The Generals

Chapter 57

‘At last,’ Arthur muttered as he finished reading the dispatch from Richard. He laid it down and looked up at the small team of officials he had gathered in his office to discuss the coming campaign. In addition to Fitzroy, there was Stevenson, Close and Purneah. ‘The Governor General has concluded a treaty with Goklah, the Mahratta warlord whose territory borders Mysore. It seems that Dhoondiah Waugh has been carelessly indiscriminate about whose lands he preys on. Now he has another enemy, and we shall crush him between our forces and those of Goklah.The Governor General’s final instruction is that when we take Dhoondiah Waugh he is to be hanged from the nearest tree.’

‘Good!’ Stevenson exclaimed heartily. ‘Now we surely have the man caught between the beaters and the hunters. All that remains is to stick him.’

‘Quite,’ Arthur responded with an amused smile. ‘Now then, gentlemen, let’s turn our minds to the plan. We’ve seen that Dhoondiah Waugh cannot be stopped by defending the trade routes that pass through Mysore.We simply have not got enough men for that. So what I propose is the offensive control of those routes.We’ll send a strong column against him, consolidating our gains as we push on, driving him up towards Goklah.We’ll do all we can to deny him access to men, arms and supplies. My hircarrah scouts report that Dhoondiah Waugh has a number of strong forts in the border areas. To start with we will ignore his raiding columns and concentrate on reducing those forts. Without them, he’ll be forced to keep on the move. Without supplies, I suspect that his followers will begin to melt away. Eventually, he will be cornered and finished off. And then we’ll have peace in Mysore.’

The Company’s resident in Seringapatam, Barry Close, leaned forward as he responded. ‘That’s fine in principle, sir, but as long as Dhoondiah Waugh has gold and silver to pay for supplies, then we can be sure that the brinjarris will sell him grain, and other goods, even weapons.’

‘I have thought of that,’ said Arthur. ‘I think it’s time we made the merchants aware of the dangers of dealing with Dhoondiah Waugh.’ He turned to Purneah. ‘A hint might be given to them that I am in the habit of hanging those whom I find living under the protection of British and Company forces and dealing treacherously towards our interests. I shall spare neither rank nor riches in this respect.’

Purneah nodded. ‘I shall see to it, sahib.’

‘Very well.’ Arthur indicated the bottle of arrack on the table. ‘Fitzroy, if you would do the honours?’

When every man had a full glass,Arthur raised his to make the toast. ‘Gentlemen, the hunt is on. To the day’s fox.’

Early in June Arthur led the small army he had formed into the northern region of Mysore, the stronghold of Dhoondiah Waugh. In addition to two King’s battalions there were five Company battalions. Each unit had been allocated two small field guns, since grapeshot had proved to have a profoundly demoralising effect on enemy warriors more used to small arms fire and hand to hand fighting. In order to move swiftly enough to counter the enemy’s moves, Arthur also took along two King’s regiments of cavalry and three of the Company’s mounted units.

The villages the column marched through all bore evidence of Dhoondiah Waugh’s cruel regime: the blackened shells of burned buildings and the pinched faces of those who had lost all their animals and crops to the brigands. All that he saw made Arthur more determined than ever to crush Dhoondiah Waugh and give some peace and order to the desperate natives who stared at the passing soldiers and held out their hands as they begged for scraps of food.The hircarrah scouts soon found the first of the enemy’s strongholds on the border with the Mahratta federation. The defenders were offered terms, and when they contemptuously turned them down Arthur ordered his guns to blow the gates open with roundshot before his soldiers stormed the fort and killed every man under arms within. The rest were released, and Arthur had few doubts about their fate if they ever passed through the lands they had once preyed on.

One by one the enemy’s strongholds fell to the British forces, and the stores of arms and food that could not be carried off were set on fire. As the summer heat beat down on the parched landscape the campaign assumed a steady rhythm of marching during the cool hours before dawn and into the morning, before lying up during the suffocating midday heat, and then resuming their progress into the early evening before making camp for the night. The only relief from marching came when they encountered each stronghold, which fell in less than a day, and then the column moved on.

As July began with still no sighting of Dhoondiah Waugh and his army Arthur began to doubt that his campaign plan was working. The British were steadily whittling down the enemy’s supply bases and reducing his strongholds and yet Dhoondiah Waugh resolutely refused to give battle, even though he surely knew where Arthur’s column was from day to day, since his horsemen were nearly always in sight somewhere in the hazy distance, keeping a watch on the column’s progress.

