Event Summary:
In 1600,
Elizabeth I chartered the establishment of the "Merchant Adventure Company" in England, which in India had become an authority.
At the end of the year, a prince and nobleman in India, jealous of these foreigners who had invaded Bengal, planned an operation that shocked the world, and was said to be angry that the French had expelled them.
One hot summer day, 146 British captives were pushed into a sealed dungeon by soldiers of King Dora of Bangladesh.
Everyone was hot and thirsty, most of them had died before the morning came, and everyone was frantically trampling on each other in order to get more air and water.
By the time the dungeon was opened the next morning, only 23 people had survived.
The news soon reached Britain, causing an uproar in Britain, and the "barbarism" and "cruelty" of the conquered caused strong national anger.
The British used this to invade Bengal, which is known as the "Black Hole in Calcutta", which also led to the victory of the British army led by Clive and the establishment of the British Indian Kingdom in 1767.
First, the ill-fated Kingdom of India
As we all know, India is one of the four major ancient civilizations in the world, and it is also the second most populous country in the world, which belongs to the tropical monsoon climate.
India is rich in spices, gold and fruit. Since ancient times, India has not been able to escape the fate of being occupied by the conquerors. The oldest Indus Valley civilization is known as the Harappan culture, but eventually declined.
As the Aryans conquered India, bringing a new cultural system to India was also the origin of classical Indian culture, but this was only the beginning, Persia conquered the Indus Plain, Alexander the Great also invaded India, and wave after wave of conquerors entered India and were conquered by new conquerors.
It was not until 1526 that Babur led an army to invade India and establish the Mughal Empire, which was the last empire in India.
India has always been the focus of contention among the European powers, and since the Portuguese da Gama opened the Indian navigation route in 1497, this route has opened the door for Portugal and European countries engaged in colonial activities.
By 1515, India and the waters of the Indian Ocean were largely in the hands of the Kingdom of Portugal.
In the time that followed, the greedy rest of Europe set up their own East India Companies.
For example, the British East India Company, the French East India Company, the Danish East India Company, the Scottish East India Company, the Swedish East India Company, the German East India Company and so on.
Among them, the Dutch landed on the Indian island of Java in 1596 and returned with spices, fruits and other items full of Indian specialties. Since then, the Netherlands has quickly intervened in India with the opportunity of commercial trade.
In 1605, the Dutch East India Company seized the Portuguese-controlled fortress of Ambon Island.
In 1614, the Dutch captured Malacca and went to war with Portugal, once the hegemon of the seas, and won the war
This also strengthened and increased Dutch control over East and Southeast Asia.
With the dominance of maritime control, the Dutch then had a strong monopoly on Indian pepper, spices and other products, so that the colonial purpose of India was finally achieved.
Ii. The Mughal Empire
In 1526 Babur established the Mughal dynasty, and the chaotic administrative system could not be divided only by relying on military institutions. By the middle of the 17th century, most of India was under the rule of the Mughal Empire.
The Mughal Empire was bounded by the Himalayas to the north, kabul in Afghanistan to the west, and as far east as the border to Assam.
The Mughal Empire was the most vast regime in Indian history that penetrated deep into the southern territories.
At the beginning of the 18th century, all of India, except for the extreme southern tip of the Indian subcontinent, was incorporated into the territory of the Mughal Empire.
In 1658, aurangzeb of the Mughal Empire usurped the throne from his father Shah Jahan.
Aurang, a very fervent Muslim, rejected a policy of religious tolerance, imposed a poll tax on non-Muslims, expelled Hindus from the government, and demolished Hindu temples and idols.
At the same time, the Mughal Empire continued to expand its territory outwards, and in order to pay for the expansion war and suppress the rising peasant movements and tribal uprisings, it also required huge military expenditures and greatly increased taxes. These policies provoked fierce revolt among the non-Muslim population of the Mughal Empire.
The uprisings of the Maratha, Sikhs, and Jats kept the Mughal Empire's wars on the Deccan Plateau and the Punjab and in the hinterland perennial, depleting the kingdom's financial and military resources.
The uprisings in various places separated the entire territory from the Mughal Empire, the revenue of the national treasury decreased, the state-owned land granted to the feudal lords was sharply reduced, and the feudal lords also deviated from Germany.
The popular movement and local uprisings dealt a heavy blow to the Mughal Empire, leaving it in a precarious position.
The Mughal Empire was by this time a fragmented empire.
Third, the rising Europeans
At a time when various powers on the Indian continent were at war, britain gradually emerged from the European countries that colonized India.
In 1612 the British East India Company led an army to defeat the Portuguese fleet, landing on the west coast of India and establishing the first permanent trading post of the British in India.
In 1614 the British again defeated the Portuguese in naval battles, establishing hegemony in the Indian Ocean.
