The French fleet now left the Indian seas and Lally had to wait till the English fleet would be forced to leave the harborless Madras coast on the approach of the monsoon. He utilized the interval by making conquests of minor English outposts till the English possessed nothing in the Carnatic save Madras, Trichinopoly and Chingleput. Then When the English ships left he besieged Madras on 14th December. But the siege of Madras was marked by defects of the same kind as were noticed in the case of Tanjore. It dragged on till 16th February, 1759, when the British fleet reappeared, and Lally immediately raised the siege. This ignoble failure practically sealed the fate of the French in India.
The next twelve months completed the debacle. Lally had taken a very unwise step in recalling Bussy from Hyderabad and leaving the French troops there under incompetent commanders. Clive took this opportunity to send an army from Bengal under Colonel Forde against the French troops in the Northern Sarkars. Forde defeated the French, successively occupied Rajahamundry (7th December) and Masulipatam (6th March) and concluded a favourable treaty with the Nizam Salabat Jang.
In the Carnatic also the English took the aggressive. They were at, first defeated near Conjeeveram, but the French could not follow up their success on account of discontent among their troops for.lack of pay, which ultimately led to an open mutiny. The discomfiture of the English was, however, more than made up by the severe defeat inflicted by Pocock upon the French fleet of d’Ache which had reappeared in September. After this third defeat at the hands of Pocock, d’Ache left India for good, leaving the English the undisputed masters of the sea.
At the end of October, the able General Coote arrived in Madras with his troops and the English resumed the offensive. After a number of minor engagements a decisive battle took place (22nd January, 1760) near the fort of Wandiwash which Lally was besieging. The French army was totally routed and their fate was decided once for all.
Coote followed up his success by reducing the minor French possessions in the Carnatic. In course of three months the French lost everything in the Carnatic save Jinji and Pondicherry. The English then laid siege to Pondicherry (May, 1760).
Reduced to the last desperate strait, Lally hoped to retrieve the French position by an alliance with Hyder ‘Ali, then at the helm of affairs in Mysore. The idea was well conceived but led to no practical result. Hyder sent a contingent to the aid of the French, but the allies were not able to concert any military plan which held out a chance of success against the English. Thereupon Hyder’s contingent returned to Mysore, leaving Lally to his fate.
Pondicherry was closely blockaded both by land and sea. Lally lacked sufficient funds to maintain his army, and, even at this critical moment, failed to work in harmony with his men and officers. At last the inevitable took place, and on 16th January, 1761, Pondicherry made an unconditional surrender. The victors ruthlessly destroyed not merely the fortifications, but also the city itself. As Orme put it so pithily, ” in a few months more not a roof was left standing in this once fair and flourishing city”. The surrender of Pondicherry was followed shortly by that of Jinji. and Mahe, a French settlement on the Malabar’ coast. The French thus lost all their possessions in India, but these were restored to them by the Treaty of Paris (1763).
The causes of the failure of Lally axe not far to seek and some of them have been discussed in connection with the failure of Dupleix. Both suffered equally from the insufficient supply from home, which was due partly to the defective Organisation of the Company as a minor branch of the Government, and partly to the failure of the home Authorities to recognize the importance of securing political power in India. The inferiority of the French at sea and the discord between commanders of land and sea forces were again common handicaps to both, though they operated more decisively against the French in the Third Carnatic War. In addition, the possession of the military and financial resources to Bengal gave the English a decisive advantage over Lally.
The character and conduct of Lally also contributed not a little to the disastrous results. He had military skill and displayed bravery and energy but possessed neither the tact of a leader nor the wisdom of a statesmen. Ms end was tragic indeed. He was detained in England as a prisoner of war for two years, and allowed to return to France in 1763 at the end of the Seven Years’ War. But a worse fate awaited him there. He was imprisoned in the Bastille for more than two years and afterwards executed with ignominy and insult.
In spite of Lally’s undoubted failings and shortcomings, it is only fair to remember that the difficulties confronting him were really insurmountable, and that the French had no real chance of success against the English even under the best of leaders. There is a large element of truth in the remark of a historian, that “neither Alexander the- Great nor Napoleon could have won the empire of India by starting from Pondicherry as a base and contending with the power which held Bengal and command of the sea “.
British Ascendancy in Bengal
The revolution of 1757 definitely established the military supremacy of the English in Bengal. Their hated rivals, the French, were ousted, and they obtained a grant of territories for the maintenance of a properly equipped military force. More valuable still was the prestige they had gained by the decided victory over the unwieldy hosts of the Nawab.
As regards the government of the country, there was no apparent change. The sovereignty of the English over Calcutta was recognised, and they secured the right of keeping a Resident at the Nawab’s court. Save for these minor changes, the position of Mir Jafar differed, in theory, but little from that of Siraj-ud- daulah. In practice,, however, the supreme control of affairs had passed into the hands of Clive, as the new Nawab was entirely dependent upon his support for maintaining his newly acquired position.
The position of Clive in Bengal was anomalous in the extreme. He was merely a servant of the Governor and council of Madras When he gained the victory at Plassey. But in June, 1758, the Calcutta Council, on their own initiative, elected him to the governor. ship of Bengal, a position which was legalized -by the orders of the Company towards the end of that year.
