1 154 HISTORY OF THE SIKHs,
2 CHAPTER IX.
3 THE BATTLE OF SOBRAON.
4 Sir Hue Goucx being now the assailant, with
5 an enemy before him calmly awaiting his attack,
6 was enabled to choose his own time. He therefore
7 judiciously ordered the whole army to march on
8 Peete Sobraon, at half-past three o'clock, on the morning
9 of Tuesday, 16th February, 1846, when his men
10 were fresh and there was a certainty of many
11 The Comman- hours of daylight operation. The Commander-in-
12 der-in-chie
13 well acquaint- chief had made himself fully acquainted with the
14 ed with the és a
15 nature of the position of the Sikhs at Sobraon, for he says “ the
16 apiece enemy’s works had been repeatedly reconnoitred
17 during the time of my head quarters at Nihalkee,
18 (Akhberwala) by myself, my departmental staff,
19 and my engineers and artillery officers. Our
20 observations, coupled with the report of spies, con-
21 yinced us that there had devolved on us the ardu-
22 ous task of attacking, in a position covered with
23 Formidable formidable entrenchments, no fewer than 30,000
24 naure OS men, the best of the Khalsa troops, with seventy