Vellore Mutiny

The immediate causes of the mutiny revolved mainly around resentment felt towards changes in the sepoy dress code and general appearance, introduced in November 1805. Hindus were prohibited from wearing religious marks on their foreheads while on duty, and Muslims were required to shave their beards and trim their moustaches. In addition General Sir John Cradock, Commander-in-Chief of the Madras Army, ordered the wearing of a round hat resembling that associated at the time with both Europeans in general and with Indian converts to Christianity. The new headdress included a leather cockade and was intended to replace an existing model resembling a turban and considered unsuitable for service. These measures offended the sensibilities of both Hindu and Muslim sepoys and went contrary to an earlier warning by a military board that sepoy uniform changes should be "given every consideration which a subject of that delicate and important nature required". In addition to the military grievances listed above, the rebellion was also instigated by the sons of the defeated Tipu Sultan, confined at Vellore since 1799. Tipu's wives and sons, together with numerous retainers, were pensioners of the East India Company and lived in a palace within the large complex comprising the Vellore Fort. One of Tipu Sultan's daughters was to be married on 9 July 1806, and the plotters of the uprising gathered at the fort under the pretext of attending the wedding. The objectives of the civilian conspirators remain obscure but by seizing and holding the fort they may have hoped to encourage a general rising through the territory of the former Mysore Sultanate. However, Tipu's sons were reluctant to take charge after the mutiny arose. ==Outbreak==

The garrison of the Vellore Fort in July 1806 comprised four companies of British infantry from H.M. 69th (South Lincolnshire) Regiment of Foot and three battalions of Madras infantry: the 1st/1st, 2nd/1st and 2nd/23rd Madras Native Infantry. The usual practice for sepoys having families with them in Vellore was to live in individual huts outside the walls. However the scheduling of a field-day for the Madras units on 10 July had required most of the sepoys to spend that night sleeping within the fort so that they could be quickly assembled on parade before dawn. Two hours after midnight on 10 July, the sepoys killed fourteen of their own officers and 115 men of the 69th Regiment, However, a British officer, Major Coopes, had been outside the walls of the fort that night and was able to alert the garrison in Arcot. Nine hours after the outbreak of the mutiny, a relief force comprising the British 19th Light Dragoons, galloper guns and a squadron of the 3rd Regiment of Madras Native Cavalry, rode from Arcot to Vellore, covering in about two hours. It was led by Captain Robert Rollo Gillespie, who reportedly left Arcot within a quarter of an hour of the alarm being raised. Gillespie dashed ahead of the main force with a single troop of about twenty men. About 100 sepoys who had sought refuge inside the palace were brought out, and by Gillespie's order, placed against a wall and shot dead. John Blakiston, the engineer who had blown in the gates, recalled: Even this appalling sight I could look upon, I may almost say, with composure. It was an act of summary justice, and in every respect a most proper one; yet, at this distance of time, I find it a difficult matter to approve the deed, or to account for the feeling under which I then viewed it. The prompt and ruthless response to the mutiny snuffed out any further unrest in a single stroke and provided the history of the British in India with one of its true epics; for, as Gillespie admitted, with a delay of even five minutes, all would have been lost for the British. In all, nearly 350 ==Aftermath==

After formal trial, six mutineers were blown away from guns, five shot by firing squad, eight hanged and five transported. The three Madras battalions involved in the mutiny were all disbanded. The senior British officers responsible for the offending dress regulations were recalled to England, including the Commander-in-Chief of the Madras Army, John Craddock, the company refusing to pay even his passage. The orders regarding the 'new turbans' (round hats) were also cancelled. After the incident, the incarcerated royals in Vellore fort were transferred to Calcutta. The Governor of Madras, William Bentinck, too was recalled, the Company's Court of Directors regretting that "greater care and caution had not been exercised in examining into the real sentiments and dispositions of the sepoys before measures of severity were adopted to enforce the order respecting the use of the new turban." The controversial interference with the social and religious customs of the sepoys was also abolished. The only surviving eyewitness account of the actual outbreak of the mutiny is that of Amelia Farrer, Lady Fancourt (the wife of St. John Fancourt, the commander of the fort). Her manuscript account, written two weeks after the massacre, describes how she and her children survived as her husband perished. ==In literature==

English poet Sir Henry Newbolt's poem "Gillespie" is an account of the events of the Vellore mutiny. The novel Strangers in the Land (1976; ) by George Shipway centres on the Vellore mutiny, from the perspectives of both British and Indian participants. ==See also==