| Tatya Tope | |
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Tatya Tope, after his capture in 1859. |
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| Born | 1814 Yeola, Nashik |
| Died | 17 April 1859 Shivpuri |
| Other names | Tantya Tope |
| Political movement | First War of Indian Independence |
Ramachandra Pandurang Tope (1814 – 18 April 1859), popularly known as Tatya Tope (तात्या टोपे) was an Indian leader in the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and one of its finest generals. He was a personal adherent of Nana Sahib of Kanpur. He progressed with the Gwalior contingent after the British reoccupation of Kanpur and forced General Windham to retreat from Kanpur. Later on, he came to the rescue of Rani Laxmi Bai. However he was defeated by General Napier's British Indian troops after the betrayal of his trusted friend Man Singh. He was executed by the British Government at Shivpuri on 18 April 1859.
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Born in a village called Yeola in Maharashtra, he was the only son of Pandurang Rao Tope and his wife Rukhmabai. In 1814, when James Andrew Broun-Ramsay, 1st Marquess of Dalhousie deprived Nana Sahib of his father's pension, Tatya Tope also became a sworn enemy of the British.
Tatya Tope was Nana Sahib's close associate and general. During the Siege of Cawnpore in 1857, Nana Sahib's forces attacked the British entrenchment at Kanpur in June 1857. The low supplies of food, water and medicine added to the misery of the British Forces who decided to surrender in return for a safe passage to Allahabad. Nana Sahib agreed to this and made arrangements as best as he could.
| Historic Incidents and Life in India | |
|---|---|
| Author(s) | Caleb Wright, J. A. Brainerd |
| Publisher | J. A. Brainerd |
| Publication date | 1863 |
| ISBN | 9781135723125 |
Many of General Wheelers men were either killed or captured. The surviving British women and children were moved from the Savada House to Bibighar "the House of the Ladies", a villa-type house in Kanpur.
Nana Sahib decided to use the captives for bargaining with the.[1] The Company forces from Allahabad, under the command of General Henry Havelock, advanced relentlessly towards Cawnpore. Two forces sent by Nana Sahib to check their advance were defeated. When it became clear that the bargaining attempts had failed, an order was given to murder the women and children imprisoned at Bibighar, on July 15. The details of the incident, such as who ordered the massacre, are not clear.[2] The sepoys refused to kill the captive women and children, but some of them agreed to remove the women and children from the courtyard, when Tatya Tope threatened to execute them for dereliction of duty. Begum Hussaini Khanum, the in-charge of Bibighar, termed the sepoys' act as cowardice, and asked her lover Sarvur Khan to finish the job of killing the captives.[1] Sarvur Khan hired some butchers, who murdered the surviving women and children with cleavers.
The Company forces reached Cawnpore on July 16, and captured the city. Both Nana Sahib and Tatya Tope escaped from the city. While Nana Sahib fled to an unknown place, Tatya Tope continued the fight against the British. In November 1857, he gathered a large army, mainly consisting of the rebel soldiers from the Gwalior contingent, to recapture Cawnpore. By November 19, Tatya Tope's advance guard of 6,000 dominated all the routes west and north-west of Cawnpore. However, his forces were defeated by the Company forces under Colin Campbell in the Second Battle of Cawnpore, marking the end of the rebellion in the Cawnpore area. Tatya Tope then joined Rani Lakshmibai.
After losing Gwalior to the British, Tope launched a successful campaign in the Sagar, Madhya Pradesh and Narmada River regions and in Khandesh and Rajasthan. He took shelter for some time in Nadiad ni haveli with Bhausaheb Desai of Nadiad. The British forces failed to subdue him for over a year. He was however betrayed into the hands of the British by his trusted friend, Man Singh, Chief of Narwar while asleep in his camp in the Paron forest. He was defeated and captured on 7 April 1859 by British General Richard John Meade's troops and escorted to Shivpuri where he was tried by a military court.
Tope admitted the charges brought before him saying that he was answerable to his master Peshwa only. He was executed at the gallows on April 18 1859. There is a statue of Tatya Tope at the site of his execution near the present collectorate in Shivpuri town in Madhya Pradesh.