It’s till summer, so here’s a short post to allow you the maximum possible time out in the sun.
Today (21 July) is the anniversary of the Battle of the Pyramids, which gave Napoleon control of Egypt. It features in the upcoming Ridley Scott film, Napoleon, and you can see it in the trailer. Here’s a screenshot:
It looks great, doesn’t it?
Sadly, the reality didn’t feature the pyramids nearly so prominently. Napoleon understood PR in an astonishingly modern way. He wanted the French public to celebrate his glorious victory and announcing that he had won a battle at Embabeh wasn’t going to have nearly the impact of his saying he had won the Battle of the Pyramids. Here, in an 1808 painting by Louis-François, is a more realistic representation.
You can see the pyramids on the horizon, but it’s hardly the way Ridley Scott has presented it.
The battle was fought against the Mameluke army that held Egypt on behalf of the Turks. (That’s a very simplified summary of the situation but more than enough for now and, I suspect, more than you’re going to get from Ridley Scott.) The Mamelukes were regarded as fine soldiers but had never really faced a disciplined European army like the French. The Battle of the Pyramids turned into a rout and ended up little short of a massacre with the Mameluke army trying to escape across the Nile towards Cairo. Here’s a description of the end of the battle from my book, Burke and the Bedouin.
Some managed to escape to the south before the French army swung round far enough to close off that possibility. Most, though, forced to choose between yet another futile charge on the French lines and diving into the river, chose the latter. Brilliant horsemen as they were, few were able to swim their mounts even to the half-way point, and Burke watched in horror as the cream of the Mameluke Army perished in the Nile. They were joined in their doomed flight by the infantry who had been left in the camp. With the French pouring over the ramparts, they saw their only chance of survival to be flight by water. Although there were boats moored ready, the sheer number of terrified men leaping abort them led several to sink. Fire from the French crippled many others. In the chaos and confusion, boats collided and rammed into the shore, often drowning not only men on board but others who had been desperately trying to swim clear. A few craft eventually pulled out into the stream out of range of French fire but most of the men who took to the water died there. Through his telescope, Burke saw a reserve force which had been positioned between Cairo and the Nile. They should have offered some final resistance to the victorious invaders. Their commanders, though, had obviously watched the disaster and drawn from it the same conclusion as he had. There was nothing now that could stop the French army. The forces across the river turned and fled away from the city. Now, on both sides of the Nile, dust billowed into the air to the south as the remains of a once mighty army ran for the safety of the desert lands of Upper Egypt.
Burke’s mission to watch out for French plots in Egypt is overtaken by events when Napoleon invades the country. On one side: a French army, 35,000 strong. On the other: James Burke and Bernadita, the Spanish woman he has saved from captivity in Cairo.
From the Battle of the Pyramids to Nelson’s victory on the Nile, James Burke’s adventures in Egypt find him at the eye of a desert storm. Can he frustrate French plans and get Bernadita safely out of country? And are the pigeons he had to carry to Alexandria going to be any help at all?
James Burke’s second adventure is set against the background of one of Napoleon’s less well-known campaigns.
It’s real history – but not the stuff you learned at school.
It’s Thursday evening and I have no idea what people would like me to write about for tomorrow. I do ask suggestions from time to time but I don’t get an awful lot of feedback, especially at this time of year when I think people have more interesting things to do than read blog posts. So, in the absence of any better ideas, I am once again marking an anniversary by reposting something from a year ago.
July 15 (Saturday) marks the anniversary of the massacre of women and children at Cawnpore. It was a terrible act and it led to appalling retribution. Even today, it can rouse strong feelings with Indian Nationalists celebrating the Indian leader as a hero while in the UK the massacre (if it is remembered at all) is remembered as an infamous act.
Here’s the story.
What was the massacre and why did it become so infamous?
The siege of Cawnpore was an incident during the Indian Mutiny which ended with the British agreeing to evacuate the town in exchange for safe passage out of the area. When the British forces marched out of their camp and boarded the boats they had been promised would take them to safety, Indian forces under Nana Sahib opened fire before they could cast off. Those who stayed on the boats died on the river and those who attempted to return to shore were cut down by cavalry.
