I
 

CHAPTER IX

HAVELOCK AT CAWNPUR—THE ADVANCE
ON LUCKNOW

N Chapter IV it was shown that Havelock's
column, after much protracted exertion and
stubborn fighting, reached the cantonment of Cawnpur
after dark on July i6. The troops lay down on the
damp parade ground without food or shelter. The
Nana had fled to Bithur, whence he sent his women to
Fathgarh by water, pretending, for a time successfully,
that he had drowned himself in the Ganges. When
and where he died is not quite certain, though it is
believed he succumbed to fever, near the Chilhari Ghat,
on the left bank of the Upper Gogra River, in 1859,
but his name has become an execration, his memory a
horrible nightmare. Before quitting Bithur he added
one more to the numberless murders he had com¬
mitted. A European prisoner, who had given birth to
a child in the Palace, was kindly treated by the deceased
ex-Peshwa's women, but by the Nana's last order to
his guard the woman and infant were butchered.
July 17 On July 17 our soldiers strolled over Wheeler's
^^57 intrenchment, and wonderingly admired the desperate
valour which had defended it so long against such
overwhelming numbers; they went to the house where
the fresh blood of 200 slaughtered women and children

was  still   spread wide in   pools   over the floors, and

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