Lucknow: The Residency
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This article was written in 1939 and has been extracted from
HISTORIC LUCKNOW
By SIDNEY HAY
ILLUSTRATED BY
ENVER AHMED
With an Introduction by
THE RIGHT HON. LORD HAILEY,
G.C.S.I., G.C.I.E.
Sometime Governor of the United Provinces
Asian Educational Services, 1939.
The Residency
The Term “Residency” Now includes a large protected enclosure. Originally it applied only to the large English-looking house, colour-washed in yellow, conceived for the British Residency by Nawab Asaf-ud- Doulah in 1780 and finished by Nawab Sa’adat Ali Khan twenty years later.
The house stands upon what was then the highest point of Lucknow. It boasted three storeys. At one corner a tower projected a foot or two above the roof, bearing the flagstaff from which generations of Union Jacks have proudly waved. Wide verandahs shielded the interior from the sun. Beneath still lies a suite of tykhanas, or underground rooms, which remain dark and cool in the glare of the hottest summer day, although the narrow slits in the upper walls admit of but scant ventilation.
Until Captain John Baillie became Resident at the beginning of the nineteenth century there was no guard over the house. He, however, soon protested against this shortcoming, with the result that the Nawab built a guard house, now famous as the Baillie Gate, to be occupied by a company from Mariaon, five miles across the river.
The Marquess of Hastings records that he dined with Major Baillie at the Residency in 1814. Later the road led up the slope through some folding gates into a close, surrounded by gardens and well built houses, with barracks at the entrance. One of these houses was occupied by the Resident; another was his banqueting hall, containing apartments for his guests ; a third was unusually pleasing and assigned to guests of the King of Oudh. Stables for horses and adequate accommodation for ‘a brave retinue’ were accompanying features of this third house.
For another thirty years., until the outbreak of 1857, the community clustered about these delightful buildings on the little hill, unheeding the fate in store for them.
A brief knowledge of the events of the Mutiny is essential to appreciate the ruins of the historic enclosure. Things began to move imperceptibly many months before the actual outbreak. The first tangible evidence of the Mutiny in Lucknow was on May 2, when the 7th Oudh Irregulars at the Moosa Bagh refused to bite the new cartridge. After that incident the rebels became ever braver until their sense of superiority was complete.
The events of the siege proper could not be better summed up than in the words set upon a tablet on the wall of the women’s quarters, above the tykhanas of the Residency. “On 30th June, 1857 A.D., the day after the battle of Chinhut, the siege began. On the 2nd July, Sir Henry Lawrence was mortally wounded by a shell which burst within the Residency building. The command then devolved on Brigadier J. E. W. Inglis of Her Majesty’s 32nd Regiment. The force within the defence then consisted of 130 officers, British and native, 74 British and 700 native troops and 150 civilian volunteers.
There were 237 women, 260 children, 50 boys of La Martinière College, 27 non-combatant Europeans and 700 noncombatant natives, being a total of 2,994 souls. From the 30th June to the 25th September, for eighty-seven days, they were closely invested, subjected to a heavy artillery fire, day and night, on all sides, and had to sustain several general attacks on the position. On the 25th September, 1857 A.D., Generals Outram and Havelock, with a large force, endeavoured to release the garrison, after having, with great loss, effected a juncture with them.
They were, however, unable to withdraw, and the whole combined force was besieged for a period of fifty-three days, until finally relieved by Sir Colin Campbell on the 17th November, 1857 A.D. There remained of the original garrison, when relieved on the 25th September, a total of 979 souls, including sick and wounded, of whom 577 were European and 402 natives.” So emaciated and weakened was every living thing within the Residency that those camels and horses which had survived when the time came for the final exodus found it scarcely possible to drag one limb after the other.
The first night of freedom was spent at the Secunder Bagh, the weak refugees starting fearfully at every untoward sound. The following day, on crept the pitiful train to Dilkusha, ‘Heart’s Delight’. For these hearts which had suffered so much in those few short months, there can have been little delight.
The Baillie Guard Gateway
The Baillie Guard Gateway from which the gate has long since disappeared was, during the siege, effectively banked with earth and sandbags from the inside. To the right a battery of two nine-pounders and an eight-inch howitzer defended the entrance. On September 25, Havelock at the head of his relieving force reached the famous gateway as darkness fell to find the barricade impassable owing to its fortifications.
A gun thrust through a breach was hastily withdrawn, and the troops marched in, Havelock and Outram riding at their head, to receive a welcome that only those who were present could ever fully appreciate. An hour or two later despair fell deeper by sharp contrast, when the beleaguered garrison realised that the force was no relief at all but an added burden, requiring food, accommodation and ammunition, all of which were already at a premium.
