CHAP. took steps to punish the aggression, and assert the honour of the British arms. XXXIX. 1823. 56. mese, and of the war. The military strength of the Burmese was considerable, Resources and both their government and troops were inspired with of the Bur- the most extravagant idea of their own prowess, and of difficulties the irresistible nature of the power which they wielded. Emboldened by a long train of victories over their unwarlike neighbours in the Cochin-China peninsula, they deemed themselves invincible, and, never having been brought in contact with them, were utterly ignorant both of the force of European arms and the strength of the British power. With a body of enemies at once so ignorant and so presumptuous, there would, in the ordinary case, have been no serious difficulty in contending. But the Burmese war was rendered a difficult, and, as it proved, a very murderous one, by the nature of the country in which it was to be carried on, and the peculiar species of defence which this had suggested to its inhabitants. The territories in which it was to be carried on, forming the alluvial plains of the Irrawaddy, could only be reached either by crossing a mountain-range 6000 feet high, and impassable for artillery, which separated it from the plain of Bengal, or by ascending the course of that great river after taking Rangoon, which lies at its mouth. The latter appeared the easier and more natural course; but steam-navigation was then in its infancy; no flotilla, impelled by that powerful agent, existed to breast the stream and surmount its descending waves; and the banks on either side, thick set with jungle, were in the months of summer and autumn extremely unhealthy. Add to this, experience had taught the Burmese the art Thorton, of constructing wooden barricades or stockades in the 135; Mar- vast forests with which their country abounded, which, 424; Auber, concealed by a leafy screen till the assailants were almost Snodgrass at them, were nearly impervious to shot, and so firmly set as to be extremely difficult to force.1 Behind these impenetrable barriers, the Burmese marksmen, themselves iv. 127, tin, 423, ii. 431-434; War in Ava, 64. XXXIX. secure, took aim with fatal effect at the assailants, and it CHAP. required all the firmness of the bravest men to advance under the murderous fire. 1824. 57. rations of Taking of The first operations of the war, as so often happens with English military operations, proved unfortunate. First opeNearly as ignorant of the strength and resources of the the war. enemy as they were of ours, the force destined to act Rangoon. against the enemy by the British Government was not half of what was requisite for success. It was wisely, and in fact from necessity, determined to commence operations by a descent on Rangoon, and to march up the course of the Irrawaddy; but as this required the troops to embark from Madras and Calcutta, a very great difficulty was experienced with the native troops, part of whom positively refused to go on board. The consequence was, that the expedition consisted only of 11,000 men, of whom one half were Europeans; an unprecedented proportion in Oriental wars, and which would probably have insured early and decisive success, if it had been possible to bring them at once into action. Rangoon was abandoned without any serious resistance, and presented a valuable base of operations; and this was followed by the successful storming of the fortified June 10. post of Kemendine on the Irrawaddy, which was carried, after a gallant resistance, by the 41st and detachments of the 13th and 38th regiments and Madras European regiment, Major, afterwards SIR ROBERT SALE, being the first man who reached the summit of the work. But this success, though considerable, was the limit of our advantages, and ere long the invading army found itself involved in a mesh of difficulties, arising partly from the 1 Martin, pestilential nature of the climate, and partly from the 423, 424; peculiar species of defence which their local advantages v. 25, 26. had suggested to the enemy.1 The progress of the army, even though successful in every encounter, was necessarily slow from the thick jungle with which the country was beset, and the pesti Thornton, XXXIX. 1824. 58. gress of the war, and sickness of To CHAP. lential miasmata which a tropical sun drew up from the swamps with which it was everywhere intersected. advance in these circumstances, and make the men sleep Slow pro- in the deadly thickets, seemed little short of madness, as it was to expose them to certain destruction; and yet the British. to remain where they were seemed hardly less hazardous, for Rangoon in the autumnal months is so unhealthy that all the inhabitants who can get away leave it at that period. The British army was soon reduced by disease to less than half its former numerical amount; and the survivors were sadly depressed in spirit by seeing so many of their comrades stretched on the bed of sickness or buried around them. Encouraged by the slow progress which the invaders were making, the Burmese government made the most vigorous efforts to expel them altogether from their territory. Reinforcements July 1. and stores poured in on all sides, and the Burmese general received orders to assail the British and drive them out of the country. Notwithstanding his serious losses by sickness, Sir Archibald Campbell, the