1 THE FIRST SIKH WAR. 547
2 work their heavy batteries, from which shot and shell fell hissing in the
3 British lines, The thunder of full 120 pieces of ordnance, which were employed
4 on both sides, produced an appalling roar, the firing being very distinctly
5 heard at Ferozepur, twenty miles off. It soon became evident that the issue
6 of the contest must be left to the arbitrament of musketry and the bayonet.
7 At nine o’clock the left wing of the British army under Brigadier Stacey,
8 supported by a troop of horse artillery, advanced steadily to the attack.
9 They were within 300 yards of the heavy Sikh batterics, but, notwith-
10 standing the scientific mode of their assault, and the regularity of their move-
11 ments, so deadly a fire of cannon, musketry and swivels was kept up by
12 the enemy that the greater part of the division was driven back. The
13 battle raged with inconceivable fury, but at length the persevering gal-
14 lantry of the British triumphed, The assailants, who had been repulsed,
15 rallied and dashed forward with great pertinacity, led on by Sir Robert
16 Dick, an old and fearless commander, and, though the Sikhs offered a
17 stubborn resistance and fought desperately, the gallant British soldiers
18 leaped the ditch with great steadiness, and, after a fierce hand-to-hand
19 struggle, swarmed up and mounted the ramparts amidst loud shouts of
20 victory. The hardy Sikhs fought bravely, keenly contesting every inch of
21 ground, but fortune had forsaken the Ahdlsdé; their bravest efforts to re-
22 trieve the day proved of no avail, and destruction awaited them on every
23 side. The fire of the Sikhs first slackened, and then ceased entirely.
24 Thus were the formidable entrenchments of Subraon, which had bid
25 defiance to the British, at length carried. Many had thought the posi-
26 tion of the enemy, with his tremendous artillery, next to impregnable,
27 but all was over now. The traitor, Téj Singh, as before, had fled on the
28 first assault, and sank a boat in the middle of the bridge communicating
29 with the opposite bank of the river. But very differentwas the conduct of
30 the hoary-headed Shim Singh, the faithful friend of the Khélsdé, who,
31 remembering his vow to his countrymen, dressed himself in a garment as
32 white as his long snowy beard, galloped forward, and cheering on his ardent
33 followers, led them to the attack, reviving their spirits with the promise
34 of everlasting bliss made to the brave by their great Guru. Thus fighting,
35 thus encouraging his comrades and awakening them to a sense of their
36 duty, thus scorning death to the last, did this veteran soldier fall a martyr,
37 and his memory is held in the greatest esteem by his countrymen to this
38 day. Terrible was the carnage on that day. The trenches were filled with
39 the dead and the dying, and the parapets were covered with blood from
40 one end to the other. Although so hard pressed by the victors, no disciple
41 of the Guru asked for quarter, but everywhere showed a bold front. The
42 Sutlej had risen high in the night, and the bridge-of-boats constructed by
43 the Sikhs was swept away. The routed host tried to swim to the right bank,
44 but the British horse artillery, coming up at a gallop, poured on the flying
45 masses a deadly shower of grape and shrapnel, till the current of the stream
46 was crimsoned with blood and choked with corpses. The battle had begun in
47 earnest at nine o’clock; and by eleven o'clock, or, within the short space of
48 two hours, nearly one-third of the total forces brought by the Sikhs into the
49 field had perished. Hundreds fell under the deadly storm of grape and
50 canister, while hundreds upon hundreds were drowned in attempting the
51 passage of the swollen stream. “Their awful slaughter, confusion and dismay,”
52 observed the Commander-in-Chief, “ were such as would have excited com-
53 passion in the hearts of their generous conquerors, if the Khdlsdé troops had
54 not in the early part of the action sullied their gallantry by slaughtering
55 and barbarously mangling every wounded soldier whom, in the vicissitudes
56 The British storm
57 the Sikh position,
58 Gallant conduct
59 of Sham Singh,
60 Victory of the
61 British,
62 Sri Satguru J agjit Singh Ji eLibrary NamdhariElibary@ gmail.com