Chitral is the largest and the most important state on the northern part of the north-western frontier. It lies immediately to the west of Gilgit, while on the other side it is divided by the Hindu Kush from the province of Kafiristan—transferred to the dominions of Afghanistan during the latter part of the reign of the late Amir Abdurrahman Khan. South of Gilgit the Shandur spur and the watershed between the Chitral and Panjkora Rivers divide the country from Yasin, Kohistan and Dir; it is bordered on the north by the Hindu Kush; while to the south the watershed of the Arnawai Stream forms the boundary between Chitral and the districts of Dir and Asmar. It is an especially mountainous country, “composed partly of gigantic snowy peaks, mostly of barren rocky mountains, and, in a very small degree, of cultivated land. The valleys are narrow and confined, the main ones in their inhabited portions running from 5000 to 8000 feet above sea-level. It is only in them that any cultivation at all is found, and even then it is not carried on 184very extensively.... But the whole food production is small, and barely suffices for the people of the country, leaving little to spare for outsiders. The climate varies according to the height of the valley. In the lower parts, at about 5000 feet above sea-level, it ranges from 12° or 15° in winter to 100° in summer, and higher up, at 8000 feet, it would vary from 5° or so below zero to about 90° in summer.”[78] Sir George Robertson, in his Chitral, says that “food is so scarce that a fat man has never yet been seen in the country; even the upper classes look underfed, and the most effective of bribes is a full meal. The hill tracks, which form the main lines of communication, are seldom easy; they are often difficult, sometimes dangerous.”
The country is watered by the river which goes in its northern course indifferently by the names of the Yarkhun, the Mastuj or the Chitral River, and which, flowing from a glacier of the Hindu Kush, runs south-westerly to Asmar, where it becomes known as the Kunar River, and falls into the Kabul River near Jalalabad. During its course it receives the drainage of numerous valleys on either side, and is spanned by many rope bridges, by several untrustworthy native-built bridges, usually constructed on a rough cantilever principle, and by good suspension bridges at important crossings, such as Chitral, Mastuj, Drosh and other places. “Even when the rivers are moderately placid and shallow, the fords,” 185Sir George Robertson tells us, “are always bad, because of the boulders and stones in their beds; they are frequently devious also; and, consequently, always require a guide. It is dangerous to miss the proper line, for then one is liable to be carried into deep, heavy water, or to find oneself in a quicksand.”[79]
The Roads to Chitral
There are two main routes from Chitral to India: that which has been followed in the preceding chapter, from Chitral over the Lowari Pass, through Dir and Swat, and across the Malakand to railhead at Dargai; and another from Chitral across the Shandur Pass to the Gilgit road, and thence through Kashmir and the Jhelum Valley to the rail at Rawal Pindi. Those passes leading to the north or to the west are for the most part very difficult; some are impracticable for pack animals, some are only passable at all during certain brief seasons of the year; others again could only be crossed by a lightly equipped force of selected troops under unusually favourable circumstances. The Baroghil Pass (12,460 feet), which leads out of the Yarkhun Valley into Wakhan, is practicable for laden animals during eight months of the year, and climbs over what Holdich calls “the comparatively easy slopes of the flat-backed Hindu Kush.” Many passes, but all more or less difficult, lead from Chitral into Kafiristan, while that leading from Chitral to Upper Badakshan—the Dorah Pass (14,800 feet)—is much trodden, and is used by laden animals as a commercial link between the Kunar Valley and Badakshan. It is 186open from July to September, and has been crossed as late as early in November.
Chitral is an important state by reason of its situation at the extremity of the country over which the Government of India exerts its influence. Sir Francis Younghusband has described this state as “one of the chinks in the wall of defence. Not a very large one, but certainly capable of being made into a considerable one if we do not look after it, and in time; for not only is there a chink just here, but the wall is thinner too. Practicable roads across the mountains, especially those by the Baroghil and Dorah passes, lead into Chitral; while the width of the mountains from the plains on the south to the plains on the north, as the crow flies, is 400 miles by the Pamirs and Gilgit, but through Chitral only 200. So Chitral is a place to be looked after and efficiently guarded.”