After the Anglo-Portuguese marriage, Mumbai was transferred to England as a dowry for a Portuguese princess
At this time, the competition between European countries for the Indian continent had just begun.
In 1602, the Dutch United East India Company was established, and the Dutch government converted the securities into 25,000 guilders into the shareholder Indian Company to increase credibility.
This allowed more funds to be raised for the development of new colonies and trade routes.
In 1609, the world's first stock exchange was born in Amsterdam, which meant that the East India Company could sell its shares in exchange for more wealth to go on a crusade.
The East India Company had been committed to expansion in the Indian subcontinent since its inception, and the Dutch had managed to drive the Portuguese out of the Marabar coast and establish colonial strongholds in Queeron, Cochin, and other places.
Although the Dutch had a great deal of wealth that made it popular in the competition in the East Indies, the trade-oriented Netherlands was involved in the War in Europe and was on the verge of bankruptcy due to the tulip crisis.
The British seized the moment, the Dutch declined, india was divided, and this was the best moment for Britain to expand its colonies in India.
Only France was left to compete with Britain, and in the process of colonizing India, britain and France recruited a large number of Indian soldiers to make it a tool for their own colonization of India. The two sides fought fiercely in North America, India and other places. In 1761 the British army captured the French stronghold in India and governed locally.
The Black Jail of Calcutta
At the same time as the War with France, The British had begun to launch a conquest of the indian homeland,
In 1756 the throne of the Indian state of Bengal passed to Siraj Ude Daura.
The young king, in his 20s, was extremely dissatisfied with the British East India Company's collusion with corrupt officials and private construction fortifications.
The British acted recklessly in his country, and if he was a king, how would he serve the people and defend his king's rights. He began to try to drive out the British, and then he controlled the Trade in Bengal by himself.
On 16 June, the Bengali army led by Siraj Ude Daura personally captured the British stronghold of Fort William in Kolkata
。 At that time, the soldiers of the East India Company defending the fort did not resist much and surrendered to the Bengal army.
146 British were arrested, and the king ordered the Bengal army not to dispose of these British prisoners at will
These Indian soldiers did not have a good feeling for the British who had invaded their country, so they simply put them in the cell that the British used to keep the Indians, which had only two external windows, about 5.5 meters long and about 4.3 meters wide, with a total area of only about 23.65 square meters.
More than 140 people were crowded in such a small room, and you can imagine how incredible the scene was.
The British were crammed into huts and had difficulty even turning around, during which time the Indian soldiers were begged to change to a larger room.
But the soldiers refused, and people began to die one after another, and the guards were afraid that too many people would die, which would bring him trouble.
So I took a little water for the British who were locked up in the "black rooms."
But what he didn't expect was that
These people immediately lost control when they saw the water, and the desire to survive made them scramble to squeeze in front of the window, while the weaker people were trampled to death or crushed to death in these pushes
。
146 people were locked up in this small room for the night, until 6 a.m. the next day,
When the door was opened, only 23 people were alive and 7 others died of dehydration, and Howell, who was a survivor, reported the incident to the British army after being rescued.
"The Black Hole Event in Calcutta"
When it reached the ears of Siraj Ude Daura, he did not believe that 123 people had died in just ten hours.
Realizing the gravity of the incident, Siraj Ude Daura executed the guards and sent people to negotiate with the British, hoping to compensate the families of the deceased for quelling the incident. But the British sternly refused, and they would settle the matter by force.
The British East India Company commissioned Klevo to lead the territorial troops to Bengal, which later took place at the famous Battle of Placi, which had an army of 50,000 troops.
The British army had only 3,000 British and Indian soldiers, and in the face of the disparity in strength, the British general Klevoy took advantage of the contradictions within the enemy to buy off the traitors, and when the war broke out, the commander-in-chief of the Bangladeshi army stood still and turned against each other.
The Bengali army was shot by British guns and suffered heavy casualties. Although the Battle of Plasi was a minor battle, its outcome was more important than many of the world's largest battles, paving the way for the British to conquer Bengal and finally all of India.
epilogue
The catastrophe brought to India by the fall of India to a British colony was enormous, and historians pointed out in later writings that it was impossible for 146 Europeans to remain in Calcutta at the time of the incident, which was illogical and exaggerated, and the purpose was to invade Bangladesh as an excuse, just a pretext.
As for how many people died in the black hole in Calcutta, we have no way of knowing whether it was the British who lied or whether there was really such a thing, it is estimated that only the parties concerned know. But whatever the truth, it is true that the British used it to go to war. The British bought off the army generals of the Bengal army and effortlessly captured Bengal.
bibliography:
General Studies of India
Dictionary of Indian History
History of India
History of Kolkata