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Black Hole of Calcutta
The Black Hole of Calcutta was a small dungeon in the old Fort William in Calcutta, India, where troops of the Nawab of Bengal, Siraj ud-Daulah, held British prisoners of war after the capture of the fort on 20 June 1756.
One of the prisoners, John Zephaniah Holwell, claimed that following the fall of the fort, British and Anglo-Indian soldiers and civilians were held overnight in conditions so cramped that many died from suffocation, heat exhaustion and crushing. He claimed that 123 prisoners died out of 146 held. However, the precise number of deaths, and the accuracy of Holwell's claims, have been the subject of controversy.〔Little JH (1916) ‘The Black Hole - The Question of Holwell's Veracity’ Bengal: Past and Present, 12. P136-171.〕
==Background==
Fort William was established to protect the East India Company's trade in the city of Calcutta, the principal town of the Bengal Presidency. In 1756, with the possibility of conflict with French forces, the British began building up the fort's strengths and defences. The Nawab of Bengal, Siraj ud-Daulah, was unhappy with the company's interference in the internal affairs of his province and perceived a threat to its independence. He ordered an immediate stop to the Fort's military enhancement, but the Company paid no heed. As a consequence, Siraj organized his army and laid siege to the fort. The garrison's commander organised an escape, leaving behind 146 soldiers under the command of John Zephaniah Holwell, a senior East India Company bureaucrat who had been a military surgeon. However, desertions by allied troops made even this temporary defence ineffectual, and the fort fell on 20 June. The surviving defenders, who numbered between 64 and 69, were captured along with an unknown number of Anglo-Indian soldiers and civilians who had been sheltering in the fort. During this period some prisoners were able to escape through the gates of the fort before the guards were fully alert to the change in numbers.
抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』
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