diff --git a/core/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngine.java b/core/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngine.java
index 8330da04682..833eb92463a 100644
--- a/core/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngine.java
+++ b/core/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngine.java
@@ -411,8 +411,7 @@ public class InternalEngine extends Engine {
      * Inspects exception thrown when executing index or delete operations
      *
      * @return failure if the failure is a document specific failure (e.g. analysis chain failure)
-     * @throws ElasticsearchException if the failure caused the engine to fail
-     * (e.g. out of disk, lucene tragic event)
+     * or throws Exception if the failure caused the engine to fail (e.g. out of disk, lucene tragic event)
      *
      * Note: pkg-private for testing
      */
@@ -435,12 +434,16 @@ public class InternalEngine extends Engine {
         if (isDocumentFailure) {
             return failure;
         } else {
-            ElasticsearchException exception = new ElasticsearchException(failure);
-            exception.setShard(shardId);
-            throw exception;
+            rethrow(failure);
+            return null;
         }
     }
 
+    @SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
+    static <T extends Throwable> void rethrow(Throwable t) throws T {
+        throw (T) t;
+    }
+
     private boolean canOptimizeAddDocument(Index index) {
         if (index.getAutoGeneratedIdTimestamp() != IndexRequest.UNSET_AUTO_GENERATED_TIMESTAMP) {
             assert index.getAutoGeneratedIdTimestamp() >= 0 : "autoGeneratedIdTimestamp must be positive but was: "
diff --git a/core/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngineTests.java b/core/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngineTests.java
index be4b7bbdefe..bb2b7fe3aed 100644
--- a/core/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngineTests.java
+++ b/core/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/index/engine/InternalEngineTests.java
@@ -2153,9 +2153,8 @@ public class InternalEngineTests extends ESTestCase {
         try {
             engine.checkIfDocumentFailureOrThrow(new Engine.Index(newUid("1"), doc), new CorruptIndexException("simulated environment failure", ""));
             fail("expected exception to be thrown");
-        } catch (ElasticsearchException envirnomentException) {
-            assertThat(envirnomentException.getShardId(), equalTo(engine.shardId));
-            assertThat(envirnomentException.getCause().getMessage(), containsString("simulated environment failure"));
+        } catch (Exception envirnomentException) {
+            assertThat(envirnomentException.getMessage(), containsString("simulated environment failure"));
         }
     }