Vellore Tamil Nadu India
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Indian sepoys in Vellore mutiny against the East India Company, for the first time, on July 10, 1806.
The immediate causes of the mutiny revolve mainly around resentment felt towards changes in the sepoy dress code, introduced in November 1805.
Hindus are prohibited from wearing religious marks on their foreheads and Muslims are required to shave their beards and trim their mustaches.
In addition, General Sir John Craddock Commander-in-Chief of the Madras Army, has ordered the wearing of a round hat resembling that associated at the time with both Europeans in general and with Indian converts to Christianity.
The new headdress includes a leather cockade and is intended to replace the existing turban.
These measures offend the sensibilities of both Hindu and Muslim sepoys and run contrary to an earlier warning by a military board that sepoy uniform changes should be "given every consideration which a subject of that delicate and important nature required".
These changes, intended to improve the "soldierly appearance" of the men, have created strong resentment among the Indian soldiers.
In May 1806 some sepoys who protested the new rules had been sent to Fort Saint George (Madras then, now Chennai).
Two of them—a Hindu and a Muslim—had been given ninety lashes each and dismissed from the army.
Nineteen sepoys had been punished with fifty lashes each and forced to seek pardon from the East India Company.
In addition to these military grievances, the rebellion has also been instigated by the sons of the defeated Tipu Sultan, confined at Vellore since 1799.
Tipu's wives and sons, together with numerous retainers, are pensioners of the East India Company and live in a palace within the large complex comprising the Vellore Fort.
One of Tipu Sultan's daughters was to be married on July 9, 1806, and the plotters of the uprising had gathered at the fort under the pretext of attending the wedding.
The objectives of the civilian conspirators remain obscure but by seizing and holding the fort they may have hoped to encourage a general rising through the territory of the former Mysore Sultanate.
However, Tippu's sons are reluctant to take charge after the mutiny arises.
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.