Battle of ST. THOM
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significance : The first decisive victory of europeans on indians
Such was the decisive battle of St. Thome. "It was now," writes Mr. Orme, the contemporary historian of that period, "more than a century since any of the European nations had gained a decisive advantage in war against the officers of the Great Mughul. The experience of former unsuccessful enterprises, and the scantiness of military abilities which prevailed in all the colonies, from a long disuse of arms, had persuaded them that the Moors were a brave and formidable enemy; when the French at once broke through the charm of this timorous opinion, by defeating a whole army with a single battalion."
In the earlier days the position of the European trader aud the native of India was the direct converse of the position of the present day. Then, the European trader was the vassal, holding his lands as a rent payer and on condition of good behaviour, recognising the native ruler of the province as his overlord. It was a consequence of this well-recognised position that, when, in 1744, war broke out between France and England, and the governor of Madras made preparations to attack the French settlement of Pondichery, the governor of that settlement, M. Dupleix, appealed to the Niiwab of the Karnatak, not, indeed, to afford him aid, but to command his English tenants to renounce the threatened attack. It never entered into the head of the Madras governor either to question the right of the NuWab to issue the order, or to dispute it. Nay, more: when the English governor, professing his readiness to obey the Niiwab as faras his own power extended, expressed a regret that his authority did not reach the English fleet, which, he stated, was under the separate orders of the English commodore, and when the Nuwab answered that he should expect all English officers who came to the Koromandal coast to respect his government, the English governor, far from remonstrating, hastened to prevail upon the commander of the fleet to abstain likewise from all attack upon the French. Such was the state of affairs in Southern India so late as the year 1745. The European trader was simply the permanent occupier, on a fixed rental, of a portion of the lands of the lord of the country. He possessed the right only to claim the protection of that overlord when he might be attacked.
In one yearI might almost say in a few monthsthis position became practically inverted. The marvellous combination of circumstances by which this result was attained is known to every student of early Indian history. Until recently, however, the majority of students have cared only to examine the action on the part of the rival European traders which precipitated the change. But few have taken into consideration the workings of the native mind which enormously aided it. Had all classes of natives been able to combine as the inhabitants of a European country invaded by a foreign foe would combine, such a revolution would, at that time at all events, have been impossible. I may go even further, and affirm that if the English had been the only settlers on the coast, the revolution would not even have been thought of. It is a remarkable fact, but a fact which cannot even be questioned, that the English owe their empire in India to two causesthe first, French ambition; the second, that combination of virtues and defects in the native character of which I have already spoken.
How French ambition acted as a main factor in the events which followed the assertion, in 1745, by the Nuwab of the Karnatak of his supreme authority over all the Koromandal coast and in the waters of the Indian seas adjacent to that coast, has been told by every writer of Anglo-Indian history. . For defence against an enemy, the native ruler had then, as the European overlord has now, to be trusted to. The principle acts well now, because the European overlord really possesses the power to carry it out. It failed on the Koromandal coast because, on the first attempt to enforce his authority, the native ruler was baffled. His failure manifested itself in the first pitched battle between the European settlers and the native overlord. The battle was perhaps more than any, certainly as much as any, ever delivered, a decisive battle. It was fought on the same lines as subsequent battles between the Europeans and the natives of India have been fought; it showed the discipline, the skill, the inventive power of the few, opposed to the bad generalship, the untutored valour, the want of cohesion, the absence of patriotic feeling, of the many. But it was the first of its kind. It broke a spell which, unchallenged, might have exerted its influence for many years. It inverted, almost immediately, not openly, yet most really, the positions of the vassal and the overlord. From the day on which it was gained, supremacy in Southern India became the fixed idea in the brain of the illustrious governor of the people who had won it. In the course of time the idea passed, almost unconsciously, to his successful rivals. They certainly had not dreamed of it in the earlier days. That it finally became a part, though for long years an unwritten part, of their creed, was, however, the certain and logical consequence of the battle which first conveyed to the native rulers of Southern India the conviction that the Europeans, whom they had allowed to settle on their coasts, were able to dictate terms even to them. Thenceforth the position of vassal and overlord, recognised as binding in 1745, was broken, never to be re-imposed.
