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To: Little Ray

One of the worst incidents occured when some 200+ wives and children of a British garrison (the troops were in the field pursuing the rebels) were rounded up in either a church or a schoolhouse, and then hacked to death


3 posted on 09/27/2012 9:03:16 AM PDT by ken5050
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To: ken5050
One of the worst incidents occured when some 200+ wives and children of a British garrison (the troops were in the field pursuing the rebels) were rounded up in either a church or a schoolhouse, and then hacked to death.

You are probably referencing the Cawnpore massacre. You're not particularly accurate in your description, though.

The garrison at Cawnpore stood a siege for about three weeks, and then surrendered on guarantee of safe passage. The safe passage was violated and almost all the men killed in the massacre.

About 200 women and children were taken prisoner and held for about two weeks. As the British forces closed in, it was decided to kill them all. Nobody is still very clear on exactly who was responsible for this decision.

One theory is that it was ordered in reprisal for the atrocities being committed (quite genuine) by the relieving British forces advancing on Cawnpore.

The rebel soldiers almost all refused to kill the women and kids, despite being threatened with death themselves.

The "lady" in charge of the prison then hired butchers from the bazaar, who chopped the women and kids into pieces and threw them down a well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Cawnpore

17 posted on 09/27/2012 10:30:24 AM PDT by Sherman Logan (Perception wins all the battles. Reality wins all the wars.)
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To: ken5050; Little Ray; null and void; Sherman Logan
The article exaggerates. Firstly, the Sepoy Rebellion was mainly in the Gangetic plain and in contrast the Tamils, Sikhs and Nepalis supported the British against the Moguls

Secondly, the "give the best shot" indicates a pre-determined plan. There wasn't

Thirdly the Kanpur (or Cawnpore) massacre is as Sherman points out, chaotic and hardly planned

As Sherman points out correctly Horrible atrocities were indeed committed by both sides, though the number of Indians murdered by the Brits is probably a large multiple (20x, 50x, 100x, who knows?) of the Brits murdered by Indians. This is largely because there just weren't that many Brits in India at the time, while there were lots and lots of Indians available for slaughter.

The point is that while these atrocities happened, the true nature of events bears little semblance to this definition of a "Perfect Day."

Sherman, I would also state that the ignorance of the article's author is because many people think of India as one country while it isn't -- the people of Punjab and of Madras as different nations, different races and their languages are as similar as Italian and Japanese

The "Indian Mutiny" was really just the "Gangetic north Indian mutiny" and even then it was mainly brought on by the erstwhile rulers trying to get back their power to collect more money

The common people saw the British as just another tax collector, no better, no worse

And for Tamils, Sikhs etc., the British were better than the Moslem rulers or the Marathas (to some extent)

34 posted on 06/30/2013 11:27:43 PM PDT by Cronos (Latin presbuteros>Late Latin presbyter->Old English pruos->Middle Engl prest->priest)
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To: ken5050

The Massacre at Cawnpore


94 posted on 07/04/2020 10:19:44 AM PDT by Covenantor (We are ruled...by liars who refuse them news, and by fools who cannot govern. " Chesterton)
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