At Home: A Short History of Private Life

by Bill Bryson

made from the fat of pigs and cows—a matter of profoundest horror for Muslim and Hindu soldiers alike, since the consumption of such fats, even unwittingly, would condemn them to eternal damnation. The East India Company’s British officers handled the matter with stunning insensitivity. They court-martialed several Indian soldiers who refused to handle the new cartridges, and threatened to punish any others who didn’t fall into line. Many sepoys became convinced that it was all part of a plot to replace their own faiths with Christianity. By unfortunate coincidence, Christian missionaries had recently become active in India, fanning suspicions further. The upshot was the Sepoy Rebellion of 1857, in which the native soldiers turned on their British masters, whom they very much outnumbered. At Cawnpore, the rebels herded two hundred women and children into a hall, then hacked them to pieces. Other innocent victims, it was reported, were thrown into wells and left to drown.