History is written by the victors – the Sepoy Mutiny

Hi, this is Our Bloody History, where we climb the Ivory Tower to bring you the need to know facts and questions about past events.

In the spotlight today:

The great uprising of the Indian people against their colonial overlords, which started this week 165 years ago on 10 May 1857.

Let’s go.

It’s 1857 and India is under the rule of the British East India Company, a private company acting as a sovereign power on behalf of the British Crown. Discontent is growing as the British increasingly dominate Indian life – economically, politically and culturally. The old aristocracy is crumbling and the firanghis (foreigners, especially a British or a white person) are employing a range of tactics to usurp control of the different states. This is real life Game of Thrones, Little Finger stuff. One such tactic is the Doctrine of Lapse, which allows the British to annex the land of Hindu rulers who have no natural heir, a practice that is abused in questionable ways.

But it’s the introduction of a new type of ammunition cartridge for the Enfield rifle that breaks the camel’s back. To load the rifles, the Sepoys – Indian infantrymen employed by the East India Company – have to bite off the ends of the lubricated paper cartridges to release the powder. But a foul rumour begins to stir: the cartridges are greased in pig and cow lard, massively insulting to both Hindus and Muslims. 

This knowledge spreads like wildfire, fuelling the already strong undercurrent of mistrust. Surely, this is just another ploy of the British to divide and undermine local religion.

First to strike is Mangal Pandey, a staunch Hindu Sepoy, who's furious with the suspected used of animal fat. He flat out refuses to use the cartridges and shoots and wounds two British officers. His arrest imminent, Pandey then places the rifle to his own chest and pulls the trigger (with his toe while lying on his back!). But he survives, only to be hanged nine days later. Today he is viewed as a national hero in India, a harbinger of revolution, his persona portrayed in films, books and even on postage stamps.

This brings us to our day in history. 

On May 10, a month after Pandey’s uprising, at an army camp in Meerut, a city about 48km northeast of Delhi, another group of Sepoys refuse to use the cartridges. They’re stripped of their uniforms, put in chains and sentenced to ten years imprisonment. But their comrades revolt and all hell breaks loose. Mobs descend upon British civilians, and a number of officers, including women and children, are killed in the riots.

That same night, the Sepoys travel to Delhi and the rebellion spreads. Many more British are killed as the larger city falls. The uprising keeps growing across India and tragic atrocities are committed by both sides in the unfolding struggle. This is a great article summarising some of the key events and tragedies in more detail.

The British eventually suppress the rebellion and peace is declared in 1859. The East India Company is abolished, the British Crown takes direct control of India, and the Mughal Empire formally comes to an end.

You’ve probably heard that history is written by the victors.

What’s fascinating about the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 is how it was framed by politicians and historians for years to come. Edward J. Thompson, an Indian-born Englishman, historian and scholar of great repute, referring to the historical treatment of the events of 1857 by the British said that "no other event of first class importance has been treated so uncritically or upon such one-sided and prejudged evidence." 

History, in effect, was written unhistorically. 

Paraphrasing Arshad Islam in the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs – history can tell us about how a war was fought and won, but it doesn’t always offer us the complete picture. It’s largely silent about the loser and those sympathetic to their cause. It's full of bias.

The Sepoy Mutiny was more than just a rebellion (which isn't the view of all historians). It was a war of independence fought by the common people under the banner of the Last Mughal Emperor of India, not some small military disturbance in a far-off colony. In India it is referred to as the First War of Indian Independence. But in Britain, and the Commonwealth, the events were framed with names such as  “The Indian Mutiny,” “The Sepoy Mutiny,” and “The Indian Insurrection.”

Does what you call it make a difference?

Yes it does.

Framing is powerful. It’s how you view the world. Different frames = different views = different treatment.

The problem with calling it a mutiny is that it’s a form of colonial gaslighting. That's my view anyway. It downplays the greater motivations for freedom and independence of an entire nation. It’s failing to acknowledge and question the British Crown’s position of power in India in the first place.

Wow, that got meta quick.

So, be careful with names and titles, because they’re mental frames that come with attached narratives.

PS. While researching this, an Indian friend of mine sent me a resource with an interesting connection to my home country New Zealand. And it blew my mind. It turns out that the place I grew up, Cashmere, a suburb in Christchurch, was named by John Cracroft Wilson, a veteran of the Indian Mutiny. Wilson's intervention during the conflict was so effective that he was recommended for distinction:

Upon arriving to New Zealand Wilson took up 108 hectares of land on the other side of the Port Hills and named the farm Cashmere, after Kashmir in India. 

All this time and I had no idea. That's why I study history.

Again, it's important to understand why events and places are called what they're called.

Names are everything.

Names are stories.

3 quick facts:

• The first mail that left India after the May 10 uprising brought more than 20,000 letters to Britain. Indian affairs, which were rarely discussed in the House of Commons, became the only thing that was talked about in Parliamentary Sessions, such was the panic and anger caused by the rebellion.

• Angered by the killing of women and children, some British soldiers used a grotesque execution technique for captured mutineers. The Indians were strapped to the mouth of cannons and obliterated. 

• During the conflict of 1857, the mutineers were often referred to as "pandies" after Mangal Pandey who fired the first shot.

Other conflicts that happened this week:

• 9 May 1941: The German submarine U-110 is captured by the Royal Navy. On board is the latest Enigma machine which Allied cryptographers later use to break coded German messages.

• 10 May 1801: The Barbary pirates of Tripoli declare war on the United States of America.

• 11 May 1745: French forces defeat an Anglo-Dutch-Hanoverian army at the Battle of Fontenoy, a major engagement during the War of the Austrian Succession.

• 12 May 1864: Thousands of Union and Confederate soldiers die in the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, also known at "the Bloody Angle," almost 24 hours of desperate hand-to-hand fighting, one of the most intense conflicts of the American Civil War.

• 13 May 1846: The United States officially declares war on Mexico. See Mexican - American War. 

• 14 May 1955: The Warsaw Pact is signed by eight communist bloc countries to counterbalance the power of NATO during the Cold War.

• 15 May 1525: The German Peasants' War comes to an end at the Battle of Frankenhausen, proving the ultimate failure of the peasant movement.

A historical quote about historical things:

That's all for this week. See ya!

DisclaimerYou are reading my abstractions based on the abstractions of others. History is not always an accurate map of what really happened. The map is not the territory. Reality can be very different. We are like blind people groping an elephant, describing what we feel. It always pays to do your own research and ask questions.