The garrison of the Vellore Fort in…

July 1806 CE

The garrison of the Vellore Fort in July 1806 comprises four companies of British infantry from H.M. 69th (South Lincolnshire) Regiment of Foot and three battalions of Madras infantry: the 1st/1st Madras Native Infantry, the 2nd/1st MNI and the 2nd/23rd MNI.

Two hours after midnight on July 10, the sepoys kill fourteen of their own officers and one hundred and fifteen men of the 69th Regiment, most of the latter as they sleep in their barracks.

Among those killed is Colonel St. John Fancourt, the commander of the fort.

The rebels seize control by dawn, and raise the flag of the Mysore Sultanate over the fort.

Tipu's second son Fateh Hyder is declared king.

However, a British officer Major Coops escapes and alerts the garrison in Arcot.

Nine hours after the outbreak of the mutiny, a relief force comprising the British 19th Light Dragoons, galloper guns and a squadron of Madras cavalry, rides from Arcot to Vellore, covering sixteen miles in about two hours.

It is led by Sir Rollo Gillespie (one of the most capable and energetic officers in India at this time), who had reportedly left Arcot within a quarter of an hour of the alarm being raised.

Gillespie had dashed ahead of the main force with a single troop of about twenty men.

Arriving at Vellore, Gillespie finds the surviving Europeans, about sixty men of the 69th, commanded by NCOs and two assistant surgeons, still holding part of the ramparts but out of ammunition.

Unable to gain entry through the defended gate, Gillespie climbs the wall with the aid of a rope and a sergeant's sash that is lowered to him; and, to gain time, leads the 69th in a bayonet-charge along the ramparts.

When the rest of the 19th arrives, Gillespie has them blow open the gates with their galloper guns, and makes a second charge with the 69th to clear a space inside the entrance to permit the cavalry to deploy.

The 19th and the Madras Cavalry now charged and sabre any sepoy who stands in their way.

About one hunderd sepoys who had sought refuge inside the palace are brought out, and by Gillespie's order, placed against a wall and shot dead.

The harsh retribution meted out to the sepoys snuffs out the unrest at a stroke and provides the history of the British in India with one of its true epics; for, as Gillespie admitted, with a delay of even five minutes, all would have been lost for the British.

In all, nearly three hundred and fifty of the rebels are killed, and another three hundred and fifty wounded before the fighting has finished.