The storm of cavalry passed northwards, leaving misery in its wake.
The two four-pounder cannon that Joubert had taken forward were abandoned now, their teams killed by the horsemen, and where the 74th had been there was now nothing but an empty enclosure of dead men and horses that had formed the barricade. The survivors of the beleaguered square had withdrawn eastwards, carrying their wounded with them, and it seemed to Dodd that a sudden silence had wrapped about the Cobras. It was not a true silence, for the guns had started firing again on the southern half of the battlefield, the distant sound of hooves was nevereriding and the moaning of the nearby wounded was loud, but it did seem quiet.
Dodd spurred his horse southwards in an attempt to make some sense of the battle. Dupont’s compoo next to him had lost one regiment to the sabres, but the next three regiments were intact and the Dutchman was now turning those units to face southwards. Dodd could see Pohlmann riding along the back of those wheeling regiments and he suspected that the Hanoverian would now turn his whole line to face south. The British had broken the far end of the line, but they had still not broken the army.
Yet the possibility of annihilation existed. Dodd fidgeted with the elephant hilt of his sword and contemplated what less than an hour before had seemed an impossibility: defeat. God damn Wellesley, he thought, but this was no time for anger, just for calculation. Dodd could not afford to be captured and he had no mind to die for Scindia and so he must secure his line of retreat. He would fight to the end, he decided, then run like the wind.
“Captain Joubert?”
The long-suffering Joubert trotted his horse to Dodd’s side.
“Monsieur?”
Dodd did not speak at once, for he was watching Pohlmann come nearer. It was clear now that the Hanoverian was making a new battle line, and one, moreover, that would lie to the west of Assaye with its back against the river. The regiments to Dodd’s right, which had yet to be attacked, were now pulling back and the guns were going with them.
The whole line was being redeployed, and Dodd guessed the Cobras would move from the east side of the mud walls to the west, but that was no matter. The best ford across the Juah ran out of the village itself, and it was that ford Dodd wanted.
“Take two companies, Joubert,” he ordered, ‘and march them into the village to guard this side of the ford.”
Joubert frowned.
“The Rajah’s troops, surely.. he began to protest.
“The Rajah of Berar’s troops are useless!” Dodd snapped.
“If we need to use the ford, then I want it secured by our men. You secure it.” He jabbed at the Frenchman with a finger.
“Is your wife in the village?”
“Out, Monsieur.”
“Then now’s your chance to impress her, Monsewer Go and protect her. And make sure the damn ford isn’t captured or clogged up with fugitives.”
Joubert was not unhappy to be sent away from the fighting, but he was dismayed by Dodd’s evident defeatism. Nevertheless he took two companies, marched into the village, and posted his men to guard the ford so that if all was lost, there would still be a way out.
Wellesley had ridden north to investigate the furious fighting that had erupted close to the village of Assaye. He rode with a half-dozen aides and with Sharpe trailing behind on the last of the General’s horses, the roan mare. It was a furious ride, for the area east of the infantry was infested with Mahratta horsemen, but the General had faith in the size and speed of his big English and Irish horses and the enemy was easily out galloped Wellesley came within sight of the beleaguered 74th just as the dragoons crashed in on their besiegers from the south.
“Well done, Maxwell!” Wellesley shouted aloud, though he was far out of earshot of the cavalry’s leader, and then he curbed his horse to watch the dragoons at work.
The mass of the Mahratta horsemen who had been waiting for the 74th’s square to collapse, now fled northwards and the British cavalry, having hacked the best part of an enemy infantry regiment into ruin, pursued them. The cavalry’s good order was gone now, for the blue coated troopers were spurring their horses to chase their broken enemy across country. Men whooped like fox hunters, closed on their quarry, slashed with sabre, then spurred on to the next victim. The Mahratta horsemen were not even checked by the River Juah, but just plunged in and spurred their horses through the water and up the northern bank. The British and Indian cavalry followed so that the pursuit vanished in the north. The 74th, who had fought so hard to stay alive, now marched out of range of the cannon by the village and Wellesley, who had smelt disaster just a few minutes before, breathed a great sigh of relief.