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462 HISTORY OF THE INDIAN NAVY. ;
impossibility of carrying the works with his small force without
the certainty of incurring heavy loss, decided to re-emhark his
force and await reinforcements. Accordingly the guns and
stores were re-shipped, and, after spiking the enemy's cannon,
the troops proceeded on board the flotilla at two a.m. on the 8th.
The flotilla then dropped down to Youngyonn, and re-occupied
the strong position from which it had moved on the 6th, while
the wounded were sent down to Rangoon. In this check the
British loss was two officers and sixteen nrien killed, and four
ofiicers and one hundred and seven men wounded and missing
of these the Navy had two men wounded, and the flotilla two
killed, and Mr. A. F. Derby, commanding the gunboat
'Amherst,' and ten men, wounded.
In the meantime the land column had forded the Lyne river,
and marched on to Sarrawah, where they distinctly heard the
cannonading at Donabew, and concluded that the place had
fallen. Sir Archibald Campbell, accordingly, proceeded on to
Uandeet, about twenty-six miles above Sarrawah, where he
learned of the repulse at Donabew, upon which he immediately
commenced a retrograde march, and, by the 18th, had crossed
his whole army over the Irrawaddy at Sarrawah, on rafts.
On the 25th Sir Archibald arrived before Donabew, but as
the works were found to be much too extensive to admit of
being invested, a position was taken up, and, on the follow-
ing day, ground was broken at an old pagoda about 300 yards
from the enemy's defences. On the 27th the ' Diana,' towing
one mortar-boat, four gun-vessels, and a number of flats with
provisions and breaching guns recently brought from Panlang,
proceeded up the river, " under all the fire of the fort," and
anchored on the left of the land column. " During the heavy
cannonade that took place between the boats and the stockade,"
says Major Snodgrass, " Bundoola, who was superintending
the practice of his artiller3% gave his garrison a specimen of the
discipline he meant to enforce in this last struggle to retrieve
his lost character and reputation. A Burmese officer being
killed while pointing a gun, by a shot from the flotilla, his
comrades instantly abandoning the dangerous post, could not
be brought back to their duty by any remonstrance of their
chiefs, when Bundoola stepping down to the spot, instantly
severed the head of two of the delinquents from their bodies,
and ordered them to be stuck up upon the spot."
While forcing their w^ay past the stockade,* the flotilla was
* Major Snodgrass describes the work as follows, " The stoctade of Donabew
extended for nearly a mile along a sloping bank of the Irrawaddy, its breadth
varying according to the nature of the ground from 500 to 800 yards. The
stockading was composed of solid teak beams from 15 to 17 feet high, driven
firmly into the earth, and placed as closely as possible to each other ; behind this
wooden wall the old brick ramparts of tlie place rose to a considerable height,
strengthening the front defences by means of cross beams, and affording a firm