My Experiences in Manipur and the Naga Hills Part 16

[3] Printed official reports.

[4] One of the witnesses at the trial of the Regent and Senaputtee of Manipur, in 1891, stated that Mr. Quinton was partly induced to enter the palace from which he never emerged alive, by the Manipuris saying, "Are you not our deity?"--Ed.

[5] The a.s.sam Administration Report of 1877-8 writes of it as "notoriously unhealthy, and it had long been proposed to move the troops to a higher and less feverish spot."--Ed.

[6] When I first went to a.s.sam almost all elephant-catching was done by noosing.

[7] The country bordering on the Bhootan Dooars in the Ringpore district.

[8] See subsequent sketch of Naga tribes in Chapter III.

[9] Sir James (then Lieut.) Johnstone headed a party to clear an a.s.samese village from a panther that had killed several natives and was terrifying the district. It retreated into a house which he ordered to be pulled down, and as his men were thus engaged it sprang from a window on to his shoulder. With his other arm--the left--he fired at it behind his back and wounded it sufficiently to make it loose its hold, and rush off into the jungle, where it was killed in the course of the afternoon. His arm was terribly injured, and he always considered that he owed complete recovery of the use of it to the kindness and skill of an English medical friend who came from a great distance to attend him. Every one else who was wounded by the same panther died.--Ed.

[10] Captain Butler was struck by a spear from a Naga ambuscade, near the village of Pangti in the Naga Hills on December 25, 1876. He died on January 7. He had held the appointment of Political Agent for seven years, and was the son of Colonel Butler, the author of 'Scenes in a.s.sam' and 'A Sketch in a.s.sam,' the earliest accounts of that eastern border.--Ed.

[11] "The influence exercised by Colonel McCulloch as a political agent at Manipur was most beneficial," wrote the Times, April 1, 1891, "and since his time no one has been more successful than Colonel Johnstone, who took charge in 1877, and rendered conspicuous service by raising the siege of Kohima by the Nagas in 1879."--Ed.

[12] As a.s.sist-sup. of the tributary Mehals, Sir James (then Lieutenant) Johnstone endowed schools at Keonjhur and presented the Government with some land he had bought for the purpose. When the Rajah, during whose minority he had managed the affairs of Keonjhur as political officer, came of age, the agency was abolished for economy.--Ed.

[13] I rewarded Kurum, and he distinguished himself later on.

[14] The name means beautiful garden.--Ed.

[15] Tannah means outpost.--Ed.

[16] Probably a corruption of Khatyra.

[17] I.e. Unclean.

[18] Mentioned frequently later on. In August, 1891, he was a fugitive from the British Government, hiding himself on the Chinese frontier.--Ed.

[19] Here a British native regiment was stationed, after Sir J. Johnstone's retirement, but some time before the troubles of 1891.--Ed.

[20] Quoted by kind permission of editor from my article in Nineteenth Century.

[21] Quoted by kind permission of editor from my article in Nineteenth Century.

[22] It will be seen later on that this rumour was not correct.--Ed.

[23] A different place from Konoma.--Ed.

[24] A Sikh.--Ed.

[25] The Jubraj, who afterwards reigned as the Maharajah Soor Chandra Singh, died in exile; Kotwal Koireng and Thangal Major were hanged in August, 1891, by order of the sentence pa.s.sed upon them for resisting the British Government.--Ed.

[26] In 1891, the Jubraj, then the ex-Maharajah, brought forward this fact in his appeal to the British Government, as a reason for his restoration.--Ed.

[27] The savage mode in which the Nagas conduct their warfare is vividly described by a correspondent of the Englishman writing from Cachar, January 28, 1880, after a raid on the Baladhun Tea Gardens by a band of the same tribe as those of Konoma. He ends with "The whole was a horribly sickening scene, and a complete wreck; and such surely as none but the veriest of devils in human form could have perpetrated."--Ed.

[28] The order came in a telegram purporting to be from the Chief Commissioner, and by whom really transmitted is a mystery. The Deputy-a.s.sistant Quartermaster General's Report of this Naga Hill Expedition states, that after Lieutenant-Colonel Johnstone's Kuki levies had attacked Phesama, and killed about two hundred of the enemy in consequence of the loss of some of their own men from an a.s.sault from this village, the Manipuri army performed no other operation in this war (except as coolies and bringing in supplies, and in this respect they were invaluable). But he adds, "Colonel Johnstone, it is understood, was anxious to attack Konoma on his own account without waiting for General Nation and the troops." Colonel Johnstone explained in a memorandum that no arrangements had been made by the military authorities for the carriage of the guns, and that up to the evening before the attack on Konoma he had received no request for coolies, but foreseeing some neglect of this kind he had kept over one hundred reliable Manipuris for the work, and without them the guns could not have gone into action. As to the rest of his levy, they had lost three hundred men by sickness, and like all irregulars, had been injured by the long delay and enforced idleness. They had also been already fired upon by our troops in mistake for Nagas, and he feared some unfortunate complication if he brought them again to the front. But one hundred and fifty at the request of General Nation were posted in the valley to intercept fugitives, and they did what they were told. Another force was also left to help to protect the camp at Suchema. Colonel Johnstone therein states that he felt confident he could have captured Konoma with his Manipuris alone, directly after the relief of Kohima. The Konoma men, in fact, offered to submit on harsher terms to themselves to Colonel Johnstone than were afterwards wrested from them by General Nation with the loss of valuable lives, and at a heavy pecuniary cost.--Ed.