It happened in this wise. The English, ordered by the Nuwab in 1745 to abstain from all hostilities against their French rivals, had obeyed; but in 1746, the French finding themselves superior on the coast to the English, possessing a fleet which had driven away that of then; rivals, an army largely outnumbering theirs, deemed the moment too opportune to be lost. The clumsy action of the English governor came to aid their endeavours to persuade the native overlord, the Nuwub of the Karnatak, to allow them power of unrestricted action. That governor, warned of the French intentions, had appealed to the Nuwab to issue to his rivals the prohibition which had been imposed upon himself the preceding year; but, whether from ignorance or from thoughtlessness, he had committed the grave offence of sending his messenger empty-handed into the presence of the Nuwab. The latter was still smarting under this barbaric insolence, as he considered it, when there arrived, laden with choice and costly presents from Europe, a messenger from M. Dupleix, Governor of Pondichery. The Nuwab was an old man, and he had the reputation of being a capable man; but on this occasion, he allowed his feelings to dictate his policy. One word from him, and the French preparations would have been stayed. He would not speak that word. Whilst his better instincts withheld him from giving absolute sanction to the plans of the French, his preference for that people, and his anger against the English, combined to stifle the prohibitory sentence which would have enforced his true policy. The silence was fatal to him and to his race. Unfettered by prohibition, the French sent an expedition against Madras (September 1746). Before the place had actually fallen, the Nuwab, recovering from his infatuation, had despatched to Pondichery, on a swift dromedary, a messenger bearing a letter to Dupleix, in which he expressed his surprise that the French should have waged war in his territories, and threatening to send an army to enforce his orders unless the siege were immediately raised. Dupleix was too accustomed to deal with the natives of India to hesitate as to the reply he should give to this citation. His main object was to expel the English from Madras. Whether that place should fall permanently to the French or to the Nuwab was a matter, for the moment, of only secondary importance. He, therefore, replied that his object in attacking Madras was to secure the interests of the Nuwab, as on its conquest the English would gladly pay him a large ransom for its restoration; that for that purpose the French would at once make it over to him on its surrender. These were mere words intended
only to gain time. Before the Nuwab could form a decision to act, or not to act, Madras had surrendered to the French (21st September 1746).
As soon as the Nuwab learned that Madras had fallen he despatched his son, Maphuz Khan, at the head of 10,000 men, mostly horsemen, to take up a position in the vicinity of the fort so as to be ready to receive it when the French should be ready to evacuate it. But when one week, then two, three, and even five weeks passed, and the French still answered all his demands for the surrender with evasions, the suspicion that he had been duped began gradually to take possession of the mind of the Asiatic ruler. Up to the end of the fifth week the French had been able to offer an excuse for their conduct, which had, at all events, the appearance of validity. The disputes between La Bourdonnais and Dupleixthe former pledged to restore Madras to the English for a consideration, the latter resolved to keep it for his nation .hadLa Bourdonnais being in possessiontied the hands of Dupleix. But on the 23rd October the departure of La Bourdonnais left Dupleix free to act. Still he did not keep his promise to the Nuwab. He had no intention of keeping it, for he had resolved to risk rather the fury of his overlord; he had transmitted orders to his lieutenant, Duval d'Espremesnil, to hold Madras at all hazards, and against all enemies whatsoever.
The Nuwab, for a long time cajoled, lost patience at last. Two days after the departure of La Bourdonnais, he directed his son, Maphuz Khan, to lay siege to Madras, and to drive out the French just as the French had driven out the English. He had no idea whatever that this would be a matter of any difficulty. The French had always carried themselves so humbly, they had professed so much respect for himself, for his officers, and for his people, that he had believed that this behaviour was but the outward expression of conscious inferiority. He knew that their white soldiers numbered from five to six hundred, and that their native levies were as numerous. His son commanded ten times that number, and many more levies were marching to support him. He had, then, but to demand admittance within the fort. Who would venture to refuse to comply?
