Page:The Indian Mutiny of 1857.djvu/267

Rh The force now at Havelock's disposal consisted of 3179 men of all arms. It was constituted as follows. The first infantry brigade, composed of the Madras Fusiliers, the 5th Fusiliers, the 84th, and two companies of the 64th, was commanded by Neill. The second, composed of the 78th Highlanders, the 90th, and Brasyer's Sikhs, was led by Colonel Hamilton of the 78th, with the rank of Brigadier. The artillery brigade, composed of Maude's battery, Olpherts' battery, and Eyre's battery of eighteen-pounders, was commanded by Major Cooper. Barrow led the cavalry, consisting of 109 volunteers and fifty-nine native horsemen. Crommelin was the Chief Engineer.

With this force, leaving Colonel Wilson of the 64th, with the headquarters of his regiment and some details of convalescents, in all about 400 men, to hold Kánhpur, Havelock crossed the Ganges, on the 19th, under cover of Eyre's heavy guns. Those guns followed the next day. On the 21st Havelock drove the rebels from Mangalwár, then halting at Unáo for a mouthful of food, pushed on to Bashíratganj, already the scene of three contests, and bivouacked there for the night. It was raining heavily, and not a man but who was wet to the skin. However, the impedimenta arrived two hours later, and with it the luxury of dry clothes and a dinner. The rain was still falling as the little force set out at half-past seven the next morning. Marching sixteen miles, it came in sight of the bridge of Banní, a very defensible position had the rebels had the heart to defend it. But badly led, or believing in the greater capabilities of the narrow streets of Lakhnao, they had neither broken down the bridge over the river Sai nor manned the two half-moon batteries which they had constructed on the further side of it. Havelock then crossed the bridge, bivouacked for the night on its further bank, and fired a royal salute to inti-