greased cartridges revolt of 1857

March 15, 2023 4:07 am | by | Posted in why did the cube in albuquerque close

But those who did would not have been surprised by what happened next, for some very similar beliefs were spreading in the early months of 1857. Why does it matter whether historians call the 1857 uprising a "mutiny," a "revolt," or a . The British, who had nothing to do with the mysterious transmission, guessed the breads were a piece of mischief-making on the part of the Indians, though opinion was divided as to whether the breads came from the east, near Calcutta (Kolkata), from the north, in the province of Oude (Avadh) or from Indore, in the center of the country. The transfer of the number 66th which was taken away from a regular Bengal Sepoy regiment of the line disbanded over refusal to serve without batta, and given to a Gurkha battalion, was considered by the Sepoy as a breach of faith by the company. Setting out from Allahabad, Sir Henry Havelock fought through Kanpur to the Lucknow residency on September 25, where he was besieged in turn. It came as a greater shock than the loss of the American colonies, and prompted reprisals far more hysterical and vicious than those visited on rebellious subjects elsewhere in the Empire. All the people in the palace wondered what it could mean. Most Indians thought they were the work of the British, whothrough the East India Companyhad ruled over large portions of the country for almost a century (and were, according to one well-known prophecy, due to be unseated at that centurys end). The traditional story of the Sepoy Mutiny is that the introduction of a new cartridge for the Enfield rifle provoked much of the trouble. In the event, the chapattis were not harbingers of a coming storm. They were what people made them into, and the significance attributed to them was a symptom of the pervasive distrust and general consternation amongst the Indian population during the early months of 1857. A New Type of Rifle Cartridge Caused Problems, The Indian Revolt of 1857 Brought the End of the East India Company. Throughout May and June 1857 more units of Indian troops mutinied against the British. Mason, Philip (1974), page 236 "A Matter of Honour", London: Holt, Rhinehart & Winston. Prior to the period of British rule, any refusal to proceed on service until pay issues were resolved was considered a legitimate form of displaying grievance by Indian troops serving under Indian rulers. Match the Country with Its Hemisphere Quiz, Baron Strathnairn of Strathnairn and Jhansi. Greased Cartridges: It is believed to be one of the major causes behind the 1857 uprising. It was a source of inspiration for the national liberation movement, which later achieved what the revolt could not. Under a British policy called the "doctrine of lapse," the East India Company would take control of Indian states in which a local ruler had died without an heir. That rate was particularly disconcerting because it was vastly swifter than the fastest British mails, and urgent inquiries were made as to the source and meaning of the movement. They yielded the information that the breads were being distributed far more widely than anyone in Agra had yet realized, and that the Indians who received them generally took them as some sort of a sign. When soldiers of the Bengal army mutinied in Meerut on May 10, 1857, tension had been growing for some time. The Revolt of 1857-58 was the biggest and bloodiest conflict against any European colonial power during the nineteenth century. In the altercation, Pandey was surrounded by British troops and shot himself in the chest. KoboE. Mangal Pandey was an Indian soldier who played an important role in incidents prior to the uprising of 1857, known by different names like the 'Indian Rebellion of 1857,' the 'Sepoy Mutiny' and 'India's First War of Independence.'. of your Kindle email address below. To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org When you visit the site, Dotdash Meredith and its partners may store or retrieve information on your browser, mostly in the form of cookies. In fact, it was rather the last effort of traditional India. The moment at which the sepoys' grievances led them openly to defy British authority also happened to be the most favorable opportunity to do so.