Sharing such thoughts, Maphuz Khan presented himself, on the 26th October, before the town. Entrance having been refused, he took up a position commanding its water-supply. The French governor, M. Duval d'Espremesnil,* father of the politician who made himself so prominent in the last of the old French parlements, had not been bred a soldier, but he possessed courage, common-sense, and energy, which, against such an enemy, more than supplied the want of military training. Under instructions from Pondichery he had, on the approach of Maphuz Khan, drawn the whole of his troops within the walls of tho fort, determined to offer only a passive resistance to the army of his suzerain. But when Maphuz Khan showed himself very earnest in the attack, when he began to erect a battery, and when he occupied a position which cut off the water-supply of the town, then d'Espremesnil found it necessary to abandon his passive attitude. At first he ventured only to fire upon the men engaged in erecting the battery; but though this act of vigour drove away the assailants from the mound on which they were working, it did not affect those engaged in diverting the water, for these were out of range. More decisive measures were thus forced upon him. It had become a question either of unconditional submission to a suzerain who had been irritated and defied, or of an attack upon his troops. D'Espremesnil wisely chose the
* Duval d'Espremesnil was likewise son-in-law of Dupleix, and second member of the Council of Pondichery. He possessed, to a degree which would be considered rare even in these days, a knowledge of the people of India, their languages, and their customs. In 1747, he had the hardihood to disguise himself as a Brahman, and visit the most famous temples and pagodas of India. He succeeded, without being discovered, in penetrating the holiest recesses into which no one but a member of that sacred caste was allowed to enter.
second course. On the night of the 1st November he made all the preparations for a sortie. Early on the following morning 400 men with two field-pieces sallied from the fort to attack the portion of the besieging force which was guarding the spring which supplied the town. As this handful of men advanced, the guns behind their centre, on the point previously indicated, the enemy's horsemen, who had mounted in all haste, moved towards them with the intention of charging them. The French at once halted, extended from the centre to allow their guns to move to the front, then, when the enemy had come within range, they opened fire.
That the reader may understand the feelings which animated the horsemen of Maphuz Khan before the French guns had fired at all, and the bewilderment which came over them after the second discharge, it is necessary I should state that the practice of artillery, as understood by European soldiers, was not at all comprehended in Southern India. It is true that the native chiefs possessed guns, but not only were these guns, as a rule, uncared for, or so old that it was a positive risk to fire them, but the natives were so unskilful in their management, that they thought they had done well when they discharged them once in a quarter of an hour. Never having been engaged in warfare with Europeans, they had no idea that it was possible to fire the same piece five or six times in a minute. Their invariable practice, then, was to await the first discharge of an enemy's artillery, then, in the full belief that they had a good quarter of an hour before them before the fire could be renewed, to advance boldly and rapidly.
Their feelings, then, when the French guns opened upon them on the occasion of the sortie I am describing, may be easily imagined. That discharge killed two or three horses only. What other thought could then have possessed the Indian horsemen but this, that at the expense of those horses they hod the enemy in their power? Amongst themselves, cavalry could always ride down infantry; and now the infantry before them had thrown away their one solid support. They were preparing to use to the best advantage the quarter of an hour thus, in their belief, foolishly granted them, when another flash from the same guns, followed with great rapidity by another and another and another, came to show them that they had been living in the paradise of fools, that they had before them a new kind of enemy, an enemy of whose strange and fearful devices they knew nothing. More even than the sight of the emptying saddles in their midst, the contemplation of the unknown process came to weaken their morale. Imagination added horrors to visible slaughter. After a few moments' hesitation, they turned and fled in disorder. D'Espremesnil had not only regained his watersupplyhe had not only forced the enemy to raise the siegehe had gained a victory over the minds and imaginations of the Indian soldiers, the consequences of which were permanent. He had driven in the thin end of the wedge which was to bring to the ground the whole fabric of the Mughul empire.
