The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 12 (of 12)

You see, my Lords, what a condition these unfortunate persons were in at that period; you see they were put in irons, in a place highly unhealthy; and from this you will judge of the treatment which followed the few severities. The first yielded a bond for 600,000l.; the second, a bond for 60,000l.; the third was intended to extort the payment of these bonds, and completed their series.

I will now read a letter from Captain Jaques to Mr. Middleton, from the printed Minutes, dated Palace, Fyzabad, May 18th, 1782, consequently written nearly a month after the former.

"Sir,—The prisoners Behar and Jewar Ali Khân, who seem to be very sickly, have requested their irons might be taken off for a few days, that they might take medicine, and walk about the garden of the place where they are confined, to assist the medicine in its operation. Now, as I am sure they would be equally as secure without their irons as with them, I think it my duty to inform you of this request, and desire to know your pleasure concerning it.

    (Signed) "LEONARD JAQUES."

On the 22d May, 1782, Captain Jaques's humane proposal is thus replied to by Mr. Middleton.

"I am sorry it is not in my power to comply with your proposal of easing the prisoners for a few days of their fetters. Much as my humanity may be touched by their sufferings, I should think it inexpedient to afford them any alleviation while they persist in a breach of their contract with me; and, indeed, no indulgence could be shown them without the authority of the Nabob, who, instead of consenting to moderate the rigors of their situation, would be most willing to multiply them.

    (Signed) "NATHANIEL MIDDLETON."

I will now call your Lordships' attention to other letters connected with this transaction.

Letter from Major Gilpin to Mr. Middleton, June 5th, 1782.

"Sir,—Agreeably to your instructions, I went to the prisoners, Behar and Jewar Ali Khân, accompanied by Hoolas Roy, who read the papers respecting the balance now due, &c., &c.

"In general terms they expressed concern at not being able to discharge the same without the assistance of the Begum, and requested indulgence to send a message to her on that subject, and in the evening they would give an answer.

"I went at the time appointed for the answer, but did not receive a satisfactory one; in consequence of which I desired them to be ready, at the shortest notice, to proceed to Lucknow, and explained to them every particular contained in your letter of the 1st instant respecting them.

"Yesterday morning I sent for Letafit Ali Khân, and desired him to go to the Bhow Begum, and deliver the substance of my instructions to her, which he did, and returned with the inclosed letter from her. From some circumstances which I have heard to-day, I am hopeful the prisoners will soon think seriously of their removal, and pay the balance rather than submit themselves to an inconvenient journey to Lucknow."

To Major Gilpin, commanding at Fyzabad, from Mr. Middleton.

"Sir,—I have been favored with your letter of the 5th instant, informing me of the steps you had taken in consequence of my instructions of the 1st, and covering a letter from the Bhow Begum, which is so unsatisfactory that I cannot think of returning an answer to it. Indeed, as all correspondence between the Begum and me has long been stopped, I request you will be pleased to inform her that I by no means wish to resume it, or maintain any friendly intercourse with her, until she has made good my claim upon her for the balance due.

"I have now, in conformity to my former instructions, to desire that the two prisoners, Behar and Jewar Ali Khân, may be immediately sent, under a sufficient guard, to Lucknow, unless, upon your imparting to them this intimation, either they or the Begum should actually pay the balance, or give you such assurances or security for the assets to be immediately forthcoming as you think can be relied upon; in which case you will of course suspend the execution of this order."

Mr. Richard Johnson to Major Gilpin. Lucknow, 24th June, 1782.

"Sir,—I have received the honor of your letter of the 20th. The prisoners arrived here this morning. Lieutenant Crow has delivered them over to Captain Waugh, and returns to you in a day or two.

"I think their hint to you a very good one, and worth improving upon. Was the Bhow Begum to think that she must go to Allahabad, or any other place, while her palace is searched for the hidden treasure of the late Vizier, it might go further than any other step that can be immediately taken towards procuring payment of the balance outstanding.

"The prisoners are to be threatened with severities to-morrow, to make them discover where the balance may be procurable, the fear of which may possibly have a good effect; and the apprehensions of the Begum lest they should discover the hidden treasure may induce her to make you tenders of payment, which you may give any reasonable encouragement to promote that may occur to you.

"The jaghire cannot be released to her on any other terms, nor even to the Nabob, until the five lacs for which it was granted be paid up; and the prisoners must also be detained until the full fifty lacs be liquidated: consequently nothing but the fear of an increase of demand, upon breach of the first engagement on her part, will induce her to prompt payment."

