The Battle of Chinsurah, also known as the Battle of Biderra or the Battle of Hoogly, was a military engagement which took place on 25 November 1759 near Chinsurah (then a Dutch outpost) during the Seven Years' War. It took place between a force of British troops mainly of the British East India Company and a force of the Dutch East India Company which had been invited by the Nawab of Bengal Mir Jafar to help him expel the British and establish themselves as the leading commercial company in Bengal.
Despite the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Dutch Republic not formally being at war, the Dutch advanced up the Hooghly River. They met a mixed force of British and Indian troops at Chinsurah, fifty kilometres outside Calcutta. The British, under Colonel Francis Forde, defeated the Dutch, forcing them to withdraw. The British engaged and defeated the ships the Dutch used to deliver the troops in a separate naval battle on 24 November.
Background
Following the British capture and demolition of the French outpost at Chandernagore in 1757, Mir Jafar, the Nawab of Bengal, opened secret negotiations with representatives of the Dutch East India Company to bring troops into Dutch holdings in the area with the goal of using them against the British. Britain and the Dutch Republic were at peace, although tensions were high due to the Seven Years' War, and British East India Company administrator Robert Clive was preoccupied with fighting the French. The Dutch directors of the outpost at Chinsurah, not far from Chandernagore, seeing an opportunity to expand their influence, agreed to send additional troops to Chinsurah. A fleet of seven ships, containing more than fifteen hundred European and Malay troops, came from Batavia and arrived at the mouth of the Hooghly River in October 1759, while the Nawab was meeting with Clive in Calcutta.
The Nawab had been forced to ask the British for assistance against threats on his northern border in the interim, and told Clive that he would return to Hooghly, summon the Dutch directors, and demand the departure of their ships. After meeting with the Dutch, he informed Clive that he had granted the Dutch some privileges, and that they would leave as soon as circumstances permitted. This news, combined with reports that the Dutch were recruiting in and around Chinsurah, led Clive to treat the situation as a real military threat.
Of four ships he had available, Clive sent one out in an attempt to request assistance from Admiral Cornish, who was patrolling the coast. The Dutch captured this ship when they seized several smaller British vessels on the Hooghly River. Clive called out the militia and put out calls for volunteers, increased the fortifications on the river batteries, and sent Colonel Francis Forde with five hundred men toward Chandernagore with an eye toward capturing the Dutch outpost at Baranagore and intercepting the Dutch should they try to take Chandernagore. The Dutch landed their troops on the northern shore of the Hooghly on 21 November, just beyond the range of the British river batteries, and marched for Chinsurah.
Battle
The three remaining British ships had followed the Dutch ships up the river at some distance. When the Dutch had finished landing the troops, the Dutch ships began moving down the river. On 23 November, Commodore Charles Wilson, commander of the British flotilla, indicated that he wanted to pass the Dutch, who threatened to fire on the British if they did. The next day, after the rejection of an ultimatum from Clive demanding restitution for the earlier Dutch seizures, the two fleets engaged. In a two-hour battle, the Duke of Dorset forced the Dutch flagship Vlissingen to strike her colours, while Hardwicke and Calcutta chased off two ships and grounded a third before the remaining ships also struck their colours. (Other British ships arriving at the mouth of the river eventually captured the two remaining fleeing Dutch ships.)