Part 2
On Lally approaching, on the 31st of August, the British detachment fell back on Madras, and now our indefatigable Irishman, full of the most sanguine hopes of expelling them from the vast peninsula of Hindostan, at once made new preparations for investing Fort St. George, their principal settlement on the coast of Coromandel; but scarcity of money, and the improper conduct of the naval Chef d'Escadre, retarded the operations, frustrated the bold intentions of Lally, and ultimately betrayed them to the enemy.
While sparing no exertions to officer and equip a body of sepoy infantry, he seized a Dutch ship, in which he found a sufficient quantity of specie to enable him to attack Madras; he then sent a message to the Count d'Ache not to leave the coast; but the count replied, that he required a recruit of seamen, and must return to France. Alarmed by such a threat, Lally offered him half of his soldiers for the marine service; but deaf alike to threats and entreaties, the count sailed for the Straits of Madagascar on the 1st of September, and left Lally to cope single handed with the British forces.
On summoning to his presence M. de Bussy, who commanded the French troops in that extensive region named the Deccan (or Country of the South), and M. Moracin, who commanded at the seaport of Masulipatnam, he found these officers were somewhat influenced by the same pride and disobedience which characterized the conduct of Count d'Ache; and thus, before they would obey, and march against Madras, they required that Lally should embody an additional thousand men. He immediately ordered M. Moracin to return to his post, which the British were approaching. M. Moracin dared to refuse or delay, and taken by surprise during his absence, Masulipatnam was lost to France for ever.
In the month of October, Lally, with his slender force, the flower of which was the valiant Regiment de Lorraine, marched without opposition into the extensive district of Arcot (which seven years before had been overrun by Colonel Clive), and after remaining there at free-quarters for five days, marched back to Pondicherry.
The army was now totally destitute of pay, and the commissariat had no supply but plunder, while the departure of the Count d'Ache cut off all succour or retreat by the seaward. Though numerous, the troubles of Lally were just commencing. Discouraged and disunited by the naval disasters of d'Ache, the French officers were alternately fired with ardour and depressed by despair. M. de Bussy offered to raise 400,000 livres in three hours, if he was permitted to re-enter the Deccan with a body of troops; but being loth to divide his little force, and believing the result to be incredible, Lally wisely declined. De Bussy then informed him that he had 240,000 livres belonging to the East India Company, which were at his service if _he_ would be responsible for them; but Lally still more wisely declined to compromise his honour by appropriating the money of the merchants to the service of the nation. He resumed his preparations for the siege of Madras while the British fleet was absent from its shore; but this measure was vehemently opposed by the Governor of Pondicherry, M. Duval de Leyrit, who urged the wretched state of the commissariat and the empty military chest. Lally's Irish spirit could ill brook such disputations, and, "pay or no pay," he was for marching at once.
However, he was compelled to take the opinion of the General Council of Pondicherry, some of whom adhered to De Leyrit; but five, headed by M. le Comte d'Estaigne, offered their plate, to the value of 80,000 livres, towards the expense of the expedition. The true and generous Lally gave, from his private purse, 140,000 livres; and having thus in some measure collected the sinews of war, with his small head-quarter force, 2700 French, and a body of sepoys, he advanced towards Madras early in December.
A march of sixty-three miles brought Lally, on the 12th day of the month, in sight of the town, which, by its strength, wealth, and annual revenue in calicos and muslins, was of such great consequence, even then, to the growing English East India Company. The diamond mines were only a week's journey distant, and the rumour of their priceless wealth, and splendid wonders, animated the French soldiers, as in three divisions they marched across the sunny plains of Choultry.
Madras, or Fort St George, was divided into two parts; one called _the Black_, and the other _the White_ town. The former, Madraspatam, had been totally destroyed by the French in 1744, when they levelled to the ground every building that stood within three hundred yards of the fort. The walls of the latter, which rose above the centre of the English town were--as dispatches relate--all built of hard, iron-coloured stone, and defended by four gigantic bastions. The inner fort, or citadel, had a front of one hundred and eight yards; the outer fort consisted of half-moons, curtain-walls, and flankers, which, like the rusty-coloured ramparts of the town were studded by an incredible number of cannon. In short, the aspect of Madras, with its mansions covered by snow-white _chunam_, is delightful from the ocean, and magnificent from the land. On the latter, its walls are moated by a river, which falls into the sea on that flat and sandy shore, where a white and furious surf is ever rolling in mountains of foam.
As he crossed the plains, Lally was briskly cannonaded by the field-pieces of the enemy, and lost many officers and men; but, advancing steadily, took possession of Ogmore and Meliapore (or San Thome), an old town of the Portuguese, who had built there a large church above a grave reputed to be that of St. Thomas, who had been murdered by a tribe that dwelt in the vicinity, and whose _right legs_, after that sacrilegious act, were, according to Dr. Fryar, swollen to the size of those of elephants.
