Hyder Ali

Hyder Ali
Dalwai of Mysore (de facto ruler)
Reign	1761-1782
Predecessor	Krishnaraja Wodeyar II
Successor	Tippu Sultan

Hyder Ali (Kannada: ಹೈದರಾಲಿ, Haidarālī; Hindi: हैदर अली, Haidar Alī; c. 1722–1782) was the de facto ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore in southern India. Serving as the dalwai, or commander-in-chief to Krishnaraja Wodeyar II, he dominated the titular monarch and the Mysore government. He expanded the kingdom's borders at the expense of the Maratha Empire and Hyderabad (among others), and was one of the few local rulers to effectively blunt British military advances during two wars. In the Second Anglo-Mysore War he came within striking distance of the British outpost at Madras.

He is said to have induced his brother to employ a Parsi to purchase artillery and small arms from the government of Bombay Presidency, and to enrol some thirty sailors of different European nations as gunners, and is thus credited with having been "the first Indian who formed a corps of sepoys armed with firelocks and bayonets, and who had a train of artillery served by Europeans." He induced Shamaiya Iyengar into his ministry as minister of post and police and later Shamaiya served under Tipu Sultan.

Personal life

Hyder Ali was a Sunni Muslim and the great-grandson of an Islamic fakir from Gulbarga, Deccan. His father was a naik or chief constable at Budikote, Near KGF Karnataka, Shoolagiri (30 KM) Berikai (20 KM) Tamil Nadu, then in the Kingdom of Mysore, present-day Karnataka. He was born in Budikote between 1717 and 1722. According to some historians he was born in 1721. As a youth, Hyder assisted his brother, a commander of a brigade in the Mysore Army, and acquired a useful familiarity with the tactics of the French when at the height of their reputation under Joseph François Dupleix.

Rise to power

At the siege of Devanhalli (1749) Hyder's performance attracted the attention of Nanjaraja, the minister of the Raja of Mysore, and he at once received an independent command; within the next twelve years his energy and ability had made him completely master of minister and raja alike, and in everything but in name he became ruler of the kingdom. In 1763 the conquest of Kanara gave him possession of the treasures of Bednor, with which he resolved to make a splendid capital in India, under his own name, thenceforth changed from Hyder Naik into Hyder Ali Khan Bahadur. He even took possession of the official sword of state from the Raja of Mysore, to display to all and sundry that he had started his self-proclaimed rule and was now the ruler of Mysore. Later, in 1767, as an evidence of his control over Mysore, he had this sword sent to the Ottoman Sultan Mustafa III, for his personal inspection of the sword and to be formally invested as the ruler of Mysore, and the rights to minting his own coins, which the sultan granted. As a gesture of Spiritual Permission, the sultan praised Hyder by having an Arabic inscription in gold, put on the blade of the sword, about Hyder being a warrior. This began Hyder's official embassy with the sultans in Constantinople. Hyder Ali now began to occupy the serious attention of the Madras Presidency, which in 1766 entered into an agreement with the Nizam of Hyderabad in which the British agreed to furnish the nizam with troops to be used against their common foes. But hardly had this alliance been formed when the nizam struck a secret arrangement with Hyder. The result was that Colonel Smith's small force was met with a united army of 50,000 men and 100 guns. British dash and sepoy fidelity were devastated, first in the Battle of Chengam (September 3, 1767) and again, even more remarkably, in that of Tiruvannamalai (Trinornalai). In February 1768, the British captured Mangalore from Hyder. The Portuguese had offered to help Hyder against the British. But when they betrayed Hyder, he directed his anger towards the Mangalorean Catholics, since they had been converted to Christianity by the Portuguese. Towards the end of 1768, Hyder defeated the British and re-captured Mangalore fort, where the Mangalorean Catholics were taking refuge. Around 15,675 of them were taken as prisoners to Mysore by Hyder.

Peace treaty

On the loss of his recently-made fleet and forts on the western coast, Hyder Ali now offered overtures for peace; on the rejection of these, bringing all his resources and strategy into play, he forced Colonel Smith to raise the siege of Bangalore, and brought his army within 5 miles (8.0 km) of Madras. The result was the treaty of April 1769, providing for the mutual restitution of all conquests, and for mutual aid and alliance in defensive war; it was followed by a commercial treaty in 1770 with the authorities of Bombay. Under these arrangements Hyder Ali, when defeated by the Marathas in 1772 (three wars were fought between 1764 and 1772 by Madhavrao Peshwa against Hyder Ali, in which Hyder Ali lost), claimed British assistance, but in vain; this breach of faith stung him to fury, and thenceforward he and his son did not cease to thirst for vengeance. His time came when in 1778 the British, on the declaration of war with France, resolved to drive the French out of India. The capture of Mahé on the Malabar coast in 1779, followed by the annexation of lands belonging to a dependant of his own, gave him the needed pretext for the Second Anglo-Mysore War.

