God's Terrorists

by Charles Allen

  It was not until the morning of 22 October that a small force of mixed cavalry and infantry was sent forward to reconnoitre the Chamla valley. At first it appeared deserted, and the scouting party was able to push on down the valley for eleven miles before turning back. But it then had to fight its way back to camp, and was saved only by a moonlight cavalry charge. That same night a letter was brought into camp by one of Reynell Taylor’s spies: it was addressed to the Buner chiefs and signed jointly by Amir Abdullah Ali, leader of the Hindustani Fanatics, and Sayyed Umar Shah, leader of the Sayyeds. Although it appeared to anticipate Reynell Taylor’s proclamation, it had in fact been written in response to it:

  The evil-doing infidels will plunder and devastate the whole of the hilly tract – especially the provinces of Chumla, Bonair, Swat etc. – and annex these countries to their dominions, and then our religion and our worldly possessions would entirely be subverted . . . The infidels are extremely deceitful and treacherous, and will, by whatever means they can, come into these hills, and declare to the people of the country that they have no concerns with them, that their quarrel is with the Hindustanees, that they will not molest the people, even as much as touch a hair of their heads . . . They will also tempt the people with wealth. It is therefore proper for you not to give in to their deceit, for when they should get an opportunity, they will entirely ruin, torment, and put you to many injuries, appropriate for themselves your entire wealth and possessions, and injure your faith.

  Chamberlain’s delay had allowed the Hindustanis and their Sayyed allies to seize the initiative, giving them time to send their call out not only to the Bunerwals but to every khan and malik in the hills. The very next morning groups of armed tribesmen began to appear on the surrounding crests, coming from almost every quarter, each group headed by standard-bearers carrying green and black flags and supported by drummers. Among them were seen a large lashkar or war party of men whose distinctive black waistcoats and blue shirts identified them as Hindustanis. With every passing hour more tribesmen joined them, so when darkness came the mountains overlooking the Ambeyla gorge and the valley beyond were ringed with camp fires. It was now learned in Chamberlain’s headquarters that the Buner chiefs had met in jirga and had sent an appeal to the Akhund of Swat, calling on him to come to their aid.

  At this point Reynell Taylor still expected the Akhund, Abdul Ghaffur, to intervene in his favour, for as John Adye put it, ‘The influence of the Akhoond of Swat over all the hill and plain tribes of the Peshawur frontier is very great, and towards them he fills a position which I can best illustrate by comparing it with that of the Pope of Rome. If he declares against us, he will no doubt bring an immense amount of material as well as moral strength to the people of Bonair and the other tribes already in arms against us.’ But the Akhund was now facing his own internal challenge with the appearance of Sayyed Mubarak Shah, pretender to the title of Padshah of Swat, at the head of the Hindustanis. If he allowed the British invasion to proceed, he would lose all claim to moral authority as defender of Swat and hand the advantage to his rival.

  Three days later Reynell Taylor’s worst fears were realised when a beating of massed drums was heard and a forest of waving banners crested the northern skylines, accompanied by a host estimated at four thousand strong. They were Swatis and in their midst was the Akhund himself, who now made camp on the hills overlooking the village of Ambeyla. According to the Akhund’s grandson, the first Wali of Swat, his grandfather had set out for Ambeyla alone, but ‘the news that Saidu Baba [the Akhund] was going for jehad spread like fire and hundreds of people joined him on the way, with the result that when he reached the battlefield at Ambeyla on October 26, there were four thousand volunteers on foot and one hundred and twenty five on horseback with him.’

  Once it was known that their beloved Saidu Baba had lent his authority to the defence of Buner and Chamla, those who had previously wavered threw aside their scruples, seized their weapons and hurried over the passes to join in. By the end of October it was estimated that there were no fewer than fifty-five thousand fighting men gathered on the heights above Ambeyla, including ten thousand Swatis.