Importance of Chitral
Gilgit and Chitral seemed to the Government of India to afford good watch-towers whence the country south of the Hindu Kush might be guarded and controlled, since the northern passes provide a difficult but by no means impracticable route for the incursion of a hostile force large enough to cause trouble, or at least excitement, upon this portion of the Border. But our occupation of Chitral is not universally approved. Sir Thomas Holdich[80] has said that “the retention of Chitral may well be regarded as a doubtful advantage.... As an outpost to keep watch and ward for an advance from the north, Chitral is useless, 187for no serious menace is possible from the north. As a safeguard otherwise, it is hard to say from what it will protect us. It is in short the outcome of political, not of military, strategy. As a political centre it must be remembered that it possesses an outlook westwards over the hills and valleys through which the Amir’s great commercial roads have been projected, as well as northwards to the Hindu Kush passes. But it is at best an expensive and burdensome outpost, and is, on the whole, the least satisfactory of all the forward positions that we have recently occupied.”
Elsewhere,[81] however, Sir Thomas Holdich seems in some degree to qualify these opinions. Writing of these northern mountain approaches to India, he says, “We cannot altogether leave them alone. They have to be watched by the official guardians of our frontier, and all the gathered threads of them converging on Leh or Gilgit must be held by hands that are alert and strong. It is just as dangerous an error to regard such approaches to India as negligible quantities in the military and political field of Indian defence, as to take a serious view of their practicability for purposes of invasion.... The Dorah Pass ... is the one gateway which is normally open from year to year, and its existence renders necessary an advanced watchtower at Chitral.”
The country is divided into the nine districts of Laspur, Mastuj, Torikho, Mulrikho, Kosht, Owir, Khuzara, Chitral and Drosh. The population totals something over seventy thousand, and the fighting 188strength is estimated at six thousand men, armed for the most part with matchlocks of local manufacture or imported from Badakshan. There are also in the country under a thousand Sniders and muzzle-loading Enfield rifles, presented at different times to the Mehtar or ruler by the Indian Government.
The Chitralis are the only non-Pathan tribe described in this book and are a mixed race of Aryan type, of whose origin little is known: the language of the country is Chitrali, and Persian is also spoken by some of the upper classes. The people are all Muhammadans, mostly Sunnis, but by no means of a particularly strict or fanatical type; and while the priests have a certain amount of influence, they are unable to work their flocks up into any high degree of religious frenzy as is possible with certain Pathans. The people of Chitral are splendid mountaineers with great powers of endurance, and have fought well on occasion. Sir George Robertson has thus described their characteristics:[82] “There are few more treacherous people than the Chitralis, and they have a wonderful capacity for cold-blooded cruelty; yet none are kinder to little children, or have stronger affection for blood or foster-relations when cupidity or jealousy do not intervene. All have pleasant manners and engaging light-heartedness, free from all trace of boisterous behaviour, a great fondness for music, dancing and singing, a passion for simple-minded ostentation, and an instinctive yearning for softness and luxury, which is the mainspring of their intense cupidity and avarice. 189No race is more untruthful, or has greater power of keeping a collective secret. Their vanity is easily injured, they are revengeful and venal, but they are charmingly picturesque and admirable companions. Perhaps the most convenient trait they possess, as far as we are concerned, is a complete absence of religious fanaticism.... Sensuality of the grossest kind, murder, abominable cruelty, treachery or violent death, are never long absent from the thoughts of a people than whom none in the world are of simpler, gentler appearance.”
Early History
The early history of Chitral is a record of intrigue, civil war and assassination—“a monotonous tale of murder and perfidy—the slaying of brother by brother, of son by father,” and each successive Mehtar appears to have waded to the throne through seas of blood. The founder of the Chitral Royal Family was Shah Katur, whose descendants, dividing into two branches, parcelled the mountainous country from Kafiristan to Gilgit between them—the Khushwakt branch ruling the eastern portion, while the Katur branch governed in the west, or Lower Chitral. At the time of the British occupation of the Punjab, one Gauhar Aman reigned in the Khushwakt district, while Shah Afzul II. ruled in Lower Chitral. About 1854 the Kashmir State, having long suffered from the encroachments of the ruler of Upper Chitral, appealed to Shah Afzul for assistance, and he, induced thereto far more by hatred of his kinsman than by any wish to oblige the Kashmir authorities, seized, in 1855, Mastuj, then the headquarters of the Khushwaktia chief. Possession was, however, regained 190in the year following, but the place was again captured by the Chitralis in 1857.
