Tempo:
CHAP. IX
WAR WITH THE ENGLISH
285
The victors looked with stolid wonderment upon the 1845-6. indomitable courage of the vanquished, and forbore to strike where the helpless and the dying frowned unavailing hatred. But the necessities of war pressed upon the commanders, and they had effectually to disperse that army which had so long scorned their power. The fire of 'batteries and battalions precipitated the the Sikhs through the waters of the Sutlej, and the triumph of the English became full and manifest. The troops, defiled with dust and smoke and flight of
carnage, thus stood mute indeed for a moment, until the glory of their success rushing upon their minds, they gave expression to their feelings, and hailed their victorious commanders with reiterated shouts of
triumph and congratulation.^
On the night of the victory some regiments were The pushed
across
the
Sutlej
opposite
Ferozepore;
no passage
of
enemy was visible; and on the 12th February the fort ^^ gu'bmisof Kasur was occupied without opposition. On the fol- sjon of the" lowing day the army encamped under the walls of that Maharaja. 1 Cf Lord Cough's dispatch of the 13th Feb. 1846, and Macgregor, History of the Sikhs, ii. 154, &c. The casualties on the side of the British were 320 killed, and 2,083 wounded. The loss of the Sikhs, perhaps, exceeded 5,000, and po.ssibly amounted to 8,000, the lower estimate of the English dispatches. The Commander-in-Chief estimated the force of the Sikhs at 30,000 men, and it was frequently said they had 36 regiments in position; but it is nevertheless doubtful whether there were
so many as 20,000 armed men in the trenches. The numbers of the actual assailants may be estimated at 15,000 effective soldiers. After the war, Lord Gough ascertained, through the British authorities at Lahore, that the Sikhs admitted their strength at Sobraon to have been 42,626 men. Perhaps, however, this estimate includes all the troops on the right bank of the river, as well as those in the entrenched position on the opposite side. If so, the statement seems in every way credible. Similarly, Lord Gough learnt that 3,125 heirs of soldiers killed claimed arrears of pay, from which fact and other circumstances which came to his knowledge, his Lordship thinks the Sikhs may have lost from 12,000 to 15,000 men in this decisive victory. Sobraon, or correctly Subrahan, the name by which the battle is known, is taken from that of a small village, or rather two small villages, in the neighbourhood. The villages in question were inhabited by the subdivision of a tribe called Subrah, or, in the plural, Subrahan; and hence the name became applied to their place of residence, and has at last become identified with a great and important victory. This mode of designating villages by means of the plural form- of a patronymic is common in India, and it was once frequent in our own country, as noticed by Mr. Kemble (Saxons in England, i. 59 n., and Appendix A, p. 478) in 1,329 instances, such as Tooting in Surrey, Mailing in Kent, &c., from the Totingas, Meallingas, and other families or clans.
WAR WITH THE ENGLISH
285
The victors looked with stolid wonderment upon the 1845-6. indomitable courage of the vanquished, and forbore to strike where the helpless and the dying frowned unavailing hatred. But the necessities of war pressed upon the commanders, and they had effectually to disperse that army which had so long scorned their power. The fire of 'batteries and battalions precipitated the the Sikhs through the waters of the Sutlej, and the triumph of the English became full and manifest. The troops, defiled with dust and smoke and flight of
carnage, thus stood mute indeed for a moment, until the glory of their success rushing upon their minds, they gave expression to their feelings, and hailed their victorious commanders with reiterated shouts of
triumph and congratulation.^
On the night of the victory some regiments were The pushed
across
the
Sutlej
opposite
Ferozepore;
no passage
of
enemy was visible; and on the 12th February the fort ^^ gu'bmisof Kasur was occupied without opposition. On the fol- sjon of the" lowing day the army encamped under the walls of that Maharaja. 1 Cf Lord Cough's dispatch of the 13th Feb. 1846, and Macgregor, History of the Sikhs, ii. 154, &c. The casualties on the side of the British were 320 killed, and 2,083 wounded. The loss of the Sikhs, perhaps, exceeded 5,000, and po.ssibly amounted to 8,000, the lower estimate of the English dispatches. The Commander-in-Chief estimated the force of the Sikhs at 30,000 men, and it was frequently said they had 36 regiments in position; but it is nevertheless doubtful whether there were
so many as 20,000 armed men in the trenches. The numbers of the actual assailants may be estimated at 15,000 effective soldiers. After the war, Lord Gough ascertained, through the British authorities at Lahore, that the Sikhs admitted their strength at Sobraon to have been 42,626 men. Perhaps, however, this estimate includes all the troops on the right bank of the river, as well as those in the entrenched position on the opposite side. If so, the statement seems in every way credible. Similarly, Lord Gough learnt that 3,125 heirs of soldiers killed claimed arrears of pay, from which fact and other circumstances which came to his knowledge, his Lordship thinks the Sikhs may have lost from 12,000 to 15,000 men in this decisive victory. Sobraon, or correctly Subrahan, the name by which the battle is known, is taken from that of a small village, or rather two small villages, in the neighbourhood. The villages in question were inhabited by the subdivision of a tribe called Subrah, or, in the plural, Subrahan; and hence the name became applied to their place of residence, and has at last become identified with a great and important victory. This mode of designating villages by means of the plural form- of a patronymic is common in India, and it was once frequent in our own country, as noticed by Mr. Kemble (Saxons in England, i. 59 n., and Appendix A, p. 478) in 1,329 instances, such as Tooting in Surrey, Mailing in Kent, &c., from the Totingas, Meallingas, and other families or clans.
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