Flashman and the Mountain of Light

APPENDIX I: The Sutlej Crisis

The origins of the First Sikh War are not to be summed up in a few paragraphs. Flashman has given a reasonably fair account of the developing crisis, from close range, and perhaps all that can usefully be done is to stand farther back and try to balance some of the factors which seem specially important.

It is easy to say that with a powerful, arrogant Khalsa bent on invasion, war was inevitable; no one in the Punjab could restrain them (or wanted to), so what could the British do but prepare to meet the storm? Something, according to Cunningham, a most respected historian, who believed that, while the Khalsa took the initiative, the British were "mainly to blame" for the war. His conclusion has been eagerly seized on in some quarters, but his argument boils down to the suggestion that Britain, "an intelligent power" faced with "a half barbarous military dominion", should have acted with more wisdom and foresight. It is rather lofty, even for 1849, and perhaps "equally" or "partially" would be fairer than "mainly" At the same time, George Bruce is certainly right when he accuses Hardinge of mental paralysis, and of making no rational move to prevent war; he points to the massive failure of communication. Still, considering the state of the Lahore durbar, and the motives at work among its principals, perhaps Britain should not be shouldered with too much of the responsibility.

Granted that Broadfoot was not the ideal man for the sensitive post of North-west Agent. Like many Britons, he obviously felt that the sooner Britain was running the Punjab, the better—but then, considering what had been happening north of the Sutlej for years, can he be blamed for that? There is a tendency to cast him as the villain of the piece, and certainly he was belligerently ready to make the worst of the situation, but so were many on the other side. Jeendan and her associates wanted the Khalsa destroyed, and the Khalsa was ready to rush to destruction—it would have taken an Agent of massive forbearance, and a Governor-General of genius, which Hardinge certainly was not, to settle matters peacefully. The impression one gets of the British peace lobby, as personified by Hardinge, is that they wished the Punjab would go away—or rather that it would settle down into the strong, disciplined stability it had known under Runjeet Singh. But Hardinge had no idea of how that was to be achieved.

On the Sikh side, one can understand their apprehension. Below the Sutlej, they were well aware, was a giant who had shown an alarming tendency to conquest—Sind was a recent, appalling example. The Sikh who did not take seriously the possibility that Britain was bent on swallowing the Punjab, would have been a fool; if he was objective, he would see the logic of it. That the Company had neither the power nor the inclination for farther expansion (for the moment, anyway) would not be evident in Lahore. And the Khalsa? Bellicose, and itching for a slap at the reigning champion as they were, they had some reason to suspect that if they didn't start the fight, Britain would.

These are very general observations, and to every one of them can be added the qualification "Yes, but …" One may scan Broadfoot's correspondence, or the provocations offered from the Sikh side, in detail, but weighing all such things as evenly as one can, it seems that the war happened because it was actively desired by the Khalsa, with Jeendan and others egging them on for deplorable reasons, while on the British side there were some, including Hardinge, who lacked foresight and flexibility, and others who were ready, with varying degrees of eagerness, to let it happen. It should be remembered, too, that the fighting men on either side underestimated each other; for all their fears, the British, with far greater experience, had a deep conviction of invincibility, and while it was rudely shaken in the field, it was justified in the end. The Khalsa seem to have had no doubts at all, and even with the treachery of their leaders stacked against them, they kept their confidence until the last moments of Sobraon.

Even then, after the peace, with the Punjab a British protectorate, the spirit of the Khalsa remained: they would come again. The fuel was there, in the British presence at Lahore which began by protecting the position of the Punjab's nominal rulers and ended by assuming power; in the intrigues of Jeendan and Lal Singh who found the new order of things less rewarding than they had expected (both were eventually exiled); but most of all, perhaps, in the abiding belief of the Sikh soldiery that what they had nearly done once could be done at the second attempt. The result was the Second Sikh War of 1848-9, which ended in complete British victory—Gough, hesitant for once, fought a costly action at Chillianwalla, and was about to be replaced, but before his successor arrived he had won the decisive victory at Gujerat. The Punjab was annexed, Dalip Singh was deposed, and as Gardner had foretold, Britain inherited something infinitely more valuable than the Punjab or the Koh-i-Noor—those magnificent regiments whose valour and loyalty became a byword for a hundred years, from the Great Mutiny to Meiktila and the Rangoon road.