TIPPU SULTAN DIED 1799 MAY 4
THIRD AND FOURTH MYSORE WAR
Tipu, who gained control of Mysore after his father's death in December 1782, maintained an implacable hatred of the British, and declared not long after signing the 1784 treaty that he intended to continue battle with them given the opportunity.[3] He refused to free British prisoners taken during the war, one of the conditions of the treaty..
British General Charles, 2nd Earl Cornwallis became the Governor-General of India and Commander-in-Chief for the East India Company in 1786. While he formally abrogated agreements with the Marathas and Hyderabad that violated terms of the 1784 treaty,[3] he sought informally to gain their support and that of the Nizam of Hyderabad, or at least their neutrality, in the event of conflict with Mysore.
Events leading to war
A portrait of Tipu Sultan, made during the Third Anglo-Mysore War.
In 1788 the company gained control of the Circar of Guntur, under earlier agreements with the Nizam. In exchange, the company provided the Nizam with two battalions of company troops.[4] Both of these acts placed British troops closer to Mysore, the Nizam would support the British
The kingdom of Travancore had been a target of Tipu for acquisition or conquest since the end of the previous war. Indirect attempts to take over the kingdom had failed in 1788, and Archibald Campbell, the Madras president at the time, had warned Tipu that an attack on Travancore would be treated as a declaration of war on the company.[6] The rajah of Travancore also angered Tipu by extending fortifications along the border with Cochin into territory claimed by Mysore as belonging to its vassal state,and by purchasing from the Dutch East India Company two forts in the Kingdom of Cochin, a state paying tribute to Tipu Sultan.
Medows' campaign, 1790
It was May before Medows was prepared to march. In the meantime, Tipu had renewed his attack on Travancore, and successfully breached the Nedumkotta line in late April 1790,
Medows moved out of Trichinopoly in late May. Hampered by weather and equipment problems, his progress was slow. He met little resistance, as Tipu had withdrawn his main forces to the Mysore highlands. On 21 July Medows entered Coimbatore unopposed, after having taken some of the smaller fortifications in the district by either abandonment or the immediate surrender of the garrison.[10] His only opposition consisted of 4,000 cavalry under Sayed Sahib that Tipu had detached to observe and harass his operations; most of these were eventually driven across the Bhavani River by Medows' cavalry. Further strong points in the district fell, with Palghat and Dindigul requiring significant action to capture.Although the campaign was successful in gaining complete control of the Coimbatore district, Medows had to divide his forces to hold it, with the largest detachments at Coimbatore, Palghat, and Sathyamangalam.
Tipu's counterattack
On 2 September, Tipu left Srirangapatnam at the head of a 40,000-man army. Descending the mountain passes beginning on 9 September, he began to move toward Sathyamangalam. While the 2,800-man garrison there withstood an initial assault from Tipu's force on 13 September, Captain John Floyd, the garrison commander, opted to withdraw. Under cover of night, they crossed the Bhavani and headed for Coimbatore. Tipu, slowed by heavy rains, sent 15,000 cavalry in pursuit. Tipu then moved on to rampage through the Carnatic, destroying towns and seizing supplies as he went. He ended up at the French outpost at Pondicherry, where he attempted to interest the French in supporting his efforts against the British. As France was then in the early stages of its Revolution, these efforts were entirely unsuccessful. Medows at this point moved toward Madras, where he turned over command of his army to Lord Cornwallis.
Allied advances
British forces advance towards Bangalore.
During the summer of 1790, a Maratha army of some 30,000 under the command of Purseram Bhow, accompanied by a detachment of British troops from Bombay, began marching toward Mysore. The first several Mysorean outposts surrendered in the face of the large army, and it made steady if slow progress until it reached Darwar in September.
A second army, consisting of 25,000 cavalry and 5,000 infantry under the command of Hurry Punt assisted by a detachment of British soldiers from the Madras army, left Poona in January 1791, eventually reaching Kurnool without significant opposition.[14] . On receiving word that Cornwallis had captured Bangalore and was moving toward the Mysorean capital, Srirangapatnam, Hurry Punt moved out from Kurnool, and made junction with Cornwallis on 28 May.
First advance on Seringapatam
Cornwallis took over the main British army at Vellore on 29 January 1791. A week later he marched west, as if to pass through the Eastern Ghats at that point. This prompted Tipu to abandon Pondicherry and make haste for Bangalore, where he perceived his harem to be at some risk. Although Tipu placed defences on some of the passes, Cornwallis, after a number of feints, turned sharply north, and crossed the mountains at the Muglee Pass on 21 February against no opposition.[17] He then continued to advance, against virtually no resistance, until he was very nearly before the gates of Bangalore on 5 March. Tipu had fortified the city and supplied the garrison, but he stayed with his main force on the outskirts of the British positions as Cornwallis began siege operations. After six weeks of siege, in which the British had to repeatedly beat off attacks and skirmishes from Tipu, they successfully stormed the citadel.
