strove to excite our tributaries to revolt against us, the Jumna, and then a combined movement of our and wrote an arrogant and insulting letter to troops took place against him. Colonel Murray, General Lake, which concluded by threatening, commanding in Goojerat, was ordered to prosecute "that countries of many hundred coss (a measure-hostilities in the direction of Indore, the capital; ment of two miles), shall be over-run and plundered. Lord Lake shall not have leisure to breathe for a moment; and calamities will fall on lacs of human beings, in continual war, by the attacks of my army, which overwhelms like the waves of the sea.”*

Not satisfied with these threats, he openly solicited the alliance of Scindia, and to anticipate war, commenced to plunder the territories of the Rajah of Jeypore. Papers laid before the House of Commons, prior to our army taking the field, state that

"The predatory course of proceedings adopted by Holkar, pending a negotiation, was such as to have imposed on the British Government in that quarter, the necessity of using force for the reduction of his usurped power. There appears to have been a great deal. of treachery on the part of Holkar; and his hostile disposition before the open rupture took place was on some occasions marked with the most sanguinary and murderous traits.

"Captains Vickers, Todd, and Ryan, British officers in his service, were, in a moment of profound peace, cruelly murdered by him, because they had expressed their determination to return to the British service. The heads of these unfortunate gentlemen were severed from their bodies, exposed on pikes, and the bodies forbid to be buried, on pretence that Captain Todd had carried on a traitorous correspondence with General Lake, which the latter declares was never the case. The Marquis of Wellesley considers that, under all these circumstances, it would be creditable to the justice and honour of the British Government to restore the injured relative of Holkar to his hereditary rights; and, at all events, that the enterprising spirit and perfidious views of the usurper render the reduction of his power a desirable object, with reference to the complete establishment of tranquillity in India."

So far as numbers constituted strength, Holkar, at this time, could bring into the field nearly 50,000 cavalry and 20,000 infantry, with 100 pieces of cannon. His fortresses were numerous; and among them Gaulna and Chandore, amid high and barren hills, at the termination of the Western Ghauts, and ranked among the strongest places in India.

After the savage murders referred to, the ferocious Mahratta chief retired up the valley of * Malcolm's Political History of India."

our troops stationed above the Ghauts prepared to operate against his possessions in the Deccan ; while Lake began his march westward through the pass of Ballakeera towards the borders of Jeypore.

On the 28th of April he was at Tonk, a town which stands in a triangular hollow, not far from the city of the former name, and which is overlooked by a steep and conical mountain of rock. On the 10th May a detachment, under Colonel Don, was dispatched against Tonk Rampoora, a fort held by Holkar's Rajpoots, about sixty miles southward of Jeypore, and, though strong, it was suddenly reduced five days afterwards. The garrison consisted of 1,100 men, of whom fifty were slain. In some places the walls were forty feet thick and twenty feet high.† On losing this, his only fortress north of the Chumbul, Holkar crossed the river, closely followed by three battalions of native infantry, which Lord Lake had sent forward, under Colonel Monson, together with the troops of the Jeypore Rajah, to press him on one flank, while Colonel Murray, from the direction of Goojerat, was to act upon another.

Deeming these two columns sufficient to keep Holkar in check, Lord Lake retired to Agra, as the troops were suffering fearfully from the hot winds, which destroyed all pasture, so that the cattle perished by scores daily. On halting at Hindown on the 28th of May, tidings reached him that a party of British troops had been cut up in Bundelcund, where Colonel Fawcett had detached seven companies to reduce a fort five miles distant from his position at Koonch. The killedar promised to surrender next day if the firing ceased. To these terms the officer in command agreed; but, meanwhile, the treacherous killedar invited the intervention of Ameer Khan, then in the vicinity at the head of 7,000 horse, who fell suddenly upon the trenches and cut down to a man two companies of sepoys and fifty gunners, and carried off five pieces of cannon. The remaining five companies effected their retreat with the utmost difficulty.

The disastrous march of Lake continued, and daily men perished under the dreadful hot wind— "the Devil's breath." We are told that young men who began the route in the morning full of spirits and in vigorous health, fell dead when they halted; "and many were smitten on the road by the overpowering force of the sun, especially when at meridian, the rays darting downwards like a torrent

+ Calcutta Gazette.

1804.]

MONSON'S DISASTROUS RETREAT.

