Beginning in 1857, the Indian people began a national uprising against British rule, which was also jointly participated by the Indian feudal lords and the lower classes, and was once known in history as "India's first national war of independence".
What is less well known, however, is that the trigger for the outbreak of this uprising was the oiled bullet incident.
The hardness of the Indian people
Ever since India became a British colony in 1757, the history of the entire country has been very tragic.
After the conquest of India, the British soon established a new political system here, through a series of measures, making India their commodity market, raw material source and investment place.
Throughout the process of colonial aggression, the British encountered little resistance, and at the height of their power, they even declared that they wanted India to believe in Christianity, but such an idea could not be carried out in the end.
For a variety of reasons, India's feudal system was generally preserved, and Hinduism and Indian social life did not encounter subversive effects.
In the lands of British India, the British also established a new regime from the central to the provinces to the counties, but below the county, the British wanted to control whether they could not manage it, or retained the previous tax collection agency.
By 1849, the whole territory of India was occupied by the British, and it had become a habit for the British to do their best in India.
But the most bitter thing is the bottom people of India, after the complete reduction of the British colony, a large number of craftsmen directly lost their jobs, and life was even worse.
Many Indians chose to serve in the army, at least to have food to eat, in the middle of the 19th century, british colonists in India had about 280,000 mercenaries, many of which were hired directly from India.
These Indian soldiers had been suffering in silence, their treatment was very low, they were also discriminated against ethnically and religiously, so they were very dissatisfied with the colonial authorities and always dared to speak out.
Long-simmering conflicts finally broke out in 1857.
At the beginning of the year, the British colonial authorities handed out new bullets to the soldiers.
Unlike in the past, these bullets were packaged in paper smeared with butter and lard, and when shooting, they needed to use their teeth to bite the paper package open and remove the bullets.
At this point, the Indian soldiers were completely overwhelmed, and most of them had their own beliefs.
The new bullets, which forbid pork, and cattle, which are sacred animals in Hinduism, directly offended two groups of people.
In April 1857, 85 Indian soldiers refused to use the new bullets in Mitruh, near Delhi.
However, this matter was not taken seriously by the British colonists, who sent the soldiers directly to prison, sentenced them to 7 years in prison, and were publicly insulted.
Four days later, the Mitruh soldiers declared an uprising, they soon occupied Delhi and supported the Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah II, and then many indian underclass rose up, they were no longer willing to endure the endless bullying of the British, and the situation of the uprising developed rapidly.
In the months from May to August, uprisings broke out in many places in India, and Delhi, Kampur and other places became the epicenters of the uprisings.
In the face of the sudden uprising, the British colonists did not expect that things would be so noisy, and their troops stationed in India were already insufficient, so they hurriedly mobilized troops to request support.
Soon, the news of the defection of Indian soldiers reached britain, which also shocked many British.
These British people knew from an early age that India was a colony, and for the first time in the hundred years since the British conquered Bengal, the Indian revolt had always existed, which may be called a threat to British colonial rule.
The British authorities, in order to gain support, also distorted many facts.
The Times, for example, first reported on the "massacre of British women and children" by Indian soldiers in the Delhi area, and later found that the source of this information was completely fabricated by a missionary who was more than a thousand miles away.
For the sake of profit, the British media also selectively reported some news, portraying the soldiers of these uprisings in India as extremely greedy "non-human images".
Their Prime Minister, Palmerston, reacted more calmly, and when he learned that some cities had returned to the hands of the insurgents, he simply said lightly: "The suffering and death of British citizens in India is sad, but the situation in India is not really worrying." ”
Many British politicians do not know how to deal with this situation, but Palmerston's self-confidence has never wavered.
Driven by media public opinion and interests, France, Belgium and other countries have expressed their intention to provide military assistance to solve this problem as soon as possible, but Palmerston has not accepted it, and he will rely on his own strength to re-defeat the Indians.
His consideration was that only by showing Britain's power in front of the world could Britain's future stand taller.
In addition, he also had a layer of consideration, which was to abandon the East India Company and abolish India's dual management system.
In his mind, the East India Company, as a chartered company, was better suited to administer North America and go there to deprive "the furs of running animals."
Within a few months, he sent 80,000 British reinforcements.
The Indian uprising was fraught with hardship
This Indian uprising, ignited by the fire of anger, has no clear command and "step-by-step" action plan, and in general, is a "sudden".
On the other hand, scheming British politicians used the media to bring the Indian uprising to "unite the British" and continue to ignite their patriotism.
Those distorted and unfounded reports have also constructed poignant stories of how british women are indomitable in India, and have become an important part of the British spirit, and the weak British women's group can also most arouse the sympathy of ordinary people, although the truth is completely opposite.
