In the nineteenth century, the British owned, East India Company, was a huge export enterprise in need of local soldiers to help protect its interests. These local men were called 'sepoys'. The Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 happened when the natives turned against the foreign officers in charge of them, due to a variety of grievances.

Although the East India Company started just as a trading business, it expanded greatly and ended up controlling a extremely large area of India. This lead to tensions, as areas were taken over unjustly, the Indian people were dealt with very badly and charged extortionate taxes. Laws were also introduced making some traditional practices illegal, and the influx of lots of British missionaries at this time, suggested that they were trying to convert the Indians to Christianity.

Resentments against the East India Company led to soldiers feeling like their commanding British officers were on another side to them. They believed that those in command were out of touch with their concerns. These problems inevitably led to a lack of respect. When a new type of cartridge was introduced, many natives were very upset. These were coated in animal fat from cows and pigs and the men were required to bite off the top of them in order to load their rifles. This was a huge problem for Hindus and Muslims who are not allowed to consume these animals.

Soldiers who refused to put cartridges in their mouths were punished in a variety of ways. Mangal Pandey, thought of as a hero in India, is commonly believed to have begun the uprising, when he shot a British lieutenant and sergeant-major because some of his comrades were going to be punished. More and more revolts followed this action, particularly in north India.

There were terrible eruptions of violence in Delhi, resulting in the deaths of many British people, when a revolt in nearby Meerut spread there. In Meerut, soldiers refusing to put cartridges in their mouths were chained up. Other employees, as a consequence, went on a rampage attacking officers as well as innocent civilians, including women and children.

In Cawnpore, now known as Kanpur, some officers surrendered and tried to leave the area along with many civilians. Uprisers attacked and killed the men, and took over two hundred women and children prisoner. The local leader asked butchers to kill the captives and throw them into a well.

When officers managed to catch members of the mob, they were executed. One particularly horrible way in which they did this was by firing live men from cannons. Other soldiers were expected to watch and heed the warning. Britons were aided from reinforcements from England, and the loyalty of the Sikhs (who largely disliked the Muslims)in the south, enabling them to eventually quell the uprising.

The government back in London, dissolved the East India Company, at the end of the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857. The government then took control of India, which was ruled by Britain for a long time. Pandey, who started the revolt, is regarded as beginning the fight for Indian independence, however.