{"id":13460,"date":"2015-01-19T22:08:17","date_gmt":"2015-01-19T21:08:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/?p=13460"},"modified":"2019-01-01T19:24:28","modified_gmt":"2019-01-01T18:24:28","slug":"afghanistan-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/?p=13460","title":{"rendered":"Afghanistan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Battle Honour on The Royal Green Jackets Cap Badge<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Second Anglo\u2013Afghan War (Pashto: \u062f \u0627\u0641\u063a\u0627\u0646-\u0627\u0646\u06ab\u0631\u06d0\u0632 \u062f\u0648\u064a\u0645\u0647 \u062c\u06ab\u0693\u0647) was fought between the United Kingdom and the Emirate of Afghanistan from the year 1878 to 1880, when the latter was ruled by Sher Ali Khan of the Barakzai dynasty, the son of former Emir Dost Mohammad Khan. This was the second time British India invaded Afghanistan. The war ended after the British emerged victorious against the Afghan rebels and the Afghans agreed to let the British attain all of their geopolitical objectives from the Treaty of Gandamak. Most of the British and Indian soldiers withdrew from Afghanistan. The Afghans were permitted to maintain internal sovereignty but they had to cede control of their nation’s foreign relations to the British.<\/p>\n

Background<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Afghanistan\"<\/a>After tension between Russia and Britain in Europe ended with the June 1878 Congress of Berlin, Russia turned its attention to Central Asia. That same summer, Russia sent an uninvited diplomatic mission to Kabul. Sher Ali Khan, the Amir of Afghanistan, tried unsuccessfully to keep them out. Russian envoys arrived in Kabul on the 22nd of July 1878, and on the 14th of August, the British demanded that Sher Ali accept a British mission too.<\/p>\n

The Amir not only refused to receive a British mission under Neville Bowles Chamberlain, but threatened to stop it if it were dispatched. Lord Lytton, the viceroy, ordered a diplomatic mission to set out for Kabul in September 1878 but the mission was turned back as it approached the eastern entrance of the Khyber Pass, triggering the Second Anglo\u2013Afghan War.<\/p>\n

First phase<\/strong><\/p>\n

A British force of about 40,000 fighting men, mostly British and Indians, was distributed into military columns which penetrated Afghanistan at three different points. An alarmed Sher Ali attempted to appeal in person to the Russian Tsar for assistance, but unable to do so, he returned to Mazari Sharif, where he died on the21st of February 1879.<\/p>\n

Treaty<\/strong><\/p>\n

With British forces occupying much of the country, Sher Ali’s son and successor, Mohammad Yaqub Khan, signed the Treaty of Gandamak in the May of 1879 to prevent a British invasion of the rest of the country. According to this agreement and in return for an annual subsidy and vague assurances of assistance in case of foreign aggression, Yaqub relinquished control of Afghan foreign affairs to Britain. British representatives were installed in Kabul and other locations, British control was extended to the Khyber and Michni passes, and Afghanistan ceded various North-West Frontier Province areas and Quetta to Britain. The British Army then withdrew.<\/p>\n

However, on the 3rd of September 1879 an uprising in Kabul led to the slaughter of Sir Louis Cavagnari, the British representative, along with his guards, and staff \u2013 provoking the next phase of the Second Afghan War.<\/p>\n

Second phase<\/strong><\/p>\n

Major General Sir Frederick Roberts led the Kabul Field Force over the Shutargardan Pass into central Afghanistan, defeated the Afghan Army at Char Asiab on the 6th of October 1879, and occupied Kabul two days later. Ghazi Mohammad Jan Khan Wardak, and a force of 10,000 Afghans, staged an uprising and attacked British forces near Kabul in the Siege of the Sherpur Cantonment in the December of 1879. Despite besieging the British garrison there, he failed to maintain the Siege of Sherpur, instead shifting focus to Roberts’ force, and this resulted in the collapse of this rebellion. Yaqub Khan, suspected of complicity in the massacre of Cavagnari and his staff, was obliged to abdicate. The British considered a number of possible political settlements, including partitioning Afghanistan between multiple rulers or placing Yaqub’s brother Ayub Khan on the throne, but ultimately decided to install his cousin Abdur Rahman Khan as emir instead<\/p>\n

Ayub Khan, who had been serving as governor of Herat, rose in revolt, defeated a British detachment at the Battle of Maiwand in July 1880 and besieged Kandahar. Roberts then led the main British force from Kabul and decisively defeated Ayub Khan on the 1st of September at the Battle of Kandahar, bringing his rebellion to an end. Abdur Rahman had confirmed the Treaty of Gandamak, leaving the British in control of the territories ceded by Yaqub Khan and ensuring British control of Afghanistan’s foreign policy in exchange for protection and a subsidy.<\/p>\n

Abandoning the provocative policy of maintaining a British resident in Kabul, but having achieved all their other objectives, the British withdrew.<\/p>\n

Captured British and Indian soldiers<\/strong><\/p>\n

The British officer John Masters recorded in his autobiography that Afghan women in the North-West Frontier Province of British India during the Second Anglo-Afghan War would castrate non-Muslim soldiers who were captured, like British and Sikhs. They also used an execution method involving urine; Pathan women urinated into prisoner’s mouths. Captured British soldiers were spread out and fastened with restraints to the ground, then a stick, or a piece of wood was used to keep their mouth open to prevent swallowing. Pathan women then squatted and urinated directly into the mouth of the man until he drowned in the urine, taking turns one at a time.<\/p>\n