Letter from Mr. Richard Johnson to the Commanding Officer of the Guard. Lucknow, 23d July, 1782.

"Sir,—Some violent demands having been made for the release of the prisoners, it is necessary that every possible precaution be taken for their security. You will therefore be pleased to be very strict in guarding them; and I herewith send another pair of fetters, to be added to those now upon the prisoners."

Letter from Robert Steere Allen to Richard Johnson, Esq., Acting Resident. Lucknow, 23d July, 1782.

"Sir,—I have received your instructions, and ordered the fetters to be added; but they are by much too small for their feet. The utmost regard shall be paid to the security of the prisoners. I have sent back the fetters, that you may have them altered, if you think proper."

Letter from Mr. Johnson to the Officer commanding the Guard. Lucknow, 28th June, 1782.

"Sir,—The Nabob having determined to inflict corporal punishment upon the prisoners under your guard, this is to desire that his officers, when they shall come, may have free access to the prisoners, and be permitted to do with them as they shall see proper, only taking care that they leave them always under your charge."

I will now trouble your Lordships with the following passages from Mr. Holt's evidence.

"Q. Did you ever see the two ministers of the Begum?—A. I saw them brought into Lucknow.—Q. In what situation were they, when you saw them brought into Lucknow?—A. They were brought in their palanquins, attended by a guard of sepoys.—Q. Under whose command were the sepoys?—A. That they were brought in by?—Q. Yes.—A. I do not recollect.—Q. Were those sepoys that brought in the prisoners part of the Nabob's army, or were they any British troops?—A. To the best of my recollection, they were detached from a regiment then stationed at Fyzabad.—Q. In whose service was that regiment?—A. In the Company's.—Q. Were they imprisoned in any house near that in which you resided?—A. They were imprisoned immediately under the window of the house in which I resided, close to it.—Q. Did you or did you not ever see any preparations made for any corporal punishment?—A. I saw something of a scaffolding.—Q. For what purpose?—A. I heard it was for the purpose of tying them up.—Q. Whose prisoners did you consider these men to be?—A. I considered them as prisoners of the Resident; they were close to his house, and under an European officer."

Your Lordships have now seen the whole process, except one dreadful part of it, which was the threatening to send the Begum to the castle at Chunar. After all these cruelties, after all these menaces of further cruelties, after erecting a scaffold for actually exercising the last degree of criminal punishment, namely, by whipping these miserable persons in public,—after everything has been done but execution, our inability to prove by evidence this part of their proceedings has secured to your Lordships a circumstance of decorum observed on the stage where murders, executions, whippings, and cruelties are performed behind the scenes. I know as certainly as a man can know such a thing, from a document which I cannot produce in evidence here, but I have it in the handwriting of the Resident, Mr. Bristow, that Behar Ali Khân was actually scourged in the manner that we speak of. I had it in writing in the man's hand; I put the question to him, but he refused to answer it, because he thought it might criminate himself, and criminate us all; but if your Lordships saw the scaffold erected for the purpose, (and of this we have evidence,) would you not necessarily believe that the scourging did follow? All this was done in the name of the Nabob; but if the Nabob is the person claiming his father's effects, if the Nabob is the person vindicating a rebellion against himself upon his nearest relations, why did he not in person take a single step in this matter? why do we see nothing but his abused name in it? We see no order under his own hand. We see all the orders given by the cool Mr. Middleton, by the outrageous Mr. Johnson, by all that gang of persons that the prisoner used to disgrace the British name. Who are the officers that stormed their fort? who put on the irons? who sent them? who supplied them? They are all, all, English officers. There is not an appearance, even, of a minister of the Nabob's in the whole transaction. The actors are all Englishmen; and we, as Englishmen, call for punishment upon those who have thus degraded and dishonored the English name.