As Havelock’s force streamed through the breach, men of his troops, their blood heated to fever point from fighting every inch of their way through the streets of Lucknow, bayoneted by mistake three of the sepoys belonging to the 13th Native Infantry. “Kuch parwa nahin, Kismet hai …Baillie Guard ki jai,” they said. “Never mind. It was fate. Victory to the Baillie Guard.” Although these men had been within speaking distance of the enemy throughout the siege, no threats or cajoloments could persuade them to desert. Lord Canning wrote: “Their courageous constancy under the severest trials is worthy of all honour.” After the Mutiny the three faithful regiments, the 13th, 48th and 71st Native Infantry Regiments were formed into the 16th (Lucknow) Rajput Regiment.
The Treasury
The Treasury stands immediately on the right of the Baillie Guard entrance, the long centre room being commandeered during the siege for the manufacture of Enfield cartridges. Lieut. Aitken commanded the garrison composed of detachments from the 13th and 48th Native Infantry Regiments, to the former of which he belonged. He was assisted by Loughman with whose help they constructed and manned an eighteen-pounder gun. It is recorded that he commanded the sepoys “with signal courage and success”. They had also to garrison the Baillle Gate, holding it against great odds in the assault on July 20. Lieut. Aitken gained the V.C. for various acts of gallantry at Lucknow. Some years later he became Inspector-General of Police in Oudh.
Just above the Treasury is the BANQUETING HALL, also under the command of Lieut. Aitken during the siege. Originally it served the double purpose of Banqueting Hall and Council Chamber. Above the Resident’s offices on the ground floor were luxuriously furnished apartments reserved as guest rooms.
The building made an admirable hospital. One room, on the north side, was set apart for state prisoners, including Mustafa Ali Khan, a brother of the ex-King of Oudh, the Rajah of Tulsipore and two princes related to the Emperor of Delhi. One of the latter, Nawab Nakun-un-Doulah, died during the siege. He was buried at the gate of Ommaney’s post opposite the front entrance to the Residency proper. The enemy knew, through spies, that prisoners were kept in this building and forbore to fire heavily upon it.
Here the Reverend Henry Polehampton, during his ceaseless tending of the sick, was severely wounded on July 8. His devotion was such that “he never swerved from this self- imposed duty and only left the hospital to go to his meals.” He was well on the road to recovery after his wound when he contracted cholera. He died less than a fortnight later. Towards the end of June, he and his wife had moved into a small room in the hospital building where Mrs. Polehampton busied herself with the sick.
DR. FAYRER’S HOUSE stands across the road opposite to the Banqueting Hall. Dr. Fayrer was the Residency surgeon at the time of the Mutiny and showed all the kindness in his power to the poor refugees who crowded into the Residency at the order of Sir Henry Lawrence. Dr. and Mrs. Fayrer were a young couple who had a beautiful baby boy. At the beginning of the siege he was eleven months’ old, and the plaything of all the inmates of the house. By the beginning of August, through lack of good nourishment, poor little Bobby Fayrer was very ill. Never had there been such a sad change in any baby. From being a “lovely cherub of a child” he had shrunk to mere skin and bones and looked like a little wizened old man.
For the women, cooped up in the house, life was extremely monotonous. Each day they rose at four o’clock and sat in front of the house, where they drank a little tea and ate biscuits while such delicacies lasted. At eight o’clock they went indoors and busied themselves with setting their rooms in order. They would then put the finishing touches to their toilet before reading the Psalms and Lessons of the day, and praying.
Breakfast was at ten The rest of the morning they would sit together in the drawing-room, where the temperature was about ninety-three, sewing or playing with the children. They dined at four. When the sun set they emerged from the sheltering stone walls to have tea and ices. Prayers were again said at ninethirty. After that they went to bed in stuffy little rooms even hotter than the drawing-room. The only change or excitement was in the shape of bad news or horrible alarms.
Many of them slept together in the tykhana where they spread mattresses on the floor, lying cheek by jowl so as to reap the maximum benefit from the punkah. The room had nothing but skylights, so they ate their meals by the fitful light of a candle. The normal fare was stew “as being easiest to cook ; It is brought up in a large deckgee so as not to dirty a dish, and a portion ladled out to each person. Of course, we can get no bread or butter, so chupattis are the disagreeable substitute.
