Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria including the collection to Naval Artificers formed by JH Deacon

An important Cawnpore Massacre award to Doctor Samuel Maltby, a member of the small Fategarh garrison, severely wounded at Sughee Rampore and murdered at Cawnpore

Indian Mutiny 1857-59, no clasp (Dr. S. Maltby) edge bruise and a little polished, otherwise nearly very fine £2000-2500

Samuel Maltby was born in September 1820, son of Rev. John Ince Maltby, of Shelton, Nottingham. He attended St Thomas’ Hospital, London, qualified M.R.C.S. in 1842, and was appointed Assistant Surgeon on 31 October 1843. In 1852 he was placed at the disposal of the Lieutenant-Governor of the North West Provinces and, the following month, appointed Civil Assistant Surgeon at Furruckabad. In October 1853 he was directed to Fategarh to afford medical aid to the troops stationed there. He retired from the East India Company in November 1854 with the rank of Colonel and remained at Fategarh as a Civilian Doctor.

The situation at Fategarh in early June was becoming desperate, the surrounding area having been overrun by bodies of mutinous soldiers. Garrisoned by the 10th Native Infantry, under the command of Colonel G. A. Smith, with some European officers, the fort was prepared to withstand attack and provisioned with ammunition and food in the event of being besieged. At the same time, some boats were hired and kept in readiness to convey the whole of the European community down the river to Cawnpore, should it become necessary, where it was believed that Sir Hugh Wheeler, with an English garrison, would be able to afford them protection. As news arrived of the revolt and massacres at Shahjehanpore and Bareilly, and the impending approach of a large body of insurgents from Oude, the decision was made to employ the boats for the evacuation of all the women and children, together with a large number of persons in civil employ. This party of more than 100 men, women and children left Fategarh in the early hours of 4th June. The exact fate of this party is obscured by conflicting accounts but it is generally believed that all were massacred in the neighbourhood of Bithoor on the 12th June.

At Fategarh, meanwhile, the sepoys of the 10th Native Infantry had mutinied and the officers and European residents retired to the fort. By the 20th of June nothing fit for human habitation had been left standing in the cantonments and within the fort, from upwards of 100 Europeans, only thirty-three were capable of taking any active part in the defence of the place. Under constant bombardment from the mutineers, the position had become desperate, and once again the boats were looked to as offering the only practical means of escape. Accordingly, the women and children were divided into three parties, and, at midnight on the 3rd of July, were got safely into the boats, followed by the pickets and military officers. By 2 o’clock in the morning of the 4th, the embarkation was complete and the three boats pushed off, taking with them Doctor Maltby and his wife, Anne, and two children, Eliza and Emma. They immediately came under fire from the sepoys but without effect. Before they had gone too far it became clear that one of the boats was too large and heavy to be managed, so it was abandoned and its occupants transferred to the other boats.

At Sughee Rampore they stopped to repair the rudder of one of the boats and, having accomplished that, set off again, Colonel Smith’s boat taking the lead, with Doctor Maltby on board. Almost immediately the second boat grounded on a soft muddy bank. The occupants all got out to attempt to push the boat off but could not move her. After half an hour two boats were seen approaching and, when they were just 20 yards off, it was seen that they contained sepoys who immediately opened a heavy fire, killing and wounding several. In the ensuing confusion most of its occupants took to the water, only to be hacked to death or drowned.

Colonel Smith’s boat, meanwhile, came under a heavy fire of grapeshot from two guns, planted on the heights by the sepoys who had followed them down river. Doctor Maltby was severely wounded by grapeshot at this time, several others being killed and wounded. The fugitives carried on down the river, being chased and fired at all the way, and, on the 9th of July, they landed at the village of Fatehpur Chaurasi, opposite Nana’s palace at Bithur. Here the Nana’s batteries opened up as troops streamed down to the river with their matchlocks blazing. Some accounts state that here Doctor Maltby was killed by a musket ball. However, the following account from Fategarh and the Mutiny, by Lt. Col. F. R. Cosens and C. L. Wallace, tells a different story:

‘At four p.m. close to the western door, seventeen of the little Fategarh garrison, in tattered garments, haggard and unkempt after seven days exposure on the river were lined up with their backs to the high plinth, on which the house stands. There stood all three badly wounded, Dr. Maltby, Rev. Fisher and Lieutenant Sweetenham, Sergeants Roach, Bent, Gibson and Boscow, old soldiers long past their prime, young James the Opium officer, the two Donalds, father and son, now at the end of their long odyssey from Budnam. Dr. Heathcote wounded too and rejoicing that his wife was safe, young Henderson, Adjutant of the 10th, who trusted his men, Ensign Byrne, newly joined, Humphreys the faithful servant of Col. Tucker, and lastly Captain Vibart, who more than any had striven manfully to uphold the flag at Fategarh. A volley announced their passing to the prisoners within the home above, those that still breathed being finished off by the swords of their executioners.’

The date of Doctor Samuel Maltby’s death at Cawnpore, and that of his wife and two daughters, is officially given as the 15th of July 1857. They are commemorated on a plaque behind the altar of All Souls Church, Cawnpore.