Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria, to include the Brian Ritchie Collection (Part III)

The Indian Mutiny medal to Captain J. S. Shepherd, 2nd Oudh Irregular Cavalry, shot dead by one of our sentries at the Slaughterhouse Post during the siege of Lucknow

Indian Mutiny 1857-59, 1 clasp, Defence of Lucknow (Lieut. J. S. Shepherd, 2nd Oudh. Irreg. Cavy.) toned, extremely fine £2500-3000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Brian Ritchie Collection of H.E.I.C. and British India Medals.

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James Stevens Shepherd was the son of Captain John Shepherd, sometime of the Indiaman Berwickshire, and afterwards a Director of the East India Company, and his wife Anne, the daughter of James Stevens of the Bombay Civil Service. He was born at 37 Dorset Square, London, on 27 April 1833, and was educated under the Rev. Charles Worsley at the Manor House, Finchley. He was commissioned Cornet in the 7th Bengal Light Cavalry on 20 September 1849, and promoted Lieutenant on 20 December 1851. Two years later he was granted permission at his own request to resign from temporary employment with the Irregular Cavalry at Ramguhr and return to his own corps. In February 1856, he was placed at the disposal of the Foreign Department of the Government of India and appointed ‘2nd in Command of Cavy., Oude Irreg. Force’. The following month Lieutenant Shepherd was posted to the 2nd Oudh Irregular Cavalry at Lucknow as officiating Adjutant.

In the preface to the third edition of The Mutinies in Oudh, Martin Gubbins (See Lot 77) wrote, ‘The new matter will be found to contain ... A particular account of an interview of much interest between the Author, Lieut. Shepherd, of the 2nd O.I. Cavalry, and the native officers of his corps, during the height of the mutinies in June, 1857’. In the early part of June, Sir Henry Lawrence removed Major Gall from the command of the 2nd Oudh Irregular Cavalry, as he was a Madras officer and was thought not to possess sufficient influence over the men. Aggrieved at the loss of his command, Gall begged to be given some special duty and was eventually permitted to carry despatches to Allahabad.

He set off on the 11th disguised as a native intending to avoid all towns and travel cross country. The weather however was excessively hot and on nearing the town of Rai Bareilly, he succumbed to the temptation to enter it. He was soon betrayed, some said by the troopers of the 2nd Oudh Irregular Cavalry, and finding himself surrounded by an angry crowd, he fired two rounds from his revolver into the mob. Then, placing the weapon against his head, shot himself.

Shepherd, meanwhile, back at Lucknow had been placed in command of the remaining troopers of 2nd Oudh Irregular Cavalry, otherwise known as ‘Gall’s Horse’. Many had already deserted, mainly by night to their homes or to the rebel rendezvous at Nawabgunge or to join Nana Sahib at Cawnpore. It will be remembered that on 21 May, 240 men of the regiment under Lieutenant Barbor left Lucknow for Cawnpore with Lawrence’s Military Secretary, Captain Fletcher Hayes (Ritchie 1-79), and by this time both Barbor and Hayes together with a volunteer, Mr Fayrer, had been murdered by the men on the Grand Trunk Road.

Those troopers that remained at Lucknow ‘were a great source of anxiety to their officers, who dared no longer to sleep among them’, recorded Gubbins, ‘It was after the desertion of some had taken place, and while that of the majority of troopers was imminent, that Lieut. Shepherd, who had been placed in command of Gall’s Horse, came to consult me as to what he should do. There were then about 150 troopers in the lines. Their demeanour, though not mutinous, was such, that he dared not trust himself to sleep at the Chukker Kotee, being the only European there. He could extract nothing satisfactory, or, indeed, definite, regarding the intentions of the men, from his native officers. He requested me to confer with them, which I consented to do. The chief native officers, on whom Shepherd thought most reliance could be placed, were accordingly summoned, and he and I conferred with them in private for some time. At first I could get nothing from them but guarded and dubious answers. They did not know what the men might do; they really could not, at such a crisis, say who was to be trusted, and so forth. Vexed at this dissimulation, I upbraided them with their want of openness; and called upon them, if they possessed a spark of honesty left, to speak out, and say if there were any in the corps who could be trusted. They hesitated. “Can you trust one man?” said I. They replied in the affirmative. “Are there two trusty men?” “Yes.” “Three?” “Four? Five?” “Yes.” “How many, then, are there for whom yourselves will be responsible?” It turned out that there were twelve men, all connections of one Hurnam Singh, a native officer, who came from near Delhi, who they thought could be relied on. And about eight more relations of another native officer, who might be trusted if the latter pledged his word for them; in all twenty! I advised Lieut. Shepherd to retain these twenty men, to keep them about him, and to send the 130 others away on leave. I do not know whether my advice was followed. Ere long, however, not one remained.’




Promoted Captain on 10 June 1857, and deserted by his men, Shepherd entered the Residency entrenchment following the disaster at Chinhut and presumably was assigned initially at least to the Brigade Mess, under Lieutenant-Colonel Master, the commanding officer of the 7th Light Cavalry, with the other British officers whose regiments had effectively ceased to exist. On the night of 26 July 1857, members of the Slaughterhouse Post, optimistically believing that they would be relieved within the week by Havelock’s force, were in high spirits and singing Cheer, Boys, Cheer! when word came in that the enemy were about to attack. It was, however, no more than one of the frequent sham attacks put on by the rebels in order to harrass the defenders. Nevertheless, the fire was so intense that Julia Inglis thought the rebels had actually broken into the compound until reassured to the contrary by her husband, the Brigadier. On that fateful night Shepherd was in the Cawnpore Battery, and it being hard to ascertain exactly what was going on he ventured out beyond the perimeter into the dark and squally night to make a reconnaissance. It was to prove a fatal mistake. A shot rang out from a sentry on the roof of the Brigade Mess and Shepherd dropped dead.

Shortly afterwards L. E. R. Rees went with his officer, Captain Graydon, to the terrace of the Brigade Mess in order to make a report for Inglis on the movements of the enemy towards the Bhoosa Guard. ‘On passing through the first [Sikh] square’, he wrote, ‘we saw the body of this unfortunate officer wrapped up in a sheet, red with blood. We heard then that, while at the Cawnpore battery, the 32nd soldiers, stationed at the top of the Brigade Mess, believing the enemy to be approaching, - for it was a dark rainy night, - and thinking they saw a form passing, fired in that direction. It was unfortunately, Capt. Shepherd, who had left the battery itself, and moved to the wall to make a reconnaissance. He was shot dead. When we arrived we found Brigadier Inglis anxiously investigating the affair.’

Next day Julia Inglis made the following entry in her journal: ‘When John came to us this morning he made us very sad by telling us that Capt. Shepherd, 7th Light Cavalry, had been killed by mistake last night by a shot from one of our own garrison; he was a very fine young officer, and had been for some time attached to the 32nd. It seemed a sad fate.’ Shepherd’s services and death were subsequently officially recorded by Brigadier Inglis; ‘It only remains for one to bring to the favourable notice of his Lordship in Council the names of those Officers who have most distinguished themselves, and afforded me the most valuable assistance in these operations. Many of the best and bravest of these now rest from their labours ... Lieuts. Shepherd and Arthur were killed at their posts’ (London Gazette 16 January 1859).

Refs: Hodson Index (NAM); IOL L/MIL/10/63 & 65; IOL L/MIL/10/56; IOL/MIL/5/15; Mutinies in Oudh (Gubbins); Journal of the Siege of Lucknow (Hon Lady Inglis); A Personal Narrative of the Siege of Lucknow (Rees); Ordeal at Lucknow (Joyce).