Two eighteen-pounders came through the room Emmie and I used to sleep in, and where we have since always gone to perform an alarmed and hurried toilet. We dress now in a tiny barricaded closet out of the dining-room where no balls have come yet. We are all going to sleep in the dining-room to-night. The tykhana is too damp, everyone is ill and the dining-room is tolerably safe.” Mercifully, the summer of 1857 proved a remarkably mild one. Instead of the relentless succession of days of burning sun, sullen clouds shielded the earth from unbearable heat.
When Sir Henry Lawrence was wounded he was removed to Dr. Fayrer’s house where Mrs. Harris, wife of one of the clergymen., stayed upstairs all day to nurse him. He lingered for a day or two in extreme suffering, for “his screams are so terrible I think the sound will never leave my ears.” He died at a quarter past eight on the morning of July 4.
The Fayrers’ house was built on sloping ground so that on the Residency side it had but one storey and on the city side two. Captain Weston of the Oudh Police defended it with sepoy pensioners, for its flat roof encircled by sandbags afforded a point of vantage for sharpshooters. Below was a battery of brass nine-pounder howitzers and an eighteen-pounder gun. SANDERS’ POST was originally the Financial Commissioner’s office, and was a big double-storeyed house manned by men of the 32nd under Captain Sanders of the 13th Native Infantry.
Sago’s House
Sago’s House was another of the front line defence posts which, owing to its salient portion, was particularly vulnerable. It was a small one-storeyed building exposed on three sides to tbe enemy, and formerly belonged to a school mistress, Mrs. Sago. During the siege this house was garrisoned by a party of the 32nd under Lieut. Clery.
Germon’s Post
Germon’s Post was within a stone’s throw of Sago’s House. Transit from one to the other was down a narrow passage and was fraught with much danger. Formerly the Judicial Commissioner’s office, it was commanded by Captain Germon of the 13th Native Infantry and garrisoned by some of his own Sikhs and by uncovenanted civilians. It was a big twostoreyed house which sheltered the families of the uncovenanted civilians. So near were besieged and besiegers that instead of bullets rounds of abuse were often exchanged which may account for the fact that several feet of the walls are still standing.
The Post Office
The Post Office lay behind and to one side of Germon’s Post, and on slightly higher ground. In front of it were placed a couple of mortars and four guns. Now only a pillar remains to mark the position of what was then a building housing a large number of European soldiers and several families. It was an important defence post, an officer constantly remaining on watch upon the roof. The gallant Captain Barnard McCabe of His Majesty’s 32nd Regiment was in command, although the position was the headquarters of both the Royal Engineers and the Artillery. Captain McCabe was mortally wounded when leading his fourth sortie. He died on October 4.
The Thug Gaol
The Thug Gaol was a long narrow building in the second line of defence, in the cells of which many women and children were housed. Some thirty years before the Mutiny, the Hon. Emily Eden noted in her diary that on her flying visit to Lucknow she was taken for a hurried look at the Thug Gaol.
Anderson’s Post
Anderson’s Post was a small double-storeyed house lying upon a slope in what was one of the most exposed positions of the entrenchment. By the middle of July the brick-work had been entirely shot away. Throughout the siege the enemy was never more than forty yards away, keeping up an incessant fusillade. Captain Anderson of the 25th Native Infantry commanded it with a small garrison of nine privates and a sergeant of the 32nd, a subaltern, and eight volunteers, amongst whom was an Italian Signor Barsetelli whose unending sense of humour played no small part in keeping up the courage of his fellows.
The Cawnpore Battery
The Cawnpore Battery, hard by Anderson’s Post, consisted of three field guns, but it was such a dangerous position that the garrison was relieved every day by a Captain and detachment of the 32nd. It commanded a wide area of hostile ground, including two main roads of strategic importance.
Duprat’s House
Duprat’s House was in an open position next to the Cawnpore Battery. Its owner, M. Duprat, was a Frenchman who had come from Calcutta to set up as a merchant, and who became known as a gallant soldier, as well as a popular member of the garrison. He succumbed to a wound in the face during August.
The Martiniere Post
The Martiniere Post was a strongly built house. Underneath it were tykhanas and adjoining it outhouses, the property of an Indian banker named Shah Bihari Lall. It was only thirty feet distant from Johannes House, a point in possession of the enemy. The Martinière Post was garrisoned by a detachment of the 32nd Regiment, the masters, and about fifty of the bigger boys of the Martinière College, under the command of Mr. George Schilling, Principal of the College. The smaller boys, of whom there were about fifteen, were told off to run messages to the hospital, etc., during hostilities. They proved willing little helpers.
Surprisingly, only three boys were wounded during the entire siege, and two died of disease. THE NATIVE HOSPITAL lay behind the Martinière Post which protected it from the enemy’s fire. A mortar was near by.
