"SO I MAY DIE LIKE ONE BRAVE SOLDIER":
4TH BRITISH-MYSORE WAR, 1799
Lieutenant Thomas Falla, 12th Regiment
St. Sampson's, Guernsey
If you asked non-Indians to name an Indian ruler who fought the British I suspect the name that is mentioned most often would be that of Tipu Sultan, the ruler of Mysore in Southern India. That would almost cetrtainly be because they have seen or have heard of the famous automaton in the Victoria and Albert Museum which shows a tiger devouring a red-coated soldier. Guaranteed to grab the imagination, the tiger is a vivid representation of Tipu’s attitude towards the British; he hated them with a genuine vengeance. Unfortunately for him that hatred led to his downfall, a demise that, in the end, came startlingly quickly, and involved an eighteen-year-old Lieutenant from Guernsey, Thomas Falla.
When Napoleon landed armies in Egypt in 1798 one of his aims was to intervene in British-controlled India, and for that he needed a meaningful ally in the sub-continent, someone who burned with resentment against the British.
Tipu was carrying grievances from the Third Anglo-Mysore War, which had ended in March 1792 (the two previous wars had been under his father, Hyder Ali). As a result of the peace terms at the end of that Third War Mysore had lost land to two powerful Indian neighbours, the Maratha Confederacy and the Nizam of Hyderabad, and also to the British, who had taken away Mysore’s access to the coast. Stroking and petting his grievances, when news of Napoleon’s arrival in Egypt reached him Tipu opened communications with the French.
Obviously the British became aware of Tipu’s letters and attempted to negotiate with him, but Tipu rejected all overtures, hoping instead to foment unrest among his neighbours and drive the British out of India, or Southern India at least. British diplomacy won, however; the Marathas decided to stay neutral in the Anglo-French dispute, and the Nizam agreed to disband those units in his army which were commanded by French officers, as did neighbouring Sindhia. Tipu was left alone.
In February 1799 the British invaded Mysore from two directions. Twenty thousand men under General George Harris set out from Vellore in the north-west, to be joined by a further sixteen thousand from Hyderabad under Colonel Arthur Wellesley (later The Duke of Wellington). At the same time six and half thousand troops under Lieutenant-General James Stuart headed out from Cannanore to the east.
Defeats at Sedaseer on the 6th March, and at Mellavelly on the 27th, drove Tipu back towards his capital, Seringapatam, and by April he was besieged there. On the 4thof May, with terms of surrender refused (presumably without Tipu asking the opinions of the inhabitants), the city walls were breached, and Major-General David Baird (a former prisoner of Tipu’s) drove his men into the assault. Two hours after the assault began it was over. With no quarter given after the refusal to surrender an estimated ten thousand defenders died, including Tipu Sultan. In the whole campaign the British forces lost just over three hundred killed, with a thousand wounded.
One of the dead was Lieutenant Thomas Falla, of the 12th(East Suffolk) Regiment. Son of a well-known Guernsey family, who have been on the island for centuries, Falla was eighteen, having enlisted in the army as an Ensign in August 1796. On the 6th April Falla was in a nullah, a dry ravine being used as a defensive trench, some two to three miles from the city. A cannonball (some dispute as to whether it was a twelve-pounder or a twenty-six pounder) landed just short of the nullah and rolled in, burying itself in Falla’s groin or thigh (accounts differ). What all the accounts agree on is that the wound’s inflammation concealed the ball, so that no-one realised it remained lodged in his leg, stuck between two bones, although as the stretcher-bearers carried him away they complained of the weight, despite Falla being “below the middle stature, and not remarkably stout”. He suffered for six hours, receiving plaudits for his courage in asking for a bottle of port so that he might die “like one brave soldier”. It hardly bears thinking about.
Many grew rich on the looting of Seringapatam, but arguably the British and the East India Company gained most. French-led insurrection in India was essentially finished before it started by Tipu’s defeat, and despite scares India was, overall, calm during the World War that the Napoleonic Wars became. Am I exaggerating when I call it a World War? Look at other stories in this collection of tales, from Holland to Java to Uruguay.
When Napoleon landed armies in Egypt in 1798 one of his aims was to intervene in British-controlled India, and for that he needed a meaningful ally in the sub-continent, someone who burned with resentment against the British.
Tipu was carrying grievances from the Third Anglo-Mysore War, which had ended in March 1792 (the two previous wars had been under his father, Hyder Ali). As a result of the peace terms at the end of that Third War Mysore had lost land to two powerful Indian neighbours, the Maratha Confederacy and the Nizam of Hyderabad, and also to the British, who had taken away Mysore’s access to the coast. Stroking and petting his grievances, when news of Napoleon’s arrival in Egypt reached him Tipu opened communications with the French.