This also had the advantage of preventing the British from thinking in other directions, such as the brutal British colonial rule in India.
The so-called "revenge" also finally has the cloak of "legality".
In this contest between the two sides, the British were "playing chess" step by step, while the Indian rebel soldiers were in a mess, they were huge, but there was always "heroism" and no strategic planning.
During this period, many Indian heroes were born, such as Lakshmi Baii, queen of The Kingdom of Zhangxi.
A small kingdom bordering the Kampur region of India, laxi began his reign as queen and became the de facto ruler of jansi after his death in 1855, with no heirs to inherit the throne.
But the East India Company did not want to admit it, but forcibly annexed Zhangxi, and the seeds of hatred were naturally planted in the heart of Lakshmi Baiyi.
On May 10, 1857, Queen Zhangxi thought that the time had come, and immediately led her people to rise up, and Zhangxi also successfully became one of the strongholds of the uprising.
On March 25, 1858, the British army came to the southwest of The City of Zhangxi, and a fierce artillery battle broke out between the two sides, and Laxmi Baiy personally came to the front to take command.
In order to end the battle as soon as possible, the British fired shells non-stop every day and night.
The Queen's gunners were also indomitable, making the British pay a terrible price.
When the battle lasted until 4 April, when the British finally captured the city of Zhangxi due to the betrayal of internal traitors, Laximi Baiy was still reluctant to surrender, and with a thousand elite soldiers and the enemy engaged in a white-knife battle, she herself dressed in men's clothing, slashed and killed the enemy on the front line.
However, the British soldiers were so numerous that 23-year-old Laximi Baie was cut in the head by a British cavalryman and eventually died in a hut.
Zhangxi's death was a blow to the morale of the rebel army and also brought huge losses to the Indian national uprising.
Laxmi Baie also became India's immortal hero, and she showed all Indians that the British officers and soldiers who looked high on their toes were not invincible.
During this period, many Indian insurgents were arrested by the British, and in order to deter them, the British adopted a very extreme pattern of execution.
Founded in 1891, lePetit Jouranl, europe's most famous French-language publication covering international events at the time, shows a scene on the cover of which several people tied a prisoner to a cannon barrel, and what awaited him would be "fragmented."
Other paintings depict similar scenes: British colonial forces tie captured insurgents to the muzzles of their guns and smash them.
By April 1858, the rebel army was actually in decline, withdrawing from the cities and dispersing to the rural areas to fight, and many feudal lords were bribed by the British and defected.
The great national uprising was finally suppressed in 1859.
This uprising was a tough resistance of the Indians, but the rebel army had too many weaknesses, which eventually led to the failure of the uprising.
The whole process of the uprising was limited to north India, and did not extend to the core areas of British rule such as Bangladesh and Bombay, where if there were some "red flags", then the British could seek assistance from their home countries and send reinforcements from other places.
In the layout of repression, the British have always firmly controlled some of these important strongholds.
The Indian rebel army was also a very loose organization within itself, lacking a common goal and a supreme spiritual leader, so when the British began to counterattack, many of the resistance forces were eliminated from region to region.
The "network" of the East India Company was affected to some extent, but not fundamentally shaken.
Those wavering local powers and local forces in India do not have a firm belief, they are "where they are strong, they will help.".
When the rebel army arrives, they will choose to stand with the rebel army, but after the British large army re-kills, they naturally have to consider their own interests, so they are not willing to resist any longer, they will only consider how to restore the old feudal order, and will not take into account the emotions of the masses at the bottom.
However, for India, the failure of this uprising is still of great historical significance.
The Great Uprising raised the patriotic consciousness of the vast number of Indian people, restored the idea of indian independence and spread to the people, and many stories of heroic struggles were handed down, and finally left seeds among the Indian people.
The great uprising caused by the Indian mutiny also caused hatred between them and the British, and once there was hatred, it would take a long, long time to eliminate it.
The British consolidated colonial rule through brutal repression and once again amassed generous rewards.
India's development as a source of raw materials and Britain's largest export of cotton fabrics has also increased rapidly.
Defending India was a burden for britain, but it didn't cost British taxpayers money, two-thirds of India's taxes were used to do it, and the British had almost no cost.
Both for India and Britain, 1857 was a bloody year, and both sides paid a terrible price.
After this, the British continued to grab a lot of profits in India, and it was not until after World War II that British imperialism, under the strong pressure of the Indian national liberation movement, finally proposed a "divide and rule" plan.
reference
John Darwin: Why was India conquered by the British earlier and more completely than elsewhere in Asia and Africa? Observer Network
Rudranshu Mukhji: Indian Uprising of 1857, Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences, Peking University