[Footnote 22:  Lieutenant Paul, the Commandant, was killed.  Lieutenant Oldfield mortally, and Lieutenant McQueen severely, wounded.  Lieutenant Willoughby, who brought the regiment out of action, was quite a lad, and was killed at Ruhiya the following April.  Both he and McQueen were recommended for the V.C. for their gallantry on this occasion.  After the fight was over, one of the Native officers, bemoaning the loss of the British officers, asked me who would be sent to replace them.  He added:  ’Sahib, ham log larai men bahut tez hain, magar jang ka bandobast nahin jante’ (’Sir, we can fight well, but we do not understand military arrangements’).  What the old soldier intended to convey to me was his sense of the inability of himself and his comrades to do without the leadership and general management of the British officers.]

* * * * *

CHAPTER XXIV. 1857

Henry Norman—­The Shah Najaf—­The mess-house—­Planting the flag —­A memorable meeting—­The Residency

The operation which I have tried to describe in the last chapter was not completed until well on in the afternoon, when the movement towards the Residency was at once proceeded with.  To the left as we advanced the ground was fairly open (with the exception of quite a small village) for about 1,100 yards in the direction of the British Infantry mess-house.  To the right also, for about 300 yards, there was a clear space, then a belt of jungle intersected by huts and small gardens extending for about 400 yards farther, as far as the Shah Najaf,[1] a handsome white-domed tomb, surrounded by a court-yard, and enclosed by high masonry loopholed walls; and beyond the Shah Najaf rose the Kadam Rasul,[2] another tomb standing on a slight eminence.

But little opposition was experienced from the village, which was carried by the Infantry, while the Artillery were brought up to open fire on the Shah Najaf and Kadam Rasul.  The latter was soon occupied by the 2nd Punjab Infantry, belonging to Greathed’s brigade, which had by this time joined the main body; but the Shah Najaf proved a harder nut to crack.  This building was almost concealed by dense jungle, and its great strength therefore remained unsuspected until we got quite close up to it.

Barnston’s battalion of Detachments advanced in skirmishing order, under cover of our guns.  One of the shells most unfortunately burst prematurely, wounding Major Barnston so severely that he died soon afterwards.  Whether it was that the men were depressed by the loss of their leader, or that they were not prepared for the very damaging fire which suddenly poured upon them, I know not, but certain it is that they wavered, and for a few minutes there was a slight panic.  The Commander-in-Chief, with Hope Grant, Mansfield, Adrian Hope, and their respective staffs, were sitting on their horses anxiously awaiting the