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A court of inquiry was held on Tuesday October 30 and continued its sittings till Sunday November 4.
The story of this plot is as follows: For some little time Hyder Ali Khan, the "Nawaub" as he pleased to call himself, had lived in the Pettah at [[Bangalore]]. He appeared to be well supplied with money, and exercised not a little hospitality; his main endeavour being at first to attract to his house as many sepoys and native officers of the Company's service as he could, particularly those of the Native Horse Artillery. He had also entered into communication with, and enlisted in his design, a goodly number of disbanded troopers and discharged sepoys who had formerly been in the service of the Rajah of [[Mysore]]. Some two or three hundred Pindarees, too, were prepared to join when the signal of revolt was given. It happened, too, that certain details of light cavalry had left Bangalore for Mysore on the 25th under the command of a [[Subadar-Major]]. Arrangements had been made to intercept this force, and with the aid of certain mutineers who belonged to it, to murder the officers if true to their salt, and then to return and join their comrades at Bangalore. If the subadar chose to throw in his lot with the mutineers, all the better. The [[Mughal_Empire#Vakil|Vakeel]] of the [[Coorg]] Rajah also had promised 12,000 horse and 7000 foot soldiers to be at Bangalore by daybreak on the 29th, provided he received news that the mutiny had really taken place.
By means of a clever ruse, a [[havildar]] favourable to the conspiracy had been appointed on the Mysore gate at [[Bangalore]] for that night, and his task was to open it and admit the mutineers. How this appointment was managed is worth relating. It appears that his brother, also a mutineer, met the havildar major coming out of the Adjutant's quarters. To the havildar major he presented a couple of silk handkerchiefs which had been provided for the purpose by the "Nawaub". The handkerchiefs were accepted and the traitor then proceeded to ask a favour. "As my child's ear is diseased," said he, "and the doctors tell me that the blood of swallows is good for it, if you will put my brother on the Mysore gate he will be able to get some for me." The petition was granted, and Shaik Ismael, havildar in the 9th Native Infantry, was duly posted on the gate. The mutineers divided themselves into three groups. The first was to be admitted through the Mysore gate, where the arsenal and magazine were to be seized and arms distributed, the European guard having been killed. Next the European Main guard was to share the same fate, after which the garden of the general commanding the district (Major-General Hawker) was to be surrounded, and that officer murdered. A gun was then to be fired from the ramparts, and a green flag displayed. This gun was to be a signal for the other two parties of mutineers to get to their allotted work, and to warn the Native Horse Artillery as well that their time for action had arrived.
