The siege of Cawnpore was a key episode in the Indian Rebellion of 1857. The besieged East India Company forces and civilians in Cawnpore (now Kanpur) were duped into a false assurance of a safe passage to Allahabad by the rebel forces under Nana Sahib. Their evacuation from Cawnpore thus turned into a massacre; most of the men were killed, while women and children were taken to a nearby dwelling known as Bibi Ghar. As an East India Company rescue force from Allahabad approached Cawnpore, around 200 British women and children captured by the rebels were butchered in what came to be known as the Bibi Ghar massacre, their remains then thrown down a nearby well. Following the recapture of Cawnpore and the discovery of the massacre, the angry Company forces engaged in widespread retaliation against captured rebel soldiers and local civilians. The murders greatly enraged the British rank-and-file against the sepoy rebels and inspired the war cry "Remember Cawnpore!".
Background
Cawnpore was an important garrison town for the East India Company forces. Located on the Grand Trunk Road, it was connected directly to the Sindh (Sind), Punjab and Awadh (Oudh) regions.
By June 1857 the Indian rebellion had spread to several areas near Cawnpore, namely Meerut, Agra, Mathura and Lucknow. However the Indian sepoys at Cawnpore initially remained loyal. The British General at Cawnpore, Hugh Wheeler, knew the local language, had adopted local customs and was married to an Indian woman. He was confident that the sepoys at Cawnpore would remain loyal to him and sent two British companies (one each of the 84th and 32nd Regiments) to besieged Lucknow.
The British contingent in Cawnpore consisted of around nine hundred people, including around three hundred military men, around three hundred women and children and about one hundred and fifty merchants, business owners, drummers (salesman), engineers and others. The rest were the native servants, who left soon after the commencement of the siege.
In the case of a rebellion by the sepoys in Cawnpore, the most suitable defensive location for the British was the magazine in the north of the city. It had thick walls, ample ammunition and stores and also hosted the local treasury. However General Wheeler decided to take refuge in the south of the city, in an entrenchment composed of two barracks surrounded by a mud wall. There was a military building site to the south of Cawnpore, where nine barracks were being constructed at the dragoon barracks. The British soldiers found it difficult to dig deep trenches, as it was the hot summer season. The area also lacked good sanitary facilities and there was only one well (which would be exposed to enemy fire in the event of an attack). In addition there were several buildings overlooking the entrenchment that would provide cover for the attackers, allowing them to shoot down on the defenders easily.
General Wheeler's choice of this location to make a stand remains controversial given the availability of safer and more defensible places in Cawnpore. It is believed that he was expecting reinforcements to come from the southern part of the city. He also assumed that, in event of a rebellion, the Indian troops would probably collect their arms, ammunition and money and head to Delhi and therefore he did not expect a long siege.
Rebellion at Fatehgarh
The first sign of the rebellion at Cawnpore came in the form of a rebellion at Fatehgarh (or Futteghur), a military station on the banks of the Ganges. To disperse the Indian troops away from Cawnpore and lessen the chances of a rebellion, General Wheeler decided to send them on various "missions". On one such mission he sent the 2nd Oudh Irregulars to Fatehgarh. On the way to Fatehgarh, General Wheeler's forces under the command of Fletcher Hayes and Lieutenant Barbour met two more Englishmen, Mr Fayrer and Lieutenant T. Carey.
On the night of 31 May 1857 Hayes and Carey departed to a nearby town to confer with the local magistrate. After their departure the Indian troops rebelled and decapitated Fayrer. Barbour was also killed as he tried to escape. When Hayes and Carey came back the next morning, an older Indian officer galloped towards them and advised them to run away. However, as the Indian officer explained the situation to them, the rebel Indian sowars (cavalry troopers) raced towards them. Hayes was killed as he tried to ride away while Carey escaped to safety.
Outbreak of rebellion at Cawnpore
There were four Indian regiments in Cawnpore: the 1st, 53rd and 56th Native Infantry, and the 2nd Bengal Cavalry. Although the sepoys in Cawnpore had not rebelled, the European families began to drift into the entrenchment as the news of rebellion in the nearby areas reached them. The entrenchment was fortified, and the Indian sepoys were asked to collect their pay one by one, so as to avoid an armed mob.
The Indian soldiers considered the fortification, and the artillery being primed, as a threat. On the night of 2 June 1857, a British officer named Lieutenant Cox fired on his Indian guard while drunk. Cox missed his target, and was thrown into the jail for a night. The very next day, a hastily convened court acquitted him, which led to discontent among the Indian soldiers. There were also rumours that the Indian troops were to be summoned to a parade, where they were to be massacred. All these factors influenced them to rebel against the East India Company rule.
The rebellion began at 1:30 AM on 5 June 1857, with three pistol shots from the rebel soldiers of the 2nd Bengal Cavalry. Elderly Risaldar-Major Bhowani Singh, who chose not to hand over the regimental colours and join the rebel sepoys, was subsequently cut down by his subordinates. The 53rd and 56th Native Infantry, which were apparently the most loyal units in the area, were awoken by the shootings. Some soldiers of the 56th attempted to leave. The European artillery assumed that they were also rebelling, and opened fire on them. The soldiers of the 53rd were also caught in the crossfire.
The 1st N.I. rebelled and left in the early morning of 6 June 1857. On the same day, the 53rd N.I. also went off, taking with them the regimental treasure and as much ammunition as they could carry. Around 150 sepoys remained loyal to General Wheeler.
After obtaining arms, ammunition and money, the rebel troops started marching towards Delhi to seek further orders from Bahadur Shah II, who had been proclaimed the Badshah-e-Hind ("Emperor of India"). The British officers were relieved, thinking that they would not face a long siege.