‘The bloody man is going to retreat to the ends of the earth,’ Fitzroy grumbled one morning early in the month. He was riding at Arthur’s side, and squinting in the harsh glare of the sun. The dust kicked up from the column filled the air and settled on the jackets and crossbelts of the battalion marching beside them so that it seemed as if they had all passed through a pool of ochre dye.

Arthur licked his lips and spat out the grit that had got caught in his saliva. ‘He can’t go too far. If Goklah is true to his word then even now he will be moving towards us with his army. Dhoondiah Waugh will have a battle on his hands whichever way he turns. There will be no escape.’

‘I pray so,’ Fitzroy muttered. ‘Before we all choke on this wretched dust. I imagine you’ll be looking forward to returning to the comforts of Seringapatam as much as the rest of us, sir?’

‘Yes. I suppose so,’ Arthur replied. His mind went back to one of the final communications he had received from Richard, shortly before setting off on the present campaign. Another attempt was to be made to take Java, to secure the trade routes from French privateers. Richard had asked him to consider taking command of the expedition once he had dealt with Dhoondiah Waugh. Although the idea attracted him, Arthur had been forced to set it aside while the present campaign was under way. His thoughts were interrupted by the sudden pounding of hooves as a rider came galloping down the column.

‘Wellesley, sahib?’ the man called out. ‘Colonel Wellesley?’

‘Here!’ Arthur raised his hat and waved it from side to side as he halted Diomed.

The rider yanked his reins and veered his mount towards Arthur. It was the chief of the hircarrah scouts, a man whose reliability Arthur had come to trust. He had been sent ahead of the column to gain knowledge of Goklah’s movements and report back. Now he reined in and Arthur saw at once that both the man and his mount were exhausted from days of hard riding.

‘What is it?’ Arthur asked in Hindoostani. ‘What’s happened?’

‘Goklah has been defeated by Dhoondiah Waugh, sahib. Six days ago.’

‘Defeated?’ Arthur shook his head. It could not be true. Goklah had over fifteen thousand men and eight guns. He looked closely at the scout. ‘How did this happen?’

‘Sahib, I was not there,’ the scout replied carefully. ‘I met some survivors hiding in a nullah. They told me what had happened. They were ambushed as they camped for the night. I rode on to the battlefield to see with my own eyes, and it was true, sahib. A shallow valley filled with the dead.’

‘And Goklah? What of him?’

‘Dead, sahib. The men saw it, and they said that Dhoondiah Waugh himself dyed his beard in the blood of Goklah.’

Arthur continued to stare at the man for a moment, as the column tramped past. He was aware of Fitzroy at his side, fretting to know the nature of the news the scout had brought. He told the scout to join the column, but not to speak a word of the fate of Goklah. As the man rode off he turned to Fitzroy and spoke in an undertone.

‘Goklah is dead. His army is destroyed.’

‘Good God . . . What now, sir?’

‘What now? We carry on with the plan.’

‘Sir?’ Fitzroy looked surprised. ‘How can we? Goklah’s army was three times the size of ours. If Dhoondiah Waugh can defeat Goklah, what chance have we got?’

‘Man for man, our forces are more than a match for any army on this continent. As long as we hold the column together we have little to fear. Besides, with such a victory under his belt, Dhoondiah Waugh might become reckless enough to face us in battle. And if he does, then he is doomed, Fitzroy. Hold to that thought.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Fitroy replied uncertainly.

Arthur turned his mount back towards the head of the column and with a click of his dry tongue he gently urged Diomed forward.

They continued to reduce the enemy’s strongholds until, at the end of July, they stormed the final fortress of Dummul late in the afternoon. As dusk settled over the surrounding hills Arthur’s men went through the fort with firebrands, systematically torching everything that could burn. Brilliant sheets of red and orange flame crackled up against the rouge glow of the sunset. A thick plume of smoke gathered over the blaze, billowing gently into the gloom as it rose steadily higher. Even though they had burned several of Dhoondiah Waugh’s strongholds in the previous weeks the soldiers still regarded the spectacle with fascinated awe for a while before returning to their camp and preparing their evening meal.

‘That’s it, then, sir,’ Fitzroy announced. ‘The last of them. There’s nowhere for Dhoondiah Waugh to run now.’

‘True enough,’ Arthur agreed.

‘What will he do now, sir?’

‘There’s not much he can do, apart from keep on the move. We’ve destroyed his supplies, so there will be little food to sustain a large force. He’ll have to divide his army. Very soon, the prospect of continually being on the march without rest and further spoils will cause his men to melt away. At which point, Dhoondiah Waugh will be little more than a common criminal on the run. The days of the King of Two Worlds are numbered. It has come to the final act.’