Cornwallis found the Nizam's men to be noticeably unhelpful. were interested in plunder and in living off the army's supplies instead of foraging and scouting against Tipu.[18] The Marathan military leaders, Purseram Bhow and Hurry Punt, had to be bribed to stay with the army, and Cornwallis reported the Hyderabadi forces to be more of a hindrance than a help;
Tipu offered him battle at a ford near the village of Arakere. In the ensuing battle on 15 May, Cornwallis flanked Tipu's position and drove him to retreat behind Seringapatam's walls. and his army was on the verge of starvation, Cornwallis then made the difficult decision on 22 May to destroy his siege train and retreat.[20] Only three days later, the Maratha army arrived, Tipu having successfully prevented most of its messengers from reaching Cornwallis before then.
Second advance on Seringapatam
Cornwallis established a chain of outposts to protect the supply line from Bangalore. When the massive army reached the plains before Seringapatam on 5 February, Tipu's began showering the force with rockets. Cornwallis responded with a night-time attack to dislodge Tipu from his lines. After a somewhat confused battle, Tipu's forces were flanked, and he retreated into the city, and Cornwallis began siege operations. On 12 February Abercromby arrived with the Bombay army, and the noose began to tighten around Tipu.
By 23 February, Tipu began making overtures for peace talks, and hostilities were suspended the next day when he agreed to preliminary terms. Among the preliminary terms that Cornwallis insisted on was the Tipu surrender two of his sons as hostages as a guarantee for his execution of the agreed terms. On 26 February his two young sons were formally delivered to Cornwallis amid great ceremony and gun salutes by both sides. Cornwallis, who was not interested in significantly extending the company's territory, or in turning most of Mysore over to the Mahrattas and Hyderabad, negotiated a division of one half of Mysorean territory, to be divided by the allies, in which the company's acquisition would improve its defences. He later wrote, "If we had taken Seringapatam and killed Tippoo, [...]
On 18 March 1792 Tipu agreed to the terms and signed the Treaty of Seringapatam, ending hostilities.[26]
FOURTH MYSORE WAR 1799
This was the final conflict of the four Anglo–Mysore Wars. The British captured the capital of Mysore. The ruler Tipu Sultan was killed in the battle. Britain took indirect control of Mysore, restoring the Wodeyar Dynasty to the Mysore throne (with a British commissioner to advise him on all issues). Tipu Sultan's young heir, Fateh Ali, was sent into exile. The Kingdom of Mysore became a princely state in a subsidiary alliance with British India and ceded Coimbatore, Dakshina Kannada and Uttara Kannada to the British.
The war, specifically the Battle of Mallavelly and the Siege of Seringapatam, with many of the key protagonists, is covered in the historical novel Sharpe's Tiger.
Background
Napoleon's landing in Egypt in 1798 was intended to further the capture of the British possessions in India, and the Kingdom of Mysore was a key to that next step, as the ruler of Mysore, Tipu Sultan, sought France as an ally and his letter to Napoleon resulted in the following reply, "You have already been informed of my arrival on the borders of the Red Sea, with an innumerable and invincible army, full of the desire of releasing and relieving you from the iron yoke of England." Additionally, General Malarctic, French Governor of Mauritius, issued the Malarctic Proclamation seeking volunteers to assist Tipu. Horatio Nelson crushed any help from Napoleon after the Battle of the Nile
Course of Events
Three armies – one from Bombay and two British (one of which contained a division that was commanded by Colonel Arthur Wellesley, the future 1st Duke of Wellington), marched into Mysore in 1799 and besieged the capital, Srirangapatnam, after some engagements with Tipu. On 8 March, a forward force managed to hold off an advance by Tipu at the Battle of Seedaseer. On 4 May, in the Battle of Seringapatam, broke through the defending walls. Tipu Sultan, rushing to the breach, was shot and killed.
Today, the spot where Tipu's body was discovered under the eastern gate has been fenced off by the Archaeological Survey of India, and a plaque erected. The gate itself was later demolished during the 19th century to lay a wide road.
One notable military advance championed by Tipu Sultan was the use of mass attacks with iron-cased rocket brigades in the army. The effect of the Mysorean rockets on the British during the Third and Fourth Mysore Wars was sufficiently impressive to inspire William Congreve to develop the Congreve rockets.
Many members of the British East India Company believed that Umdat Ul-Umra, the Nawab of Carnatic, secretly provided assistance to Tipu Sultan during the Fourth Anglo–Mysore War; and they immediately sought his deposition after the end of the conflict.
magazine of rockets
During the conclusive British attack on Srirangapattana on 2 May 1799, a British shot struck a magazine of rockets within Tipu Sultan's fort, causing it to explode and send a towering cloud of black smoke with cascades of exploding white light rising up from the battlements.
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