In this year Shah Afzul II. died quietly in his bed—the demise of a ruler from natural causes was almost unprecedented in this country—and was succeeded by his second son, Aman-ul-Mulk, known as “the great Mehtar.” In 1860 the eastern chief also died, being succeeded in the Mehtarship of Khushwaktia by Mir Wali, who was deposed and slain by his own brother; while in 1880 Aman-ul-Mulk invaded and possessed himself of the eastern portion of Chitral, uniting the whole country under his sovereignty. Not long after this, during the viceroyalty of Lord Lytton, it was decided that the policy of the Government of India should be so extended as to control the external affairs of Chitral in a direction friendly to our interests; so as to secure an effective guardianship over the northern passes, and to keep watch over what goes on beyond them. To initiate and carry out this policy, Major Biddulph was sent to Gilgit in 1877 and spent some years there, succeeding in entering into relations with Aman-ul-Mulk, then Mehtar of Chitral. No very definite arrangement was come to at this time, the position was considered rather too isolated, and Major Biddulph was withdrawn. Then in 1885 Lord Dufferin despatched the late General Sir William Lockhart at the head of an important mission, to enter into more definite and closer relations with the Mehtar of Chitral, and to report upon the defences of the country. Colonel Lockhart, as he then was, spent 191more than a year in Chitral; he wintered at Gilgit, traversed the State of Hunza, crossed the Hindu Kush, passed through Wakhan down the southernmost branch of the Oxus, and travelled over Chitral territory from one end of the country to the other. Similar visits were paid to Chitral by Colonel Durand in 1888 and 1889, and in this latter year the Agency at Gilgit, withdrawn in 1881, was re-established, and certain allowances, doubled in 1891, were granted to the Mehtar, Aman-ul-Mulk.
Beginning of Trouble
In the following year the thirty-two years’ reign of “the great Mehtar” came to an end, he dying suddenly of heart failure while in durbar. His eldest son, Nizam-ul-Mulk, was away in Yasin at the time, and the second brother, Afzul-ul-Mulk, seized the fort at Chitral with its arsenal and treasure, and sent off urgent demands to the Agent at Gilgit that he might at once be recognized as Mehtar. Nothing was to be feared from Nizam, who was no fighter and fled to Gilgit, leaving Afzul to return triumphant to Chitral. Afzul had, however, apparently overlooked or disregarded the fact that there was another candidate for the Mehtarship in one Sher Afzul, fourth son of Shah Afzul II., and consequently a younger brother of Aman-ul-Mulk and uncle to Afzul-ul-Mulk. Sher Afzul seems to have left Kabul, where he had been living, directly he heard of his brother’s death, crossed the Dorah Pass from Badakshan at the head of a handful of followers, and, marching rapidly, surprised the fort at Chitral, Afzul-ul-Mulk being shot down in the ensuing mêlée.
192Sher Afzul, who seemed to have many adherents in the country, was now proclaimed Mehtar, but his reign was a very short one. Nizam-ul-Mulk, plucking up courage, determined to proceed to Chitral and turn out the new pretender. He was joined by a Hunza chief of considerable military capacity and force of character, while his advance appears to have been preceded by extravagant rumours that his candidature was supported by the British authorities; and Sher Afzul then, losing heart, fled back to Kabul by way of the Kunar Valley.
Nizam-ul-Mulk was now formally recognised as Mehtar by the British Government, and two of the political officers of the Gilgit Agency visited the new ruler in Chitral and promised him that, under certain conditions, the same allowances and support would be given to him as had been afforded to his father, Aman-ul-Mulk. So far as could be seen, it appeared that the new ruler was in the way to be fairly well established on the throne.
It is now necessary to revert to Umra Khan of Jandol, of whom some mention has already been made in the last chapter, and whose actions and aggressions were largely responsible for the troubles which now arose upon this part of the frontier.
At the end of 1894 the situation here was as follows: Umra Khan had at last made friends with his old enemy, the Khan of Nawagai; he had established his authority over a considerable portion of Swat, the greater part of Bajaur, and the whole of Dir; while he had possessed himself of the strip 193of country known as Narsat, hitherto claimed alike by Chitral, Dir and Asmar. He had attacked some villages in the Bashgul Valley, claimed by Chitral; had commenced to build forts at Arnawai and Birkot, in the Kunar Valley; and had encroached upon Chitral territory, and demanded the payment of tribute from Chitral villages. The ex-Khan of Dir was at this time a refugee in Upper Swat. Nizam-ul-Mulk was proving himself a fairly efficient and popular, though not a strong, ruler; Sher Afzul was believed to be safely interned at Kabul; and Nizam’s younger brother, Amir-ul-Mulk, who had at first fled from Chitral, had now returned there and been well received by the new Mehtar.
