War: First Anglo-Sikh War
Date: 10th February 1846
Place: In the Punjab in North West India
Combatants: British troops and Indian troops of the Bengal Presidency against Sikhs of the Khalsa, the army of the Punjab.
Generals: Major General Sir Hugh Gough and General Sir Henry Hardinge, the Governor General of Bengal, against Tej Singh.
Size of the armies: A British and Bengali army of 15,000 men and 108 guns against a Sikh army of 40,000 men and 67 guns.
Account: A temporary cessation of hostilities followed the battle of Ferozeshah. The English were not in a position to assume the offensive and waited for heavy guns and reinforcements to arrive from Delhi. Lal Singh and Tej Singh allowed them the much needed respite in as much as they kept the Sikhs from re crossing the Sutlej. To induce desertions, Lord Hardinge issued a proclamation on the Christmas day inviting all natives of Hindustan to quit the service of the Sikh State on pain of forfeiting their property and to claim protection from the British government. The deserters were also offered liberal rewards and pensions.
A Sikh sardar, Ranjodh Singh Majtha, crossed the Sutlej in force and was joined by Ajit Singh, of Ladva, from the other side of the river. They marched towards Ludhiana and burnt a portion of the cantonment. Sir Harry Smith (afterwards Governor of Cape Colony), who was sent to relieve Ludhiana, marched eastwards from Firozepur, keeping a few miles away from the Sutlej. Ranjodh Singh Majitha harried Smith’s column and, when Smith tried to make a detour at Baddoval, attacked his rear with great vigor and captured his baggage train and stores (21 January). But Harry Smith retrieved his position a week later by inflicting a defeat on Ranjodh Singh Majithia and Ajlt Singh, of Ladva, (28 January).
The last battle of the campaign took place on 10 February. To check the enemy advance on Lahore, a large portion of the Sikh army was entrenched in a horse-shoe curve on the Sutlej near the village of Sabhraon, under the command of Tej Singh while the cavalry battalions and the dreaded ghorcharas under Lal Singh were a little higher up the river. Entrenchments at Sabhraon were on the left bank of the Sutlej with a pontoon bridge connecting them with their base camp. Their big guns were placed behind high embankments and consequently immobilized for offensive action. The infantry was also posted behind earthworks and could not, therefore, be deployed to harass the opponents.
Early in February, the British received ample stores of ammunition from Delhi. Lal Singh had already passed on to the English officers the required clues for an effective assault. Gough and Hardinge now decided to make a frontal attack on Sabhraon and destroy the Darbar army at one blow. A heavy mist hung over the battlefield, enveloping both contending armies. As the sun broke through the mist, the Sikhs found themselves encircled between two horse-shoes: facing them were the British and behind them was the Sutlej, now in spate. After a preliminary artillery duel, British cavalry made a feint to check on the exact location of the Sikh guns. The cannonade was resumed, and in two hours British guns put the Darbar artillery out of action. Then the British charged Sikh entrenchments from three sides. Tej Singh fled across the pontoon bridge as soon as the contest started and had it destroyed making reinforcement or return of Sikh soldiers impossible. Gulab Singh Dogra stopped sending supplies and rations from Lahore. Lal Singh’s ghorcharas did not put in their appearance at Sabhraon. In the midst of these treacheries, a Sikh warrior, Sham Singh Attarivala, symbolizing the unflinching will of the Khalsa, vowed to fight unto the last and fall in battle rather than retire in defeat. He rallied the ranks depleted by desertions. His courage inspired the Sikhs to make a determined bid to save the day, but the odds were against them. Sham Singh fell fighting in the foremost ranks along with his dauntless comrades. The British casualties at Sabhraon were 2,403 killed; the Sikhs lost 3,125 men in the action and all their guns were either captured or abandoned in the river. Captain J.D. Cunningham, who was present as an additional aide-de-camp to the governor-general, describes the last scene of the battle vividly in his “A History of the Sikhs:” Although assailed on either side by squadrons of horse and battalions of foot, no Sikh offered to submit, and no disciple of Guru Gobind Singh asked for quarter. They everywhere showed a front to the victors, and stalked slowly and sullenly away, while many rushed singly forth to meet assured death by contending with a multitude. The victors looked with stolid wonderment upon the indomitable courage of the vanquished”
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Lord Hugh Gough, the British commander-in-chief, under whose leadership the two Anglo-Sikh wars were fought, described Sabhraon as the Waterloo of India. Paying tribute to the gallantry of the Sikhs, he said: “Policy precluded me publicly recording my sentiments on the splendid gallantry of our fallen foe, or to record the acts of heroism displayed, not only individually, but almost collectively, by the Sikh Sardars and the army; and I declare were it not from a deep conviction that my country’s good required the sacrifice, I could have wept to have witnessed the fearful slaughter of so devoted a body of men.”
Lord Hardinge, who saw the action, wrote: “Few escaped; none, it may be said, surrendered. The Sikhs met their fate with the resignation which distinguishes their race.
Casualties: Sikh casualties are said to have been 9,000. All 67 Sikh guns was captured. The casualties of the British and Bengal army were 2,283. Among the British dead were General Sir Robert Dick, who had lost an arm during the Peninsular War, and Brigadiers Taylor and Maclaran and among the wounded Major General Sir Walter Gilbert and Brigadier Penny.
Follow-up: Two days after their victory at Sabhraon, British forces crossed the Sutlej and occupied Kasur. The Lahore Darbar empowered Gulab Singh Dogra, who had earlier come down to Lahore with regiments of hill men, to negotiate a treaty of peace.
The wily Gulab Singh first obtained assurances from the army Parishes that they would agree to the terms he made and then tendered the submission of the Darbar to Lord Hardinge. The governor-general, realizing that the Sikhs were far from vanquished, forbore from immediate occupation of the country. By the terms imposed by the victorious British through the peace treaty of 9 March, the Lahore Darbar was compelled to give up Jalandhar Doaba, pay a war indemnity amounting to a million and a half sterling, reduce its army to 20,000 infantry and 12,000 cavalry, hand over all the guns used in the war and relinquish control of both banks of the Sutlej to the British. A further condition was added two days later on 11 March: the posting of a British unit in Lahore till the end of the year on payment of expenses.
The Darbar was unable to pay the full war indemnity and ceded in lieu thereof the hill territories between the Beas and the Indus. Kashmir was sold to Gulab Singh Dogra for 75 lakh rupees. A week later, on 16 March, another treaty was signed at Amritsar recognizing him as Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir, affirming the suspicion that Gulab Singh Dogra indeed was involved in sedition against Khalsa Sarkar. Although Maharani Jind Kaur continued to act as the regent and Raja Lal Singh as water of the minor Maharaja Duleep Singh, effective power had passed into the hands of the British resident, Colonel Henry Lawrence. And thus end the First Anglo-Sikh war.