Factory of Calcutta.[8] The Governor, the commandant[9] of the troops, and some two hundred persons of lesser note, had deserted the Fort almost as soon as it was actually invested, and Holwell, one of the councillors, an ex-surgeon, and the gallant few who stood by him and continued the defence, were captured, and, to the number of 146, cast into a little dungeon,[10] intended for military offenders, from which, the next morning, only twenty-three came out alive.  The English took refuge at Fulta, thirty miles down the river, where the Nawab, in his pride and ignorance, left them unmolested.  There they were gradually reinforced from Madras, first by Major Kilpatrick, and later on by Colonel Clive and Admiral Watson.  About the same time both French and English learned that war had been declared in Europe between England and France in the previous May, but, for different reasons, neither nation thought the time suitable for making the fact formally known.

Towards the end of December the English, animated by the desire of revenge and of repairing their ruined fortunes, advanced on Calcutta, and on the 2nd of January, 1757, the British flag again floated over Fort William.  The Governor, Manik Chand, was, like many of the Nawab’s servants, a Hindu.  Some say he was scared away by a bullet through his turban; others, that he was roused from the enjoyment of a nautch—­a native dance—­by the news of the arrival of the English.[11] Hastening to Murshidabad, he reported his defeat, and asserted that the British they had now to deal with were very different from those they had driven from or captured in Calcutta.

The English were not satisfied with recovering Calcutta.  They wished to impress the Nawab, and so they sent a small force to Hugli, which lies above Chandernagore and Chinsurah, stormed the Muhammadan fort, burnt the town, and destroyed the magazines, which would have supplied the Nawab’s army in an attack on Calcutta.  The inhabitants of the country had never known anything so terrible as the big guns of the ships, and the Nawab actually believed the men-of-war could ascend the river and bombard him in his palace at Murshidabad.  Calling on the French and Dutch for aid, which they refused, he determined to try his fortune a second time at Calcutta.  At first, everything seemed the same as on the former occasion:  the native merchants and artisans disappeared from the town; but it was not as he thought, out of fear, but because the English wished to have them out of the way, and so expelled them.  Except for the military camp to the north of the city, where Clive was stationed with his little army, the town lay open to his attack.  Envoys from Calcutta soon appeared asking for terms, and the Nawab pretended to be willing to negotiate in order to gain time while he outflanked Clive and seized the town.  Seeing through this pretence Watson and Clive thought it was time to give him a lesson, and, on the morning of the 5th of February,