(Eleanor Macdonell's Memories)

Brigadier Innes came to our house on the 10th of May, and before he left, it was arranged that he would take a drive with us the next afternoon.   However, when the time came, Ranald told me that he and the Brigadier had some "Business" to attend to in the station, and that I had better have my drive although alone.   This I did;  and in the evening we had a small dinner party which went off pleasantly.

Several telegrams came to the Brigadier that day, and more the following morning.   The first was from Meerut telling of the mutiny there, and warning the military of our station to  be on their guard.   So the Brigadier's "business" was to tell the various commanding officers of Ferozepore to keep their men under arms on some pretext. 

 On the 12th came the news from Delhi of the massacre there;  (the man who sent it, I have heard, was killed immediately after he had despatched the telegram.)   Ranald then  told me to drive up to the fort, so I sent a note by a coolie, to Mrs. Anderson, our doctor's wife, telling her of the telegrams, -"mutiny at Meerut",  "mutiny at Delhi", and asking her to be ready when I should call, and I would drive her with her two children and English nurse to the fort.

In the meantime the Brigadier had ordered the three native regiments to be separated, and each with its officers was sent out to a different place to camp, while they were led to believe they were to take part in some military manoeuvres.   This was on the 13th of May.   I was naturally a good deal upset at parting with Ranald, for I was within three months of my confinement, and no one knew how this outbreak of the Sepoys would end, or indeed how this day might end.   But his parting words recalled me to myself.   "Remember", he said, smiling gravely, "that you are a soldier's wife, and must be brave".   And with one long embrace, we parted.

Then I, taking a change of clothes with me, called for Mrs. Anderson, and we drove nearly up to the fort gate, when the riding master galloped hard after us to say not to go that way, as only native soldiers were there, but to go to the mainguard in the barracks.

There we were first put into the sergeants' mess-room, which was by that time crammed with people, - mostly women and children, - some very young infants among them.   After a couple of hours we were sent to the mainguard, which was not so crowded.  There was nowhere to lie down there, but we were all too nervous to do so, even if there had been.   So we sat up all night long on the soldiers' forms outside the guardroom.

There was a gun fired down from the fort in the middle of the night, - no one knew by whom, - and we were told to "keep out of the doorways!"  in case of another;  but there were no more.

The 45th and 57th Native Infantry mutinied that night.  They set fire to the church, some hospitals, and twenty-five bungalows, firing the thatch;  then, after doing all the mischief they could, they bolted off to Delhi.   The clergyman seeing the church blazing, wrapped himself in a sheet like a native, and went into the building and saved the communion plate.  But little or nothing was rescued from the burning bungalows;  and many people lost all they had.   I know one lady who had not even a change of linen except what was at the wash.   It was fortunate for us that our house was about the furthest off in the station, and Ranald had sent our plate to the mainguard of the Tenth before the mutinous regiments suspected the plans of the Brigadier..

We were told, lest we should be unnecessarily alarmed at the report, that the bells of arms belonging to the 57th and 45th regiments were to be blown up early next morning, which was done.   It made a tremendous report;  the plaster ceiling of the guardroom cracked and fell down in a thousand pieces.   One lady fainted, and others became hysterical.

 (NOTE: Bell of arms is, strictly speaking, a stand against which rifles are stacked and fastened, and is so called because they thus assume the shape of a bell.   But it is also applied rather loosely to rooms where arms are kept when in use and not in store.)

At the time of the mutiny of the 57th and 45th N.I. the 10th Cavalry behaved very well;  they, with their officers, were in their saddles all that dreadful night, ready for the Brigadier's orders;  and for three months after that, the regiment remained faithful.   Then a few days before the fall of Delhi, a "shaky" regiment of irregulars (which had been sent away from Delhi during the siege, as being untrustworthy,) in passing through  Ferozepore, watered their horses at the cavalry barracks and persuaded the men to mutiny, but the Vet. was the only man of the cavalry killed.   Half the regiment was, as usual in the hot weather, away on furlough at the time, and afterwards vigorously repudiated the mutinous conduct of their comrades at Ferozepore.  Some of the native officers who were there, had been actually passed for long service pensions, and they bolted, apparently in fright.   Ram Singh, a trooper who had been many years in the regiment, and who remained faithful, although in Ferozepore at the time of the mutiny, came up to our house, and wept over the disgrace the regiment had brought upon itself.   "Our faces are blackened for ever", he said.

Ram Singh, and all the other troopers who did not join the mutineers were placed in new regiments formed after the mutiny.

H.M.S. 61st regiment was the only English regiment in Ferozepore at the time of the outbreak, and they were not then in the fort, - which was a mud erection, - but in the barracks in the station.   The fort was occupied by the 45th and 57th Native Infantry.   I remember seeing the 61st marching up to the fort to take it, which they did, and thereafter with a hundred coolies quickly repaired and strengthened the place;  and then no one was allowed in or out of it without a pass.   It had a moat all round it and was entered by a drawbridge:   The 61st afterwards did good service at Delhi.

