp; Malleson, G.B.: The Indian Mutiny of 1857, Rupa %26amp; Co., Delhi, (1st edition 1890) reprint 2005.


Roberts, Field Marshal Lord, Forty-one Years in India, Richard Bentley, London, 1897 Forty-one years in India, available at Project Gutenberg.


Innes, Lt. General McLeod: The Sepoy Revolt, A.D. Innes %26amp; Co., London, 1897.


Fitchett, W.H., B.A.,LL.D., A Tale of the Great Mutiny, Smith, Elder %26amp; Co., London, 1911.


Sen, Surendra Nath, Eighteen fifty-seven, (with a foreword by Maulana Abul Kalam Azad), Indian Ministry of Information %26amp; Broadcasting, Delhi, 1957.


Barter, Captain Richard The Siege of Delhi. Mutiny memories of an old officer, London, The Folio Society, 1984.


Hibbert, Christopher, The Great Mutiny : India 1857, London, Allen Lane, 1988.


Roy, Tapti, The politics of a popular uprising : Bundelkhand 1857, Delhi, for the Oxford University Press, 1994.


Stanley, Peter, White Mutiny: British Military Culture in India, 1825-1875, Christopher Hurst %26amp; Co., London, 1998.


Taylor, P. J. O., What really happened during the mutiny : a day-by-day account of the major events of 1857 - 1859 in India, Delhi, for the Oxford University Press, 1999.


Rizvi, Syed Khurshid Mustafa: 1857 - History of the Indian Struggle for Freedom, Raza Library, Rampur, 2000 [in Urdu].


Mukherjee, Rudrangshu: Awadh in Revolt 1857-1858, Permanent Black, Delhi, 2001.


Saul David, The Indian Mutiny : 1857,Penguin Books, 2003.


Farrell, J.G. "The Siege of Krishnapur", New York Review of Books, 2004.


Wilberforce, Reginald G, An Unrecorded Chapter of the Indian Mutiny, Being the Personal Reminiscences of Reginald G. WIlberforce, Late 52nd Infantry, Compiled from a Diary and Letters Written on the Spot London: John Murray 1884, facsimile reprint: Gurgaon: The Academic Press, 1976.


Godse Vishnubhat, Maza Pravas: 1857 cya Bandaci Hakikat, ed. Datto Vaman Potdar, Pune: Venus Prakashan, 1974. (This text is in Marathi)


Pandey Sita Ram, From Sepoy to Subedar, Being the Life and Adventures of Subedar Sita Ram, a Native Officer of the Bengal Native Army, Written and Related by Himself, trans. Lt. Col. Norgate, (Lahore: Bengal Staff Corps, 1873), ed. James Lunt, (Delhi: Vikas Publications, 1970).





--------------------------------------...





Continued... Facts %26amp; Figures





"Indian Mutiny." Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Online. http://www.eb.com:180/cgi-bin/g?DocF=mic... 23 Mar. 1998.


"Lee-Enfield Rifle." Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Online. http://www.eb.com:180/cgi-bin/g?DocF=ind... 23 Mar. 1998.


Campbell, Sir Colin. Narrative of the Indian Revolt. London: George Vickers, 1858.


Collier, Richard. The Great Indian Mutiny. New York: Dutton, 1964.


Kaye, John William. A History of the Sepoy War In India (3 vols). London: W.H. Allen %26amp; Co., 1878.


Keene, H. George. British Administration During the Revolt of 1857. New Delhi: Inter- India Publications, 1985.


Malleson, Colonel G.B. The Indian Mutiny of 1857. New York: Scribner %26amp; Sons, 1891.


Marx, Karl %26amp; Freidrich Engels. The First Indian War of Independence 1857-1859. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1959.


Palmer, J.A.B. The Mutiny Outbreak at Meerut In 1857. Cambridge: University Press, 1966.


Stokes, Eric. The Peasant Armed: The Indian Revolt of 1857. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986.


Ward, Andrew. Our Bones Are Scattered. New York: Holt %26amp; Co., 1996.


Fictional %26amp; Narrative Literature





Kilworth, Garry Douglas. Brothers of the Blade: Constable %26amp; Robinson, 2004.


Alavi, Seema. The Sepoys and the Company: Tradition and Transition 1770-1830. New York: Oxford U P, 1995.


Farrell, J.G.. The Siege of Krishnapur. New York: Carroll %26amp; Graf, 1985 (orig. 1973; Booker Prize winner).


Fenn, Clive Robert. For the Old Flag: A Tale of the Mutiny. London: Sampson Low, 1899.


Grant, James. First Love and Last Love: A Tale of the Mutiny. New York: G. Routledge %26amp; Sons, 1869.


Kaye, Mary Margaret. Shadow of the Moon. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1979.


Masters, John. Nightrunners of Bengal. New York: Viking Press, 1951.


Raikes, William Stephen. 12 Years of a Soldier's Life In India. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1860.


[edit] See also


Vellore Mutiny


Azimullah Khan


History of South Asia


British Raj


Titumir


Syed Ahmad Khan


Martial Race


[edit] External links


History of Bharat on Bharatadesam.Com


The Bollywood film The Rising depicts events around the life of Mangal Pandey


Truth behind 1857 part I


Truth behind 1857 part II


Truth behind 1857 part III


First War of Independence - Sify


Development of Situation-January to July 1857 - Maj (Retd) AGHA HUMAYUN AMIN from WASHINGTON DC


The Library of Congress (US) - Research Centers - Country Study - India @ 1857
Reply:Visit


www.bbc.co.uk/hindi/india