Vellore Mutiny

Vellore Mutiny, outbreak against the British on July 10, 1806, by sepoys (Indian troops employed by the British) at Vellore (now in Tamil Nadu state, southern India). The incident began when the sepoys broke into the fort where the many sons and daughters of Tippu Sultan of Mysore and their families had been lodged since their surrender at Seringapatam (now Shrirangapattana) in 1799 during the fourth Mysore War.

The July 10 outbreak, though encouraged by the Mysore princes, was basically caused by resentment at new British regulations that ordered changes in headgear and shaving style and the prohibition of ornaments and caste marks for the Indian troops. Little effort was made by the British to reassure the men or listen to their grievances, which included the belief that the regulations were detrimental to the religious practices of both Hindus and Muslims. There were also complaints about the sepoys’ pay. About 130 British troops were killed in the initial assault, but the fort was recovered within hours by a relief force of British soldiers and sepoys under Colonel Robert Gillespie from nearby Arcot. Hundreds of mutineers were killed, either in the fighting or in subsequent executions by the British.

The affair alarmed the British because of its connection with the Mysore princes, who were thereupon removed to Calcutta (now Kolkata). Lord William Bentinck, the governor of Madras (now Chennai), and Sir John Cradock (later John Caradock, 1st Baron Howden), the commander in chief at Madras, were both recalled. It is believed, however, that the severity of punishments meted out by the British—which included tying some of those convicted of mutiny to the barrels of cannons and then firing them—deterred sepoys in southern India from joining the Indian Mutiny of 1857–58.