[29] I also heard from an old Mozuma friend, Lotoje, that the enemy intended to concentrate all his fire on the officers, so as to render the men helpless. I told this to the General and Major c.o.c.k, and strongly advised them to do as I did, and cover their white helmets with blue turbans to render themselves less conspicuous, urging the inadvisability of needlessly rendering themselves marks for the enemy's fire. The General refused, and c.o.c.k said he should do as the General did, so I said no more; admiring their dogged courage, but wishing that they would take advice.

[30] Sharp stakes of bamboo hardened in the fire.

[31] The official medical report of this campaign gives a deplorable account of the sufferings of the wounded, and the gangrene which affected the wounds in consequence of the extremely insanitary condition of the Naga villages and stockades, where the Naga warriors had been congregated for weeks expecting the attack--an additional reason why the immediate pursuit into their strongholds which Colonel Johnstone had recommended after the relief of Kohima should have been carried out--failing the acceptance of the harsh terms of peace. See ante.--Ed.

[32] This was the road along which Colonel Johnstone had marched to relieve Kohima. The old route from the capital of Manipur to Cachar was easy enough in comparison.--Ed.

[33] All wars rest in winter.

[34] Chief Court.

[35] Major Edward Dun died on the 5th of June, 1895.--Ed.

[36] Known as Regent during the recent troubles.

[37] "The Senaputtee seemed determined to wipe away all signs of British connection with the State. Not only were the charred remains of the Residency still further demolished, but every building in the neighbourhood, and the very walls of the compound and garden were levelled, and the graves of British officers were desecrated. The Kang-joop-kool Sanatorium, twelve miles from the capital, built by Sir J. Johnstone, was burnt, and his child's grave dug up."--Times'

telegram, May 3, 1891.--Ed.

It appears by the official correspondence that the Senaputtee sent seven Manipur sepahis to open the child's grave, and scatter the remains, out of spite to Sir J. Johnstone, whom he knew had wished him to be banished, and who (on account of the Senaputtee's exceptionally bad character) would never admit him into the Residency. For this act the British military authorities had the sepahis flogged.--Nos. 1-11, East India (Manipur) Blue Books.--Ed.

[38] "Oh! for a moment of Colonel Johnstone's presence at such a crisis," wrote a British official from Manipur, to the Pioneer, in 1891. "One strong word with the ominous raising of the forefinger, would have paralyzed the treacherous rebel Koireng (Senaputtee) from perpetrating this outrage."--Ed.

[39] Major Trotter. He received wounds from an ambuscade, and died of their effects, July, 1886.--Ed.

[40] "The general history of the Manipur incident," wrote the Times in a leading article, Aug. 14, 1891, "must inspire mingled feelings in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of most Englishmen. The policy in which it originated, cannot be said to reflect credit on the Government of India, while the actual explosion itself was precipitated by a series of blunders which have never been explained. There seems to be little doubt that had the Government of India made up its mind promptly on the merits of the dynastic quarrel between the dethroned Maharajah and his brothers, the Senaputtee would hardly have been able to commit the crimes which have cost him his life. But for five months the Government of India seemed to accept the revolution accomplished last September in the palace of Manipur. That revolution was notoriously the work of the Senaputtee, although he chose, for his own reasons, to place one of his brothers on the throne. The Government did not indeed a.s.sent to the change, but their local representative does not appear to have taken marked steps to express his disapproval. He is said to have tolerated and condoned it to this extent, that he kept up friendly relations with the new ruler as with the old. On the deplorable mistakes which led up to the ma.s.sacre, and made it possible, it is unnecessary to dwell. They are still unaccounted for, and so many of the chief actors in that fatal business have perished, that it is more than doubtful whether we shall ever know exactly to whom they severally were due."--Ed.

[41] Three columns (one alone numbering 1000 strong), were marched at once on Imphal, which was found deserted. The Regent was the last of the princes who fled. He released the surviving English prisoner, and sent him to the British camp to ask for an armistice; but this was refused until he delivered up the Englishmen already dead. The Manipuris, then expecting no mercy, opposed the march of the troops.--Ed.