The Disarming of the 14th BNI at Jhelum

At Jhelum, a similar scene to that in Rawalpindi was unfolding – however, with dramatically different results.
“Before gunfire on the 7th, the horse artillery guns, under Captain Cookes, and the remaining half of Lind’s Mooltanee Horse, had, by previous arrangement, moved in and taken up ground on the extreme right of cantonments to guard that flank and cut off any communication with the city. The day dawned, but the Europeans were not in sight: at length, they appeared, filing down the neighbouring high ground, and on reaching the level, they deployed into line. The 14th NI were at the time on their own parade ground, in open columns; about a hundred Sikhs had just been separated from the rest and were standing apart. As soon as the sepoys saw the European force advancing, they knew what was meant and began loading. Colonel Gerard and the other officers remonstrated, but in vain; and, perceiving their own danger, rushed forward from the regiment towards the Europeans (as also did the Sikhs), and were followed by several stray shots from the sepoys, but no one was touched. The sepoys at once broke and fell back on their lines, making the quarter-guard their advanced position and placing a small body across the road leading to it.“

If there was meant to be an element of surprise, it failed, for as Captain Gerrard wrote in his report:

” I paraded the men of the 14th Regiment N.I. for the purpose of withdrawing all the Sikhs and Punjabees, and on his arrival in the morning, for the disarming of the down countrymen. The men were paraded at 4 o’clock a.m., the Sikhs were marched off, and on the appearance cf the force under Col. Ellice on the parade ground, I attempted to explain to the men that they would be called upon to give up their arms for the present; but that if they continued to behave as well as they had hitherto been doing, that they would get them back, and that the 14th Regiment would still be borne on the strength of the army.
I had scarcely uttered the words when the whole of the Grenadier company commenced loading their firelocks, and although every effort was made by myself and my officers to dissuade the men, they loaded, and as we retired from among them towards the approaching force, they fired on us, which hastened our movements.

His final words to his regiment prompted them to load and open fire on their officers.

Five hundred yards off, the Multani Horse was ordered to charge. With Lind in the forefront, down they thundered towards the sepoys – not a shot was fired until at 30 yards, the sepoys opened a withering volley. Undeterred, the sowars raced forward, cutting down men on their right and left but the sepoys were quickly under the shelter of the nearby verandahs, on the battlemented- top of the quarter guard and most cleverly, in their huts, firing through loopholes they had previously prepared as if anticipating just such an attack. Lind’s horse was shot dead; as his charger fell, rolling the lieutenant in the dust, his men faltered and made to retreat. In those first ten minutes, they had lost nine dead and 28 wounded out of 240 sowars; sixty horses were killed and wounded. As they made their way back, the Multani Infantry and Miller’s police took up the charge, but they proved ineffectual. Many of them were raw recruits having but lately raised and barely trained; above all, they carried matchlocks and had no experience of battle against well-armed and disciplined sepoys. The six-pounders were brought into play, but the sepoys had chosen their positions carefully – the grapeshot hardly told on their defences and the guns. So they held their lines and the quarter guard. The battlements on the building had been thoughtfully provided and constructed as “an improvement in station architecture” – little did the engineer of the day suspect that his work would one day be used in quite such a manner. From their huts, behind walls and from the loopholed battlements on the quarter guard, the sepoys kept up a brisk and deadly fire.
Fifty men of the 24th under Ellice now took the chance to rush the quarter-guard – out in the open as they were and under the determined fire of the sepoys, with retreat no option, a resounding charge was the only way forward. They quickly carried the quarter guard, but Ellice was dangerously wounded in the neck, the bullet coming out close to his spine, and the thigh while his horse was shot dead. His sudden departure from command caused momentary confusion in the 24th, allowing the sepoys to rush from their lines to those of the 39th. The Multani Cavalry charged again, but they could not drive the sepoys out of the huts – this singularly harassing work was left to the infantry and the bayonet, with the sepoys of the 14th putting up as much of a fight as the Europeans could stomach. Lieutenants Streathfield and Chichester were both wounded, and the infantry was falling fast.

Meanwhile, in a curious change of events, the 100 Sikhs who had turned away from the mutiny, having been told they when seperated on the parade ground they were to accompany the 24th to Rawalpindi, were deployed with the police and placed under the command of Lieutenant Battye and Lieutenant Macdonald – they were swift to join in on the fight against their former comrades in arms. The affair could not be allowed to continue – a well-aimed shell blew up the regimental magazine, and the sepoys quickly retreated to the village of Saemlee, still 300 strong. The outworks of the village were quickly taken, but the sepoys still showed no signs of letting up; unfortunately for them, until darkness came, they also had no means of retreating. The firing dwindled and then stopped, but not before Captain Spring of the 24th lay mortally wounded on the field. It was now one o’clock in the afternoon. The men of the 24th, after a long march and seven hours of fighting, were well done up. During the short respite, they took the opportunity to avail themselves, with as much liberality a hungry and thirsty man may do, of the stores left behind by Major Knatchbull in the 39th mess house. For a moment, “order was lost” among the Europeans, and it was left to the Multani Horse and the artillery to keep watch on the village.