The King’s Hospital
The King’s Hospital, a little further on, was in the front line of defence. Later, during hostilities, it was known as the Brigade Mess.
Here were quartered the officers of regiments which had mutinied. Here also lived Mrs. (afterwards Lady) Couper, wife of Sir Henry Lawrence’s secretary, in a room some ten feet square, with many other women and children. The building, solid and spacious, gave a good view of the city from the roof. Colonel Master of the 7th Light Cavalry got his nickname of “The Admiral” owing to his habit of hailing from the roof top. The officers found this roof a good vantage point for sniping.
It was largely owing to their good marksmanship that the enemy attacks on August 11 and 18 failed. Known to be a dangerous post, the enemy rained bullets into it on every occasion until, by the end of August, the upper part had become a mere ruin. On September 7 two hundred and eighty round shots were collected from it, varying in size from a twenty-four pounder to a threepounder. At the back were the Brigadier’s quarters and those of Lady Inglis and her children.
Johannes House
Johannes House stood exactly opposite to the Brigade Mess, but outside the line of defences. Previous to the outbreak of hostilities Johannes, an Armenian, was the richest merchant in Lucknow. It had been intended to include his house within the Residency area, but so swift was the debacle after the battle of Chinhut that the enemy occupied it before the British could do so.
The Armenian’s house remained a constant source of trouble until August 12 when a cunningly placed mine exploded and the whole building tumbled to ruins, dragging with it a number of mutineers. Chief amongst its garrison was an African, formerly in the army of the King of Oudh, whom the defenders nicknamed “Bob the Nailer”, for his aim was so accurate that every shot he fired literally “nailed” his man.
The Sikh Square
The Sikh Square consisted of two quadrangular courtyards surrounded by low flatroofed buildings and a horse picket yard for fifty cavalry and artillery horses. It adjoined the Brigade Mess and was garrisoned by the Sikh Cavalry and some Christian drummers under the command of Captain Hardinge of the Oudh Irregular Cavalry and other officers who were relieved in weekly rotation. The loyalty of the Sikhs was a much debated question, but the majority of them remained staunch and proved invaluable as miners. For this hazardous work each man was paid at the rate of two rupees a day.
The Begum’s House
The Begum’s House behind the horse-lines of Sikh Square was a large building on the roof of which the two minarets and three domes of a small mosque still stand. The house was the dwelling of a Mrs. Walters and her elder daughter who was known as Begum Ashraf-ul- Nisa. The younger daughter, under the title of Mukhaddar-i-Ulaya, had married King Nasirud- Din Haider, who reigned from 1827 to 1837.
Ommanney’s House
Ommanney’s House stood close to the Begum’s House some way back from the front line fortified in case the troops should have occasion to fall back upon it. GRANT’S BASTION occupied a prominent position, separated from Sikh Square by a long narrow passage in possession of the enemy, at the blind end of which stood a British mortar.
Gubbins’ Battery
Gubbins’ Battery was an outwork which protected the south-west corner of the position, and was garrisoned by covenanted civilians. Many of their names have since become famous, such as Ommanney, Couper, Martin, Capper Thornhill and Lawrence. GUBBINS’ HOUSE stood not far from Gubbins’ Battery, but scarcely anything except the swimming bath remains of what was once a large house with an imposing front portico. Water was plentiful throughout the siege, and this swimming bath was a great boon.
At first the house was filled to overflowing with ladies and children occupying the upper storey, but towards the end of August it became unsafe from the number of round shot poured into it by the enemy, so all but the garrison vacated it. Details of the 32nd, the 48th Native Infantry, Pensioners and Gubbins’ Levies comprised the garrison under Major Banks, Captain Forbes, 1st Light Infantry, Captain Hawes, 5th Oudh Irregular Infantry, and finally under Major Apthorpe, 41st Native Infantry.
Major Banks was mortally wounded at this post, also Captain Fulton of the Engineers, who by general consent was accorded the palm of merit for his conduct during the defence. Mr. Gubbins was financial secretary of Oudh and he afterwards wrote an illuminating book about the siege.
The Slaughter-House
The Slaughter-House POST lay along part of the west wall of the defences. It is now only marked by pillars, but originally consisted of outhouses belonging to the Residency, including a sheep pen and a slaughter-house. They were held by uncovenanted civilians under Captain Boileau of the 7th Light Cavalry. Nearly every officer who slept there contracted fever owing to the unwholesome and overpowering stench which arose from the decaying entrails of the butcher’s dally victims. These were simply thrown over the parapet as the only means of disposing of them.