  Chamberlain’s only concern now was to prevent his position from being overwhelmed. His picquets on the slopes on the north and south sides of the Ambeyla Pass were most at risk, the one overlooked by the Guru mountain range, the other by a high conical peak known as Laloo. The land dropped from these two high points in a series of irregular steps that formed bluffs, of which the most prominent was a position on the north side that came to be known as the Eagle’s Nest, and a sharp-pointed knoll on the south that was named the Crag Picquet. On the night of 24 October Chamberlain’s troops launched the first of a series of attacks to prevent these two positions from being encroached upon. Owing to the broken nature of the ground it was impossible to build continuous defensive lines or trenches, but wherever possible sangars were thrown up, loop-holed stone breastworks protected where possible by sharp-pointed sticks.

  No sooner had these two strategic positions been secured than they were subjected to a succession of desperate assaults, with the Hindustanis almost invariably to be seen in the thick of the fighting. Thirty Hindustani dead were counted after the first attack, many of them young men of Bengali appearance. In the short truces that followed this and subsequent assaults it was observed that while the tribesmen came forward to collect their dead and wounded, the fallen Hindustanis were left untouched: ‘Their allies seemed to look upon the Hindustanis as earthen vessels, to be thrown at our heads in the day of battle, but of which it was quite superfluous to think of picking up the fragments if they happened to get broken in the fray.’

  Despite their superiority in weaponry, the defenders were unable to prevent the tribesmen from launching repeated attacks on the most vulnerable sectors of their perimeter. These were always preceded by heavy fire from concealed positions, which allowed assault parties to work their way forwards through the rocks and brushwood until they were massed before one section of the defences. The attackers would then rise from cover with cries of ‘Allah-ho akbar’ (‘God is great’), raise their standards and charge: ‘The bolder spirits of the mountaineers – men armed with short swords, and who had fully made up their minds to a hand-to-hand fight – then advancing rapidly and with great courage to the very foot of the work, and collecting under cover of the rocks, would pause for a while to regain their breath, and prepare for a final rush.’

  In an attack launched just before dawn on 30 October on the Crag Picquet a company of the 1st Punjab Infantry was overwhelmed and the position seized by the Hindustanis. At first light several hundred tribesmen to the rear could be seen moving down to join the Hindustanis, and a desperate counter-attack was launched: ‘A most exciting hand to hand fight ensued, in which Major Keyes was wounded, the enemy driven out at the point of the bayonet, the position recovered and three standards taken . . . The Hindustani fanatics lost 54 men killed on the spot, and 3 wounded.’ This was the first of three occasions in which the Crag Picquet changed hands.

  After a week of heavy fighting Neville Chamberlain sat down to write a despatch outlining the seriousness of his position:

  There is in fact a general combination of almost all the tribes, from the Indus to the boundary of Cabool, against us. Old animosities are, for the time, in abeyance; and under the influence of fanaticism, tribes usually hostile to each other are hastening to join the Akhoond’s standard. The Akhoond has hitherto been opposed to the Sitana Moulvie [Amir Abdullah Ali], who represents an exceptional set of Mahomedans; but at present the two are understood to be on friendly terms, and it is certain that the whole of the Hindoostanee colony are either at, or on their way to, Umbeyla . . . We are engaged in a contest in which not only are the Hindoostanees and the Mahabun tribes, but also the Swatees, the Bajourees, and the Indus tribes north of the Burrendo, with a large sprinkling of the discontented and restless spirits from within our own border.

  An advance on the Hi
ndustani stronghold of Malka was now out of the question, but so too was a retreat: ‘The only way to uphold the honour of our arms and the interests of the Government is to act on the defensive, in the position the force now holds, and trust to the effect of time, and of the discouragement which repeated unsuccessful attacks are likely to produce upon the enemy.’