Timeline of battles<\/strong><\/p>\n

There were several decisive actions in the Second Anglo\u2013Afghan War, from 1878 to 1880. Here are the battles and actions in chronological order. An asterisk (*) indicates a clasp was awarded for that particular battle with the Afghanistan Medal.<\/p>\n

1878<\/strong>
\nBattle of Ali Masjid* (British victory)
\nBattle of Peiwar Kotal* (British victory)<\/p>\n

1879<\/strong><\/p>\n

Action at Takht-i-Pul (British victory)
\nAction at Matun (British victory)
\nBattle of Khushk-i-Nakud (British victory)
\nBattle of Fatehabad (British victory)
\nBattle of Kam Dakka (Afghan victory)
\nBattle of Charasiab* (British victory)
\nBattle of Shajui
\nBattle of Karez Mir
\nBattle of Takht-i-Shah
\nBattle of Asmai Heights* (Afghan victory)
\nSiege of Sherpur* (British victory)<\/p>\n

1880<\/strong><\/p>\n

Battle of Ahmed Khel* (British victory)
\nBattle of Arzu
\nSecond Battle of Charasiab
\nBattle of Maiwand (Afghan victory)
\nBattle of Deh Koja (Afghan Victory)
\nBattle of Kandahar* (British victory)<\/p>\n

1881<\/strong><\/p>\n

Kandahar (and Afghanistan) Evacuation
\nOrder of battle
\nPeshawar Valley Field Force Lieutenant General Sir Samuel Browne
\nCavalry Brigade Brigadier General C. J. S. Gough
\n10th Hussars (2 Sqdns)
\n11th Probyn’s Lancers
\nGuides Cavalry
\nRoyal Artillery
\nFirst Infantry Brigade Brigadier General H. T. Macpherson
\n4th Battalion Rifle Brigade
\n20th Brownlow’s Punjabis
\n4th Gurkha Rifles
\nSecond Infantry Brigade Brigadier General J. A. Tytler
\n1st Battalion Leicestershire Regiment
\nQueen’s Own Corps of Guides (infantry component)
\n51st Sikhs
\nThird Infantry Brigade Brigadier General F. Appleyard
\n81st North Lancashire Regiment
\n14th Sikhs
\n27th Punjabis
\nFourth Infantry Brigade Brigadier General W. Browne
\n51st King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry
\n6th Jat Light Infantry
\n45th Sikhs
\nKurram Valley Field Force Major General Roberts
\nCavalry Brigade Brigadier General Hugh Gough
\n10th Hussars (1 sqdn)
\n12th Cavalry
\n25th Cavalry
\nRoyal Artillery Colonel A. H. Lindsay
\nFirst Infantry Brigade Brigadier General A. H. Cobbe
\n2nd Battalion, 8th Foot
\n23rd Pioneers
\n29th Punjabis
\n58th Vaughn’s Rifles
\nSecond Infantry Brigade Brigadier General J. B. Thelwell
\n72nd Seaforth Highlanders
\n21st Punjabis
\n56th Rifles
\n5th Gurkha Rifles
\nKandahar Field Force
\nFirst Division Lieutenant General Donald Stewart
\nCavalry Brigade Brigadier General Walter Fane
\n15th Hussars
\n8th Cavalry
\n19th Fane’s Lancers
\nRoyal Artillery Brigadier General C. G. Arbuthnot
\nFirst Infantry Brigade Brigadier General R. Barter
\n2nd Battalion King’s Royal Rifles
\n15th Sikhs
\n25th Punjabis
\nSecond Infantry Brigade Brigadier General W. Hughes
\n59th East Lancashire Regiment
\n12th Kelat-i-Ghilzai Regiment
\n1st Gurkha Rifles
\n3rd Gurkha Rifles
\n2nd Division Major General M A Biddulph
\nCavalry Brigade Brigadier General C. H. Palliser
\n21st Daly’s Horse
\n22nd Sam Browne’s Horse
\n35th Scinde Horse
\nArtillery Colonel Le Mesurier
\nFirst Infantry Brigade Brigadier General R. Lacy
\n70th East Surrey Regiment
\n19th Punjabis
\n127th Baluchis
\nSecond Infantry Brigade Brigadier General Nuttall
\n26th Punjabis
\n32nd Pioneers
\n55th Coke’s Rifles
\n129th Baluchis<\/p>\n

Sourced from Wikipedia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Second Anglo\u2013Afghan War (Pashto: \u062f \u0627\u0641\u063a\u0627\u0646-\u0627\u0646\u06ab\u0631\u06d0\u0632 \u062f\u0648\u064a\u0645\u0647 \u062c\u06ab\u0693\u0647) was fought between the United Kingdom and the Emirate of Afghanistan from the year 1878 to 1880, when the latter was ruled by Sher Ali Khan of the Barakzai dynasty, the son of former Emir Dost Mohammad Khan. This was the second time British India invaded Afghanistan. The war ended after the British emerged victorious against the Afghan rebels and the Afghans agreed to let the British attain all of their geopolitical objectives from the Treaty of Gandamak. Most of the British and Indian soldiers withdrew from Afghanistan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1259,1236,25,17,26,50],"class_list":["post-13460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","tag-afghanistan","tag-battle-honour","tag-krrc","tag-memorial-at-peninsula","tag-rifle-brigade","tag-royal-green-jackets","category-6-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13460\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.memorialatpeninsula.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}