Although many women and children died in this massacre, they do seem to have been what we would now call ‘collateral damage’. It was the troops who were the target and all but four men who escaped down river died in that action. The women and children who survived were taken to a house that had been the residence of an officer’s mistress or bibi and which was therefore known as the bibighar.
After the insurrection had been suppressed, the British made much of the poor conditions in the bibighar, but, though the building was crowded and uncomfortable, the Nana Sahib does seem to have been doing his best to keep his prisoners safe. Guards on the building were as much there to protect the women and children from hostile (or just curious) crowds, as to prevent attempts at escape. Conditions could have been a lot worse (and after the conditions in the Entrenchment the bibighar must have seemed paradisaical) but the care of the women and children was entrusted to a serving girl (often described as a prostitute) called Hussaini Khanum who saw this as an opportunity to avenge herself on women who had always looked down on her and her like. She made their already difficult conditions nearly intolerable. Crowded, baking in the July heat, short of water and with limited amounts of food, some of the women went mad. Cholera took off others.
Nana Sahib seemed genuinely uncertain what to do with his prisoners. He provided them with a doctor, but no proper facilities to treat the sick — not even a separate building with more air. They were at one stage given fresh clothing, but with no proper access to water for washing their replacement clothes were soon reduced to filthy rags as well and no further clothing was provided. There were sweepers, but not enough to keep the place clean. Nana Sahib seemed, on the one hand, to feel that if the women and children were kept reasonably well, they might be used as hostages to bargain with the British, who were rumoured to be approaching Cawnpore looking for revenge. On the other hand, his advisers seem to have been suggesting that if a single European was left alive to give details of the massacre at the boats then the Indians might well be massacred in turn.
Eventually, with the British only days away, he seems to have reached a decision that it was too late to try to negotiate his way out of his situation. On 15 July, orders were given for sepoys to fire into the bibighar and kill everybody there. To their credit, the men ordered to do the killing refused, firing instead into the ceiling. A few of the women and children were killed by the sepoys but the soldiers finally refused to shoot any more and withdrew. At this point Hussaini Khanum called on her lover to do the job. He recruited four helpers – two of them butchers – who entered the building and proceeded to hack at the women and children inside with swords.
The next day, the building was cleared. Three or four of the women and a handful of children were sitting apparently uninjured and, after asking orders as to what to do with them, the women were killed as well. The bodies were cleared from the building and thrown down a nearby well. Some were not quite dead, but they were thrown in the well anyway. The children, panicked and with nowhere to run, circled the well until, with the bodies of their mothers disposed of, they too were murdered.
“The Well and Monument, Slaughter House, Cawnpore”, taken in 1858.Picture shows the Bibighar house and the well where the bodies were found.
It was a vile act and it became the excuse for terrible retaliatory behaviour by the British. “Remember Cawnpore!” was often used as a battle cry by the British army in the fighting that followed. British attitudes are reflected in this poem, which appeared in The London University Magazine in 1858:
Let us swear by that well e’en the Hindoo unborn Shall have cause to remember Cawnpore For vengeance the blood of the massacred cry, For vengeance each true British heart beateth high, Who would not for vengeance be willing to die When he thinks of that well at Cawnpore?
Sadly, as is so often the case, the atrocities committed by troops who were “remembering Cawnpore” rivalled those of the initial massacre. Certainly far more people were killed by the British than had ever died at the hands of Indians in Cawnpore.
The well became a shrine to the dead. In the decades following the uprising more tourists visited the Cawnpore memorial park than the Taj Mahal and it continued to be a popular tourist location until Indian Independence in 1947. The independent government of India removed the statuary that marked the well. It now stands in a local church.
Image credits and further reading
“The Well and Monument, Slaughter House, Cawnpore” (1858). From ‘Murray Collection: Views in Delhi, Cawnpore, Allahabad and Benares’ taken by Dr. John Murray.