[24]. "The Sepoy Mutiny of 1857." But the back of the rebellion had been broken and time gained for reinforcements to restore British superiority. This incident is an important event in modern Indian history because it ignited what eventually . Narasimha Rao, The BJP becomes the largest party in the Lok Sabha, BJP reelection bids and tensions in Kashmir, Addressing COVID-19 and its economic impact. As time passed, the powers of the commanding officers reduced and the government became more unfeeling or distant from the concerns of the sepoys. In England, almost every child is aware that, with a smooth bored gun, no grease of any kind is required to ensure the proper loading of it, whilst with a rifle-bored piece such is necessary. So writes Mrs Peile, one of those who escaped from Delhi on 11 May 1857. This meant that when they came to be threatened by modernizing regimes in Calcutta, from the 1840s onwards, the sepoys had become accustomed to very high ritual status, and were extremely sensitive to suggestions that their caste might be polluted. I had no conversation with the King on the subject; but others talked in his presence about it, wondering what could be the object. By a campaign in Avadh and Rohilkhand, Campbell cleared the countryside. And the uprising became extremely violent. Extensive inquiries into the meaning of the breads produced plenty of theories but few facts; even the runners and watchmen who baked them and carried them from village to village did not know why they had to run through the night with chupatties in their turbans, though they took them just the same. Order was restored by the firmness of Charles John Canning (later Earl Canning), first viceroy of India (governed 185862), whose title of Clemency was given in derision by angry British merchants in Calcutta, and of Sir John Lawrence in the Punjab. Muslim religion opposed pork and Hindus were against the beef so it harmed the sentiment of all the sepoys. This took the form of Muslim millenarianism, with preachers in Lucknow foretelling the end of the raj. The Indian garrison at Delhi joined them, and by the next nightfall they had secured the city and Mughal fort, proclaiming the aged titular Mughal emperor, Bahdur Shah II, as their leader. 1857 revolt started firstly on 29th March 1857 from Bairakpur (West Bengal) by Mangal Pandey. In one sense, this was not surprising; since India had a large and settled British population, there were more women and children around for the rebels to kill. Many Animals, Including the Platypus, Lost Their Stomachs. The resumption of tax-free land and confiscation of jagirs (the grant or right to locally control land revenue) caused discontent among the jagirdars and zamindars. The East India Company had been active in India for nearly 250 years, but the violence of the 1857 uprising led to the British government dissolving the company and taking direct control of India. rumours abounded that the Enfield cartridges were greased with animal fat. The Revolt of 1857 in India eventually broke out over the incident of greased cartridges. Sympathetic rulers, such as Lord William Bentinck were replaced by arrogant aristocrats, such as Lord Dalhousie, who despised the troops and the populace. Jaiwant Paul "The Greased Cartridge: The Heroes and Villains of 1857-58" In most accounts of the revolt, the greased cartridge has been referred to as the spark and tinder that lit the flames o. In another, however, the appalling atrocities visited by the Companys armies on the people of northern India were far from justified, since the British proved to be just as prone to rumors and panics as their Indian subjects. And, historically, much the same thing had happened before in times of trouble. The surrender of Kanpur, after a relatively brief siege, was followed by a massacre of virtually all British citizens and loyal Indian soldiers at Kanpur. ThoughtCo. The system was subject to abuse, and the company used it to annex territories in a questionable manner. "[26] Their rule in India had begun with the Battle of Plassey in 1757. The cartridge had to be bitten off before loading it into the gun. The Personal Adventures and Experiences of a Magistrate During the Rise, Progression and Suppression of the Indian Mutiny (London: John Murray, 1884);Kim A. Wagner. Although the armies of many Rajas or states which rebelled contained large numbers of guns, the British superiority in artillery was to be decisive in the siege of Delhi after the arrival of a siege train of thirty-two howitzers and mortars. In 1824, there was another mutiny by a regiment ordered overseas in the First Anglo-Burmese War, who were refused transport to carry individual cooking vessels and told to share communal pots. Leader of the British Conservative Party and future prime minister Benjamin Disraeli argued these objects were signs to rebel and evidence of a conspiracy, and the press echoed this belief. The uprising was put down, but the methods employed by the British were so harsh that many in the western world were offended. The company had developed a military organization where, in theory, the fealty of the sepoys to the company was considered the height of "izzat" or honour, where the European officer replaced the