British June 25. commander, resolved to anticipate the attack by offensive operations on his own side. An expedition was sent against the island of Cheduba, where 600 of the Burmese were intrenched, which was carried with the loss of half their forces and the capture of the rajah. Soon after, the Burmese, in three columns, made a general attack on the English position, but they were repulsed at all points into the jungle without the loss of a single man to the victors. It was now evident that they were no match for the English in the field; but still behind their stockades, and aided by their forests and pestilential swamps, they were formidable antagonists. On the 8th July the British moved in two columns against the enemy, the one under General Macbean by land, the other, under v. 29, 30; Sir A. Campbell in person, proceeding by boats on the 1824, 274. river to destroy some strong works which the enemy had erected to bar farther passage up the stream.1 1 Thornton, Ann. Reg. CHAP. XXXIX. 1824. 59. the British. Both attacks proved successful. After an hour's cannonade from the ships under Captain Marryat, a practicable breach was made in the stockade on the shore; the stormers were immediately landed, and carried three in- Successes of trenchments, armed with fourteen guns, in the most gal- July 8. lant style. The operations of the land columns were equally successful. On arriving in the vicinity of the enemy, General Macbean found himself faced by a network of stockades, armed with heavy artillery, presenting, in the central redoubt, three lines of intrenchments, one within the other, and garrisoned by at least 10,000 men. Nothing daunted by these formidable means of resistance, Macbean ordered the scaling-ladders to the front, and the storming party, consisting of detachments of the 13th, 38th, and 89th regiments, advanced to the assault. In ten minutes the first line was carried; the second, after a violent struggle, was also stormed. Major Sale singled out a Burmese chief of high rank for combat, and slew him with his own hand. Soon after other stockades were carried, and the assailants penetrated into the inner work, after a desperate struggle, by mounting on each other's shoulders. The victory was now complete: ten stockades, armed with thirty pieces of cannon, were car- v, 31, 32; ried without a shot being fired, by escalade; and the enemy, 424; Ann. four times the number of the assailants, were driven from 271, 274. their intrenchments with the loss of 800 men.1 1 Thornton, Martin, Reg. 1824, 60. sustained July 24. Various attacks, some successful, and some unsuccessful, were made on stockades of the enemy near Rangoon, Reverses with a view to extending the quarters of the army and by them. getting supplies during August and September; and at July 16. length an expedition, consisting of native infantry under Colonel Smith, was despatched to attack a fortified Oct. 10. position of the enemy at Kykloo, fourteen miles from Rangoon. The work to be assailed consisted of a pagoda strongly garrisoned and barricaded, surrounded by several exterior lines of stockades. The latter were soon carried; but when the troops approached the VOL. VI. 2 K XXXIX. 1824. CHAP. pagoda itself, they were assailed by so severe a fire from a covered and unseen enemy that most of the British officers who led the column were killed or wounded, and the few who survived were forced to take refuge from the deadly storm of bullets by flying to the nearest shelter. The result was that the sepoys dispersed, abandoned all the works they had carried, and sought safety in flight, which would have been most disastrous had not reinforcements despatched by Sir A. Campbell reached them ere long, and covered their retreat to Rangoon. The panic on this occasion, as is often the case in war, was not confined to the assailants; it extended also to the enemy; and when General Creagh advanced a few days after to renew the attack, he found the works entirely abandoned by them. The British were soon after consoled for this . 34, 36; discomfiture by a successful expedition under Colonel Snodgrass' Godwin against the town of Martaban, which was stormed Burmah, by a detachment of the 41st and part of the 3d Madras native infantry. Immense military stores of all descriptions here rewarded the courage of the victors.1 Oct. 29. 1 Thornton, War in 74-79; Martin, 424. 61. These alternate successes and defeats, however, deterSufferings mined nothing, and ere long the natural difficulties of the ish in Ran- campaign appeared with fatal effect in the invading army. of the Brit goon. The country around Rangoon had been entirely devastated by orders of the Burmese government; and the thickness of the jungle and strength of their stockaded positions rendered it impossible for the British to extend their posts farther into the interior. The result was, that being cooped up in an unhealthy town in the autumnal months, without fresh meat or vegetables, the troops became fearfully sickly-fever and dysentery spread fatal ravages in the camp, and before the end of autumn there Auber, ii. were not 3000 men left in it capable of bearing arms.2 579; Two These calamities, to which the Burmese government were Ava, 241; no strangers, encouraged them to persevere in their resistance, notwithstanding the repeated and unexpected reverses which they had experienced from their strange Years in Martin, 424. |