The Brian Ritchie Collection of H.E.I.C. and British India Medals

The Indian Mutiny medal to Doctor John J. Halls, Civil Surgeon, one of the gallant defenders of Arrah in 1857 and author of the best contemporary account of the affair

Indian Mutiny 1857-59, no clasp (Dr. John A. Halls) note incorrect second initial, extremely fine and very rare £2000-2500

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Brian Ritchie Collection of H.E.I.C. and British India Medals.

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John James Halls was born on 1 September 1820. Educated at Canterbury (B.A. 1842) Halls qualified as M.R.C.S. in 1846 and F.R.C.S. in 1850. He was appointed an Assistant Surgeon in the Bengal Service on 10 June 1854, and posted as Civil Surgeon to the District of Shahabad on 16 April 1855, where he became register of deeds and Marriage Registrar on 2 February 1856.

At the outbreak of the Mutiny, Doctor Halls was stationed at Arrah, a small town not far from Dinapore in the District of Shahabad. It was subsequent to the outbreak at Meerut and the massacre at Delhi that the European inhabitants of Arrah realised that they too were at great danger. On the 9th of June a meeting of the male Europeans was held at the magistrates house whereby it was decided to evacuate the women and children to Dinapore, where the presence of 600 men of H.M’s 10th Regiment would ensure their safety. That evening, the ladies and children were embarked in the guard-boat and conveyed by river to Dinapore, accompanied by Mr Vicars Boyle, the resident railway engineer. However, for the most part, all the remaining non-official males also ‘made the best of their way, some by boat, some on horseback, to Dinapore, carrying with them a formidable battery of double-barrelled guns and revolvers.’

Thus the party at Arrah was reduced to just six officials, subsequently joined by three railway engineers, including Vicars Boyle upon his return from Dinapore. These six, Mr Littledale (the Judge), Mr Coombe (the Officiating Collector), Mr Wake (the Magistrate), Mr Halls (the Civil Surgeon), Mr Colvin (the Assistant Magistrate) and Mr Field (the Sub-Deputy Opium Agent), all moved into the Judge’s house which they left by day to carry on their public business as usual, and by night to patrol the town in turn, accompanied by a force of native police and watchmen.

When, on the 25th of July, news was received that the native troops at Dinapore had mutinied and were headed for Arrah, the Europeans moved to Mr Vicars Boyle’s residence which, defying the sarcastic comments of his colleagues, he had fortified by bricking up the veranda arches and placing numerous sandbags against the walls. To augment the large supply of rice, grain, biscuits, water, brandy and beer already stored there, they brought with them a few dozen cases of port and sherry, which belonged to Doctor Halls, and settled into their little fortress. Here they were joined by the Muslim Deputy Collector, two native servants, six Eurasian volunteers, and fifty Sikhs, recently arrived from Patna in charge of treasure, whose loyalty they were obliged to take on trust.

No sooner had they bricked themselves up in the building than the mutineers arrived in Arrah, looted the Treasury of 70,000 rupees, broke open the gaol and, joined by the prisoners, guards, and hundreds of bandmashes, charged down upon Boyle’s two-storeyed fortified building, ‘shouting like demons and firing as fast as they could’. This first attack was held off but, as Doctor Halls recorded, very much to the surprise of the defenders:

‘The first rush of the vast force was certainly the most fearful: and, judging of the feelings of others by my own, I suspect few of us had much hope beyond that of selling our lives as dearly as possible. Indeed, had the rebels had the pluck to advance, they might have kicked down our defences, or have scaled the walls and overwhelmed us by their weight of numbers. Fortunately, however, they had not; and, when this their first attack had been repulsed, our hopes began to revive, especially as we all escaped providentially without a wound, and expected that relief must shortly come from Dinapore.’

Although all were unhurt, most of them had experienced narrow escapes, including the gallant Doctor, ‘Three inches difference in a bullet’s direction, on two separate occasions, and I should not be writing to you now: on a third, a brick behind which I was squinting, to get a shot at a Sepoy, was shivered by a ball, a great quantity of the fragments and brick-dust flying into my face and eyes, making me for a second or two fancy myself hit. Many others of our party could tell similar stories.’

Day after day the firing continued as the mutineers, having failed to smoke the defenders out by setting fire to a pile of chillies, slowly approached the building by digging a deep mine. A party of Sikhs ran out one night to grab the mining -ools; and with these a counter-mine was sunk. The Sikhs behaved splendidly, Halls wrote, answering the mutineers’ offer of 500 rupees for every European they brought out with ‘sarcastic remarks and musket bullets’. They both designed and carried out ‘some of the most important measures for the safety of the garrison’; and not only enabled the enemy’s mining-tools to be turned against them by their stealthy sallies at night but also procured some sheep to enliven the garrison’s boring diet. Yet Halls confessed that, bravely as they and the rest of the garrison fought, he had never thought that they could possibly survive unless relief arrived within one or two days.

The relieving force was slow in coming and the first attempt ended in disaster when a column under Captain Dunbar of the 10th Foot, despatched by General Lloyd from Dinapore, was ambushed when just a few miles from Arrah. Out of 400 men, mainly from the 10th Foot and 37th Foot, nearly 200 were killed and another 60 to 80 wounded, the survivors eventually making their way back to Dinapore. General Lloyd made no further efforts to help the garrison at Arrah. But a more enterprising officer decided to assume personal responsibility for the relief. This was Major Vincent Eyre, an elderly artillery officer who was on his way from Calcutta to Allahabad with his battery when he heard of the plight of the garrison at Arrah. Persuading Captain L’Estrange, who was at Buxar with a detachment of 160 men of the 5th Fusiliers, to join him, he immediately marched to Arrah on his own responsibility.

Defeating the mutineers at Gujraganj, where they had hoped to check his advance, he sent them flying from Arrah, relieved the grateful garrison, pursued the rebels towards Jagdishpur, and, proclaiming martial law, hanged thirty wounded prisoners as well as various native officials who had entered Kunwar Singh’s service.

Doctor John Halls died on board SS Ceylon on 6 November 1860, whilst on passage to England. His account of the defence of Arrah, entitled Two Months in Arrah in 1857, was published in London later that same year. It was reprinted in 1893 in a volume entitled Arrah in 1857, together with an account of the relief of Arrah by Charles Kelly, the whole edited by Lieutenant G. F. T. Feather, 5th Fusiliers. Just 103 copies of Arrah in 1857 were printed, of which copy Number 46 accompanies this Lot.