The picture of the monument and the picture of ‘The Angel of Cawnpore’ from inside the monument (at head of page) were both taken by Samuel Bourne in 1860.
Anyone who wants more detail on the events at Cawnpore should read Andrew Ward’s excellent Our Bones Are Scattered. John Murray 1996
‘Cawnpore’
You will be pleased to know that my book, Cawnpore does not feature the massacre at the Bibighar. It does have a lot about life in the Entrenchment (the British camp during the siege) and the massacre at the boats and, honestly, that’s more than enough misery.
Despite the horrors of the massacres, I remain broadly sympathetic to the Indian cause. The British were not evil and neither was Nana Sahib, but the relationship between Indians and British was poisoned by the politics of colonialism. Cawnpore is a book about a decent man from England who finds his closest friendship in the Indian community and who is torn in a terrible conflict of loyalties when the fighting breaks out. At the time that I wrote it, my son was with the British Army in Afghanistan. Like many of the young men in colonial India, he thought he was helping the people there. Sadly, history suggests that life is never that simple.
Cawnpore is not a cheerful book, but of all the books I’ve written it is the one that I am most pleased with. I do hope you will give it a go.
It’s summer and everybody has better things to do with their time than sit and read my blog post. My beloved and I have been away for a couple of days having much more fun than if I’d stayed home writing.
We’ve been to Bristol, so our trip has had a historical element ranging from exploring Iron Age hill forts to an afternoon on the SS Great Britain (launched 1843) and time spent admiring the Clifton Suspension Bridge (completed 1864) from every angle. We rounded it off with a visit to Britain’s twee-est hamlet, Blaise Hamlet. Built as a model village in 1809, I thought it was beyond saccharine but if King Charles has his way, the solution to the housing crisis may see us all living like this!
Iron Age
This is the remains of the inner ramparts of the Iron Age fort at Leigh Woods near the Clifton Suspension Bridge
Here, after more than two thousand years, you can still see the ditch between two ramparts
Steam Age
The SS Great Britain was the first steel built ocean going ship to be powered by by a propellor rather than paddle wheels.
Clifton Suspension Bridge
Blaise Hamlet
The cottages here all all inhabited: we suspect by hobbits.
The trouble with anniversaries is that they come round every year. I’ve been threatening to spend less of my time writing blog posts so as we, yet again, mark the anniversary of the British invasion of Buenos Aires, I’m recycling one from last year. (I’ve edited it a bit though.) The invasion featured a prominent role for Sir Home Popham, who is the subject of a biography that Jacqueline Reiter, one of my fellow-authors in Tales of Empire, has just finished writing. She’s a brilliant researcher and a great writer, so I hope we’ll revisit Popham soon once her book is out. (Who knows? I might even be able to persuade her to write something here.)
It would be nice if Jacqueline’s new book were to generate more interest in the invasion, as most people are unaware of it.
British forces captured Buenos Aires on 27 June 1806. It’s one of the least well-known campaigns of the Napoleonic Wars but the first of the James Burke books, Burke in the Land of Silver, centres on the run-up to this battle (not that there was really a battle) and its aftermath (which was much more exciting).
Why did Argentina matter?
The British invasion of Buenos Aires is often overlooked, possibly because it does not reflect particularly well on British military prowess. Spain’s South American possessions were important primarily because of the silver that they produced. Britain was anxious that, with Spain about to join the war on Napoleon’s side, the French should not get their hands on South American bullion. South America was also felt to be a relatively soft target, because of the unrest amongst the population there who were growing increasingly unhappy with Spanish rule.
Enter Sir Home Popham
Enter the extraordinary Commodore Home Popham. Almost forgotten until recently, Popham has suddenly become fashionable with both historians and novelists, and keeps on popping up all over the place. He deserves this newfound interest because Sir Home Riggs Popham was an extraordinary character.
