JANUARY 1766. 
67 
About 3 miles NWBW from Dewangunge, we came to the Eastern Bank of the 
Teesta, a large River from Boutan. 1 The bed of this River is from a mile to a mile 
& quarter in breadth, but the Channell at this Time is not more than 300 yards over 
& from 3 to 7 Cubits deep ; the Stream not very rapid & the Water extremely clear. 
The bottom is Sand & Pebbles. Its Course is here from N. to S. running as we are 
informed by Raage Gunge & Denospour,* & emptying itself into the Ganges by several 
Channells. Near the Place of crossing are the remains of two small Intrenchments, 
one on the West side thrown up by M. Courtin, 3 & y e other on the East side by the 
Nabob of Rungpour. 
The Rungpour Countrey begins again on the West side of the Teesta ; this being 36 
the Province of Bodaw + ceded to Rungpour some years ago by an independent Rajah. 
1 Now the upper portion of the channel of the Atrai, from which the Teesta broke away in 1787-88 (Martin, History, 
Vol. Ill, p. 361). 
* £ Dinajpur. 
•' M. Courtin was chief of the French Factory at Dacca in 1756, and on the capture of Calcutta by Siraj-ud-daula 
took under his protection the Company ’s servants in the English Factory; but, after the breaking out of war between 
the Enclish and French in 1757 and the fall of Chandernagore, M. Courtin found himself in a very precarious 
position, and the day before the battle of Plassey was fought (i.e. 011 June 22 nd 1757) he left Dacca in order to join 
Siraj-ud-daula at Murshidabad. On the way he heard of the battle and of the death of the Nawab, but not relying on the 
report, pushed on to the mouth of the Bhagirathi, where the news was confirmed, and he also learned that M. Law, the 
chief of the French Factory at Cossimbazaar, who had come down from Patna to join the Nawab, but had not been in 
time to do so, was being pursued by the English. He accordingly turned northwards (though at the time it was 
supposed that he had taken refuge “ in the east of the Province of Dacca, in the kingdom of Assam which borders on 
Cochin China” [Hill. Bengal in 175 6 - 57 ) Vol. Ill, p. 262]), and proceeded to Dinajpur, where the Raja attempted to 
oppose his passage up the Atrai, at that time the main channel of the Teesta. Having however made the passage 
in spite of the Raja, M. Courtin proceeded up the river, intending as he says to take refuge in the mountains of Tibet, 
and advanced to within two or three days’ journey from the foot of the Hills. But his boatmen objecting and beginning 
to desert, he accepted an offer from the Raja of Sahibganj, in Kuch Behar, to give him a site for a fort, which he built 
on the side of a creek flowing into the Teesta about 15 miles south of Jalpaiguri. The fort was triangular, with a 
bastion at each angle, on elevated ground, protected 011 one side by a marsh. Two Swedish guns were mounted on the 
ramparts. The fort was named ‘ Fort Bourgogne ’ and took rather more than a month to build. Before it was quite 
finished, M. Courtin received news of the arrival of a French force at the mouth of the Hughly, and of an 
insurrection against Mir Jafar, and determined to return. After considerable difficulty in extricating his boats from the 
marsh, the creek having almost dried up, and to add to his misfortunes, an outbreak of sickness among his men, 
he left the fort in the middle of December 1757. Not long afterwards, while still in the Rangpur district, he heard that 
the rumours of succour by the French were unfounded, but as the river was too low for him to return to his fort, he re- 
mained where he was, and was attacked in the middle of January 1 7 5 8 by Kasim Ali Khan, the Faujdar or Military 
Governor of Rangpur. Having entrenched himself on the bank of the river (this is the small entrenchment 
referred to in the text), he held out till the beginning of February, when he was compelled to abandon his position, and 
started again down the river closely pursued by the enemy. At the same time he wrote to M r . Scrafton, the Resident at 
Murshidabad, whom he had befriended at Dacca, offering to surrender. After many adventures, constantly harassed 
by the enemy, and having bad to abandon all his boats, he reached Dinajpur. Here he remained, in considerable peril 
on account of the timidity of the Raja, who would he feared deliver him to the B'aujdar of Rangpur, until the beginning 
of March, when orders were received from Lord Clive that he should be sent to Murshidabad. He arrived there on the 
12 th March, not without further adventures, and after some time his boats and so much of his goods as could be 
recovered were restored to him by the English. He subsequently went to Chandernagore, whence he wrote to Lord Clive 
in 1759 protesting against the proposed demolition of that place, and from thence to Pondicherry, and was present at the 
capitulation of that place by Lally in January 1761 He afterwards returned to France, and. it is supposed, was elected 
to the Conseil des Indes in that country. 
1 hese particulars are taken from a letter from M. Courtin to his wife, quoted at p. 137 of M r . S. C. Hill’s work, 
three Frenchmen in Bengal, or the Commercial Ruin of the French Settlements in 1757 ’’ — London, 1903. 
■* Boda, one of the six chaklas or divisions of the old Province of Rangpur, part of the Zemindari of the Raja of 
Kuch Behar. 
[167 j 
