115. SUSPICION TAKES ROOT

Lord Auckland to the Secret Committee, 27th April 1838.

4. In my former Despatch, I stated that I could not look to any stability of Persian domination in the Afghan countries. But there is a course open to the agents of Russia, in the attempts made by them to extend the power and influence of their country, which they seem ready to pursue, and to prefer to the support of the direct dominion of Persia over Afghanistan. It may be collected from their language and proceedings that they would, on one side, appear to be aiding Persia in the establishment of a general supremacy over the Afghan chiefships, and on the other as protecting those chiefships from any serious aggression and injury. Professions and promises to this effect may at least assist the immediate views of Persia, but they may also have the ultimate effect, in the actual distracted condition of Afghanistan, of giving to Russia an arbitration over the fortunes of all who exercise authority in that region.

6. I need not say that we should seem to have the clearest rights and interest to remonstrate against such proceedings; for Russia can have no legitimate ground for extending her political connections to Afghanistan, while we are necessarily interested in the peace and independence of that country by proximity and position.

(Parliamentary Papers, Afghanistan, 1837-42, p. 281.)

116. THE TREATIES WITH RANJIT SINGH AND THE
AMIRS OF SIND

The Governor-General to the Secret Committee, 13th August 1838. 5. The first interview of the mission with the Maharaja occurred on the 31st May.

9. The manner in which the views of the British Government were propounded, and the mode of the Maharaja's acceptance of them, is thus described in Mr. Macnaghten's dispatch:

66

"I then said, 'Your Highness some time ago formed a treaty with Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk; do you think it would still be for your benefit that that treaty should stand good, and would it be agreeable to your wishes that the British Government should become a party to that treaty?''This,' replied

his Highness, would be adding sugar to milk.' 'If such,' I observed, be decidedly the wish of your Highness, I do not think that the Governor-General would object to supplying Shah Shuja with money and officers, to enable him to recover his throne.' He (Shah Shuja) should advance by the route of Kandahar, while the troops of his Highness should advance towards Kabul. . . . This appeared to me a good opportunity for making a formal declaration of the moderate views of the British Government, as prescribed in my instructions. I told his Highness that the possessions of the British Government in India were already sufficiently extensive, and that we did not covet one biga of additional ground; that our only objects were to improve the condition of the people under our rule, to cultivate the friendship of such allies as his Highness and to extend the benefits of commerce, but that we were perfectly prepared to repel and punish any aggression upon our rights and dignity, from whatever quarter it proceeded.

"I then told the Maharaja that the benefit of the combined scheme would be almost exclusively his; that our share of the adventure would be almost entirely confined to our having a faithful friend in the possession of Afghanistan, instead of one who was of doubtful character, if not disaffected to our interests.

39. A still more important point than any comprised in the above negotiation yet remained to be arranged; the relations, namely, of the Amirs of Sind with Shah Shuja-ulMulk and this Government, in consequence of the course of intended operations. The Resident at Sind was therefore directed to explain to these chiefs the nature of the pending crisis, which compelled the Government to form a powerful combination with its frontier states, for the purpose of counteracting the apparently aggressive alliances of the states to the westward; and the following instructions given him upon the question of composition with Shah Shuja for tribute due to him from one of the Amirs:

"You will perceive that, by one of the articles of the treaty recently concluded, the British Government engages to arbitrate the claim of Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk upon Shikarpur, and the territories of Sind generally, and proposes at the same time to bring to a final settlement the claims of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, as connected with the Shah, and the territories along the course of the Indus, which were formerly included in the dominions of the Afghan kingdom.

66

The Governor-General . . . will endeavour to prevail upon Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk to reduce the claim which he has on the Amirs to a reasonable amount; and he trusts that you will have no difficulty in convincing them of the magnitude of the benefits they will derive from securing the undisturbed possession of the territories they now hold, and obtaining immunity from all future claims on this account by a moderate pecuniary sacrifice."

40. After desiring the Resident to insist much upon the friendly feeling of this Government towards the Amirs, and the anxiety which I felt for its maintenance, I caused the following intimation to be given him of the course which would be forced upon me, should the Amirs decline concession to the wishes of this Government and its allies :

66

Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk will probably arrive with his own army, and the direct support of the British troops, at Shikarpur about the middle of November next, in progress to take possession of Afghanistan. The Governor-General is averse from contemplating a refusal on the part of the Amirs to enter into such a composition with his Majesty (Shah Shuja) as the British Government may deem just and reasonable; but it may be proper to apprise them of the probable consequences of their not coming cordially into the general views of his Lordship at a crisis so important; and you are authorized to tell them that his Lordship must regard the demonstration of such a spirit, as rendering it indispensably necessary to the success of the enterprise, that temporary occupation should be taken of Shikarpur, and as much of the country adjacent as may be required to afford a secure base to the intended military operations.

