The next day, in the fine curtain of rain, a squad of British soldiers took advantage of the overcast skies and slipped into the innermost layer of the "Pa" through a breach blasted open by a cannon.
The defending Mysore soldiers hastily fled through the tunnels, but the man left to ignite the gunpowder kegs took out a flint and struck three times. However, the sparks were all extinguished by the rainwater blown in by the wind.
Two British soldiers appeared at the entrance to the tower, raising their Brown Bess flintlock guns at him.
An hour later, the Marquess of Wellesley looked at the seven or eight corpses soaked in the rain, his expression somber. It had taken him a full 14 days to finally break through this crude fortress, and the Mysoreans had lost less than 30 men.
He glanced at the 200 or so flintlock guns piled up not far away, and a 4-pound cannon, and just as he was about to return to his tent, he suddenly paused.
He turned to the officer in charge of organizing the loot and asked, "Why don't I see the enemy's gunpowder and cannonballs?"
The officer hurriedly pointed to about a dozen small wooden boxes under the tree: "Over there, Lieutenant Colonel."
Wellesley came from a military family and, though young, already held the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.
He said with some surprise, "That's it?"
"Yes, Lieutenant Colonel. Actually, this is the first time we have captured their weapons. Previously, they would detonate the gunpowder when they retreated."
Wellesley stood in the rain, squinting his eyes. This ammunition was only enough for the soldiers defending the fortress to last another 10 days. That meant they had only prepared ammunition for a little over 20 days from the start.
He wiped the rainwater off his face and looked towards the narrow tower at the top of the "Pa", then suddenly the corners of his mouth curled upward. He turned to Cornwallis beside him and said, "I think I've discovered its weakness."
About forty to fifty Hyderabad soldiers, in a very loose formation and trembling with fear, advanced toward the "Pa" on the dirt mound ahead.
Soon, gunfire erupted from inside the "Pa", and one Hyderabad soldier had half his head torn off by a musket ball right there on the spot.
The others were shocked and instinctively wanted to flee, but as they turned, they saw hundreds of British soldiers in red uniforms aiming their guns this way.
They tensed up immediately, recalling the scene where dozens who had fled back in the morning were shot on the spot. They hurriedly turned back and looked for cover, then gritted their teeth and returned fire.
The British commander had ordered them to launch an aggressive attack for one hour, after which they could retreat and be replaced by another group.
However, it took less than half an hour for these few dozen to be killed by the Mysore soldiers.
The British officer in the distance put down his telescope, turned to Wellesley, and saw the latter nod. He immediately shouted at a small squad of Maratha soldiers nearby, "It's your turn! Go take down that fortress!"
The Marathas, driven by the British soldiers, moved toward the "Pa" with pale faces.
"Are you sure this is effective?" Cornwallis asked Wellesley, watching the Indian soldiers fall one after another, "It seems we've gained nothing but heavy casualties."
"Just watch patiently," Wellesley replied calmly, "If I'm not mistaken, we will take down this fortress before nightfall."
Nearly 50 Maratha soldiers were soon killed, and another batch of British auxiliary forces were forced to charge. They began to use the bodies of the previous group as cover. However, they lasted only about 40 minutes before the next group had to step in...
After 5 p.m., Cornwallis looked at the bodies strewn around the "Pa," roughly estimating that there must have been more than ten squads of Indian soldiers who died there, at least 600 men.
Just as he was about to say something more to Wellesley, he unexpectedly found that the fortifications of Mysore had quieted down.
"Alright, it seems my judgment was correct." A smile appeared on Wellesley's face as he said to the officer beside him, "Let our men go up."
"Yes, Lieutenant Colonel!"
Subsequently, nearly a thousand British "Lobster Soldiers" surrounded that "Pa," yet they encountered only sporadic resistance.
The British methodically blew up several layers of walls with gunpowder, driving the Mysore soldiers into the tunnels.
Then the retreating defenders detonated their barrels of gunpowder, toppling a large portion of the tower atop the "Pa."
By the fading light of the sunset, Cornwallis saw the British flag planted atop the fortress that had troubled him for half a year. He was shocked and turned to Wellesley, "How did you do it? You took this thing in just one day!"
"Ammunition reserves," the Marquess of Wellesley replied indifferently, pointing to the tower on top of the "Pa," "The main body of this fortress has three layers of walls, and only the middle one could be used to store ammunition.
"Based on its narrow dimensions, I estimated that after a portion of the space was taken up by food and water, they could store a maximum of 300 cannonballs and just over 15,000 flintlock gun rounds, along with the corresponding gunpowder.
"So, I had men attack in waves. Under relentless pressure, the people of Mysore would overlook their ammunition reserves, oh, and sustained shooting would also greatly reduce their accuracy.
"Finally, when they had used up all their ammunition, our soldiers rushed in. Just like that."
In reality, he was omitting a detail. That was the fact that the Mysore soldiers, after killing numerous enemies, would enter an extremely excited, bloodthirsty state, blindly firing away, utterly neglecting tactical considerations.
Cornwallis stood there dumbfounded as he listened to the young officer calmly describe the tactic of "using human lives to deplete the enemy's ammunition"—it turned out that his own previous efforts to reduce casualties and value the lives of his soldiers had also given the enemy time to rest and arrange their tactics.
Indeed, relentless pressure was the best tactic against the Mysoreans, who had a low level of military discipline!
"But," he thought of another issue, "Although we have quickly breached this fortress, the casualties seem too high..."
That day's assault cost them at least 600 lives. By that count, they would pay with twenty to thirty thousand lives to deal with all of Mangalore's fortresses!
"They are just Indian natives," Wellesley dismissed with a wave of his hand, "Their population is vast, this is nothing."
As he was speaking, he saw the Hyderabad Army's commander approaching with a dark face, and yet he continued to speak to Cornwallis as if nothing were amiss:
"Moreover, my goal is not to take down Mangalore. It's only necessary to show Tipu that we can quickly breach his fortresses."
The Hyderabadi officer came up to the two of them and, without any pleasantries, bellowed loudly:
"You cannot let my soldiers die , nearly 400 have perished today alone!"
The Marquess of Wellesley looked at him with a smile and said:
"Dying in battle is a soldier's duty. There will be many more such assaults, you had better get used to it quickly."