THE “BUTCHER OF CAWNPORE”

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 291, 8 September 1928, Page 24

THE “BUTCHER OF CAWNPORE”

WHEN DID HE DIE? The great problem of Nepal, ou the southern slopes of the Himalayas, is one of the few independent States that remain in India, and has al ways, jealously guarded its frontiers against the white man. Few are the travellers who have been permitted to enter it. As the author remarks in this superb book—ot which only 1000 copies are printed: “The little valley of Katraunda (where the capital stands) and the arduous track leading up to it from the plains of India are probably not known to more than 250 Europeans, and to these the rest of this great State, some 000 miles in length and 100 in breadth, is as completely closed to western observation and research as in 250 8.C.” The late Mr. Percival Landon, the author of "Nebal,” a recently published two-volume work, of which only 1000 copies were.printed, is the only European who has ever been allowed to examine hits antiquities aud explore its territory With the help of the public-spirited anu enlightened Maharaja of Nepal, after prolonged and exhausting research, he has been-able to give the world a standard work. One great mystery has been solved by Mr. Landon in his researches. ' After the hideous massacre of English men and women at Cawnpore, during the Indian Mutiny of 1857, the fiend responsible for that massacre, known as Nana Sahib, “the butcher, escaped to Nepal. The Prime Minister of Nepal at that time was Jung Bahadur, who was omnipotent, and friendly towards the British. He declined to protect the fugitive, and sent him a message: “If you want to fight the English, say so, and you shall be massacred to a man.” But at the same time, he hinted that if Nana Sahib kept out of the way he should not be huuted down. There seems to have been some sort of secret compact, as the result of which Nana handed over some of his jewels to the Prime Minister as the price of his life. These stones are now in Nepal: “Among others was a remarkable single emerald, three inches in length . . and a finger-ring with a single diamond of the purest water and of great size. It is a shade under three-quarters of an inch in length and over half an inch in width. . . There was also a necklace of forty-eight pearls and twentyfour emeralds.”

It was always reported that Nana Sahib carried away one Englishwoman from Cawnpore, and this was apparently true; but she was sent back under pressure from the Prime Minister of Nepal. He wrote: “If she and all the Christians were not surrendered, none of the rebel women would be protected, and the whole lot of them would be captured aud handed over to the English.” Nana Sahib was reported to have died in Nepal in 1859, but there is strong evidence to show that he was alive long after and that he even entered India in disguise: . “He is said from time to time to have attended the Kumbh mela at Allahabad, it is almost inconceivable that he should have thus put his head into the noose, but it will be remembered that his existence among the inhospitable mountains and jungles of Nepal must have been almost unbearable to a man used to the last luxuries that India or Europe could afford. . . The rumour of the survival of Nana Sahib has been heard in India within the last twelve years.” In 1895'“an aged mendicant, who had been creating a disturbance on the road, was arrested” in India. The man claimed to be Nana Sahib himself. “The- English police officer sent for the record of Nana Sahib’s bodily marks, and he found that his prisoner possessed them, at least to some extent. ’ • The Government was informed by telegraph, but sent back orders to release the man at once. Yet it is possible, and perhaps even probable, that this was the “butcher of Cawnpore in his old age. If so. he died about that date, as there were Indian reports recentiy current that lie was murdered between 1890 and 1900 by someone whom he had wronged.