Sir Home Riggs Popham
Popham was a naval officer: his rank kept slipping about depending on whether or not he was politically in favour and on the effectiveness of his efforts at self-promotion. He had been sent to the Cape of Good Hope with a squadron carrying 6,000 men to capture the place, but the Cape fell unexpectedly easily, leaving him with a small army and no war to use it in. At this point, he decided that he’d head to Buenos Aires, taking 1,635 men with him (the rest being left to garrison the Cape). Deprived of a change for glory in South Africa, he would find it in South America. They sound pretty much the same, so why not?
Historians still argue about whether this decision was politically sanctioned or not. It was certainly never official, but there’s quite a lot of evidence that the government did encourage him to attack Buenos Aires.
Enter James Burke
Either way, Popham arrived in the River Plate in June 1806, where he sails into the story of Burke in the Land of Silver. The Plate is a difficult river to navigate. Popham was quoted at the time as saying, “It was a bit bumpy,” as his ships nearly grounded on sandbanks. According to some accounts Popham was helped to navigate the unfamiliar river by a British agent. If so, it’s quite likely that the real James Burke was involved. Was he really? The joy of writing about a secret agent is that what exactly he did do is a secret. He may genuinely have been there, but we can’t know for sure.
A square rigged ship on the Rio Plate. (It’s a very big river.)
Popham was in charge of the force while it was on the water, but once it landed control was handed over to Colonel William Beresford. The illegitimate son of the 2nd Earl of Tyrone, Beresford had served under Wellington and was held by many (though not Wellington himself) to have a less than perfect grasp of military strategy. (He features in Burke and the Lines of Torres Vedras too. If you read that, you’ll know that I’m not a fan.) He landed his troops at Quilmes, fifteen miles from Buenos Aires. The Spanish did not have enough troops to mount an adequate defence and, as Popham had predicted, Beresford had an easy march, brushing aside the meagre forces sent to oppose him. On the 27 June 1806, Buenos Aires surrendered.
Things end badly
James Burke had arrived in Buenos Aires with instructions to prepare the way for a British invasion. He could congratulate himself on a job well done. But with the military victory easily achieved, Beresford had to move from winning the war to winning the peace. He told the locals he had come to liberate them from Spain and made promises of generous treatment of the city.
Beresford’s original proclamation promised peace and prosperity
In the end, though, he proved no better at handling the aftermath of war than some more modern occupying powers. The confiscation of the State treasury suggested to many people that the invasion was little more than a pirate raid and restrictions on trade with Spain threatened to bankrupt the economy. A series of missteps turned the population against the British and the locals rose in revolt. The British were driven out of Buenos Aires, their tails between their legs.
Aftermath
With the Spanish rising against the French, Napoleon never did get his hands on that silver. The Spanish colonists became our allies again. James Burke did return to Argentina where I like to think he contributed to the struggle of the locals to free themselves from Spanish rule. Whether he did or not, the population did rise against Spain and the independence of Argentina was declared on July 9, 1816 by the Congress of Tucumán.
Nobody is quite sure what happened to James Burke after his ventures in South America, but evidence from the Army rolls suggests that he remained in the Army with a pattern of movement between regiments and ranks that suggested continued to work in intelligence until well after the war with France was over.
Burke in the Land of Silver
Burke in the Land of Silver is the first of the stories I’ve written about James Burke. All my stories have a solid basis in historical fact, but this one is the closest to a true story. Burke’s adventures, including his improbable romantic entanglements with royalty, are pretty close to what actually happened. The story grew out of my love for Buenos Aires and I have visited many of the places featured in the book. It’s a rollicking good read, as well as an excellent introduction to a little-known bit of Britain’s military and political history. It’s available on Kindle at £2.99 (buy it quickly: this price won’t hold forever) and in paperback at £7.99.
Picture credit
‘The Glorious Conquest of Buenos Ayres by the British Forces, 27th June 1806’ Coloured woodcut, published by G Thompson, 1806. Copyright National Army Museum and reproduced with permission.