Colonel Lawrence, a gallant and resolute officer, who commanded the garrison of Madras, was ably seconded by Pigot the governor, by Colonel Draper, Major Caillaud, and other gentlemen. Thus Lally encountered the most determined resistance. The garrison consisted of 5000 men; of these, 1600 were regular troops of the British line, 300 were sepoys, and 400 were servants of the East India Company. Lawrence retired to the island in order to prevent the French from obtaining possession of the island bridge, and ordered all the posts to be occupied in the Black Town, which was triangularly shaped, and surrounded by a fortified wall.
At daybreak, on the morning of the 14th December, Lally sent forward M. de Rillon at the head of his regiment, which assailed the Black Town with great spirit, and after giving and receiving several severe discharges of musketry, during a contest of some hours, gained the place, driving back the British, who retired by detachments into the fort or citadel of Madras. This successful movement was followed by an advance of the Regiment de Lorraine, to keep the ground De Rillon had won; but within an hour, a grand _sortie_ was made upon them by a body of British infantry, led by Colonel Draper, who behaved with great personal bravery.
Shrouded in smoke, he led a charge of bayonets against the Regiment de Lorraine; a furious _melee_ ensued, and the French must have been driven back, or cut off, had not Lally sent forward another detachment, with some sepoys, to sustain the troops of M. de Rillon. A great number of officers and men were shot or bayoneted on both sides; but Colonel Draper was compelled to retreat, for his grenadiers gave way in a somewhat discreditable manner. After this, the garrison of Madras contented themselves by defending their works, being too weak to engage in _sorties_ beyond them.
Colonel, afterwards Sir William Draper, was that _preux chevalier_ who afterwards conquered Manilla, and became a paramount judge in all matters of military etiquette, and who, in his celebrated letter to Junius, expressed a hope that he would never see officers pushed into the British army who had nothing to lose but their _swords_.
Thus encouraged, by hemming in the enemy, Lally continued to push his approaches, and build batteries. Meanwhile M. de Lequille, another Chef d'Escadre, had arrived at the Isle de France, with four ships of war and three millions of livres, destined for the service of the French India Company. When about to leave the isle for the roads of Pondicherry, he unfortunately met the discomfited fleet of the Count d'Ache, who, being his superior officer, prevented him from proceeding, and removed the treasure on board his own ship, taking upon himself to send only _one_ million of livres to the Count de Lally, in a small frigate, which reached Pondicherry on the 21st December, 1758.
This supply enabled Lally to press the siege with greater vigour, and to pay his French soldiers and Indian levies a portion of their arrears; but the blacks were of little service to him during the operations. M. Lally erected several batteries against the Black Town and Fort St. George; one of these, called the Grand Battery, was 450 yards distance from the glacis. They opened on the 6th January, 1759; after which they maintained a continued discharge of shot and shells for twenty days, the pioneers pushing on the trenches until their sap had reached the base of the glacis, within pistol-shot of the parapets. Then Lally formed another and loftier battery, on which he placed four pieces of heavy cannon. It opened on the 31st of January; but for five consecutive days the artillerists were compelled to close up their embrasures with fascines and earth, for the superior fire of the fort was not to be withstood, and it soon compelled them to abandon their redoubt. The Grand Battery, however, still continued a fire, which was so well directed, that it dismounted or broke twenty-six pieces of cannon and three mortars, beating down the wall and effecting a considerable breach.
During these operations, Lally had somewhat needlessly bombarded the town, to terrify the inhabitants, and demolished a number of their houses; but the precautions of Governor Pigot, the vigilance, valour, and experience of Colonels Draper, Lawrence, and Major Brereton repelled every attack; and thus, after the 5th of February, the fire of Lally's batteries gradually diminished from twenty-three to six pieces of cannon. Money, powder, and shot became scarce together; he had lost many of his bravest men; two months had elapsed, and still the British standard waved above the fort of Madras. During this period the remonstrances which Lally sent frequently to France for succour, describe the deep anxiety he felt for the success of a cause in which his honour was implicated; and so keen and bitter did this feeling become, that at times, when aggravated by an illness incident to the climate, his reports and dispatches are remarkable for containing occasional sentences expressive of horror and distraction.
His general chagrin at the conduct of Count d'Ache and others is strongly portrayed in the following letter, which he addressed from the trenches at Madras to the Governor of Pondicherry, and which had been intercepted:--
"M. DUVAL DE LEYRIT,--A good blow might be struck here; there is in the roads a 20-gun ship laden with all the riches of Madras; she will remain there till the 20th. The _Expedition_ is just arrived, but M. Gerlin is not a man to attack her, for she made him run away once before. The _Bristol_, on the other hand, did but just make her appearance before San Thome, and on the vague report of thirteen ships coming from Porto Nova, she took fright, and, after landing the provisions with which she was laden, she would not stay even long enough to take on board twelve of her own guns, which she had lent us for the siege (of Madras).
