Page:The Imperial Gazetteer of India - Volume 2 (2nd edition).pdf/156

 BAREILL K

146 cavalry. District.

Rohilkhand Military

Bareilly forms the head-quarters of the

The

population of the cantonments as distinguished from

the town population, consists of 10,257, namely, 6339 Hindus, 2272 Muhammadans, 1430 Christians, and 216 ‘others.’ The ordinary

regiment each of European and Native

a

includes

military

force

infantry,

a battery of Royal Artillery, and a regiment of Native cavalry,

the whole under the

command

of a Brigadier-General.

The

place was founded, according to tradition, about the year 1537, Bas Deo and Barel Deo, from the latter of whom it derives its

by name.

The Katheriyas

of Rohilkhand

(see

Bareilly District) had

long been carrying on a desultory warfare with the of Sambhal and Aonla



and the Mughal

Musalman governors

Imperialists found

it

neces-

sary to establish a strong outpost to the east of their previous frontier.

Troops were thus posted at Bareilly and round their encampment a city soon sprang up, whose irregular outline and mean architecture The town long remained still betrays its hasty and temporary origin. a mere military station, the last stronghold of the Mughals on their

extreme north-eastern

frontier.

governor, founded the

new

In 1657, RajaMakrand Rai, the

city of Bareilly, cut

west of the old town, and expelled

From 1660

all

down

Hindu

the forest to the

the Katheriyas from

its

precincts.

1707, the regular succession of Imperial governors at Bareilly continued without a break ; but in the last-named year, on to

the death of the

man

Emperor Aurangzeb, the Hindus threw

off the

Musal-

yoke, and began a series of internecine quarrels with their

own

co-religionists.

Their

dissensions

Muhammad Khan, been

fully related

gave

an

opportunity

for

chief of the Rohilla Pathins,

in

the

whose

the article on Bareilly District.

of

Ali

history

has

rise

For half a

century Bareilly remained the capital of the Rohilla race, until the

conquest of the country by the British forces on behalf of the Nawab Wazir of Oudh. From the Wazirs it passed to the British in 1801,

once the head-quarters of a Division and District. Muhammadan and Hindu population arose in 1816, 1837, and 1842, but our rule was never During that great seriously threatened until the Mutiny of 1857. struggle, Bareilly was the centre of disaffection for the whole of Rohilkhand. The troops rebelled on the 31st of May, and Khan Bahadur Khdn, a descendant of the Rohilla chieftains, was proclaimed governor. Most of the Europeans escaped to Naini Tal. After the fall of Lucknow, the Nawab of Fatehgarh, the Nana Sahib, Firoz Shah,

and became

at

Religious disturbances between the

and other leading

rebels,

took refuge in Bareilly.

On

the 5th of

May

army arrived before the town, and two days later the rebels fled into Oudh, and the English occupied Bareilly. In 1871, the peace of the town was again disturbed by riots, on the occasion of the 1858, the English