Tempo:
—
— HISTORY OF THE SIKHS
280 1845-6.
chap, ix
thing and the leaders nothing. Hearts to dare and hands to execute were numerous; but there was no mind to guide and animate the whole each inferior commander defended his front according to his skill and his means, and the centre and left, where the dis:
ciplined battalions were mainly stationed, had batteries and salient points as high as the stature of a man, and ditches which an armed soldier could not leap without exertion; but a considerable part of the line exhibited at intervals the petty obstacles of a succession of such banks and trenches as would shelter a crouching marksman or help him to sleep in security when no longer a watcher. This was especially the case on the right fiank, where the looseness of the river sand it impossible to throw up parapets without and labour, and where irregular troops, the least able to remedy such disadvantages, had been allowed or compelled to take up their position. The flank in question was mainly guarded by a line of two hundred
rendered art
'zamburuks' or falconets; ^ but it derived some support from a salient battery, and from the heavy guns retained on the opposite bank of the river.- Tej Singh commanded in this entrenchment, and Lai Singh lay with his horse in loose order higher up the stream,
watched by a body of British cavalry. The Sikhs, generally, were somewhat cast down by the defeat at
—
[1 These were light swivel guns usually mounted on camels. In the muster-rolls of the Sikh army they are shown as organized into regular batteries like field artillery. Specimens of these guns may be seen in the Armourj'^ in the Fort at
Lahore.
Ed.]
The ordinary belief that the entrenchments of Sobraon were jointly plarmed and executed by a French and a Spanish colonel, is as devoid of foundation as that the Sikh army was rendered effective solely by the labours and skill of French and Italian generals. Hurbon the brave Spaniard, and Mouton the Frenchman, who were at Sobraon, doubtless exerted themselves where they could, but their authority or their inJ^uence did not extend beyond a regiment or a brigade, and the lines showed no trace whatever of scientific skill or of unity of design. [This note is typical of the author's belittling style. The works were really of an extremely strong nature. 'For some weeks the Sikhs under the direction of a Spanish officer named Huerha had been employed in constructing a remarkably -
powerful tete de pent
at the village of Sobraon to cover a bridge of boats which they had thrown across the river Sutlej .... and it was now completed in a series of half-moon bastions, connected by curtains, and covered by a ditch in front, both flanks resting on the river. This great work, two and a half miles in length, was protected by batteries on the right bank of the river, so as to command the passage, and manned by 35,000 of the best of the Sikh troops with 67 guns.' (Meadows Taylor.) Ed.]
— HISTORY OF THE SIKHS
280 1845-6.
chap, ix
thing and the leaders nothing. Hearts to dare and hands to execute were numerous; but there was no mind to guide and animate the whole each inferior commander defended his front according to his skill and his means, and the centre and left, where the dis:
ciplined battalions were mainly stationed, had batteries and salient points as high as the stature of a man, and ditches which an armed soldier could not leap without exertion; but a considerable part of the line exhibited at intervals the petty obstacles of a succession of such banks and trenches as would shelter a crouching marksman or help him to sleep in security when no longer a watcher. This was especially the case on the right fiank, where the looseness of the river sand it impossible to throw up parapets without and labour, and where irregular troops, the least able to remedy such disadvantages, had been allowed or compelled to take up their position. The flank in question was mainly guarded by a line of two hundred
rendered art
'zamburuks' or falconets; ^ but it derived some support from a salient battery, and from the heavy guns retained on the opposite bank of the river.- Tej Singh commanded in this entrenchment, and Lai Singh lay with his horse in loose order higher up the stream,
watched by a body of British cavalry. The Sikhs, generally, were somewhat cast down by the defeat at
—
[1 These were light swivel guns usually mounted on camels. In the muster-rolls of the Sikh army they are shown as organized into regular batteries like field artillery. Specimens of these guns may be seen in the Armourj'^ in the Fort at
Lahore.
Ed.]
The ordinary belief that the entrenchments of Sobraon were jointly plarmed and executed by a French and a Spanish colonel, is as devoid of foundation as that the Sikh army was rendered effective solely by the labours and skill of French and Italian generals. Hurbon the brave Spaniard, and Mouton the Frenchman, who were at Sobraon, doubtless exerted themselves where they could, but their authority or their inJ^uence did not extend beyond a regiment or a brigade, and the lines showed no trace whatever of scientific skill or of unity of design. [This note is typical of the author's belittling style. The works were really of an extremely strong nature. 'For some weeks the Sikhs under the direction of a Spanish officer named Huerha had been employed in constructing a remarkably -
powerful tete de pent
at the village of Sobraon to cover a bridge of boats which they had thrown across the river Sutlej .... and it was now completed in a series of half-moon bastions, connected by curtains, and covered by a ditch in front, both flanks resting on the river. This great work, two and a half miles in length, was protected by batteries on the right bank of the river, so as to command the passage, and manned by 35,000 of the best of the Sikh troops with 67 guns.' (Meadows Taylor.) Ed.]
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