  So stand and fight became the order of the day, and for the next three weeks Chamberlain’s army had to contend with repeated attacks by day and by night, with intermittent sniping in between. At many points along the perimeter the two sides were now so close that the men were able to exchange taunts and insults. ‘The enemy’, recorded Major Frederick ‘Bobs’ Roberts, one of half a dozen Mutiny VCs present at Ambeyla, ‘used to joke with Brownlow’s and Keyes’s men [20th and 1st Punjab Infantry, both Muslim regiments] and say on these occasions, “We don’t want you. Where are the men of the lal pagriwalas? [14th Sikhs, who wore red turbans] or the goralog [white people]? They are better shikar [sport]!”’ Soldiers in all the Punjab Frontier Force units present found themselves fighting against men from their own tribes, and in several instances against brothers and other relatives. After one engagement a sepoy from Buner recognised his father lying among the enemy dead in front of his position. Remarkably, there was not a single desertion.

  The first great crisis for Chamberlain and his troops began on 12 November as the Pathans made a new attempt to recapture the Crag, launching one attack after another throughout the night and the following morning. After forty-eight hours under constant fire the defenders of Crag Picquet broke and ran. In the confusion, sepoys manning sangars lower down the slope also panicked and joined in the retreat. Brigadier Neville Chamberlain was in the camp directly below but, because of the thick mists overhanging the mountainside and the clouds of black smoke from all the firing, was unable to tell what was going on. Alarmed by a stampede of camp-followers past his tent, he ran out and called for the 101st Royal Bengal Regiment. Quite fortuitously, this British regiment was about to take up new positions, and was already lined up before moving out. It was ordered to retake the Crag at all costs. The heights were stormed and the Crag reclaimed, but at such cost that a temporary truce was called to allow both sides to collect and bury their dead.

  Chamberlain’s positions on the slopes of Laloo on the south side of the pass had by now become extremely vulnerable. Reynell Taylor was anxious to make some gesture to the Bunerwals to show that the British had no designs on their territory, so on the night of 16–17 November all the troops on the heights of the Guru mountain range north of the pass were quietly withdrawn. This gesture went down well with the Bunerwals, who from this time onwards no longer played an active role in the fighting. But it failed to curb the fighting zeal of the Hindustanis. Interpreting the withdrawal as a sign of their enemy’s weakening resolve, they responded with a near-suicidal rush on the camp’s front breastworks in the valley itself, and were only repulsed after the fiercest hand-to-hand fighting. Shaken, Chamberlain despatched a blunt call for help to Montgomery: ‘I find it difficult to meet the enemy’s attacks . . . If you can give some fresh corps to relieve those most reduced in numbers and dash, the relieved corps can be sent to the plains and used in support. This is urgent.’

  A day later the Pathans and Hindustanis made their third and last attempt on the Crag Picquet. As before, they attacked in repeated waves and, as before, the two hundred men holding the picquet finally lost their nerve and abandoned the position. But this time the enemy’s capture of the Crag took place in broad daylight and was seen from every corner of the camp. Every field gun and rifle was brought to bear on the attackers, pinning the new occupiers down until a reserve corps could be brought up. Now it was the turn of the other British regiment present, the 71st Highland Light Infantry, to show its mettle.

  Despite being warned by Reynell Taylor to stay out of harm’s way, Neville Chamberlain chose to lead from the front: ‘The prospect of failure pressed upon the mind and he could stand it no longer.’ Both he and Taylor were at the head of the Highlanders as they retook the Crag at the point of the bayonet, and for his pains Chamberlain received a bullet in the arm, smashing the bones of his elbow. The surgeon who removed the bullet was his old friend Henry Bellew.

  In Lahore Sir Robert Montgomery received Chamberlain’s call for reinforcements with alarm. Not only did he have no troops to send but he had been warned by Major Hugh James in Peshawar that ‘the excitement was spreading far and wide’ along the Afghan border: ‘The Momunds on the Peshawar border were beginning to make hostile demonstrations . . . Rumours were also reaching me from Kohat of expected raids by the Wuzeerees and Othman-Khail. Emissaries from Cabool and Jellalabad were with the Akhoond, who had been further reinforced by Ghuzzun Khan, the chief of Dher, and 6000 men.’ The Pathans and Hindustanis had now suffered in excess of two thousand dead and perhaps three times that number wounded, but the British losses were proportionately just as severe: 18 officers and 213 men killed, and another 731 wounded.