We do not use torture or cruelties, even for the greatest crimes, but have banished them from our courts of justice; we never suffer them in any case. Yet those men, in order to force others to break their most sacred trust, inflict tortures upon them. They drag their poor victims from dungeon to dungeon, from one place of punishment to another, and wholly on account of an extorted bond,—for they owed no money, they could not owe any,—but to got this miserable balance of 60,000l., founded upon their tables of exchange: after they had plundered these ladies of 500,000l. in money, and 70,000l. a year in land, they could not be satisfied without putting usury and extortion upon tyranny and oppression. To enforce this unjust demand, the miserable victims were imprisoned, ironed, scourged, and at last threatened to be sent prisoners to Chunar. This menace succeeded. The persons who had resisted irons, who had been, as the Begums say, refused food and water, stowed in an unwholesome, stinking, pestilential prison, these persons withstood everything till the fort of Chunar was mentioned to them; and then their fortitude gave way: and why? The fort of Chunar was not in the dominions of the Nabob, whose rights they pretended to be vindicating: to name a British fort, in their circumstances, was to name everything that is most horrible in tyranny; so, at least, it appeared to them. They gave way; and thus were committed acts of oppression and cruelty unknown, I will venture to say, in the history of India. The women, indeed, could not be brought forward and scourged, but their ministers were tortured, till, for their redemption, these princesses gave up all their clothes, all the ornaments of their persons, all their jewels, all the memorials of their husbands and fathers,—all were delivered up, and valued by merchants at 50,000l.; and they also gave up 5,000l. in money, or thereabouts: so that, in reality, only about 5,000l., a mere nothing, a sum not worth mentioning, even in the calculations of extortion and usury, remained unpaid.

But, my Lords, what became of all this money? When you examine these witnesses here, they tell you it was paid to Hyder Beg Khân. Now they had themselves received the money in tale at their own assay-table. And when an account is demanded of the produce of the goods, they shrink from it, and say it was Hyder Beg Khân who received the things and sold them. Where is Hyder Beg Khân's receipt? The Begums say (and the thing speaks for itself) that even gold and jewels coming from them lost their value; that part of the goods were spoilt, being kept long unsold in damp and bad warehouses; and that the rest of the goods were sold, as thieves sell their spoil, for little or nothing. In all this business Mr. Hastings and Mr. Middleton were themselves the actors, chief actors; but now, when they are called to account, they substitute Hyder Beg Khân in their place, a man that is dead and gone, and you hear nothing more of this part of the business.

But the sufferings of these eunuchs did not end here; they were, on account of this odd 5,000l., confined for twelve months,—not prisoners at large, like this prisoner who thrusts his sore leg into your Lordships' faces every day, but in harsh and cruel confinement. These are the persons that I feel for. It is their dungeon, it is their unrevenged wrongs that move me. It is for these innocent, miserable, unhappy men, who were guilty of no offence but fidelity to their mistresses, in order to vex and torture whom (the first women in Asia) in the persons of their ministers these cruelties were exercised,—these are they for whom I feel, and not for the miserable sore leg or whining cant of this prisoner. He has been the author of all these wrongs; and if you transfer to him any of the sympathy you owe to these sufferers, you do wrong, you violate compassion. Think of their irons. Has not this criminal, who put on these irons, been without one iron? Has he been threatened with torture? Has he been locked up without food and water? Have his sufferings been aggravated as the sufferings of these poor men were aggravated? What punishment has been inflicted, and what can be inflicted upon him, in any manner commensurate with the atrocity of his crimes?

At last, my Lords, these unhappy men were released. Mr. Bristow, who had been sent to Lucknow, writes to Mr. Hastings, and informs him that severities could do no more, that imprisonments and menaces could get no more money. I believe not, for I doubt much whether any more was to be got. But whether there was or not, all the arts of extortion, fortified by all the arts of tyranny, of every name and species, had failed, and therefore Mr. Bristow released the prisoners,—but without any warrant for so doing from Mr. Hastings, who, after having received this letter from Mr. Bristow, gets the Supreme Council to order these very severities to be continued till the last farthing was paid. In order to induce the Council to sanction this measure, he suppressed Mr. Bristow's declaration, that severities could do nothing more in exacting further payments; and the Resident, I find, was afterwards obliquely punished for his humanity by Mr. Hastings.

Mr. Bristow's letter is dated the 12th of December, and he thus writes.

"The battalion at Fyzabad" (where the Begums and their ministers had been confined) "is recalled, and my letter to the board of the 1st instant has explained my conduct to the Begum. The letter I addressed her, a translation of which I beg leave to inclose, (No. 2,) was with a view of convincing her that you readily assented to her being freed from the restraints which had been imposed upon her, and that your acquiescence in her sufferings was a measure of necessity, to which you were forced by her extraordinary conduct. I wished to make it appear this was a matter on which you directed me to consult the Vizier's pleasure, that it might be known you were the spring from whence she was restored to her dignity and consequence."

On the 3d of March following, the Council agree to send the following order to Mr. Bristow.

