१८५७ का स्वातन्त्र्य समर (वीर विनायक दामोदर सावरकर - अंग्रेजों द्वारा छपने से पूर्व प्रतिबन्धित महाग्रन्थ)

THE CONFLAGRATION
On the 17th of July, Havelock's victorious army entered
the city of Cawnpore. Havelock and his army who had
brought up to Cawnpore the first wave of victory, to
revive the lost English prestige were blessed by English-
men, both in India as well as in England. Everywhere
in England, in the street-corners, on sign-boards of shops,
on the walls of public-houses, Havelock's name was
engraved !
When the permission to loot Cawnpore was given, hun-
dreds of English officers and soldiers, along with the Sikhs,
fell upon Cawnpore like vultures on a wounded lion. At
Bibigarh, the spot was clotted with blood and there was a
suspicion that it was English blood that had been spilt
there. Therefore, a large number of Brahmins in Cawn-
pore were caught and those of them against whom there
was any suspicion of complicity with the Revolution were
sentenced to death. Not merely that, but, before being
hanged, they were made to lick off, with their tongue, the
blood spots and, then wash away the stains, broom in
hand. The reason of giving this unheard-of punishment
to those about to be hanged is thus given by an English
officer : “ I know that the act of touching Feringhi blood
and washing it with a sweeper’s broom degrades a high
caste Hindu from his religion. Not only this but I make
them do it because I know it. We could not wreak a true
revenge, unless we trample all their religious instincts
under foot, before we hang them, so that they may not
have the satisfaction of dying as Hindus.” In the massa-
cres ordered by the Revolutionaries, not only no religious
injuries were inflicted on the English, but they were always
given time, when they requested so, to read the Bible
before they were killed. But the English clean took away,
so far as they could, from the Revolutionaries who were
massacred at Cawnpore and Delhi, all consolations of
religion. But many gallant men, even. in this misery,
embraced death with a smile for the sake of their principle
and made sacred the gallows on which they were hanged.
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