Murder of Nizam
On the 1st January, 1895, Nizam-ul-Mulk was shot dead while out hawking by one of the servants, and at the instigation, of Amir-ul-Mulk, who at once caused himself to be proclaimed Mehtar, but his recognition was delayed for reference to Simla. There can be little doubt that this fresh murder was the outcome of a conspiracy between Amir-ul-Mulk, Sher Afzul and Umra Khan, and that the object was to remove Nizam and cause him to be temporarily succeeded by Amir, who was then to resign in favour of Sher Afzul. Umra Khan was to be called in merely to help the furtherance of the schemes of the other two: but Umra Khan had his own personal interests to consult, and on hearing news of the murder he at once crossed the Lowari Pass with between 3000 and 4000 men, and occupied the southern Chitral Valley. He sent on letters stating that he had come to wage 194a holy war against the Kafirs of the Bashgul Valley, that he had no hostile designs against Chitral, and that if Amir-ul-Mulk did not join and help him he must take the consequences. Umra Khan now advanced on Kila Drosh, twenty-five miles below Chitral fort.
At this date there were rather over 3000 troops garrisoning posts in the Upper Indus, Gilgit and Chitral Valleys, and of these roughly one-third were regular troops of the Indian Army, the remainder belonging to regiments of the Kashmir Durbar. When the murder of Nizam took place, Lieutenant Gurdon was in political charge at Chitral, accompanied by no more than eight men of the 14th Sikhs, drawn from a detachment of 103 posted at Mastuj under Lieutenant Harley. There were no other troops of any kind in Chitral, and the nearest garrison was at Gupis, far on the eastern side of the Shandur Pass. The nearest regular troops were ninety-nine men of the 14th Sikhs at Gilgit, while the 32nd Pioneers, rather over 800 strong, were employed on the Bunji-Chilas road. Gurdon at once drew upon Mastuj for fifty Sikhs of its garrison, and these reached him unhindered and unmolested on the 7th January. In anticipation of possible trouble, the following moves then took place: Mastuj was reinforced by 100 men of the 4th Kashmir Rifles from Gupis, 200 men of the same regiment moved up to Ghizr, while Gupis was strengthened by 150 men of the 6th Kashmir Light Infantry from Gilgit.
Shortly before this Surgeon-Major Robertson—now 195Sir George Robertson—had relieved Colonel Bruce in charge of the Gilgit Agency, and he now at once left for Chitral, taking with him some of the 4th Kashmir Rifles under Captain Townsend, Central India Horse, and the remainder of the 14th Sikhs from Mastuj—100 in all. Before he reached there, however, the Chitralis, who had at first evinced some intention of opposing Umra Khan, had been driven from a position they had taken up in front of Kila Drosh; while a fortnight later—on the 9th February—the fort of Drosh was surrendered, without any pretence of resistance, to Umra Khan, with all its rifles and stores. About the 18th the situation, already sufficiently complicated, was rendered even more so by the news that Sher Afzul, probably the most generally popular of all the claimants to the throne, had arrived at Drosh. He was at once joined by some of the lower class Chitralis, and by the end of February nearly all the Adamzadas (members of clans descended from the founder of the ruling family) had also gone over to him. On the 1st March the British Agent withdrew his escort—now numbering 100 of the 14th Sikhs and 320 of the 4th Kashmir Rifles—into the fort at Chitral; and on the following day in durbar, it being patent that Amir-ul-Mulk, listening to the promptings of ill-advisers, had been intriguing with Umra Khan, Amir was placed under surveillance, and his young brother, Shuja-ul-Mulk, was formally recognised as Mehtar, subject to the approval of the Government of India.
The New Mehtar
The number of followers with which Umra Khan 196had entered Chitral territory had been gradually increasing, as his star appeared to be in the ascendant, and his total strength was now estimated at between 5000 and 8000 men. On the afternoon of the 3rd March Sher Afzul reached the neighbourhood of Chitral at the head of an armed force, and took up a position in some villages about two miles to the south-west of the fort. At 4.15 two hundred men of the Kashmir Rifles were sent out, under Captains Campbell, Townsend and Baird, to check the enemy’s advance.
Captain Campbell proposed to attack the position in front, while fifty men under Captain Baird made a flank attack along some high ground to the west. The enemy were found to be well armed and strongly posted; the Kashmir troops were met with a very heavy fire, and the attempts to carry the position by assault failed. It was rapidly getting dark, and Captain Campbell commenced to retire, being followed up closely by the enemy. The main body sustained heavy losses, but gained the fort under cover of the fire of a party of the............