"We desire you will inform us if any and what means have been taken for recovering the balance due from the Begum at Fyzabad, and, if necessary, that you recommend it to the Vizier to enforce the most effectual means for that purpose."

My Lords, you see the fraud he has put upon the Council. You will find that Mr. Bristow's letters, up to the 3d of March, had been suppressed; and though then communicated, yet he instigated his cat's-paw, that blind and ignorant Council, to demand from the Vizier the renewal of these very severities and cruelties, the continuance of which the letters in his pocket had shown him were of no effect. Here you have an instance of his implacable cruelty; you see that it never relaxes, never remits, and that, finding all the resources of tyranny useless and ineffective, he is still willing to use them, and for that purpose he makes a fraudulent concealment of the utter inefficacy of all the means that had been used.

But, you will ask, what could make him persevere in these acts of cruelty, after his avarice had been more than satiated? You will find it is this. He had had some quarrel with these women. He believed that they had done him some personal injury or other, of which he nowhere informs you. But, as you find that in the case of Cheyt Sing he considered his visit to General Clavering as an horrid outrage against himself, which he never forgave, and revenged to the ruin of that miserable person, so you find that he has avowed the same malicious disposition towards the Begums, arising from some similar cause. In page 367 of your printed Minutes, he says,—"I am sorry that I must in truth add, that a part of the resentment of the Begums was, as I had too much reason to suspect, directed to myself personally. The incidents which gave rise to it are too light to be mixed with the professed subject and occasion of this detail; and as they want the authenticity of recorded evidence, I could lay no claim to credit in my relation of them. At some period I may be induced to offer them to the world, my ultimate and unerring judges, both of that and of every other trait in my political character."

My Lords, you have an anecdote here handed to you which is the key of a great part of this transaction. He had determined upon some deep and desperate revenge for some injury or affront of some kind or other that he thought he had received from these people. He accuses them of a personal quarrel with himself; and yet he has not the honor or honesty to tell you what it was,—what it was that could induce them to entertain such a personal resentment against him as to ruin themselves and their country by their supposed rebellion. He says, that some time or other he will tell it to the world. Why did he not tell his counsel, and authorize them to tell a story which could not be unimportant, as it was connected with a rebellion which shook the British power in India to its foundation? And if it be true that this rebellion had its rise in some wicked act of this man, who had offended these women, and made them, as he says, his mortal enemies, you will then see that you never can go so deep with this prisoner that you do not find in every criminal act of his some other criminal act. In the lowest deep there is still a lower deep. In every act of his cruelty there is some hidden, dark motive, worse than the act itself, of which he just gives you a hint, without exposing it to that open light which truth courts and falsehood basely slinks from.

But cruelly as they have suffered, dreadfully as they have been robbed, insulted as they have been, in every mode of insult that could be offered to women of their rank, all this must have been highly aggravated by coming from such a man as Mr. Middleton. You have heard the audacious and insulting language he has held to them, his declining to correspond with them, and the mode of his doing it. There are, my Lords, things that embitter the bitterness of oppression itself: contumelious acts and language, coming from persons who the other day would have licked the dust under the feet of the lowest servants of these ladies, must have embittered their wrongs, and poisoned the very cup of malice itself.

Oh! but they deserved it. They were concerned in a wicked, outrageous rebellion: first, for expelling their own son from his dominions; and, secondly, for expelling and extirpating the English nation out of India.—Good God Almighty! my Lords, do you hear this? Do you understand that the English nation had made themselves so odious, so particularly hateful, even to women the most secluded from the world, that there was no crime, no mischief, no family destruction, through which they would not wade, for our extermination? Is this a pleasant thing to hear of? Rebellion is, in all parts of the world, undoubtedly considered as a great misfortune: in some countries it must be considered as a presumption of some fault in government: nowhere is it boasted of as supplying the means of justifying acts of cruelty and insult, but with us.

We have, indeed, seen that a rebellion did exist in Baraitch and Goruckpore. It was an universal insurrection of the people: an insurrection for the very extermination of Englishmen,—for the extermination of Colonel Hannay,—for the extermination of Captain Gordon,—for the extermination of Captain Williams, and of all the other captains and colonels exercising the office of farmer-general and sub-farmer-general in the manner that we have described. We know that there did exist in that country such a rebellion. But mark, my Lords, against whom!—against these mild and gracious sovereigns, Colonel Hannay, Captain Gordon, Captain Williams. Oh, unnatural and abominable rebellion!—But will any one pretend to say that the Nabob himself was ever attacked by any of these rebels? No: the attacks were levelled against the English. The people rose in favor of their lawful sovereign, against a rebellion headed by Mr. Middleton, who, you see, usurped his authority,—headed by Colonel Hannay,—headed by Captain Gordon,—headed by all those abominable persons exercising, under the Nabob's name, an authority destructive to himself and his subjects. Against them there was a rebellion. But was this an unnatural rebellion,—a rebellion against usurped authority, to save the prince, his children, and state, from a set of vile usurpers?

