2-888-410 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Commander-in-Chief Sir Charles Napier - from a recent sketch, 1850. 'When these regiments [of the Indian Army] chose to 'charge,' the Commander-in-Chief, to his astonishment, beheld the men discharging their firelocks straight up in the air; and he saw some men...actually firing off their muskets to the rear over their shoulders as their bearers (he will not call them soldiers) were running to the front!...if ever such again happens, he will expose the commanding officer of any regiment that so disgraces itself...to the whole Indian army...No commander could go into action with a regiment capable of such conduct...The Commander-in-Chief will, therefore, hold commanding officers responsible (for they alone are to blame) that any soldier who shouts, or charges, or fires, without orders, be instantly seized, tried at once by a drum-head court-martial, and the sentence executed on the spot'. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.