The Letters of Queen Victoria Volume Iii Part 60

_Viscount Palmerston to Queen Victoria._

BROCKET, _10th September 1857_.

Viscount Palmerston presents his humble duty to your Majesty and begs to submit that an impression is beginning to prevail that it would be a proper thing that a day should be set apart for National Prayer and Humiliation with reference to the present calamitous state of affairs in India, upon the same principle on which a similar step was taken during the Crimean War; and if your Majesty should approve, Viscount Palmerston would communicate on the subject with the Archbishop of Canterbury.... It is usual on such occasions that the Archbishop of Canterbury should attend,[37] but in consideration of the distance his attendance might well be dispensed with on the present occasion.

[Footnote 37: _I.e._ at the meeting of the Council which was to be summoned.]

[Pageheading: A DAY OF INTERCESSION]

_Queen Victoria to Viscount Palmerston._

BALMORAL, _11th September 1857_.

Lord Palmerston knows what the Queen's feelings are with regard to Fast-days, which she thinks do not produce the desired effect--from the manner in which they are appointed, and the selections made for the Service--but she will not oppose the natural feeling which any one must partake in, of a desire to pray for our fellow-countrymen and women who are exposed to such imminent danger, and therefore sanctions his consulting the Archbishop on the subject. She would, however, suggest its being more appropriately called a day of prayer and intercession for our suffering countrymen, than of fast and humiliation, and of its being on a _Sunday_, and not on a week-day: on the last Fast-day, the Queen heard it generally remarked, that it produced more harm than good, and that, if it were on a Sunday, it would be much more generally observed. However, she will sanction whatever is proper, but thinks it ought to be as soon as possible[38]

(in a fortnight or three weeks) if it is to be done at all.

She will hold a Council whenever it is wished.[39]

[Footnote 38: It was kept on the 7th of October (a Wednesday).]

[Footnote 39: Shortly after the date of this letter came the intelligence from India that Delhi had not fallen, and that the Lucknow garrison was not yet relieved. This news, coupled with the tidings of fresh outbreaks, and the details of the horrors of Cawnpore, generated deep feelings of resentment in the country.]

_Queen Victoria to the Earl of Clarendon._

BALMORAL CASTLE, _23rd September 1857_.

The Queen hopes that the arrival of troops and ships with Lord Elgin will be of material a.s.sistance, but still it does not alter the state of affairs described by the Queen in her letter, which she wrote to Lord Palmerston, and which she is glad to see Lord Clarendon agrees in. Though we might have perhaps wished the Maharajah[40] to express his feelings on the subject of the late atrocities in India, it was hardly to be expected that he (naturally of a negative, though gentle and very amiable disposition) should p.r.o.nounce an opinion on so painful a subject, attached as he is to his country, and naturally _still_ possessing, with all his amiability and goodness, an _Eastern nature_; he can also hardly, a deposed Indian Sovereign, _not very_ fond of the British rule as represented by the East India Company, and, above all, impatient of Sir John Login's[41] tutorship, be expected to _like_ to hear his country-people called _fiends_ and _monsters_, and to see them brought in hundreds, if not thousands, to be executed.

His best course is to say nothing, she must think.

It is a great mercy he, poor boy, is not there.

[Footnote 40: Lord Clarendon had written that he was "sorry to learn that the Maharajah (Dhuleep Singh) had shown little or no regret for the atrocities which have been committed, or sympathy with the sufferers."]

[Footnote 41: Sir John Spencer Login, formerly surgeon at the British Residency, Lucknow, guardian of the Maharajah Dhuleep Singh, 1849-1858.]

[Pageheading: LETTER FROM LORD CANNING]

[Pageheading: SIR COLIN CAMPBELL]

[Pageheading: INDIA]

[Pageheading: THE POLICY OF CLEMENCY]

_Viscount Canning to Queen Victoria._

CALCUTTA, _25th September 1857_.

Lord Canning presents his humble duty to your Majesty, and asks leave again to address your Majesty, although the desire which he has felt that his next letter should announce to your Majesty the fall of Delhi, and the first steps towards a restoration of your Majesty's Authority throughout the revolted Districts, cannot as yet be accomplished. But although it is not in Lord Canning's power to report any very marked success over the Rebels, he can confidently a.s.sure your Majesty that a change in the aspect of affairs is gradually taking place, which gives hope that the contest is drawing to a close, and the day of punishment at hand....

Another ground for good hopes is the appearance of things at Lucknow.

News just received from Sir James Outram announces that he has joined General Havelock's force at Cawnpore, and that the Troops crossed the Ganges into Oudh on the 19th, with hardly any opposition. The European force now advancing on Lucknow is about [....][42] strong, well provided with Artillery. The beleaguered Garrison was in good spirits on the 16th of September, and had provisions enough to last to the end of the month. They had lately inflicted severe losses on their a.s.sailants, and some of the latter had dispersed. The influential proprietors and chiefs of the country had begun to show symptoms of siding with us.

This is a very different state of things from that which existed when General Havelock's force retired across the Ganges in July; and Lord Canning prays and believes that your Majesty will be spared the pain and horror of hearing that the atrocities of Cawnpore have been re-enacted upon the brave and enduring garrison of Lucknow. Every English soldier who could be made to reach Cawnpore has been pushed on to General Outram, even to the denuding of some points of danger in the intervening country, and General Outram's instructions are to consider the rescue of the garrison as the one paramount object to which everything else is to give way. The garrison (which, after all, is nothing more than the House of the Resident, with defences hastily thrown up) contains about three hundred and fifty European men, four hundred and fifty women and children, and one hundred and twenty sick, besides three hundred natives, hitherto faithful. The city, and even the province, may be abandoned and recovered again, but these lives must be saved now or never; and to escape the sorrow and humiliation of such barbarities as have already been endured elsewhere is worth any sacrifice. It is in consideration of the state of things at these two most critical points, Delhi and Lucknow, that Lord Canning ventures to ask your Majesty to look hopefully to the events of the next few weeks; notwithstanding that he is unable to announce any signal success....

