2-969-871 - /Heritage Images

The 45th Regiment, Native Infantry, Burning a Santhal Village and Recovering Plunder, 1856. British Army responds to an uprising by the Santhal people in present-day Jharkhand and West Bengal: '...a band of armed Santhals had decapitated a police-officer in the hills...and were plundering the neighbouring villages. The intelligence...was disbelieved, from the simple fact that the Santhals had up to that moment borne the character of being the most truthful, faithful, gentle, and harmless race in India. Rapid and repeated messages, however, pouring in one after the other, soon confirmed the truth of the first report; and it was too soon discovered that this race of men, naturally the most cowardly and harmless of the human race, were all of a sudden turned into the cruelest, boldest, and most bloodthirsty wretches that ever disgraced the face of the earth'. From "Illustrated London News", 1856.