Page:Our Indian Army.djvu/492

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468
OUR ANGLO-INDIAN ARMY.

Majesty ceded to the Company in perpetuity the conquered provinces of Arracan,[1] and also four other provinces, with their islands and dependencies; his Majesty agreed to pay one crore of rupees, as part indemnification for the expenses of the war – that henceforth accredited British Ministers, with a body-guard of fifty men, should be allowed to reside at Ava, that an accredited Burmese Minister should be sent to reside at Calcutta, and that free-trade should be allowed to British subjects in all the dominions of his Majesty.

The sufferings of our troops, during nearly the whole of this war, were excessively great. The loss by the sword was as nothing compared with the ravages of disease, and the mortality caused by excessive fatigue. It was not often that a score of men fell in escalading and carrying even the strongest stockades; but they died by heaps on their marches through the pestilential jungles, or in their unhealthy camp stations. Throughout the campaigns, and all the way from Rangoon, every soldier of the Anglo-Indian Army had to carry his knapsack, sixty rounds of ammunition, a blanket and three days' provisions, together with his arms and accoutrements, under the scorching rays of a tropical sun. "Perhaps," adds an officer who served in the war,[2] "there are few instances on record in the history of any nation, of a mere handful of men, with constitutions broken down by many months of previous disease and privation, forcing their way in the face of such difficulties, and through a wilderness hitherto untrodden by Europeans, to the distance of five hundred miles from the spot where they originally disembarked, and ultimately dictating a peace within three days' march of the enemy's capital."

  1. In the month of January, 1825, while the army of Sir Archibald Campbell was cooped up at Rangoon, General Morrison, with H.M. 44th and 54th regiments, about 200 European artillery, and several regiments of native infantry and pioneers, who had been assembled at Chittagohg for the purpose, took undisputed possession of the province of Arracan.
  2. Lieutenant-Colonel Tullock. "Statistical Reports on the Sickness, Mortality, and Invaliding among His Majesty's Troops."