Sir Colin Campbell has been in a state of delight ever since his favourite 93rd landed five days ago.[43] He went to see them on board their transport before they disembarked, and when Lord Canning asked how he found them, replied that the only thing amiss was that they had become too fat on the voyage, and could not b.u.t.ton their coats. But, indeed, all the troops of the China force have been landed in the highest possible condition of health and vigour. The 23rd, from its large proportion of young soldiers, is perhaps the one most likely to suffer from the climate and the hardships of the Service--for, although no care or cost will be spared to keep them in health and comfort, Lord Canning fears that hardships there must be, seeing how vast an extent of usually productive country will be barren for a time, and that the districts from which some of our most valuable supplies, especially the supply of carriage animals, are drawn, have been stripped bare, or are still in revolt. As it is, the Commander-in-Chief has most wisely reduced the amount of tent accommodation for officers and men far below the ordinary luxurious Indian allowance.

The presence of the ships of the Royal Navy has been of the greatest service. At least eleven thousand seamen and marines have been contributed by them for duty on sh.o.r.e, and the broadsides of the _Sanspareil_, _Shannon_, and _Pearl_, as they lie along the esplanade, have had a very rea.s.suring effect upon the inhabitants of Calcutta, who, until lately, have insisted pertinaciously that their lives and property were in hourly danger.[44]

No line-of-battle ship has been seen in the Hooghly since Admiral Watson sailed up to Chandernagore just a hundred years ago;[45] and certainly nothing in his fleet was equal to the _Sanspareil_. The natives stare at her, and call her "the four-storied boat."

For the future, if Delhi should fall and Lucknow be secured, the work of pacification will go forward steadily. Many points will have to be watched, and there may be occasional resistance; but nothing like an organised contest against authority is probable. The greatest difficulties will be in the civil work of re-settlement. The recent death of Mr Colvin,[46] the Lieutenant-Governor of the North-Western Provinces, has removed an officer whose experience would there have been most valuable. He has died, fairly exhausted; and is the fourth officer of high trust whose life has given way in the last four months.

One of the greatest difficulties which lie ahead--and Lord Canning grieves to say so to your Majesty--will be the violent rancour of a very large proportion of the English community against every native Indian of every cla.s.s. There is a rabid and indiscriminate vindictiveness abroad, even amongst many who ought to set a better example, which it is impossible to contemplate without something like a feeling of shame for one's fellow-countrymen. Not one man in ten seems to think that the hanging and shooting of forty or fifty thousand mutineers, besides other Rebels, can be otherwise than practicable and right; nor does it occur to those who talk and write most upon the matter that for the Sovereign of England to hold and govern India without employing, and, to a great degree, trusting natives, both in civil and military service, is simply impossible. It is no exaggeration to say that a vast number of the European community would hear with pleasure and approval that every Hindoo and Mohammedan had been proscribed, and that none would be admitted to serve the Government except in a menial office. That which they desire is to see a broad line of separation, and of declared distrust drawn between us Englishmen and every subject of your Majesty who is not a Christian, and who has a dark skin; and there are some who entirely refuse to believe in the fidelity or goodwill of any native towards any European; although many instances of the kindness and generosity of both Hindoos and Mohammedans have come upon record during these troubles.

To those whose hearts have been torn by the foul barbarities inflicted upon those dear to them any degree of bitterness against the natives may be excused. No man will dare to judge them for it. But the cry is raised loudest by those who have been sitting quietly in their homes from the beginning and have suffered little from the convulsions around them unless it be in pocket. It is to be feared that this feeling of exasperation will be a great impediment in the way of restoring tranquillity and good order, even after signal retribution shall have been deliberately measured out to all chief offenders.[47]

Lord Canning is ashamed of having trespa.s.sed upon your Majesty's indulgence at such length. He will only add that he has taken the liberty of sending to your Majesty by this mail a map which has just been finished, showing the distribution of the Army throughout India at the time of the outbreak of the Mutiny. It also shows the Regiments of the Bengal Army which have mutinied, and those which have been disarmed, the number of European troops arrived in Calcutta up to the 19th of September, and whence they came; with some few other points of information.

There may be some slight inaccuracies, as the first copies of the map have only just been struck off, and have not been corrected; but Lord Canning believes that it will be interesting to your Majesty at the present moment.

Lord Canning begs to be allowed to express his earnest wishes for the health of your Majesty, and of His Royal Highness Prince Albert, and to offer to your Majesty the humble a.s.surance of his sincere and dutiful devotion.

[Footnote 42: Word omitted in the original.]

[Footnote 43: At the battle of the Alma, Sir Colin Campbell, in command of the 2nd or Highland Brigade of the 1st Division, had, with his Highlanders in line, routed the last compact column of the Russians. On the 11th of July 1857, he was appointed Commander-in-Chief in India, and started literally at one day's notice, reaching Calcutta on the 14th of August.]

[Footnote 44: The services of the Naval Brigade, at the relief of Lucknow, were warmly recognised by Sir Colin Campbell, and especially the gallantry of Captain Peel of the _Shannon_.]

[Footnote 45: In retribution for the atrocity of the Black Hole of Calcutta, Watson, under instructions from Clive, reduced Chandernagore on the 23rd of March 1757; the battle of Pla.s.sey was fought on the 23rd of June.]

[Footnote 46: John Russell Colvin, formerly Private Secretary to Lord Auckland, had been Lieutenant-Governor since 1853.]