215
posted himself in Cawnpore, until the arrival of Sir
Colin Campbell as commander-in-chief in India
called both generals into the field for the relief of
Lucknow.
After so many inevitable delays that object was to
be achieved at last, and the expedition was to be
commanded by Havelock, who, notwithstanding his
previous quarrels with Neill, selected him for the
command of the right wing of his force. It was a
choice not only honourable to him who made it, but
the officer on whom it fell: it showed that the one
was superior to all private resentments, and that the
other was judged the worthiest to hold such an office.
The advance on Lucknow was commenced, and
among Neill's military preparations to insure its
success, his tender care for the comfort of those who
were to be relieved is thus described by one of his
officers: "The kind and thoughtful general, who was
always thinking what he could do for others with-
out a thought for himself, had taken great pleasure
in laying in a little store of arrow-root, sago, can-
dles, and wine, to take to the poor ladies who had
been suffering for so long in Lucknow; and he took
his palkee carriage to place at the disposal of some
of them for their journey back to Cawnpore." The
march was commenced on the 19th of September,
1857, and on the evening of the 23d the troops were
in possession of the Alumbagh, in the immediate
neighbourhood of the city. On the following day
there was some hard fighting, but the Sepoys were
defeated, and on the 25th Lucknow was to be entered
by two divisions, the one commanded by Havelock
and the other by Neill. After suffering by the fire
from the Kaiser Bagh and the Mess House, Neill's
division had entered the city, and were preparing,
under a heavy fire of musketry from every house-
top, to force their way to the British residency,
when the general, who was a conspicuous object on
horseback, was aimed at by the enemy, a bullet
passed through his head, and in an instant the brave
Neill was lying on the ground a corpse. In a few
minutes more, had he been spared from the fatal
shot, he would have entered the residency a living
man and a conqueror; but as it was, his lifeless body
was brought into it by his weeping soldiers, who
loved him as a father. He was buried in the church-
yard of the residency, and his grave was watered
with the tears of all ranks, who lamented his death
as a bereavement in which all equally shared.
In this manner a great soldier prematurely passed
away, when the world had learned his value, and
were anticipating for him a brilliant career. Much
indeed he had already accomplished, but it was re-
garded merely as an earnest of what he was yet to
achieve. Of the manner in which the loss was felt
in India, the following extract from a despatch of
Lord Canning, when the report had reached him
only as a rumour, will convey some idea; "The
governor-general in council forbears to observe
further upon information which is necessarily imper-
fect; but he cannot refrain from expressing the deep
regret with which he hears of the death of Brigadier
Neill, of the 1st Madras European fusileers, of
which it is feared that no doubt exists. Brigadier-
general Neill, during his short but active career in
Bengal, had won the respect and confidence of the
government of India; he had made himself conspicu-
ous as an intelligent, prompt, and self-reliant soldier,
ready of resource and stout of heart; and the gover-
nor-general in council offers to the government and
to the army of Madras his sincere condolence upon
the loss of one who was an honour to the service of
their presidency." Nor was our government at home
less eager to testify to his worth. For his earlier
services in the war of the Indian mutiny General
Neill had already been appointed an aid-de-camp to
the queen; had he survived, he would have been
recommended for the dignity of knight-commander
of the Bath; but as it was, his widow was commis-
sioned by royal order to hold the title, rank, and
privileges she would have held had that honour been
conferred upon her husband. To these honours a
liberal endowment was added by the East India
Company. As was most fitting for so distinguished
a man, a monument was erected to his memory in
the town of Ayr, nigh to the place of his birth. The
figure is of colossal size, ten feet high, and stands
upon a pedestal of Dalbeattie granite twelve feet
high. The incident selected by the artist was that
which occurred at the railway station at Howrah.
When Neill and his fusileers were about to proceed
to Benares, a portion of his regiment having not yet
arrived, the train was about to be started without
them, when the general immediately arrested the
railway officials, and compelled them to await the
expected arrival. The monument itself bears the
following inscription:—
"JAMES GEORGE SMITH NEILL, C.B.,
Aid-de-camp to the Queen,
Lieutenant-colonel in the Madras Army,
Brigadier-general in India:
A brave, resolute, self-reliant soldier, universally
Acknowledged as the first who stemmed
The torrent of rebellion in BengaL
He fell gloriously
At the relief of Lucknow,
z6th Sept. 1857,
Aged 47.
NEILSON, JAMES BEAUMONT, the inventor of
the hot-blast in its application to the smelting of
iron, was born at Shettleston, near Glasgow, 22d
June, 1792. His father, Walter Neilson, was what
at that time was called an engine-wright, or at the
present time an engineer, and died at a good old age,
in the employment of the late William Dixon, iron-
master, as engineer at his collieries at Govan—greatly
respected by all who knew him, and by his employer,
who had his portrait painted and hung on the walls
of his residence. Walter had two sons, John and
James, who both became engineers. John, who was
some years the senior of his brother, received a clas-
sical education, and was a great reader and ardent
student. At his works, the Oakbank Foundry at
Glasgow, in 1825, he designed, and afterwards con-
structed, the first iron steamer that went to sea.
Latterly he became also an ironmaster, and died at a
good age: his sons are proprietors of extensive iron-
works in Lanarkshire. James, or Beaumont as he
was usually called, at an early age assisted his father
in erecting and working the steam-engines constructed
for mining purposes, and was afterwards apprenticed
to his brother. In 1814 he left his brother's works,
like his father became engine-wright, and was em-
ployed by Mr. William Taylor at his collieries, near
Irvine. In 1817 he was appointed engineer to the
gas-works then just established at Glasgow, where he
remained until he resigned this situation as engineer
and manager in 1847. The gas- works were greatly ex-
tended under his directions, and many improvements
introduced by him into gas manufacture, then prac-
tically little known. In consequence of the great
eminence to which he rose as a gas-engineer, he
was much consulted from all quarters. He intro-
duced clay-retorts instead of iron, and as early as
about 1826 Cheated his retort ovens entirely by the
waste coal-tar as liquid fuel—used sulphate of iron
solutions to remove the ammonia found so injurious
to pipes and gas-fittings, &c. &c.; but the most
beautiful and ingenious of his inventions was the