There was needed, however, a stronger, a more decided blow of the mallet to drive in the wedge a little further, to prevent the close of the fissure caused by the first. A comparatively few men of the army of Maphuz Khan had witnessed the magic power of the French guns. Those few men had been panicstricken; they had communicated their panic to their comrades; their comrades had fled they knew not why. The original fugitives when questioned doubtless varied their replies. No one could positively declare the actual number of hostile guns. After all, they began to argue, the victory might have been the result of skilful management. They came by degrees to the belief that the French must have had several guns, and that they had fired only two at one time, then two more, whilst the others were reloading. This would explain much of the mishap. At the end of a few hours, after the subject had been well ventilated, and the heroes of the flight had recovered their equanimity, it probably was so explained. At all events, the dismay of the native soldiers evaporated.
Maphuz Khan had lost seventy men by the fire of the French guns. He had raised the siege and had taken up a position two miles to the westward of Madras. He was there, when, on the day following his discomfiture, he learned that a French force, marching from Pondichery to Madras, would arrive at St. Thome, four miles to the west of that place, the following morning. By this time big talk and bluster had succeeded the panic of the previous morning. Maphuz Khan, who had not been one of the fugitives, and who probably attributed the defeat of his soldiers to a sudden but ordinary panic, was burning to avenge himself on the audacious Europeans. He immediately, then, took a step worthy of a great commander. Resolving to intercept the approaching force before it should effect its junction with the garrison of Madras, he marched that evening (3rd November) on the town of St. Thome, and took up a strong position on the northern bank of the river Adyar, at the very point where it would be necessary for the French to cross it, and lined the bank with his guns.
The detachment which was approaching consisted of 280 Europeans and 700 sepoys. There were no guns with it. But its commander, Paradis, was a man to supply any deficiency. A Swiss by birth, and an engineer by profession, Paradis had been selected by Dupleix, in the dearth of senior officers of the military service, for command in the field. Paradis amply justified the discernment of the French governor, for he had been born with the qualities which no soldier can acquire decision of character, calmness, and energy.
The movements of Maphuz Khan had not been so secretly carried out as to escape the notice of the French within Madras. Aware of the approach of Paradis, and divining the motives of Maphuz Khan, d'Espremesnil had at once despatched a messenger to the former, recommending him to defer an engagement with Maphuz Khan until the garrison of Madras should have time to operate on his rear. But events would not allow Paradis to delay the contest. At daybreak on the morning of the 4th November, that officer approached the south bank of the Adyar. He beheld the whole space between the north bank of that river and the town of St. Thomea space about a quarter of a mile in lengthoccupied by the hostile armythe bank itself as far as eye could reach lined with their guns, each gun well-manned. There they were, horse, foot, and artillery, more than 10,000 in number, barring the road to Madras.
If Paradis entertained any doubt as to the motives which swayed the leader of the masses on the northern bank, a discharge of artillery directed against his advancing troops quickly dispelled it. Under such circumstances, to await on the south bank the promised co-operation appeared to him a proceeding fraught with peril. A halt where he was would be impossible, for he was under the fire of the enemy's guns; he must fall back, even though it should be only a few hundred yards. Such a movement would, he thought, expose him, unprovided with guns, to a charge from the enemy's horsemen, eager to avenge their defeat of two days' previously. His Europeans were fighting for the first time on Indian ground, his native troops were raw levies. With such material, could he, dare he, encounter the risk of retiring? On the other hand, a bold advance would inspire his men and discourage the enemy.
Such thoughts coursed through the brain of Paradis as his men were advancing under fire. His resolution was immediately taken. His bold spirit had solved in an instant the problem as to the method to be pursued when European troops should be pitted against the natives of India. That method was, under all circumstances, to advance to close quarters. With a cool and calm decision, then, he plunged without hesitation into the waters of the Adyar, and led his infantry to attack the three arms of the enemy, ten times their superior in numbers.