"If I was to judge of the point of honour of the Company's officers, I would break him like glass, as well as some others of them.
"The _Fidele_, or the _Haerlem_, or even the aforesaid _Bristol_, with her twelve guns restored to her, would be sufficient to make themselves masters of the British ship, if they could get to windward of her in the night. Maugendre and Tremillier are said to be good men, and were they employed to transport 200 wounded we have here, their service would be of importance. We remain in the same position; the breach made these fifteen days; all the time within fifteen toises of the place, and never holding up our heads to look at it. I believe we must, on our return to Pondicherry, learn some _other trade_, for this of war requires too much patience.
"Of the 1500 sepoys who attended our army, I believe nearly 800 are employed upon the road to Pondicherry, laden with pepper, sugar, and other goods; and as for the coolies, they have been employed for the same purpose since the first days we came here. I am taking my measures from this day to set fire to the Black Town and to blow up the powder-mills.
"You will never imagine that fifty French deserters and 100 Swiss are actually stopping the progress of 2000 men of the king's and Company's troops, which are still here existing, notwithstanding the exaggerated accounts that every one makes, according to his own fancy, of the slaughter that has been made among them; and you will be still more surprised if I tell you that, were it not for the combats and four battles we sustained, and for the batteries which failed, or (to speak more properly) which were unskilfully made, we should not have lost fifty men from the commencement of the siege to this day. I have written to M. de Larche, that if he persists in not coming here, let who will raise money upon the Poleagers for me, I will not do it! And I renounce--as I informed you a month ago--meddling directly or indirectly with anything whatever that may relate to your administration, civil or military. For I would rather go and command the Caffres of Madagascar than remain in this Sodom, which the fire of the English must sooner or later destroy, if that from heaven should not. I have the honour to be, &c.,
"Lally.
"P.S.--I think it necessary to apprise you that, as M. des Soupirs has refused to take upon him the command of this army, which I have offered him, and which he is empowered to accept, by having received from the Court a duplicate of my commission, you must necessarily, with the council, take it upon you. For my part, I undertake only to bring it back either to Arcot or Sadraste. Send, therefore, your orders, or come yourselves to command it, for I shall quit it upon my arrival there.--L."
Though his cannonade had been diminished to only six pieces, Lally had advanced his sap along the seashore by cutting a trench about ten feet broad, with traverses to cover the soldiers, until he embraced the whole north-east angle of the covered way, from whence the Regiment de Lorraine, by a well directed mousquetade, drove the besieged in disorder. An attempt to open a passage into the ditch by mining failed, for the mine was sprung without effect.
Meanwhile Major Caillaud and Captain Preston, a Scottish officer, with a body of sepoys, another of Indian cavalry, and some European soldiers drawn from the British garrisons at Trinchinopoli and Chingalaput (which Clive when a captain had taken from the French in 1752), hovered on the roads a few miles from Madras, blocking up the avenues, cutting off succour and provisions from Pondicherry, thus compelling Lally four times (as his better states) to drive them back by detachments. These measures successfully retarded the siege until the 16th February, when, at the very time he was preparing for a grand assault at point of the bayonet, his Britannic Majesty's ship _Queensberry_, commanded by Captain Kempenfeldt, the Company's ship _Revenge_, and four other vessels, having on board 600 men of the 79th, or Colonel Draper's regiment, with a great supply of provision of every kind, came to anchor in the roadstead, and the troops were immediately disembarked and marched into Madras. The rage and mortification of Lally were now complete!
He had encountered innumerable difficulties occasioned by the scarcity of money and munition, by the wretched supplies of the Government commissaries and contractors, by the conduct of Count d'Ache and others, by the sinking of his soldiers' courage before the obstinate defence of the besieged; and now, with Kempenfeldt's arrival all hope of success vanished. After maintaining a smart cannonade until the night of the 16th closed over Madras, Lally abandoned his trenches, and was compelled by scarcity of horses to leave forty pieces of cannon behind him: he blew up the powder-mills of Ogmore and retreated into Arcot.
Soon after this siege had been abandoned, the British received from home another reinforcement of 600 infantry, and on the 16th April the main body of their troops, which had been centred at Madras for its protection, took the field in three divisions against Lally, under the command of Major Brereton. The Chevalier des Soupirs felt the first brunt of this movement, being driven by the Major from Conjeveram, a large and handsome town, principally inhabited by Brahmins, which lies forty-four miles from Madras, and had the chief manufacture of turbans and red handkerchiefs. Major Forde, with another division, took by assault the town of Masulipatnam, the governor of which, M. Moracin, was still absent, as before related. The garrison, which was commanded by the Marquis de Conflans, had been weakened by the withdrawal of its soldiers to the siege of Madras. Thus the commerce of Britain secured a sea-coast of at least eight hundred miles in length along a country teeming with wealth and commerce, while that of France was almost confined to the narrow limits of Pondicherry. The third division of British under Colonel Clive was meanwhile advancing from the province of Bengal to assist the Rajah of Visanapore, who had driven the French out of Vizagapatam, and hoisted thereon the British flag.
