Siege Of Bharatpur
The Siege Of Bharatpur took place by British Forces under the leadership of Lord Lake in January 1805.
The Siege Of Bharatpur
Ram Sarup Joon[1] writes that ... Lord Lake in an effort to cause disunity, reminded Raja Ranjit Singh of the forgotten enmity with Marathas and his treaty with the British. But Ranjit Singh was a man of his words. He straight-away refused to surrender Holkar and took up the gauntlet thrown by the British Army with the opening of heavy Artillery fire.
On 7th Jan. 1805 Lord Lake explored every possible avenue to penetrate the fort. A large number of British Officers and soldiers were killed in this action, the supply of rations and ammunition ran short and they failed in capturing the fort. They employed 5 inch and 7 inch guns but these did not make much impression on the thick mud walls. After two days, they succeeded in creating a break in the Southern Wall and the fort was charged by four Indian units and 1,500 British troops. The Jats repulsed this attack after inflicting heavy casualties. Colonel Maitland and 400 troops were killed. The British advanced for the third time and attacked the fort under the covering fire of heavy Artillery. The troops bravely crossed the mote and tried to scale the walls of the fort. As they came up the Jats kept killing them till the mote was filled with dead bodies, General Smith and Col Meeker,
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commanders of the British troops requested Lord Lake to sign a peace treaty with Jats but he did not consider it appropriate in the hope of getting fresh reinforcements from Bombay. The confederacy of Yashwant Rao Holkar, Amir Khan, Nawab of Rohilla and Ranjit Singh decided to teach a lesson to the foreigners.
They came out of the fort and started an open battle inflicting heavy casualties on the enemy. The British launched a fierce attack on 11 Jan 1805 but again they were beaten back leaving behind 250 dead and 700 wounded. Lord Lake still insisted that bharatpur must be captured, otherwise it would be a disgrace to them. Fresh reinforcements arrived in the meantime from Madras and Bombay and fierce attacks were renewed. When British troops started scaling the walls of the fort, huge boulders were hurled on their heads and when they were in the mote. Inspite of all this some British soldiers succeeded in scaling the walls and a hand to hand fight ensued. Thus after suffering a loss of 1,000 soldiers, the British were forced to withdraw. About 3,000 had been killed and several thousand were injured by this time. The Jats opened artillery fire on the withdrawing enemy.
Lord Lake offered to have a peace treaty. Ranjit Singh was not keen to continue this war and agreed to the terms. The Jat ruler promised not to engage a European officer in his Army. One son of the ruler was to be on the staff of the Viceroy. The siege was lifted.
Reports mention that Jat Gunners in the fort of Deeg did not give up firing till their bodies were pierced like sieves with bayonets.
The third invasion was launched under Colonel Owen. The 73 British Regiment refused to attack. As Indian Regiment attacked most of them were killed by the Jats. The British soldiers were ordered to fall
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in on parade and were badly humiliated.
All these details are given in "War and Sports of Indian and an Officers Diary" by June Western page 384.
On the occasion of the fourth invasion Raja Ranjit Singh was making a round of the fort with a wooden staff in his hand and encouraging his soldiers to fight on. "Brethern, it is your fort".
Each Jat soldier, would grab two soldiers and jump down from the fort ramparts.
The soldiers requested him to stay in the Command post but he refused remarking that bullets could strike only these for whom they were destined. Sergeant Ship writes that he fired at a Jat soldier six times from a distance of 60 yards but he never bowed his head or took shelter. An enemy soldier succeeded in planting the British flag on the fort wall. The Jats did not kill him but gave him shoe-beating and then threw him down in the mote along with his banner. The British guns became out of order due to excessive firing.
According to Colonel Nicholson in his book 'Native States of India' the policy adopted by Rajas of Bharatpur resulted in great financial loss to the Jats, but it earned name and fame for them. Ranjit Singh was followed by Randhir Singh, Baldev Singh, Balwant Singh, Yashwant Singh, Ram Singh, Srikrishan Singh and Brijendra Singh.
The fort of Bharatpur is the only fort in India which was never physically captured by the British.
References
- ↑ History of the Jats/Chapter X,p. 172-174
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