My Lords, I shall soon close our proceeding for this day, because I wish to leave this part of our charge strongly and distinctly impressed upon your Lordships' memory, and because nothing can aggravate it. I shall next proceed, in the farther examination of the prisoner's defence, to dissipate, as I trust we have done, and as I hope we shall do, all the miserable stuff they have given by way of defence. I shall often have occasion to repeat and press upon your Lordships that that miserable defence is a heavy aggravation of his crime. At present, I shall conclude, leaving this part of our charge with the impression upon your Lordships' minds that this pretended rebellion was merely an insurrection against the English, excited by their oppression.

If the rebellion was against the Nabob, or if he was the author of the oppression which caused it, why do the English only appear to be concerned in both of them? How comes it that the Nabob never appears to have expressed any resentment against the rebels? We shall prove beyond a doubt, that the Begums had nothing to do with it. There was, indeed, as I have already said, what may be called a rebellion; but it was a rebellion against—not the Nabob, but in favor of the lawful prince of the country,—against the usurpers of his authority and the destroyers of his country. With this, as a rebellion, Mr. Hastings has charged these women; he has charged them with a war against their son, for the purpose of exterminating the English. Look, I pray you, at the whole business, consider all the circumstances of it, and ask yourselves whether this is not a charge, not only so grossly improbable, but so perfectly impossible, that there is not any evidence which can make it even plausible. Consider next, my Lords, on the other side, the evidence of their innocence, and then ask yourselves whether any additional matter could make its probability in the least degree more probable. My Lords, the evidence we have produced is neither more nor less than that of almost all the persons who have had a share in exciting that rebellion, and who, to justify their own horrible cruelty, have attempted to charge the natural consequences of that cruelty upon these unhappy women.

But where, all this time, is the Nabob, against whom this rebellion is pretended to be directed? Was it ever even insinuated to him that his mother had raised a rebellion against him? When were the proofs shown to him? Did he ever charge her with it? He surely must have been most anxious to prevent and suppress a rebellion against himself: but not one word on that subject has ever come out of his mouth; nor has any one person been produced to show that he was informed of the existence of such a rebellion. The persons said to be rebels are his mother and grandmother; and I again ask, Was there the least intimation given to him by Mr. Middleton, or by any other person, of their being even suspected of rebellion against him? There was, indeed, a hint of some rebellion, which the creatures of Mr. Hastings got at obliquely; but neither the person against whom the rebellion is supposed to exist, nor the persons who were said to be guilty of it, were ever either informed of or charged with it. I defy the prisoner and his whole gang to produce one word ever uttered by any one of them, from which the Nabob or Begums could learn that they were supposed to be concerned in the rebellion: so that none of those who were said to be the principal actors in the scene ever heard of the parts they were acting from the actual authors and managers of the business. Not one word was uttered of a charge made, much less of proof given. Nothing was heard but "Give me the money!"—irons,—new irons,—new imprisonment,—and at last the castle of Chunar.

And here I beg leave to pause, and to leave upon your minds the impression, first, of the wrong that was done, the violence, and the robbery,—and, secondly, of the pretences, both civil and criminal, by which they have attempted to justify their proceedings.

SIXTH DAY, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 11, 1794

My Lords,—Your Lordships will recollect that we closed the last day of your proceeding in this trial at a most interesting part of our charge, or rather of our observations upon that charge. We closed at that awful moment when we found the first women of Oude pillaged of all their landed and of all their moneyed property, in short, of all they possessed. We closed by reciting to you the false pretence on which this pillage was defended, namely, that it was the work of the Nabob. Now we had before proved to you, from evidence adduced by the prisoner himself, that this Nabob was a mere tool in his hands; and therefore, if this pretence be true, it aggravates his guilt: for surely the forcing a son to violate the property of his mother must everywhere be considered a crime most portentous and enormous. At this point we closed; and after the detail which has been given you already of these horrible and iniquitous proceedings, some apology may perhaps be necessary for entering again into the refutation of this iniquitous pretence.