387

of fire;" while, to add to the misery of want of Accordingly Colonel Monson, certain that he could water, hordes of robbers hovered about, pillaging and murdering every straggler, till the troops reached Agra, on the 5th of June.*

Colonel Monson's force consisted of five battalions of infantry and 3,000 irregular cavalry, and with these, hoping to co-operate effectively with Murray, he penetrated into Holkar's territory by the Mokundra Pass, and sent forward a detachment, under Major James Sinclair, to redeem the hill fort of Hinglaisghur, which stands on a height, surrounded by walls and a deep ravine 200 yards in breadth, crossed by three artificial causeways, and deemed, of course, impregnable. On Sinclair's arrival within a mile of this place, he learned that Holkar, with the most of his forces and guns, was within a short distance; but as the rains were at hand, there was no time to be lost, and he at once led his troops to the attack, under a heavy cannonade, which the admirable fire of his artillery silenced in an hour. He then took by storm the fort, which was garrisoned by 800 foot and 300 horse. The killedar escaped, with many others, by a sally port, but they perished miserably in the adjacent jungles.

Colonel Monson had marched fifty miles beyond the pass in the direction of Chumbul, when he heard that Holkar was advancing with his whole army. This was on the 7th of July. The gallant Monson hastened to anticipate the meeting, but found it prudent to desist, as Sinclair's detachment had not yet rejoined him, and another was absent in search of grain. The startling intelligence also came that Colonel Murray was intending to fall back on the river Mhye. He was thus compelled to send off his baggage and stores to Sonara; and at four o'clock on the morning of the 8th of July, 1804, to begin a retreat towards the Mokundra Pass, leaving the irregular cavalry, under Lieutenant Lucan, to cover the movement, and in half an hour after bring him intelligence of Holkar. But he had not proceeded twelve miles when he heard that the latter had cut off Lucan's force, and made him prisoner. On the 9th Monson was in the pass, and on the following day the Mahratta cavalry covered all the slopes of it, and Holkar demanded the surrender of our guns and small arms. This was, of course, refused, and both sides prepared for battle.

Dividing his cavalry into three columns, Holkar charged the detachment, in front and on both flanks, but was always repulsed with great loss, and drew off till his artillery and infantry came up. * Major Thorn, &c.

not with success resist long in the field, retired upon Kotah, a fortified town on the east bank of the Chumbul; and after two marches, though dreadfully harassed by the enemy, by want of food, and the rains, he succeeded in reaching it, to find its gates closed upon him by the Rajpoot Rajah, and his toil-worn and desperate troops were compelled to turn their weary steps towards the Gaumuch ford on the river. It lay but seven miles distant, but so soft was the soil, and so much was the country now under water, that a whole day was spent ere the ford was reached, only to be found impassable — impassable, and a fierce enemy coming on!

After a brief halt to procure some food, the guns were abandoned amid the mud in which they sank hopelessly; so they were spiked, and the troops pushed on to the Chumbulee, a rivulet, now swollen by the rains to a red and roaring river. 17th, the troops began to cross on elephants and rafts, but ten days elapsed ere the whole of them were over, and, in the meantime, their privations nearly drove the men mad. Many of the wives and children of the soldiers, who had been unwisely left to the last on the opposite side, were murdered by the barbarous Bheels, under the eyes of their husbands and fathers, who were unable to yield them the slightest protection.

On reaching Rampoora, a succouring force of cavalry and infantry, with four field-pieces and two howitzers, sent by Lord Lake, now came up on the 29th July, and the retreat was continued towards Kooshalghur. Monson's force, now reduced to five battalions and six companies of sepoys, reached the Bunass on the 22nd of August, but that river was found so swollen as to be unfordable, yet some boats were procured, and in these the treasure was sent across, under six companies of the 21st Regiment, with orders to lodge it in Kooshalghur.

Early on the following morning, in great strength, the cavalry of Holkar appeared, and pitched their tents at the distance of four miles. On the 24th the waters subsided, and four regiments, most of the baggage, and a howitzer, were sent across by Colonel Monson; but Holkar's cavalry also crossed in great force on both flanks of our position, and at four in the afternoon, their infantry and guns opened a cannonade on the solitary battalion and pickets left on the south bank to protect the passage of the camp-followers, that necessary appendage, and yet curse to all Indian armies. officer in command of this force, Lieutenant Jones, 2nd Infantry, in a letter dated Agra, September

The

the 24th, 1804, thus details what ensued to a brother-officer :

Our loss of officers in this retreat was twenty-two, including Major James Sinclair, who was killed, and many drowned. The prisoners were treated with great inhumanity by Holkar, who cut off the right hand of most of them.