village headman with benevolent figures of authority, and where regiments were mostly recruited from sepoys belonging to the same caste, and community. In an elaborate ceremony, Lord Lytton, the serving viceroy of India, honored a number of Indian princes. Mason, Philip (1974), pages 203-204 A Matter of Honour", London: Holt, Rhinehart & Winston. Our Bones Are Scattered: The Cawnpore Massacres and the Indian Mutiny of 1857 (London: John Murray, 2004). The revolt of 1857, which the British call the Indian Mutiny but many Indians prefer to think of as the First War of Independence, was the defining event in British imperial history. As further evidence, he observes that the Urdu sources of the pre- rebellion and post- rebellion periods usually refer to the British not as angrez (the English), goras (whites) or firangis (foreigners), but as kafir (disbeliever) and nasrani (Christians). } A cartridge for the new Enfield rifle. Yet discreet inquiries soon revealed that many hundreds of chapatis were passing through his district, and through other parts of India as welleverywhere from the Narmada river in the south to the border with Nepal several hundred miles to the north. On 29 March 1857, Mangal Pandey, a sepoy of the 34 th Bengal Native Infantry (BNI) mutinied against his commanding officers of the East India Company. Sepoy units in the south of India remained loyal, but in the north, many units of the Bengal Army turned on the British. Some currents simply ran cold, while others moved in parallel, or paused before continuing. The Politics of a Popular Uprising: Bundelkhand in 1857 (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1994);Mark Thornhill. This revolt had shaken the foundation of . He first defeated the Gwalior contingent and then, when the rebels Tantia Topi and Rani Lakshmi Bai of Jhansi had seized Gwalior, broke up their forces in two more battles. Beyond that, however, opinions remained divided. One common punishment was to tie mutineers to the mouth of a cannon and then fire the cannon, completely obliterating the victim. https://www.thoughtco.com/sepoy-mutiny-of-1857-1774014 (accessed March 1, 2023). It is however also possible to enclose within the paper container the bullet as well as the powder and the cartridge then becomes a balled cartridge. The grease used was tallow, probably containing both cow and pig fat. However much of this sense of the invincibility of the British was lost in the First Anglo-Afghan War where poor political judgment and inept British leadership led to the massacre of Elphinstone's army (which included three Bengal regiments) while retreating from Kabul. Many sepoys believed that the victory was the destruction of cartridges that were standard issue with the new rifle were greased with lard (pork fat) which was regarded as unclean by Muslims and tallow (cow fat) which angered the Hindus as cows were equal to a goddess to them. Did an Ancient Magnetic Field Reversal Cause Chaos for Life on Earth 42,000 Years Ago? Measures of prevention of future crises naturally began with the army, which was completely reorganized. The immediate cause of the Revolt was the issue of the greased cartridges. The signal spread in all directions with wonderful celerity. They shot the British officers and made for Delhi, 40 miles (65 km) distant, where there were no British troops. The particular reason, the greased cartridges for the Enfield rifles, was a mistake rectified as soon as it was discovered; but the fact that explanations and reissues could not quell the soldiers suspicions suggests that the troops were already disturbed by other causes. The mutiny and great revolt of 1857-59. Another suggestion they put forward was to introduce a new drill, in which the cartridge was not bitten with the teeth but torn open with the hand. Thornhill came into his office one morning to find four dirty little cakes of the coarsest flour, about the size and thickness of a biscuit lying on his desk. The magistrates tried to stop it, but, in spite of all they could do, it passed along to the borders of the Punjab. [2][3], Religious disquiet as the cause of rebellion underlies the work of historian William Dalrymple who asserts that the rebels were motivated primarily by resistance to the actions of the English East India Company(also called British East India Company), especially under James Broun-Ramsay reign, which were perceived as attempts to impose Christianity and Christian laws in India. In spite of their apparently desperate situation, the British possessed long-term advantages: they could and did receive reinforcements from Britain; they had, thanks to the resolution of Sir John Lawrence, a firm base in the Punjab, and they had another base in Bengal, where the people were quiet; they had virtually