Page:The Indian Mutiny of 1857.djvu/231



Sir Henry Lawrence, on the 1st and 2d of July, concentrating his troops within the Residency of Lakhnao. He had, on the evening of the 1st, caused the Machchí Bhawan to be blown up, and its garrison, guns and treasure to be withdrawn to the enclosure which he had fixed upon as the place most capable of offering resistance to the rebels. Within that enclosure he had, on the morning of the 2d of July, 535 men of the 32d Foot, fifty of the 84th, eighty-nine artillerymen, 100 English officers attached to the loyal sipáhís, or unattached, 153 civilians, covenanted and uncovenanted servants of the State, and 765 natives. The place these held was, from a military point of view, not defensible. The slight fortifications, in the shape of earthworks, which had been contemplated, were still incomplete, whilst distant from these less than the width of the Strand were houses capable of being occupied in force by the rebels. The west and south faces of the enclosure were practically undefended, the bastion commenced at the angle of the two faces having been left unfinished. The position may, in a few words, be roughly described as comprising a number of houses built for ordinary domestic purposes, separated originally from one another by small plots of ground but now roughly united by mud walls and trenches.