We had great difficulty in driving the enemy back; they contested every inch of the ground, the many serais and walled gardens affording them admirable cover; but our troops were not to be withstood; position after position was carried until we found ourselves in sight of the Lahore gate and close up to the walls of the city.  In our eagerness to drive the enemy back we had, however, come too far.  It was impossible to remain where we were.  Musketry from the walls and grape from the heavy guns mounted on the Mori and other bastions committed terrible havoc.  Men were falling on all sides, but the getting back was hazardous to the last degree.  Numerous as the enemy were, they had not the courage to stand against us as long as we advanced, but the first sign of retreat was the signal for them to leave their shelter and press us the whole way to camp.

When the retirement commenced I was with the two advanced guns in action on the Grand Trunk Road.  The subaltern in charge was severely wounded, and almost at the same moment one of his sergeants, a smart, handsome fellow, fell, shot through the leg.  Seeing some men carrying him into a hut at the side of the road, I shouted:  ’Don’t put him there; he will be left behind; get a doolie for him, or put him on the limber.’  But what with the incessant fire from the enemy’s guns, the bursting of shells, the crashing of shot through the branches of the trees, and all the din and hubbub of battle, I could not have been heard, for the poor fellow with another wounded man was left in the hut, and both were murdered by the mutineers.  So many of the men with the two guns were hors de combat, and the horses were so unsteady (several of them being wounded), that there was great difficulty in limbering up, and I was helping the drivers to keep the horses quiet, when I suddenly felt a tremendous blow on my back which made me faint and sick, and I was afraid I should not be able to remain on my horse.  The powerless feeling, however, passed off, and I managed to stick on until I got back to camp.  I had been hit close to the spine by a bullet, and the wound would probably have been fatal but for the fact that a leather pouch for caps, which I usually wore in front near my pistol, had somehow slipped round to the back; the bullet passed through this before entering my body, and was thus prevented from penetrating very deep.

The enemy followed us closely right up to our piquets, and but for the steadiness of the retirement our casualties must have been even more numerous than they were.  As it was, they amounted to 15 men killed, 16 officers and 177 men wounded, and 2 men missing.

The enemy’s loss was estimated at 1,000.  For hours they were seen carrying the dead in carts back to the city.

My wound, though comparatively slight, kept me on the sick-list for a fortnight, and for more than a month I could not mount a horse or put on a sword-belt.  I was lucky in that my tent was pitched close to that of John Campbell Brown, one of the medical officers attached to the Artillery.  He had served during the first Afghan war, with Sale’s force, at Jalalabad, and throughout both the campaigns in the Punjab, and had made a great reputation for himself as an army surgeon.  He looked after me while I was laid up, and I could not have been in better hands.