The ignited bags of gunpowder drove the enemy out from their lair to be promptly bayoneted. One soldier, using butt and bayonet and shouting "Revenge for Hodson!", killed more than half of them single-handed. In another doorway Lieutenant MacBean, Adjutant of the Ninety-Third, a soldier who rose from the ranks to die a Major-General, encountered eleven sepoys and killed them all with his claymore, one after the other. With the advent of night opposition for the most part ceased, although numbers of rebels were still in hiding in the dark rooms. The troops bivouacked in the courts of the palace under cover of strong guards. Horrible spectacles were presented with the daylight of the 12th. Hundreds of bodies lay about smouldering in the cotton clothing which had caught fire from the exploding bags of gunpowder, and the stench of burning flesh was sickening. During the morning the camp-followers dragged the corpses into the deep ditch which had been found so difficult to cross on the previous day. The Begum's palace was recognised to be the key to the enemy's position, and our heavy guns were promptly advanced for the object of breaching the Imambara, which was the only building of magnitude intervening between the Begum's palace and the Kaiserbagh.
From the early morning of the 11th Sir Colin had been at the front superintending the preparations for the assault of the Begum Kotee. But before that enterprise was ripe he was reluctantly summoned from the scene of action to receive a visit from Jung Bahadoor, who had just arrived at the Dilkoosha with the Nepaulese army after an interminable series of delays. In the midst of the formal durbar there occurred a striking scene. Captain Hope Johnstone, aide-de-camp to General Mansfield, covered with powder-smoke and the dust of battle, strode up to the Chief with the welcome tidings that the Begum Kotee had been taken. Thereupon Sir Colin, to whom ceremonial was detestable, seized the occasion to bring the durbar to a close, and after announcing the news to his guest hurried to the front. Next day the Nepaulese troops came up into position holding the line of the canal between Banks' house and the Charbagh bridge, thus covering the left of the main attack. On the right the Shah Nujeef had been occupied on the evening of the 11th, on a parallel front with the position in the Begum Kotee.