The first severe shock sustained by the arms of Britain in the East was given by the gallant Lally in person. Sensible of the importance of such a place as Conjeveram, which with the fort of Chingelpel, commanded all the adjacent country and secured the British conquests to the northward, he marched towards Major Brereton, and took up a strong position at Vandivash. There he cantoned his troops until the month of September, when Brereton, on receiving 300 men under Major Gordon, from Colonel Coote's Bengalese force, resolved on beating up the French in their quarters. Accordingly, on the 14th March he advanced from Conjeveram, at the head of 400 European infantry, 7000 sepoys, seventy European and 300 native horsemen, with fourteen pieces of artillery.
After capturing the fort of Trivitar, he advanced against the village of Vandivash, where Lally, although still struggling with a severe illness, had formed a strong intrenched camp, the lines of which were protected by a redoubt commanded by a rajah, and mounted with twenty pieces of cannon worked by Indians, under the directions of a single French cannonier.
At two on the morning of the 30th September the British attacked the village on three points, and on all with equal fury and determination. The French infantry, 1000 strong, made a spirited resistance; and the moment daylight broke, the guns of the rajah poured a storm of grape-shot upon the ranks of the enemy.
Lally did all that ability and gallantry could inspire to animate his troops; but being deserted by his black pioneers, who (like those of Brereton) fled at the moment of attack, the French were discouraged, and retired beyond a deep dry ditch, from whence the regiments of Lally and Lorraine made a succession of desperate sallies on the British, until, seeing that the column of Anglo-Indian horse were watching for an opportunity to fall upon his flanks, Lally, to preserve his little force from utter ruin, brought up his reserve to cover the retreat, and fell back, after the loss of many gallant chevaliers and 400 soldiers. Brereton and Gordon remained encamped in sight of the fort for some days; but the approach of the rainy season compelled them to retire into Conjeveram.
The Fort of Vandivash was afterwards garrisoned by French and sepoys, while another column of King Louis's troops assembled in Arcot, under Brigadier-General the Marquis de Bussy, who endeavoured to levy as many sepoys as possible. These native troops, whose now familiar name is derived from _Sepahe_, the Indian word for a feudatory chief or military tenant, have ever made excellent soldiers, having an inborn predilection for arms. The success at Vandivash, for giving the British even a _check_ was now deemed almost equal to a victory, made Lally conceive the idea of besieging Trinchinopoli; but again the folly or the treachery of the naval Chef d'Escadre baffled his intentions.
After having a third engagement with the British fleet on the 4th September, when with eleven ships of the line he was as usual defeated by Admiral Pocock with nine, the Count d'Ache, on the 17th, reached the roads of Pondicherry, from whence he wrote to the Count de Lally, then in position before Vandivash, offering to place at his disposal, for the king's service, 800,000 livres in piastres and diamonds, being the plunder of a British ship which he had taken at sea, and which he begged the lieutenant-general to receive as part payment of the two millions so improperly detained in the preceding year at the Isle of France. He concluded his dispatch by a notification that on the following day, the 18th September, he would sail towards Madagascar.
At this time, when British valour was bearing all before it; when the powerful fortress of Karical (which the King of Tanjowar had ceded to France in 1739) was about to fall, and he lost, with all the fertile district around it; when the united fleets of Admirals Pocock, K.B., and Sir Samuel Cornish were sweeping along the shores of the Carnatic, reducing many places of minor importance, and by their cannon everywhere beating down the _Fleur-de-lys_ of France; when Colonel Eyre Coote was pressing the French and their allies along the frontier of Bengal, and when the Prince of Vizanapore and other native rajahs were in open revolt against King Louis,--the announcement of the Chef d'Escadre filled the colonists with fear and confusion. Indignant and exasperated, Lally would have left the camp and sought Count d'Ache in person; but at that crisis, being so reduced by sickness that he could not quit his bed, he sent a deputation of field officers to represent the necessity of his remaining in the immediate vicinity of the Carnatic coast; of his co-operating with the land forces, and conjuring him by all means to suspend the execution of a design so pregnant with disaster to the Indian interests of his Most Christian Majesty. But nothing that these officers could urge, or their united eloquence suggest, would avert the fatal purpose of the Count d'Ache, who put to sea, and once more left the disheartened soldiers of King Louis to their fate.