Losses

With the empire extended to the Krishna River, he descended through the passes of the Western Ghats amid burning villages, reaching Kanchipuram (Conjeevaram), only 45 miles (72 km) from Madras, unopposed. Not till the smoke was seen from St. Thomas Mount, where Sir Hector Munro commanded some 5200 troops, was any movement made. Then, however, the British general sought to effect a junction with a smaller body under Colonel Baillie recalled from Guntur. However, they failed to meet, and Hyder sent his son Tipu, who captured Baillie's force of 2800 at Pollilur (September 10, 1780). Warren Hastings sent from Bengal Sir Eyre Coote, who, though repulsed at Chidambaram, defeated Hyder thrice successively in the battles of Porto Novo, Pollilur and Sholingarh, while Tipu Sultan was forced to raise the siege of Vandavasi (Wandiwash), and Vellore was provisioned. On the arrival of Lord Macartney as governor of Madras, the British fleet captured Nagapattinam (Negapatam), which convinced Hyder Ali that he could never completely defeat an enemy that had command of the sea. He had sent his son Tipu to the west coast, to seek the assistance of the French fleet, when he died quite suddenly at Chittoor in December 1782.

Invasion of Tanjore

Suffren meeting with Hyder Ali in 1783, J.B. Morret engraving, 1789.

Hyder Ali invaded Tanjore in 1781, at the height of the Second Mysore War. Col. Braithwaite tried to stem his advance but was defeated and had to surrender. Hyder extracted the allegiance of the Maratha king Thuljaji and plundered the country. Cattle and crops were destroyed. The gross produce of the Tanjore kingdom fell from 10,439,057 in 1780 to 1,578,520 in 1781. It further slid to 1,370,174 in 1782. The ravages of Hyder Ali and his son Tippu Sultan were followed by alleged expeditions of plunder launched by the Kallars. There was scarcity of food and work and the economy was shattered. The kingdom of Tanjore did not recover from the effects of the invasion until the start of the 19th century. The period of suffering referred to in local folklore as Hyderakalam is considered to be one of the darkest periods in the region's history since the invasions of the Kalabhras.

Military use of rockets

Hyder Ali and his son Tipu Sultan are regarded as pioneers in the use of solid fuel rocket technology or missiles for military use. A military tactic they developed was the use of mass attacks with rocket brigades on infantry formations. Tipu Sultan wrote a military manual called Fathul Mujahidin in which 200 rocket men were assigned to each Mysorean "cushoon" (brigade). Mysore had 16 to 24 cushoons of infantry. The areas of town where rockets and fireworks were manufactured were known as Taramandal Pet ("Galaxy Market"). It was only after Tipu's death that the technology eventually reached Europe.

The rocket men were trained to launch their rockets at an angle calculated from the diameter of the cylinder and the distance to the target. In addition, wheeled rocket launchers capable of launching five to ten rockets almost simultaneously were used in war. Rockets could be of various sizes, but usually consisted of a tube of soft hammered iron about 8 inches (20 cm) long and 1.5 to 3 in (3.8 to 7.6 cm) in diameter, closed at one end and strapped to a shaft of bamboo about 4 ft (1 m) long. The iron tube acted as a combustion chamber and contained well packed black powder propellant. A rocket carrying about one pound of powder could travel almost 1,000 yards. In contrast, rockets in Europe, not being iron cased, could not take large chamber pressures and as a consequence, were not capable of reaching distances anywhere near as great.

Hyder Ali's father, the Naik or chief constable at Budikote, commanded 50 rocketmen for the Nawab of Arcot. There was a regular Rocket Corps in the Mysore Army, beginning with about 1200 men in Hyder Ali's time. At the Battle of Pollilur (1780), during the Second Anglo-Mysore War, Colonel William Baillie's ammunition stores are thought to have been detonated by a hit from one of Hyder Ali's rockets, contributing to a humiliating British defeat.

See also

• Muslim warriors

References

• This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. {{cite encyclopedia}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
• Gidwani. The Sword of Tipu Sultan. {{cite book}}: Text "firstBhagwan S" ignored (help)
• Subramanian, K. R (1928). The Maratha rajas of Tanjore. Mylapore, Madras: self-publisher. OCLC 249773661.

Further reading

• 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica references:
  • LB Bowring, Haidar Ali and Tipu Sultan, Rulers of India series (1893)
  • For the personal character and administration of Hyder Ali see the History of Hyder Naik, written by Mir Hussein Ali Khan Kirmani (translated from the Persian by Colonel Miles, and published by the Oriental Translation Fund)
  • The curious work written by M Le Maitre de La Tour, commandant of his artillery, L'histoire d'Hayder-Ali Khan, Paris, 1783
  • For the whole life and times see Wilks, historical Sketches of the South of India (1810-1817).

External links

• Haidar Ali And Tipu Sultan And The Struggle With The Musalman Powers Of The South By Lewin B. Bowring