ABSTRACT
In the wake of the Indian Mutiny, the Indian army had been reformed, but was still lacking effectiveness and professionalism. The proportion of British units had been considerably increased. Many ‘native’ companies, and even regiments, were now formed on an ethnic or caste basis, so that Sikhs lived and fought with Sikhs, Gurkhas with Gurkhas, and so on, with corresponding advantages in terms of cohesion and morale. However, the calibre of the officer corps remained uneven, with promotion still dependent on length of service rather than merit. With the exception of the Punjab Frontier Force, the army had done little campaigning, had never operated in large formations and was largely untried in battle. Many regiments were under-strength and the system of short-service engagements in the British regiments meant that many of the troops were inexperienced and unacclimatised. Intelligence gathering was still neglected and often inadequate. Above all, the army’s logistics organisation was appalling – some, indeed, maintained that there was no organisation at all. Although the railway now ran to the Indus, transport beyond it was still reliant on animals and, even with the denuding of northern India, their numbers were inadequate, they died in droves, and there was barely an operation that was not to some extent hindered by lack of transport. Although the numbers of camp followers was reduced, an army on the march was still burdened with a large baggage train and retinue of hangers on. Communications, however, with the introduction of the telegraph and heliograph, were now reasonably good. A submarine telegraph cable had been laid between Britain and India a few years previously, and armies on the march erected telegraph lines as they advanced. Command and control, therefore, was now, for much of the time, virtually immediate.
