The Massacre Of An Army

The sentinels on the ramparts of Jelalabad, a fortified post held by the

British in Afghanistan, looking out over the plain that extended

northward and westward from the town, saw a singular-looking person

approaching. He rode a pony that seemed so jaded with travel that it

could scarcely lift a foot to continue, its head drooping low as it

dragged slowly onward. The traveller seemed in as evil plight as his

horse. His head was bent forward upon his breast, the rein had fallen

from his nerveless grasp, and he swayed in the saddle as if he could

barely retain his seat. As he came nearer, and lifted his face for a

moment, he was seen to be frightfully pale and haggard, with the horror

of an untold tragedy in his bloodshot eyes. Who was he? An Englishman,

evidently, perhaps a messenger from the army at Cabul. The officers of

the fort, notified of his approach, ordered that the gates should be

opened. In a short time man and horse were within the walls of the town.



So pitiable and woe-begone a spectacle none there had ever beheld. The

man seemed almost a corpse on horseback. He had fairly to be lifted from

his saddle, and borne inward to a place of shelter and repose, while the

animal was scarcely able to make its way to the stable to which it was

led. As the traveller rested, eager questions ran through the garrison.

Who was he? How came he in such a condition? What had he to tell of the

army in the field? Did his coming in this sad plight portend some dark

disaster?



This curiosity was shared by the officer in command of the fort. Giving

his worn-out guest no long time to recover, he plied him with inquiries.



"You are exhausted," he said. "I dislike to disturb you, but I beg leave

to ask you a few questions."



"Go on sir; I can answer," said the traveller, in a weary tone.



"Do you bring a message from General Elphinstone,--from the army?"



"I bring no message. There is no army,--or, rather, I am the army," was

the enigmatical reply.



"You the army? I do not understand you."



"I represent the army. The others are gone,--dead, massacred,

prisoners,--man, woman, and child. I, Doctor Brydon, am the army,--all

that remains of it."



The commander heard him in astonishment and horror. General Elphinstone

had seventeen thousand soldiers and camp-followers in his camp at Cabul.

"Did Dr. Brydon mean to say----"



"They are all gone," was the feeble reply. "I am left; all the others

are slain. You may well look frightened, sir; you would be heart-sick

with horror had you gone through my experience. I have seen an army

slaughtered before my eyes, and am here alone to tell it."



It was true; the army had vanished; an event had happened almost without

precedent in the history of the world, unless we instance the burying of

the army of Cambyses in the African desert. When Dr. Brydon was

sufficiently rested and refreshed he told his story. It is the story we

have here to repeat.



In the summer of 1841 the British army under General Elphinstone lay in

cantonments near the city of Cabul, the capital of Afghanistan, in a

position far from safe or well chosen. They were a mile and a half from

the citadel,--the Bala Hissar,--with a river between. Every corner of

their cantonments was commanded by hills or Afghan forts. Even their

provisions were beyond their reach, in case of attack, being stored in a

fort at some distance from the cantonments. They were in the heart of a

hostile population. General Elphinstone, trusting too fully in the

puppet of a khan who had been set up by British bayonets, had carelessly

kept his command in a weak and untenable position.



The general was old and in bad health; by no means the man for the

emergency. He was controlled by bad advisers, who thought only of

returning to India, and discouraged the strengthening of the fortress.

The officers lost heart on seeing the supineness of their leader. The

men were weary of incessant watching, annoyed by the insults of the

natives, discouraged by frequent reports of the death of comrades, who

had been picked off by roving enemies. The ladies alone retained

confidence, occupying themselves in the culture of their gardens, which,

in the delightful summer climate of that situation, rewarded their

labors with an abundance of flowers.



As time went on the situation grew rapidly worse. Akbar Khan, the

leading spirit among the hostile Afghans, came down from the north and

occupied the Khoord Cabul Pass,--the only way back to Hindustan.

Ammunition was failing, food was decreasing, the enemy were growing

daily stronger and more aggressive. Affairs had come to such a pass that

but one of two things remained to do,--to leave the cantonments and seek

shelter in the citadel till help should arrive, or to endeavor to march

back to India.



On the 23d of December the garrison was alarmed by a frightful example

of boldness and ferocity in the enemy. Sir William Macnaughten, the

English envoy, who had left the works to treat with the Afghan chiefs,

was seized by Akbar Khan and murdered on the spot, his head, with its

green spectacles, being held up in derision to the soldiers within the

works.



The British were now "advised" by the Afghans to go back to India. There

was, in truth, nothing else to do. They were starving where they were.

If they should fight their way to the citadel, they would be besieged

there without food. They must go, whatever the risk or hardships. On

the 6th of January the fatal march began,--a march of four thousand five

hundred soldiers and twelve thousand camp-followers, besides women and

children, through a mountainous country, filled with savage foes, and in

severe winter weather.



