![]() The success of the British at Plassey is often cited as the start of large-scale colonial rule in India, a rule that would last uninterrupted until independence in 1947. In June of the same year, Robert Clive and a force of just 3,000 men defeated the Newab’s 50,000 strong army at the Battle of Plassey. After a prolonged siege, Fort William fell to the British in January 1757. When news of the ‘Black Hole’ reached London, a relief expedition led by Robert Clive was immediately assembled and subsequently arrived in Calcutta in October. Those that begged for the mercy of their captors were met with jeers and laughter, and by the time the cell doors were opened at 6am there was a mound of dead bodies. According to Holwell’s account, the next few hours saw over a hundred people die through a mixture of suffocation and trampling. With temperatures hitting around 40 degrees and in intensely humid air, the prisoners were then locked up for the night. the name later given to the tiny room in Calcutta (Kolkata), India, in which 146 British prisoners, including one woman, were put. His reign marked the entry of Great Britain into India’s internal affairs. 1729died July 2/3, 1757), ruler, or nawab, of Bengal, India, under the nominal suzerainty of the Mughal emperor. Right: John Zephaniah Holwell, Zemindar of CalcuttaĪs the Newab’s forces entered the city, the remaining British soldiers and civilians were rounded up and forced into the fort’s ‘black hole’, a tiny enclosure measuring 5.4 metres by 4.2 metres and originally intended for petty criminals. Sirj al-Dawlah, original name Mrz Muammad, (born c. ![]() Left: The Newab of Bengal, Siraj ud-Daulah. ![]() Powder for the mortars was too damp to be used, and their commander – John Zephaniah Holwell – was a governor with limited military experience and whose main job was tax collecting! With between 70 and 170 soldiers left to protect the fort, Holwell was forced to surrender to the Newab on the afternoon of June 20th. Unfortunately for the British, the fort was in a rather poor state. By June 19th 1756 most of the local British staff had retreated to the Company’s ships in the harbour, and the Newab’s force was at the gates of Fort William. Upon hearing of the increased militarisation of Fort William, the nearby Newab of Bengal, Siraj ud-Daulah, rallied together some 50,000 troops, fifty cannons and 500 elephants and marched on Calcutta. It is important to remember that during these early days of colonial rule, the East India Company had direct control only over a small number of strongholds in India, and to maintain these strongholds the Company was often forced into uneasy truces with nearby princely states and their ruling ‘Nawabs’. As a preventive measure, the Company decided to increase the defences of its main fort in the city, Fort William. The East India Company, a relative newcomer to the Indian subcontinent, had already established a popular trading base in Calcutta but this hegemony was under threat by French interests in the area. Holwell's account of the incident has been challenged by modern historians and scholars.The horrifying story of the Black Hole of Calcutta starts in early 1756. An obelisk was later raised in memory of those who died in the Black Hole. The British captured and killed the Nawab. Today most concede that Holwell greatly exaggerated the number of captives. However, 146 people could not have fit in a room of 24 x 18 feet. The story was told by John Zephaniah Holwell, a survivor. John Zephaniah Holwell, a British eyewitness, reported that those taken in the capture of the fort, numbering 146, were confined to the dungeon, and that only 23 survived. During hostilities in 1756, the fort was captured by the army of the Nawab of Bengal on 20 June. The fort was built by the British to defend their trading interests in Calcutta. It was 18 feet (5.5 metres) long and 14 feet (4 metres) wide, and had two small windows. The Black Hole of Calcutta enclosed by a railingīlack Hole of Calcutta was a dungeon in old Fort William, Calcutta, India.
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