  Montgomery concluded that the only thing for it was to authorise Chamberlain to withdraw. He ordered Major James to Ambeyla to replace Reynell Taylor and to tell Chamberlain to pull out ‘if it was desirable on military terms’. James found Chamberlain in too much pain to be able to discuss the situation in detail – but set in his belief that a withdrawal would be ‘most unadvisable’.

  The Commander-in-Chief, Sir Hugh Rose, now intervened, overruling Montgomery, and ordered troops from Amballa and elsewhere in the plains to proceed by forced marches to Peshawar. Major ‘Bobs’ Roberts, at that time attached to Rose’s headquarters staff, was sent up to Ambeyla to report on the true state of affairs. He found Chamberlain confined to his tent but adamant that a withdrawal would only encourage the Pathans to extend the fighting along the Frontier. Furthermore, there were clear signs that the Bunerwals and Swatis were beginning to lose heart: ‘They had borne the brunt of the campaign, and had lost many men, and they now found their valley overrun, and their limited supplies eaten up by crowds of hungry mountaineers from distant provinces.’

  On 10 December a delegation of Buner khans and maliks approached the camp under a flag of truce, and an agreement was worked out by which they would allow the British to expel the Hindustanis from the Mahabun Mountain provided there was an immediate withdrawal thereafter. It seemed that the fighting was over – until the agreement became known to the Akhund of Swat. He had now come round to Abdullah Ali’s view that the British were intent on conquest, and that what was at stake here was his religion. Setting aside his long hostility to the Wahhabis and their teachings, the Akhund called every Swati of fighting age to arms to protect his faith. For a second time the hillsides around became crowded with tribesmen and their encampments: ‘Standards might be counted by the dozen, and the watchfires at night betokened the presence of many thousands.’ By mid-December it was estimated that fifteen thousand Pathans were massed on the slopes of Laloo mountain alone.

  Half the relieving force were now gathered at Nowshera, awaiting the arrival of Sir Hugh Rose and the remaining troops. But so critical had the situation at Ambeyla become that Major James asked General Garvock, commanding this first brigade of three regiments, to march without further delay. His troops reached Ambeyla on the morning of 15 December and were immediately thrown into action: ‘General Garvock directed “the advance” to be sounded down the centre of the line. At that signal 5,000 men rose up from their cover, and, with loud cheers and volleys of musketry, rushed out at the assault – the regiments of Pathans, Sikhs, and Goorkhas all vying with the English soldiers as to who should first reach the enemy’. Their assault carried on up and along the Laloo mountain range, pushing the enemy down from the hills and into the Chamla valley, where they could be harried by the cavalry and dispersed.

  Characteristically, the last to offer resistance was a large body of Hindustanis, described by ‘Bobs’ Roberts as ‘a band of ghazis’, who made a desperate charge just when it appeared that the fighti
ng was all over. ‘At the critical moment,’ wrote Roberts, ‘Wright, the Assistant Adjutant-General, and I, being close by, rushed in among the Pioneers and called on them to follow us. As we were personally known to the men of both regiments they quickly pulled themselves together and responded to our efforts to rally them . . . We were entirely successful in repulsing the Ghazis, not a man of whom escaped. We counted 200 of the enemy killed; our losses were comparatively slight – 8 killed and 80 wounded.’

  By the following day the dozens of Pathan tribes and clans who had gathered about the Ambeyla Pass were on their way back to their homes, leaving only the Bunerwals and the Amazais, whose lands extended along the southern edge of the Chamla valley and the hills above. The Bunerwals had taken no part in the most recent fighting, and their leaders now came to a new agreement with Reynell Taylor: if he promised to remove all British troops from their soil, they would themselves expel the remaining Hindustanis from the Mahabun Mountain and destroy their stronghold at Malka.