The attacking foe, led by Holkar in person, nearly annihilated this luckless rear-guard. Colonel "We were now completely cut off from communi- Monson was obliged to abandon the baggage, to cation with the army encamped on the other side. facilitate his retreat to Kooshalghur, which he Our battalion had only four hundred able to bear reached on the night of the 25th of August, and arms, and the pickets of the 9th and 12th, and where he discovered that Sedasheo Bhow Bhaskur, with this small force we had to combat the strength an officer of Scindia's, whom he had expected to of Holkar's army-nearly 20,000 horse and twenty- join him with six battalions and twenty guns, had eight guns, with four battalions of sepoys, called declared himself an enemy, and begun to levy conAlliads, extremely despicable, and without match-tributions in the territory of Jeypore, demanding locks. The enemy, perceiving the situation I have the surrender of the elephants, treasure, and described, did not fail to take advantage of it, and baggage which had arrived there with the escort of immediately posted his guns in a commanding the 12th, under Captain Nicholl, and had actually situation, very close to us. The action began by cannonaded the fort of Kooshalghur, but without his attacking my picket, only eighty men strong, effect. which was advanced closer to his posts than any other. He continued to bring guns to bear upon me, and with such effect that, in spite of my endeavours to secure myself, I lost upwards of fifty men out of the eighty in ten minutes-all by grape-shot. Monson, the brigadier, seeing that I could not stand, advanced to my support, when a terrible and destructive fire commenced, which unfortunately did too much execution, and the alternative was, either to perish on the spot or endeavour to take his guns. Accordingly our battalion, in the most brave manner, succeeded in securing seven; but the whole of our ammunition being expended, and no possibility of support or means of making use of the enemy's guns appearing -they having had the precaution to run away with the sponge staves-we were under the necessity of retreating. The moment the order was given, and our backs turned, the whole of the enemy rushed in, sword in hand, but for some time were checked by the powerful use of the bayonet. The troops, however, were able to effect their retreat to the river, spent with fatigue, and mostly all wounded-dering down in three divisions. Coolly and bravely your son included. the toil-worn infantry reserved their fire till the horses' breasts were almost at the bayonet's point, and then it was poured in with terrible effect.

Everything now, of course, went to wreck, and the officers, as well as the men, consulted their own safety by throwing themselves into the river with the utmost precipitation; and here the final destruction of our battalion ensued.

"Such was the strength of the current, that those who could swim were carried down for miles before they could effect a landing, and in this sad place your unfortunate son was buried. He and his young chum, Walker, perished together-both wounded, and weak with loss of blood. Those who escaped the waves were instantly cut to pieces on their landing on the beach. The enemy showed no quarter to Europeans in particular. I escaped by being put by some faithful sepoys on an elephant, prior to the retreat of the battalion."*

*E. I. U. S. Journal, vol. viii.

On the morning of the 26th, after his arrival at Kooshalghur, Colonel Monson found himself surrounded by the whole of Holkar's cavalry, between whom and some of his native officers he detected a secret and dangerous correspondence, in consequence of which two companies of sepoys, and many of the Hindostani Horse, went openly over to the enemy. At seven in the evening the colonel moved again, with his troops formed in an oblong square, into which the enemy's charging horsemen strove in vain to hew a passage; and on the following night he reached the ruined and deserted fort of Hindown, from whence, after a few hours' halt, he resumed his most disastrous retreat, at one o'clock in the morning; but was no sooner clear of some rugged ravines, than the yelling and charging hordes of steel-shirted Mahratta horse came thun

By sunset on the 28th, sinking with starvation and fatigue, the troops reached the Biana Passfifty-four miles south-west of Agra-where it was Monson's intention to halt for the night. But now Holkar's artillery came up and opened fire; confusion ensued; the ranks were broken, and the troops taking fairly to flight, made their way, thinned, disordered, and demoralised, to Agra, pursued as far as Futtehpore by flying parties of the enemy's cavalry. Of this disastrous affair, Sir Arthur Wellesley wrote thus to Colonel Wallace:"In the first place, it appears that Colonel Monson's corps was never so strong as to be able to + Major Thorn.