Around 5 p.m., Gerrard, who had assumed command after Ellice was wounded, resolved to drive the 14th out of the village. The Multani Horse and the police were placed on the left flank to cut off the sepoys’ retreat, and the artillery was brought to the front but despite Captain Cooke remonstrating them in every term he had in his vocabulary for being too close, they opened a very ineffectual fire “the sepoys, safe behind the walls and houses, picking off the gunners with fatal precision, while the grape spent itself on the mud walls or passed over their heads.”
Now, instead of rushing the village at the point of the bayonet, the Europeans inexplicably did nothing. Captain McPherson of the 24th, with six men, made the only “gallant dash” of the day, but they were left unsupported, and he was forced to fall back, fortunately for him, without the loss of a man. In the meantime, the infantry had been wasting their ammunition, and as it began to fall short, they fell back. The artillery, in their pointless position, were suffering terribly, and as men and horses fell, they too were forced to retire. Unable to drag it along, their howitzer remained where it was. The whole force was soon out of range of the sepoys’ firing; in their turn, the sepoys now sallied out and captured the howitzer, spiked as it was and dragged it with the limber into the village. While they did toss the gun into the river, they kept the ammunition. As the sun set over this very uneasy standoff, it was clear the village could not carry on after dark. As such, the men lay on the ground and bivouacked unsheltered for the night while a watch was kept up on the uncompromised walls of the village.
A telegraph was sent with all haste to Rawalpindi. Colonel Browne of the 24th was sent off with all haste to take command, and further detachment, under Lieutenant Holland, was ordered to march to Jhelum. They had only just reached the halfway point between Goojur Khan and Rawalpindi when they were told to turn and make for Jhelum. So, it was another forced march for the 24th, and when they arrived, they had to be ready for a fight.
Or not.
It was found that sometime between the dark of night and dawn, the sepoys had abandoned the village, leaving it empty. Unfortunately, escaping Jhelum was the beginning of their troubles. They had not reckoned with Deputy Commissioner Major Clement Browne. Browne, like the sepoys who had loopholed their huts, had anticipated that Jhelum would not be disarmed peacefully. As such, he had set to work well before they left the village to make any thought of escape impossible.

When the sepoys reached the river at the rear of the cantonment, they found Browne had ordered all the boats seized by a detachment of police who had deftly replaced the regular sepoy guard. All the ferryboats were under Browne’s control along the banks; after a march, some private boats were found moored along the cantonment gardens – some sepoys managed to push off and cross the river but to their consternation, the party of Multani Horse, despatched previously for just this occaision, were waiting for them. Of this party, hardly a handful lived to tell the tale. Another boat with 12 sepoys managed to catch the stream- they had escaped the Multani sword, but a worse fate awaited them.
After four days of drifting down river, their boat stranded, and they were taken prisoner at Jhung by an assistant commissioner named Hawes and a detachment of police. Hawes wrote to Robert Montgomery, requesting instructions:

180 of the sepoys managed to escape, via the Manglas Ford, into Kashmir and to their relief, Gulab Singh guaranteed their safety – but they could not know that within 2 months, Singh would be dead and the Kashmiri authorities quickly threw out 120 of them, back to the Punjab and straight to their very short trials for mutiny.
Of the 500 sepoys on the 7th of July, 150 were killed in the fight on the same day – ultimately, only 50 would remain unaccounted for. One of them would be found far afield at the capture of Lucknow in 1858. He would be killed by Captain Scott of the 9th Lancers, who took from him the Union Flag that had once occupied the top-left canton of the regimental colours. 36 years later, that relic appeared in a saleroom in the Sotheby’s saleroom in London and sold to a collector for the price of £ 17 5s.

As for the force that had taken to the field against the 14th, they lost 44 killed and 109 wounded.

In the ranks of the wounded was a young civil engineer named Scott who had “gallantly volunteered.” Captain Spring succumbed to his wounds shortly after the battle. Captain Gerrard, now without a regiment, would fall not many months hence, before the walls of Delhi.

So ended the 14th Regiment of Bengal Infantry, the once proud Escottan-ki-Pultan who had fought their last valiant fight, far from their homes, in the land of dust.