I visit quite a lot of historic sites around Britain but surprisingly few that relate directly to the periods that I write about. So my trip to Kew Palace this week was particularly enjoyable. I visited before, many years ago when it was rather a sad shadow of itself but this is the first time that I have seen it since it reopened to the public after major renovation in 2006. It’s been restored to its appearance in the early 19th century, slap in the middle of the Napoleonic wars, so a visit there is quite definitely a visit to a house being shown as it was lived in during James Burke’s time.
It may be odd to present this as if it was just an ordinary private house when it was in fact the home of King George III. However, this was very much a private home. (It was originally built in the 17th century for a successful merchant.) There was no architect as such. The builders put it up in line with the general direction of the man having it built. This was common in the 17th century.
Kew had been leased by the royal family since 1728, being used as “overspill” accommodation for the growing numbers of royal children. It was never the seat of the court and there are not the grand throne rooms and reception rooms of other historic royal palaces. George III loved the place. It was used mainly as a summer home. It was a private space where he could spend time with his family and it was conveniently situated close to some of the farmland which he managed. (George III was an enthusiastic agriculturalist and a strong supporter of new agricultural techniques being introduced in the later 18th century.)
When George III first went mad (to this day nobody knows for sure what was the matter with him), Kew Palace provided a quiet retreat where he was attended by doctors away from the glare of court life. He spent much of his time isolated in a separate wing of the palace which has since been demolished.
After the king was moved permanently to Windsor in 1810, Kew Palace was less often used although his wife, Queen Charlotte, was visiting Kew (passing through on her way from London to Windsor) when she was taken ill. She never left, dying there in November 1818. The armchair in which she died is still on display in the palace.
Kew, then, gives a fair impression of how a wealthy family would have lived around 1804.
The kitchens of the palace were in a separate block, originally linked to the palace by a covered walkway. Although Kew palace was principally a summer residence, carrying the food from the kitchens to the house must have meant that it arrived quite cool. Georgians were not that concerned about their food being very hot, although food warmers and chafing dishes would have reheated it to some extent.
The kitchens were abandoned for decades but Queen Victoria, visiting the palace, was enthusiastic about the idea of opening them to the public. They now provide I wonderful picture of the kitchens as they were in 1818.
Even in the recent hot weather, the cold room where food was stored remains chilly being a semi basement. Meat would be hung from the hooks in the metal beams.
Here’s the bakery. The small oven in the centre of the picture would be heated with wood in the oven. The ash would be cleared out and it would be used to bake bread. As it cooled, pies would be baked in it and, finally, desserts that needed to be cooked at a lower temperature would be put in.
Georgians did like a lot of pies, although the menus (lovingly hand copied from the original records in the nearby National Archive) showed an awful lot of roast meat, particularly mutton. Very different menus were served to the different ranks within the court with the King and Queen’s own menu featuring such delicacies as larks, grouse and crab, as well as venison and partridges.
The main kitchen represented the best in the kitchen technology at the time with the spit being turned by the rising draughts from the fire, thus sparing the need to have a small child constantly turning it.
One room in the kitchens is unusual in that it contains a bath. When George III was being treated for his illness at Kew, his doctors said that he should have regular hot baths. With no provision for heating large amounts of hot water in the palace itself, the king had his bathtub installed in the kitchens where hot water was readily available. The bathtub shown in the photograph is supposed to be his actual bathtub, although the wooden cover is now missing. The cover did not only keep in the heat, but meant that George could read and write in his bath.
I enjoyed my visit to Kew palace. I hope you can share in my pleasure at seeing Georgian life close to.
James Burke’s world
Burke never visited Kew Palace, but the real-life Burke, like the Burke of my novels, certainly mixed with some very well-placed men in this period and he would have visited houses like this.
There’s much more to Burke than a soldier-spy. He was a diplomat (see New research on James Burke) and well-connected with figures such as the Duke of York, who lived in Kew Palace as a child.
Learn more about James Burke and his world in my books: all available on Kindle and in paperback. You can read for free if you are subscribed to Kindle Unlimited: My books.