Nana Sahib's involvement
Nana Sahib was the adopted heir to Baji Rao II, the former peshwa of the Maratha Confederacy. The East India Company had decided that the pension and honours of the lineage would not be passed on to Nana Sahib, as he was not a natural born heir. Nana Sahib had sent his envoy Dewan Azimullah Khan to London, to petition the Queen against the company's decision, but failed to evoke a favourable response. In May 1857, Nana Sahib arrived in Cawnpore with 300 soldiers, stating that he intended to support the British: Wheeler asked him to take charge of the government treasury in the Nawabganj area.
Amid the chaos in Cawnpore in 1857, Nana Sahib entered the British magazine with his contingent. The soldiers of the 53rd Native Infantry, who were guarding the magazine, were not fully aware of the situation in the rest of the city. They assumed that Nana Sahib had come to guard the magazine on behalf of the British, as he had earlier declared his loyalty to the British, and had even sent some volunteers to be at the disposal of General Wheeler. However, Nana Sahib joined the rebels.
After taking possession of the treasury, Nana Sahib advanced up the Grand Trunk Road. His aim was to restore the Maratha Confederacy under Peshwa tradition, and he decided to attempt to capture Cawnpore. On his way, Nana Sahib met with rebel soldiers at Kalyanpur. The soldiers were on their way to Delhi, to meet Bahadur Shah II. Nana Sahib initially decided to march to Delhi and fight the British as a Mughal subordinate, but Azimullah Khan advised him that leading the rebels in Kanpur would increase his prestige more than serving a weak Muslim king.
Nana Sahib asked the rebel soldiers to go back to Cawnpore, and help him in defeating the British. The rebels were reluctant at first, but decided to join Nana Sahib, when he promised to double their pay and reward them with gold, if they were to destroy the British entrenchment.
Attack on Wheeler's entrenchment
On 5 June 1857, Nana Sahib sent a polite note to General Wheeler, informing him that he intended to attack on the following morning, at 10 AM. On 6 June Nana Sahib's forces (including the rebel soldiers) attacked the British entrenchment at 10:30 AM. The British were not adequately prepared for the attack, but managed to defend themselves for a long time, as the attacking forces were reluctant to enter the entrenchment. Nana Sahib's forces had been led to falsely believe that the entrenchment had gunpowder-filled trenches that would explode if they approached.
As the news of Nana Sahib's advances against the British garrison spread, several of the rebel sepoys joined him. By 10 June, he was believed to be leading around twelve to fifteen thousand Indian soldiers.
The British held out in their makeshift fort for three weeks with little water and food supplies. Many died as a result of sunstroke and lack of water. As the ground was too hard to dig graves, the British would pile the dead bodies outside the buildings, and drag and dump them inside a dried well during the night. The lack of sanitation facilities led to the spread of diseases such as dysentery and cholera, further weakening the defenders. There was also a small outbreak of smallpox, although this was relatively confined.
During the first week of the siege, Nana Sahib's forces encircled the entrenchment, created loopholes and established firing positions in the surrounding buildings. Captain John Moore of the 32nd (Cornwall) Light Infantry countered this by launching night-time sorties. Nana Sahib withdrew his headquarters to Savada House (or Savada Kothi), situated about two miles away. In response to Moore's sorties, Nana Sahib decided to attempt a direct assault on the British entrenchment, but the rebel soldiers displayed a lack of enthusiasm.
On 11 June, Nana Sahib's forces changed their tactics. They started concentrated firing on specific buildings, firing endless salvos of round shot into the entrenchment. They successfully damaged some of the smaller barrack buildings and also tried to set fire to the buildings.
The first major assault by Nana Sahib's side took place on the evening of 12 June. However, the attacking soldiers were still convinced that the British had laid out gunpowder-filled trenches, and did not enter the area. On 13 June, the British lost their hospital building to a fire, which destroyed most of their medical supplies and caused the deaths of a number of wounded and sick artillerymen who burned alive in the inferno. The loss of the hospital was a major blow to the defenders. Nana Sahib's forces gathered for an attack, but were repulsed by canister shots from the artillery under the command of Lieutenant George Ashe. By 21 June, the British had lost around a third of their numbers.
Wheeler's repeated messages to Henry Lawrence, the commanding officer in Lucknow, could not be answered as that garrison was itself under siege.
Assault on 23 June
The sniper fire and the bombardment continued until 23 June 1857, the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Plassey, which had taken place on 23 June 1757 and been one of the pivotal battles leading to the expansion of British rule in India. One of the driving forces of the sepoy rebellion was a prophecy of the downfall of East India Company rule in India exactly one hundred years after the Battle of Plassey. This prompted the rebel soldiers under Nana Sahib to launch a major attack on the British entrenchment on 23 June 1857.
The rebel soldiers of the 2nd Bengal Cavalry led the charge but were repulsed with canister shot when they approached within 50 yards of the British entrenchment. After the cavalry assault, the soldiers of the 1st Native Infantry launched an attack on the British, advancing behind cotton bales and parapets. They lost their commanding officer, Radhay Singh, to the opening volley from the British. They had hoped to be protected by cotton bales; however the bales caught fire from the canister shot and became a hazard to them. On the other side of the entrenchment some of the rebel soldiers engaged in hand-to-hand combat against 17 British men led by Lieutenant Mowbray Thomson. By the end of the day the attackers were unable to gain entry into the entrenchment. The attack left more than 25 rebel soldiers dead, with very few casualties on the British side.