St. Mary’s Church
St. Mary’s Church, a handsome Gothic building, had been erected in 1810. Well shaded by trees and surrounded by a wall, it had no churchyard for the good reason that India did not bury her dead near churches in those days. The east window was an imitation, likewise the side aisles which were verandahs where slood the punkah coolies. The church held a hundred and thirty people.
The first to be buried in the church garden were the victims of the surprise attack upon Mariaon. During the siege, the church, standing on a slope, was very exposed. In spite of this, services were regularly held. Artillery horses were picketed in the garden, and stores stowed away in part of the building itself. The vestry and other shelters housed refugees, giving the church a most warlike appearance. At one time the authorities seriously considered blowing it up. The idea, however, was abandoned because it involved the useless expenditure of gunpowder.
Burials were conducted under cover of darkness by two gallant padres, Harris and Polehampton. It was impossible to dig very deep, partly owing to the time factor, and the bodies were merely wrapped in sheets and laid in the ground, with the result that the churchyard developed a most offensive smell, making the wretched clergymen ill. Polehampton died from cholera contracted while convalescing from the effects of a severe wound. His young wife, who had but lately lost her only child, was anxious that her husband should have a coffin, a simple wish that seemed impossible to gratify, for wood was at a premium.
A search was made, however, and an old coffin found, stowed away with some boxes under a staircase at the hospital. He was duly buried in a separate grave. During the siege those who died were normally sewn up in their bedding and buried in one grave. The death of the brave clergyman was a serious loss, for he had been unremitting in his kindness to the sick and wounded in the hospital. He never swerved from a self-imposed duty, and only left the hospital to go to his meals.
Innes House
Innes House stood on an exposed peninsula of ground below the church, and separated from it by a low mud-wall. It was originally occupied by Lieut. James McLeod Innes of the Bengal Engineers. During the Mutiny a party of the 32nd Regiment defended it, augmented by a handful of sepoys of the 13th Native Infantry, and by some uncovenanted civilians, all under the command of Lieut. Longman of the 13th Native Infantry and later of Captain Craydon of the 44th Native Infantry.
The house itself was large and well-built, with a sloping roof and verandahs on two sides. An inside staircase led to the roof. In one corner of the compound stood a small double-storeyed shed, the upper floor being known during the siege as the cockloft, commanding a view of the Iron Bridge spanning the Gumti.
On July 20, a massed attack was launched against the Residency with Innes House as its primary objective. The enemy came within ten yards of the stockade carrying scaling ladders, but met with such a hot reception that they were forced to retire as attack after attack repeatedly failed.
They nearly succeeded, however, in occupying the cockloft. Mr. Ereth, a corporal in the Volunteers, rushed forward through a hail of bullets only to fall mortally wounded in the neck. He was a railway contractor who had been married a bare three months. Such was his self-effacement and keenness that when he lay dying in hospital, he asked whether all was going well at Innes Post. No sooner had he fallen than Mr. George Bailey, another volunteer, doubled up with a few sepoys who succeeded in holding their own in spite of being badly wounded.
The insurgents continued to make isolated attacks on the various outposts during the whole morning, but contented themselves in the latter part of the day with heavy musketry and gun fire. At the diagonally opposite corner of Innes’ enclosure a rebel standard-bearer was actually shot in the ditch of the Cawnpore Battery,, so close had he advanced. In spite of fierce fighting the British losses were only four killed and twelve wounded. Lady Inglis records that “this attack and its complete repulse raised all our spirits and gave us confidence that with God’s help we should be able to hold out till succour arrived. It was the severest assault that the enemy had yet made, and John said the bullets fell like hail.”
The Redan Battery
The Redan Battery stood not far from the Water Gate. It was built during June by Captain Fulton, a Sapper, and a very gallant man. He discovered some Cornish miners in the ranks of the 32nd, and with them conducted all the mining of the siege. There is in Lucknow a picture of him crouched in a mine, revolver in hand, like a terrier at a rat-hole. He was wonderfully brave, and took great risks with supreme modesty.
He was killed on September 14 by a round shot, having won from his comrades the title of “The Defender of Lucknow.” The Redan Battery was the strongest within the defences, having two eighteen-pounders and one nine-pounder with which to rake the riverside. It was manned by men of the 32nd Regiment under one of their own officers, Lieut. Sam Lawrence. Here it was that Mr. Ommanney, the Judicial Commissioner, was fatally wounded by a cannon ball which struck his head. Two enemy attempts were made to blow up the battery, but in vain.