"His Lordship is further unwilling to contemplate the contingency of offensive operations being undertaken against the Amirs by the Shah after he shall have established, by the support of the British power, his authority in Afghanistan for the realization of what he may deem his just claims. But the Amirs must be made sensible that, if they should now deprive themselves of the advantage of his Lordship's mediation, with a view to effect an immediate favourable compromise, the British Government will be precluded from offering opposition to any measures for the assertion of those claims which the Shah may eventually determine to adopt."

58. I need not enlarge on the additional proofs, which have been furnished since the date of my former dispatches,

Y

of the manifest designs of the Russian officers to extend the interference and authority of their country to the borders of India. The opposition of the Russian Ambassador before Herat, by which the efforts of Mr. M'Neill to arrange a peace, upon just and reasonable terms, between the Shah and the besieged were wholly frustrated, when they seemed on the point of being effectual; the aid given by the Russian Ambassador to the siege, by advances of money, and still more, the employment of an officer of the mission to direct the works of the siege, are facts which will have forcibly arrested the attention of your Honourable Committee. (Parliamentary Papers, Afghanistan, 1837-42, i. p. 285 ff.)

117. TROUBLE IN AFGHANISTAN

The Governor-General to the Secret Committee, Dec. 22, 1841.

17. We have thus stated, in as accurate an outline as the means at our command will permit, the afflicting events by which our position in Afghanistan has been so suddenly and seriously endangered. We have marked the obstinacy with which, notwithstanding the apparent accommodation of the Eastern Ghilzai chiefs with Captain Macgregor about the 22nd of November, the tribes under them . . . contested every portion of the advance of the British troops eastward, at a time when these tribes stood alone openly committed to insurrection. We cannot doubt that the comparative success of the Ghilzai mountaineers in their defiles, the report of which must have reached Kabul with much exaggeration, had an important effect in giving encouragement to the disaffected in that city. And we think it may be assumed as certain, that the discontent of the Durani chiefs at Shah Shuja's court with the arrangement of the king's government, which partially affected their pecuniary interests, and threatened to destroy their political interests, has been the direct operative cause of the formidable rebellion by which our authority has been shaken. This discontent found ready material for the excitement of hostility and disorder, in the national and religious feelings of the Afghan tribes, whom our presence, and the measures pursued under our influence, have failed to conciliate. The population with the exception of the labouring cultivators, who probably regard our ascendancy with satisfaction, but

whose good will is of little value in such a crisis, is armed, and accustomed to turbulence and violence; and time has not admitted of any effectual repression of these habits, or of giving stability to the new order of things.

(Parliamentary Papers, Afghanistan, 1837-42, iii. p. 5.)

118. THE MURDER OF MACNAGHTEN

Lord Auckland to the Secret Committee, Jan. 22, 1842.

We have now to communicate, with the deepest regret, the melancholy intelligence of the treacherous murder of the Envoy and Minister, Sir William Macnaghten, at a conference to which he was invited, in furtherance of negotiations for the withdrawal of our troops.

2. From our dispatch of the 9th instant, your Honourable Committee will be aware of the unsatisfactory accounts which had reached us from Kabul to the 9th of December. From that date to the 25th, we have no letter from any of the British officers, either of the Kabul mission or force; but it appears certain that about the 13th or 15th of December, Sir William Macnaghten judged it necessary to make overtures to the Afghan chiefs in arms against us, as the basis of our evacuation of the positions which we held at the capital. Mahomed Akbar Khan, son of Dost Mahomed Khan, who had escaped from confinement at Bokhara, and was proceeding to Kabul, to deliver himself up to the Envoy and Minister, found the insurrection in full violence on his arrival, and immediately took a prominent part in it. He appears to have been the channel through which Sir William Macnaghten's negotiations for withdrawal were carried on, and was believed in the country to be disposed in some measure to aid our interests. What the motives were, which induced him to take the life of Sir William Macnaghten, by an act which seemed to have been one of the most gross and barbarous perfidy, we do not yet know with accuracy, but the fact of the murder is placed beyond doubt, by the brief note of Major Pottinger of December 25th, and by the concurrent tenor of all the reports which have reached Jellalabad.

(Parliamentary Papers, Afghanistan, 1837-42, iii. p. 75.)