no anxiety in the south and only a little in the west; and they had an immense belief in themselves and their civilization, which gave resolution to their initial desperation. Stbere im grten eBookstore der Welt und lies noch heute im Web, auf deinem Tablet, Telefon oder E-Reader. The revolt was sparked by a number of reasons, including economic exploitation, cultural repression, and mistreatment of Indian soldiers. But in the 1830s and 1840s, tensions began to emerge. Thornhill examined the chapatis in his office. Victoria added the title "Empress of India" to her royal title. [9], Until the 1840s there had been a widespread belief amongst the Bengal sepoys in the Iqbal or continued good fortune of the East India Company. The Indian Rebellion of 1857 was a major uprising in India in 1857-58 against the rule of the British East India Company, . Their educational policy was a Westernizing one, with English instead of Persian as the official language; the old elites, schooled in the traditional pattern, felt themselves slighted. There has been much controversy over its nature and causes. Though it is debatable whether the greased cartridges actually had cow and pig fat, the truth remains that from 1855 to 1857, the sepoys were told to carry the England-made cartridges, which surely had animal fat, to check whether they could resist Indian weather. As mutineers were captured, they were often killed on the spot, and many were executed in dramatic fashion. These recalcitrant troops were placed in irons, but their comrades soon came to their rescue. To facilitate its passage, the cartridges were greased with tallow, which, in the U.K., was made of beef and pork fat. Both Hindu and Muslim sepoys refused to use them. What was the issue of cartridges? The revolt of 1857, which the British call the Indian Mutiny but many Indians prefer to think of as the First War of Independence, was the defining event in British imperial history. Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service. Books and articles about the bloody fighting and heroic deeds by British officers and men were published for decades in London. Following the fighting of 185758, India was legally considered a colony of Britain, ruled by a viceroy. Though the revolt was suppressed later, it shook the foundation of British rule in India. Some people said that it was a propitiatory observance to avert some impending calamity; others, that they were circulated by the Government to signify that the population throughout the country would be compelled to use the same food as the Christians, and thus be deprived of their religion; while others again said that the chupatties were circulated to make it known that Government was determined to force Christianity on the country by interfering with their food, and intimation of it was thus given that they might be prepared to resist the attempt. (2021, July 31). By the time of the chupatty movement, no more than a handful of aged India hands could remember such long-ago events as the Vellore Mutiny. At other times however, the Company directly or indirectly conceded the legitimacy of the sepoy's demands, such as when troops of the Bengal and Madras armies refused to serve in Sindh without batta after its conquest. Click to view in higher resolution. McNamara, Robert. The restoration of peace was hindered by British cries for vengeance, often leading to indiscriminate reprisals. The Revolt of 1857, an anti-colonial movement which fought against the imperialist policies of the British East India Company, is an important event that took place in Indian history. [20], In 1857, the Bengal Army contained 10 regular regiments of Indian cavalry and 74 of infantry. The Sepoy Mutiny of 1857. Privacy Statement One could say that the major causes of this revolt were the usage of cow fat to grease rifle cartridges, the British attempting to convert Sepoys to Christianity, and the British taking over the town of Oudh. Mopping-up operations followed, lasting until the British capture of rebel leader Tantia Topi in April 1859. McNamara, Robert. The Great Fear of 1857: Rumours, Conspiracies and the Making of the Indian Uprising (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2010);Andrew Ward. Prior to the outbreak of the Revolt, Bahadur Shah Zafar lived in Delhi as a Pensioner of the British. [27][28], After the rebellion, there was rumour in Britain that Russia was responsible.[28]. It is called the chupatty movement. . A rumour spread that the cartridges of the new Enfield rifles were greased with the fat of cows and pigs. The Indian papers are full of surmises as to what it means. Naturally began with the fat of cows and pigs Animals, Including the Platypus, Lost Their.... 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