The first day's march took them but five miles from the works, the

evacuation taking place so slowly that it was two o'clock in the morning

before the last of the force came up. It had been a march of frightful

conditions. Attacked by the Afghans on every side, hundreds of the

fugitives perished in those first five dreadful miles. As the advance

body waited in the snow for those in the rear to join them, the glare of

flames from the burning cantonments told that the evacuation had been

completed, and that the whole multitude was now at the mercy of its

savage foes. It was evident that they had a frightful gantlet to run

through the fire of the enemy and the winters chilling winds. The snow

through which they had slowly toiled was reddened with blood all the way

back to Cabul. Baggage was abandoned, and men and women alike pushed

forward for their lives, some of them, in the haste of flight, but

half-clad, few sufficiently protected from the severe cold.



The succeeding days were days of massacre and horror. The fierce

hill-tribes swarmed around the troops, attacking them in front, flank,

and rear, pouring in their fire from every point of vantage, slaying

them in hundreds, in thousands, as they moved hopelessly on. The

despairing men fought bravely. Many of the foe suffered for their

temerity. But they were like prairie-wolves around the dying bison; the

retreating force lay helpless in their hands; two new foes took the

place of every one that fell.



Each day's horrors surpassed those of the last. The camp-followers died

in hundreds from cold and starvation, their frost-bitten feet refusing

to support them. Crawling in among the rugged rocks that bordered the

road, they lay there helplessly awaiting death. The soldiers fell in

hundreds. It grew worse as they entered the contracted mountain-pass

through which their road led. Here the ferocious foe swarmed among the

rocks, and poured death from the heights upon the helpless fugitives. It

was impossible to dislodge them. Natural breastworks commanded every

foot of that terrible road. The hardy Afghan mountaineers climbed with

the agility of goats over the hill-sides, occupying hundreds of points

which the soldiers could not reach. It was a carnival of slaughter.

Nothing remained for the helpless fugitives but to push forward with all

speed through that frightful mountain-pass and gain as soon as possible

the open ground beyond.



Few gained it. On the fourth day from Cabul there were but two hundred

and seventy soldiers left. The fifth day found the seventeen thousand

fugitives reduced to five thousand. A day more, and these five thousand

were nearly all slain. Only twenty men remained of the great body of

fugitives which had left Cabul less than a week before. This handful of

survivors was still relentlessly pursued. A barrier detained them for a

deadly interval under the fire of the foe, and eight of the twenty died

in seeking to cross it. The pass was traversed, but the army was gone. A

dozen worn-out fugitives were all that remained alive.



On they struggled towards Jelalabad, death following them still. They

reached the last town on their road; but six of them had fallen. These

six were starving. They had not tasted food for days. Some peasants

offered them bread. They devoured it like famished wolves. But as they

did so the inhabitants of the town seized their arms and assailed them.

Two of them were cut down. The others fled, but were hotly pursued.

Three of the four were overtaken and slain within four miles of

Jelalabad. Dr. Brydon alone remained, and gained the fort alone, the

sole survivor, as he believed and reported, of the seventeen thousand

fugitives. The Afghan chiefs had boasted that they would allow only one

man to live, to warn the British to meddle no more with Afghanistan.

Their boast seemed literally fulfilled. Only one man had traversed in

safety that "valley of the shadow of death."



Fortunately, there were more living than Dr. Brydon was aware of. Akbar

Khan had offered to save the ladies and children if the married and

wounded officers were delivered into his hands. This was done. General

Elphinstone was among the prisoners, and died in captivity, a relief to

himself and his friends from the severe account to which the government

would have been obliged to call him.



Now for the sequel to this story of suffering and slaughter. The

invasion of Afghanistan by the English had been for the purpose of

protecting the Indian frontier. A prince, Shah Soojah, friendly to

England, was placed on the throne. This prince was repudiated by the

Afghan tribes, and to their bitter and savage hostility was due the

result which we have briefly described. It was a result with which the

British authorities were not likely to remain satisfied. The news of the

massacre sent a thrill of horror through the civilized world.

Retribution was the sole thought in British circles in India. A strong

force was at once collected to punish the Afghans and rescue the

prisoners. Under General Pollock it fought its way through the Khyber

Pass and reached Jelalabad. Thence it advanced to Cabul, the soldiers,

infuriated by the sight of the bleaching skeletons that thickly lined

the roadway, assailing the Afghans with a ferocity equal to their own.

Wherever armed Afghans were met death was their portion. Nowhere could

they stand against the maddened English troops. Filled with terror, they

fled for safety to the mountains, the invading force having terribly

revenged their slaughtered countrymen.



It next remained to rescue the prisoners. They had been carried about

from fort to fort, suffering many hardships and discomforts, but not

being otherwise maltreated. They were given up to the British, after the

recapture of Cabul, with the hope that this would satisfy these terrible

avengers. It did so. The fortifications of Cabul were destroyed, and the

British army was withdrawn from the country. England had paid bitterly

for the mistake of occupying it. The bones of a slaughtered army paved

the road that led to the Afghan capital.