Sir Henry Harding, the governor of the British colony of India at this time, fought in the Napoleonic Wars and defeated the main French army under the command of Soulte in the Peninsular War with 7,000 remnants.

At the Battle of Linne, Sir Henry Harding found that the Prussian forces were too scattered, but neither Blucher nor the Prussian chief of staff, Gneisenau, refused to listen to the wild words of a young man in his early twenties.

As a result, the Prussian army was directly routed by Napoleon, and could only be the first to withdraw from the battlefield.

Sir Henry Harding lost his left arm in the battle, but instead of surrendering or withdrawing from the battle, he caught up with the Prussians and urged them to return to the war.

Blucher paid great tribute to the brave young man, and in the end the Prussian army arrived at Waterloo as planned, giving the final blow to Napoleon and his empire.

The Duke of Wellington called him the bravest Englishman, and in recognition of his exploits, the Duke of Wellington presented Napoleon's saber to Lieutenant Colonel Henry Harding.

It's just that this brave soldier never fought in the war after the end of the Napoleonic Wars, but threw himself into politics.

It was not until the eve of the outbreak of the Sikh War that he was recommended as the viceroy of India.

Because although the war waged against the Sikh Empire at that time was a lot of applause in the country, no one was sure that it would be able to deal with this formidable enemy.

The Sikh Empire, once ruled by Gillant Singh, is certainly worthy of the title of formidable enemy.

To take a more straightforward example, in 1839 the Sikh Empire's fiscal revenue was as high as 50 million rupees, nearly half of that of the Austrian Empire during the same period in history.

The exchange rate of the florin and the rupee is very close, about 1 to 1.09.

At that time, the Sikh Empire's defense expenditure was as high as 45%, so the weapons and equipment of Girant Singh's new army could be called "luxurious".

The 80,000 Forces nouvelles had more than 600 French artillery pieces and 70,000 Delvigne-1826 rifles, and the literacy rate of the soldiers was as high as 60%, far exceeding that of European armies of the same period.

There was also a corps of 300 French instructors, including many high-ranking officers who had fought in the Napoleonic Wars, and even directly hired French as commanders of the army.

In addition, Gillant Singh was able to recruit about 35,000 tribal forces and nearly 10,000 fanatics.

However, all this glory disappeared with the death of Gironte Singh, and the continued turmoil in the country made the tribes that had previously been subdued by him begin to rebel.

Local landlords and officials began to band together to enrich themselves, and state finances declined rapidly. Ethnic and religious contradictions also erupted at the same time, with a large loss of population, barren land, and commercial shrinkage.

On the other hand, the status of the army continued to rise, and the financial support demanded also increased, and by 1843 the emperor had no money to repair the garden for 400,000 rupees.

The "Kassar", an association of soldiers, took control of state politics to a certain extent and purged a large number of officers loyal to the royal family.

However, the emaciated camel was bigger than the horse, and the Sikh Empire could still raise an army of 60,000 men.

Henry Harding, though brave, was not a reckless man. He refused to accept London's orders to advance directly to Punjab, and instead chose to build a relatively safe wall and accumulate grain.

This is partly because of Henry Harding's personal caution, and partly because the two main warlords in history have died in battle.

A veteran died on the way to quell the chaos, while Hugh Gough left his life on the island of Kalimantan.

Without the interference of these two powerful factions, Henry Harding chose a completely different style of play from history, and he was ready to besiege the Sikh Empire, using fortresses and pillboxes to camp step by step.

The French staff in the Sikh army immediately discovered the intentions of the British, but due to the chaos within the Sikh Empire at the time, it was not until a few months later that the higher-ups discovered that Henry Harding was about to besiege them.

The Sikh Empire was once again in turmoil, and in the end, Queen Regent's faction prevailed.

Then he declared war on the British, led by Degas Singh and Lal Singh, both of whom were also commanders-in-chief, and the operation of commanding the troops separately was very confusing.

But in fact, these two men came from different factions, so they wanted to kill each other more than the British.

On the other hand, Henry Harding also lamented the difference in the combat strength of the Indians, and he even suspected that the Indian soldiers in front of him were not as good as the Spaniards.

This strengthened Henry Harding's strategy of retreat, but to his dismay, he waited in the fortress for almost a month without seeing a single Sikh soldier, but rather many locals risked their lives to sell goods and work as coolies.

Due to the fact that the people of the Sikh Empire have long been unable to make a living over the years, it is much better to work for the British than to work as a coolie for the Sikh army, at least to have enough to eat.

There are not many people waiting to see this fireworks, but a month is indeed a little too long.

Both Degas Singh and Lal Singh want each other to fight to the death with the British, and then reap the benefits of the fisherman, so neither of them wants to be the first bird.

Historically, it was Lal Singh's forces that collided with Hugh Gough's vanguard forces, but now the latter is in ashes.

Henry Harding was adamant about holding out, because he felt that it was not wise to rashly lead a group of Ah San into the hinterland of the enemy country.

So the two sides were consumed like this, but soon the supplies of the Sikh Empire could not keep up. Degas Singh and Lal Singh had no choice but to agree to attack the British at the same time.

Finally seeing the army of the Sikh Empire, the British troops in the fortress were still quite excited, because as long as they finished the battle, they could return to their respective regions to become the overlords of the earth.

But soon the excitement was gone, because the firepower of the Sikhs was far beyond the imagination of the British.

Historically, the British army was stunned by Sikh artillery, and Hugh Gough judged from experience that bringing 20~30 guns was enough to defeat the opponent.

As a result, the other side brought more than 200 artillery pieces, which were directly broken into the employees of the British Indian Colonial Army and the East India Company.

At this time, although Henry Harding ordered the construction of city walls and fortresses, Ah San's architectural level could naturally only create some superficial things.

At the beginning of the war, the British army was at a great disadvantage, and the walls and fortresses they relied on did not provide them with much protection.

In fact, French goods were quite terrible at the time, although there were many old antiques from the French Revolution, but it was not something that the Indians could stop from building a temporary old-fashioned wall.

In fact, Henry Harding didn't think of this, he just hoped to reduce the loss a little.

I didn't expect the other party's firepower to be so fierce, but fortunately, he specially brought some siege artillery, at least in terms of power, he didn't fall too much.

The artillery battle between the two sides was clearly dominated by the Sikhs, so Dega Singh and Lal Singh swelled up a bit.

At the same time, the two ordered to prepare for the siege of the city, and whoever defeated the British first would be the future leader of Casal.

(End of chapter)