Obviously the British became aware of Tipu’s letters and attempted to negotiate with him, but Tipu rejected all overtures, hoping instead to foment unrest among his neighbours and drive the British out of India, or Southern India at least. British diplomacy won, however; the Marathas decided to stay neutral in the Anglo-French dispute, and the Nizam agreed to disband those units in his army which were commanded by French officers, as did neighbouring Sindhia. Tipu was left alone.
In February 1799 the British invaded Mysore from two directions. Twenty thousand men under General George Harris set out from Vellore in the north-west, to be joined by a further sixteen thousand from Hyderabad under Colonel Arthur Wellesley (later The Duke of Wellington). At the same time six and half thousand troops under Lieutenant-General James Stuart headed out from Cannanore to the east.
Defeats at Sedaseer on the 6th March, and at Mellavelly on the 27th, drove Tipu back towards his capital, Seringapatam, and by April he was besieged there. On the 4thof May, with terms of surrender refused (presumably without Tipu asking the opinions of the inhabitants), the city walls were breached, and Major-General David Baird (a former prisoner of Tipu’s) drove his men into the assault. Two hours after the assault began it was over. With no quarter given after the refusal to surrender an estimated ten thousand defenders died, including Tipu Sultan. In the whole campaign the British forces lost just over three hundred killed, with a thousand wounded.
One of the dead was Lieutenant Thomas Falla, of the 12th(East Suffolk) Regiment. Son of a well-known Guernsey family, who have been on the island for centuries, Falla was eighteen, having enlisted in the army as an Ensign in August 1796. On the 6th April Falla was in a nullah, a dry ravine being used as a defensive trench, some two to three miles from the city. A cannonball (some dispute as to whether it was a twelve-pounder or a twenty-six pounder) landed just short of the nullah and rolled in, burying itself in Falla’s groin or thigh (accounts differ). What all the accounts agree on is that the wound’s inflammation concealed the ball, so that no-one realised it remained lodged in his leg, stuck between two bones, although as the stretcher-bearers carried him away they complained of the weight, despite Falla being “below the middle stature, and not remarkably stout”. He suffered for six hours, receiving plaudits for his courage in asking for a bottle of port so that he might die “like one brave soldier”. It hardly bears thinking about.
Many grew rich on the looting of Seringapatam, but arguably the British and the East India Company gained most. French-led insurrection in India was essentially finished before it started by Tipu’s defeat, and despite scares India was, overall, calm during the World War that the Napoleonic Wars became. Am I exaggerating when I call it a World War? Look at other stories in this collection of tales, from Holland to Java to Uruguay.
"...et à celle de leur fils cadet, Thomas Falla, Lieutenant au 12me Regiment d’Infanterie. au Siege de Seringapatam, ie 6 Avril, 1799. Age de 18 ans, 6 mois, 25 jours, des suites d'une blessure d'un boulet de canon solide pesant 26 livres, qui s'etait loge entre les deux os d'une de ses cuisses, la dite blessure s'etant enflamme considerablement, ie chirurgien du Regiment, quoiqu'ayant examine la plaie, ignorait qu'un boulet y fut renferme, et ce ne fut qu'apres sa mort, qui eut lieu six heures apres I'dvenement, qu'il fut extrait, à la surprise de toute l’armee."
Sources
Military
Wikipedia: Fourth Anglo-Mysore War
The Colonial Wars Source Book - Philip J. Haythornthwaite (BCA, London, 1995)
Narrative Sketches of the Conquest of Mysore, effected by the British troops and their allies, in the capture of Seringapatam, and the death of Tippoo Sultan, May 4 1799 - (printed by W. & M. Turner, Hull, 1904)
mq.edu.ac - the site of Macquarie University, New South Wales, which contains accounts and correspondence by contemporaries of Lachlan Macquarie at Seringapatam
http://glosters.tripod.com/earlyindia1.htm
Genealogy
www.ancestry.co.uk
www.priaulxilibrary.co.uk - a Guernsey local history site
www.theislandwiki.org - another Guernsey site
© Jonathan Dewhirst 2017
Military
Wikipedia: Fourth Anglo-Mysore War
The Colonial Wars Source Book - Philip J. Haythornthwaite (BCA, London, 1995)
Narrative Sketches of the Conquest of Mysore, effected by the British troops and their allies, in the capture of Seringapatam, and the death of Tippoo Sultan, May 4 1799 - (printed by W. & M. Turner, Hull, 1904)
mq.edu.ac - the site of Macquarie University, New South Wales, which contains accounts and correspondence by contemporaries of Lachlan Macquarie at Seringapatam
http://glosters.tripod.com/earlyindia1.htm
Genealogy
www.ancestry.co.uk
www.priaulxilibrary.co.uk - a Guernsey local history site
www.theislandwiki.org - another Guernsey site
© Jonathan Dewhirst 2017
