The Last Boat and Gavin Jones

We left Colonel Smith floundering on a sandbank on his way to Cawnpore. By this time, Gavin Jones on his gourd had managed to catch him up, as had the injured Reverend Fisher, half-demented after seeing his family die in the river. It finally occurred to Colonel Smith that if a mad, injured man and another one floating on a gourd could catch up to him so quickly, then maybe now was the time to make haste. The rudder was fixed, the dead bodies disposed of, and two sails fashioned from blankets were rigged up. All precautions were taken to avoid the cliffs of Khusumkhor, and the main channel was abandoned in favour of a smaller one. The boat again ran aground. This time, to their surprise, the villagers on the bank were not out for their blood. Friendly and accommodating, they assisted with getting the boat off the bank, provided the fugitives with food and milk, and Colonel Smith was able to arrange for a crew and a guard for the rest of the way to Cawnpore. Six boatmen and ten matchlock men were found, and the boat pulled up for the night at the village called Tehra. It was here that Gavin Jones left the party.
Finding himself unable to rest on the boat, injured and severely sunburned, he took himself off to the village, looking for a charpoy to lie on for the night. Lieutenant Swetenham was too badly wounded to accompany him, so Gavin went off alone.
Shortly after he left, nearby villagers became hostile to Colonel Smith and the fugitives. Demanding a share of the money the colonel had paid for the boatmen and guard, Smith thought it wiser to push off as quickly as possible. He sent word to Gavin Jones, who by this time was so unwell that he could not move. His moment of helplessness turned out to be his salvation. Protected by the villagers, he was finally able to join the Probyns and Mr Edwards at Khasaura in August. His story ends here.
What happened over the next four days to Colonel Smith is unknown. Needless to say, they made it as far as Fatehpur Chaurasi, where they were fired upon from the opposite bank by a battery set up at the Shukul Deo Ghat at Bithur. A quick surrender for unknown reasons followed. From here, their road is surprisingly similar to that of Mr Brierly’s party, barely one month earlier. First, they were taken to be inspected by Nana Sahib’s brother at the palace in Bithur. From here, they were conveyed to Savada Kothi, where they were herded into the same room as their compatriots had been, only this time, the men were kept outside. Smith, Goldie and Thornhill were separated from the rest of the men at the behest of the Nana. At 4 pm, the last of the men were lined up with their backs to a wall at the Commissariat Yard. Doctor Maltby, Mr Fisher, Lieut. Swetenham, all badly wounded, Sergt. Roach, Best, Gibson and Boscow, Mr James, opium officer, Mr. Donald and his son who had escaped from Budaon, Dr. Heathcote, Wrixon the bandsman, Captain Phillimore who had had the sense to send his wife away, Adjutant Henderson, Ensign Byrne, Humphreys, Colonel Tucker’s manservant, and finally Captain Edmund Vibart whose fight Fatehgarh was not supposed to be and he died thus, so close to Cawnpore. They were first shot and then finished off with swords, their corpses plundered, and their bodies were thrown into the Ganges.
For the remaining ladies and children, a different fate awaited them, one which has been covered in another chapter on Cawnpore, the Bibighar. Colonels Goldie and Smith, Mr Thornhill, together with Mr Greenway and his thirteen-year-old son, were shot shortly before the massacre on the 15th of July began.

A Final Note from David Churcher

In Blackwood’s Magazine, David Churcher wrote a short account of his trials and tribulations. One of his recollections is particularly poignant and concerns the victims of the Parade Ground Massacre. He writes:

“I may here mention that although this well was known to thousands who were spectators of the foul deed, not a soul brought it to the attention of the authorities when Fatehgarh was reoccupied. The discovery was made quite accidentally by Gavin Jones and myself one evening whilst strolling together and talking about past events.
We happened to meet an old man who I questioned about the massacre, asking him if he knew what became of the bodies of the victims. Hearing me talk in his own gawari, he forgot all caution and told us he could show us where they were buried. Recollecting himself suddenly, however, he became reticent and professed to know nothing of the affair, fearful lest he should be the means of establishing his own misdeeds – for few had escaped being implicated in plunder, or worse, during those days of anarchy. I succeeded in pacifying his alarm, however, after our promising that he would not be mentioned in the matter, he guided us to the spot and showed us the well into which the bodies had been flung. The matter was immediately reported by us to Mr. Power, the magistrate, who had the well examined, and the fragments of several bodies were exhumed in a very advanced stage of decomposition, the ropes with which they had been bound still clinging to their bones.”

So ends the story of Fatehgarh. Tales of escapes that should not have been, an impossible siege that could have been prevented and deaths that should not have happened.

^{Sources:
Further Papers (No. 4) Relative to the Mutinies in the East Indies (deposition of Gavin Jones, enclosure 60 in No. 4). London: Harrison & Sons, 1857
Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine. Vol. 167, January–June 1900. Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons, 1900.
The Cornhill Magazine. Vol. 11, January–June 1865. London: Smith, Elder and Co., 1865.
Danvers, Frederick Charles, ed. Memorials of Old Haileybury College. Westminster: Archibald Constable and Co., 1894.
Edwards, William. Personal Adventures During the Indian Rebellion in Rohilcund, Futtehghur, and Oude. London: Smith, Elder and Co., 1858.
Nevill, H. R., ed. Hardoi: A Gazetteer. Vol. XLI of the District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. Lucknow: Government Press, 1904.
Sherer, J. W. Havelock’s March on Cawnpore, 1857: A Civilian’s Notes. London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1910.
Wallace, C. L., and F. R. Cosens. Fatehgarh and the Mutiny. Lucknow: Newul Kishore Press, 1933. [1]
Walsh, J. Johnston. A Memorial of the Futtehgarh Mission and the Martyred Missionaries: With Some Remarks on the Mutiny in India. Philadelphia: Joseph M. Wilson, 1859.
Ward, Andrew. Our Bones Are Scattered: The Cawnpore Massacres and the Indian Mutiny of 1857. New York: Henry Holt and Co., 1996.}