After this, the first outbreak, we went back to our house for a short time, but it was a good way from barracks, and we were advised to come nearer, so we got two very tiny rooms in the 61st hospital, that had been occupied by an apothecary.   Before that, Mrs. Anderson, the doctor's wife, and I shared a portion of a gun-shed in the mud fort.   The gun was removed, the ground swept, and the cotton walls of a tent separated us from the next family.   I got a "satrinjee" (thick cotton floorcloth) from my house to make the place more comfortable, and hung a "tattee", or grass blind, in front.   Each had a "chilumchee" (brass bowl) in which to wash, and a little bed which at night was taken outside, and there in our dressing-gowns we slept.   My ayah lay on the ground alongside of me all night, wrapped in her quilt, and now and again she would get up and fan me, for the heat was very great.   Meanwhile Ranald and the other officers had to occupy tents within reach of their men.

It was while I was living in the apothecary's little room that my son, Ranaldson Gordon, was born on the 11th of August 1857, and it was when he was only eight days old, - on the 19th of August, - that the Tenth mutinied.   The Padre had come to ask for me, and he was sitting with Ranald and me, when suddenly the call to arms was heard, and a great commotion,  -bugles sounding, people shouting etc. etc.   Ranald immediately sent off his orderly to order his horse up from our house, some distance away, but the man quickly came back with the news that all the chargers were gone!

The first charger had cost Ranald Rs 1,500, the second, which was the grey Arab I used to ride, - a beautiful horse, - was worth Rs 1,000, and the third about Rs 450.   We afterwards heard that the mutineers had shot the sentries that were stationed near the troopers' horses;  they then mounted and rode off with many of them.   The gunners seeing this, fired down from the fort, but unfortunately killed more horses than men.   Ranald had not a charger left, so he was obliged to get the buggy out.  The regimental Vet. in trying to escape on foot was killed that day;  owing to having a rupture poor fellow, he could not ride.

Next morning when returning from the Vet's funeral, Ranald could hardly believe his eyes when he saw Bakhshi Singh, a faithful trooper coming to meet him, leading his favourite charger "The General" by the bridle!   This man used to be a good deal about our house, especially in our absence.   He related how the mutineers came up to him and said "We are going to help ourselves to the Colonel's horses, so as to get away.   Come along with us!"   So pretending to be quite excited at the idea, and ready to join them, Bakhshi Singh hurried forward, and taking care to mount the best horse, galloped off with the rebels.   After a time he managed to turn off without being noticed, and returning to the station, put the animal in a "godown" (outhouse) locked the door, and hid himself until it was safe to bring the horse back to us.   Ranald liberally rewarded Bakhshi Singh and subsequently got him into another regiment, giving him an excellent character, which he thoroughly deserved.

But to go back to the morning of the second outbreak.   I had thought that I was too weak to get up that day, but the excitement of the occasion seemed to give me strength, and with the assistance of a soldier's wife who was attending to me, I got up and looked out, and what I saw was a man being carried into hospital, his hand nearly severed from the wrist;  and then a second followed him, very severely wounded, who seemed more dead than alive.

That night it was thought better that I should be taken up to the fort again, as the mutineers might not be out of the station, so a litter was brought for me, and I went back to my old quarters for a few nights, the child, of course, with me;  and as soon as I was well again he was baptised in the armoury.

Some time after the first outbreak, the regiment with others, went out to punish a rajah in the district who was making a disturbance and inciting to rebellion against the government.   Just then Ranald was most unfortunately ill and confined to bed, and although riding was at the time an impossibility for him, owing to a bad abcess on the inner side of his leg, he was most anxious to get up and go with his men, if only in a doolie.   But the doctor would not hear of his attempting such a thing, and the General, who was an old friend of Aberdeen days, urged the necessity of listening to the doctor's advice.   And so therefore Ranald was not awarded the Mutiny medal, which he would otherwise have got.   It was considered by all a very unjust thing indeed that he did not get it, seeing that it was through sickness that he, the commanding officer, was unable to lead his men.

On retiring, some years after this, Ranald asked government if he might have the old standards of the 10th Cavalry now no more, but he was told that it was against regulations to give them to a private individual.   So I suppose they will lie useless in some store till they are eaten up by moths.

During the mutiny all our servants behaved well, and returned to us when we went back to our bungalow.   But for a year I am sure, we had the pistols loaded in our bedroom, and the sword handy, shoes and dressing-gowns alongside us, and a bolt on the door.

Our doctor had an uncomfortable experience:  he had made his servants give up their arms, and these he hung on the post of his bed, intending to hand them into the magazine.   This he had not done at once, and when about to do so, he was horrified to find that since he had taken them into his own charge, they had all been sharpened!   Was it a narrow escape, or a suggestive warning!

As to the blowing some native officers from guns, Ranald said that on the day when that took place, all the troopers were on the field, and that they looked almost pale, - they had never seen such a thing before.   Unfortunately the charge in the guns was at first too heavy, and one man was literally blown to pieces.   But the others just dropped down dead, and that was not such a dreadful sight.   They asked to be allowed to say their prayers, poor creatures, which was granted:  and of course theirs was a painless and momentary death.   I was sleeping in a tent in a garden at the time, and remember the sound of the guns, which I heard distinctly when lying in bed.   Shortly before this, the refugees from Fyzabad were caught by the mutineers, and blown from guns, - men, women and children.   And so one could not feel much compassion for these native officers who had shown such cruelty to our people, even to children.