Up to the moment of reaching the south bank of the Adyar, the French force had not suffered very much from the fire of the enemy's guns. The aim had been bad and the guns had been ill-served. They were still, however, dangerous, and the troops felt that their capture would decide the day. Without drawing trigger, then, they followed Paradis to the bank of the river; then, wading through it, delivered one volley and charged. The effect was electric. The Indian troops, unaccustomed to such precipitate action, gave way, abandoned their guns, and retreated as fast as they could into the town. The walls of the town had many gaps in it, but the Indians had taken the precaution to cover these on the western face with palisades. Behind these palisades they now took refuge, and from this new position opposed a strong front to the advancing force. The French, however, did not allow them time to recover the spirit which alone would have made a successful defence possible. Advancing and always advancing, in good order, and firing by sections as they did so, they forced the enemy to abandon these new defences. The defeat now became a rout. Falling back on each other in the narrow streets of the town, the enemy's horse and foot became mixed in hopeless confusion, exposed, without being able to return it, or to extricate themselves, to the relentless fire of the French. Maphuz Khan himself, mounted on an elephant, had made his escape early in the day. His troops were less fortunate. Their very numbers impeded their movements. When, at last, in small bodies, in twos and threes, they made their exit from the northern gate and attempted to hurry away with the baggage and camp equipage that yet remained to them, they found themselves face to face with the body of Europeans sent by d'Espremesnil from Madras to co-operate with Paradis. Then they abandoned everything, baggage, horses, oxen, rams, even hope itself, and fled across the plain in wild confusion. The French were too much occupied in plundering their camp to pursue them further. But the terror which had struck into
their Bouis was proved by the fact that they made no attempt to unite in masses till they had covered many miles in the direction of Arkat, and then only to fall back with all possible speed upon that capital of the Karnatak.
"It may be well asserted," writes another author,* in language which I now reproduce, "that of all the decisive actions that have been fought in India, there is not one more memorable than this. Not, indeed, that there has not since been displayed a daring equal to that of Paradis, or that numbers as disproportionate have not, within the memory of the living, achieved a victory as important. The circumstance which stamps this action as so memorable is that it was the very first of its kind, that it proved, to the surprise of both parties, the overwhelming superiority of the European soldier to his Asiatic rival. Up to that moment the native princes of Southern India had, by virtue of their position as lords of the soil, or as satraps of the Mughul, arrogated to themselves a superiority which none of the European settlers had ever thought of disputing. With the French, as we have seen, it had been a maxim of settled policy to avoid the semblance of hostility towards them. We have noticed how Martin and Dumas and Dupleix had toiled to effect this end. When at last Dupleix, to avoid a more dangerous contingency, accepted the dreaded alternative of hostility, he did so more in the hope that he might find some means to pacify the Ntiwab whilst the siege was in progress than in any expectation of routing him in the field. And now, suddenly, unexpectedly, this result had been achieved. From being the suppliants of the Nuwab of the Karnatak, the vassals whose every movement depended upon his license, the French, in a moment, found themselves, in reality, his superiors. The action at St. Thome completely reversed the positions of the Nuwab and the French governor. Not only that, but it inaugurated a new era, it introduced a fresh order of things, it was the first decided step to the conquest of Hindustan by a European power. Whether that power were French or English would depend upon the relative strength of the two nations, and even more on the character of the men by whom that strength should be put in action. The battle which introduced this change deserves, then, well to be remembered; and, in recalling it to our memories, let not us, who are English, forget that the merit of it is due, solely and entirely, to that great nation which fought with us the battle of empire on Indian soil, and did not win it."
* History of the French in India.
I find it difficult to add anything to this true description of the consequences of this most decisive battle. It was the prelude to many more resembling it in results. But not one of those which followed was fought under circumstances precisely similar. Prior to the sortie of d'Espremesnil from Madras, which may be taken as the first part of the battle which so quickly followed it, the prestige, the morale, were on the side of the children of the soil. The humble traders had, before 1746, never thought of questioning the authority, or of doubting the power, of the satraps of the Indian provinces. It was the striking, the momentous, I might almost say the eternal, consequence of those two acts of the same drama that the prestige and the morale were transferred from the nativesfrom chief and follower aliketo the European settlers. Of almost every subsequent battle between the European and the Asiatic, it may be sa'd that, in consequence of that transfer, it was half won before it had been fought. This was the magic power which the France of the Bourbons won in November 1746, and which she subsequently transferred, not willingly, to England.
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