(Eleanor Macdonell's Memories)

Our house at Peshawar was a very good one barring a few cracks in the walls, which had been caused by earthquakes, and were not of much consequence.

Peshawar stands in a pretty valley with hills all around;  Tatara, the highest peak of the Hindu Kush mountains, though far away, being the most conspicuous of them all, from its height and from its being generally covered with snow;  and through the station flows a small stream with weeping willows on each side of it.

The mornings, I remember, were lovely at Peshawar, and Ranald and I had charming rides which we much enjoyed all round the station to a distance of six miles.   No one then ventured beyond that, as there was danger from the Afreedees both to life and property, for they would risk much to steal a horse.

One day we rode into the native town which was densely crowded, and saw in the market-place, quantities of lovely peaches and apricots, and enormous piles of grapes.

The Afghans are very fine-looking men both in feature and figure; they are built on a large scale, and the loose garments and large turbans they wear, make them appear still larger.   The women wear a loose white robe called a "burka" which covers them from head to foot.   There is a slit in it, opposite the eyes, which is openly embroidered, so that the wearer can see through but cannot be seen;  so they are rather ghostly-looking figures in the street.   The children are quite fair and rosy.

Colonel Tree commanded the 10th B.L.C. in 1855, and on our arrival on the 13th of May of that year, we dined with him and Mrs. Tree.   The regiment was inspected a few days later by General Cotton, and then Ranald got some days leave to visit three out-lying forts,- Michnee, Shubkudder, and Abouzie, the most remote of which was about twenty-eight miles from cantonments.   He rode there and back, and found the heat very trying.

The Khyber Pass is only ten miles from Peshawar, and one could see distinctly from the station, the fort of Jamrud at its entrance.   Peshawar was a very feverish place at the time I was there, but that was fifty years ago, and I hear it is very different now.   It was also, I remember, subject to frequent dust or sand storms when every door and window had to be shut, and lamps lit until the dust and darkness had passed

Our first child, Alexander Ranaldson, was born on the 30th of June 1855, seven weeks after our arrival at Peshawar.   A few months later, the regiment was ordered to Ferozepore in the Punjab, and set out on the five weeks' march to that place on the 21st of November:  it arrived there on December 23rd.

Ranald rode with his regiment, and I travelled in a doolie with my baby boy, leaving camp generally at about four in the morning, so as to avoid the great dust raised by the seight hundred horses, and nearly as many grass-cutters' ponies;  besides camels, camp-followers, carts, etc. etc.   At Attock we found the Indus very different from what it was when we went up-country.   It was still very deep, but now comparatively still.  Every day there was a halt for a while to let the camp-followers and rearguard get up a bit.   The tents were all arranged in streets, the horses picketted in rows, and sentries placed as in a station:  a camp always seemed to me a very pretty sight.   We marched down-country by Rawalpindi, Jhelum, Meanmeer, and Lahore.

At Ferozepore we got a charming house which had belonged to Sir Henry Lawrence, and was therefore called the Lawrence Bagh, or Lawrence Garden;  it had a nice well-laid-out compound and fine trees all about it.

A few days after our arrival there was an inspection of the 57th Native Infantry, which Ranald and I rode out to see, he on his first charger, a splendid bay Arab, and I on his second, a grey Arab.   We both liked Ferozepore very much for although it was hot and dusty, it was healthy.

We got up early every morning and were out by daybreak:  We used to walk for a couple of miles, while our horses were led behind us by the syces, and then we mounted, and after usually a long ride, we got home at about 7.30, had tea in the garden, then retired for a siesta;  and breakfast followed at ten.   This was our routine every day except when there were parades.

On the night of the 2nd of May 1856, there was a terrific dust-storm, which lasted a long time and kept us awake.  At last it died away, and we fell asleep, only to be wakened at two or three in the morning by a sowar coming galloping up to the house.   He brought us the startling news of our commanding officer, Colonel Tree's death, for Ranald being the next senior officer, the command now fell to him.

One of the duties of the officer of the day was to ride round the station at night with an orderly, visiting the sentries, for in those days we were amongst enemies, and there were many attempts at horse stealing.   Poor Colonel Tree had been thus going his rounds when the dust-storm came on, and he suddenly became so ill that the orderly had to help him to dismount.   Laying the Colonel down, the man rode off at full speed for aid, which was quickly brought, and the unfortunate officer was taken to the nearest hospital, where, however, he soon after died.   His death was said to be due to apoplexy, brought on by the clouds of dust.

From the second of March of this year (1856) to the 12th of June, the heat was intense, and even when the rains set in, the thermometer stood at 98¼.   Cholera and heat apoplexy became very bad in many places, and at Delhi, Agra, and Alighar carried off hundreds.   Ferozepore had its turn later.   When August came it brought with it tremendously heavy rains, and at  the same time, a most deadly epidemic of cholera.   In Ferozepore alone the deaths in the European troops and artillery amounted to 70 per cent.   But in September the epidemic began to diminish and soon disappeared altogether.

NOTE:  In connection with this outbreak of cholera, Mrs. Macdonell used to relate how the wife of a private was heard to say: "If it should please the Lord to take Robert, I think I could get a sergeant".   And it did "please the Lord to take Robert", and his widow got the sergeant as she had expected!  Another soldier's wife, on being asked by a comrade of her husband, if she would marry him in the event of her husband dying, she replied that she had already promised that to another man.   "Then in the event of that man also dying, will you promise tp marry me?" "Yes", she said, "I will".   And strange as it may appear, that promise was fulfilled, for both the other men died of cholera.   This sort of engagement, -three and even four deep  - was quite common in those days when English women were too scarce, and death too common.

On the third of November, Ranald got leave to go on a shooting expedition to Faridkot, twenty miles off, and we arranged to be absent a fortnight.   Ranald and I greatly enjoyed  going into camp for two or three weeks, and did so as often as we  could, that he might have shooting.   We had two large tents with double kanats, and a bathing tent, so were most comfortable.   He  used to shoot deer, blackbuck, hares, jungle fowl, black partridge, pheasant and snipe, etc. etc.   Shooting was very good  in the Punjab.   So we left the station anticipating a very pleasant time, Ranald on horseback, and I in a doolie with my dear little baby boy.   And we did enjoy the change of life and scene, and all went well until we were within two marches of Ferozepore on our return journey. 

Then suddenly our darling boy became ill, - could not be roused nor induced to take his food - so I decided to take him back without delay to the station, as soon as the heat of the day was so far past, that it was cool enough to travel.   I gave the coolies double pay to take us quickly those two stages, and my ayah and I set out with the child.   I went straight to the doctor's house.   Directly I saw him I saw that he thought badly of the case, so I asked Major Beatson to send out a cavalry sowar with a note to Ranald begging him to come in at once, as I was so anxious.   I got another doctor's opinion, and he, like the first, said it was an affection of the brain (most probably a "touch of the sun".)   Ranald arrived at three in the morning, but the child never became conscious, and died after thirty-four hours' illness, on the 18th of November, 1856.

The native officers of the regiment kindly asked to be allowed to carry the child to the grave, and this they did.   It was extremely good of them to express their sympathy in this way, and we thoroughly appreciated their kindness, knowing that such an act as this would certainly entail upon them great trouble and expense to be re-instated in caste.