Shah Soojah

“ Many more passages might be cited from the correspondence of our political officers, to show the opinions entertained at this time by those most competent to determine the question of the Shah’s fidelity. But, after all, the question remains an open one. The future historian may still lose himself in a sea of conjecture. From the facts before us, and from all that is known of the character of Shah Soojah, the inference is, as I have said, that the king was faithful neither to his own countrymen nor to his British allies. ”

“ Amidst so much of selfish rapacity and dark ingratitude as marks these annals of the Douranee Empire, it is a pleasure to chronicle such an episode as this in the history of Shah Soojah’s fortunes. I am too willing to believe the whole story to encourage any doubt of its authenticity. The free use, indeed, which I have made of Shah Soojah’s autobiography is sufficient proof of my belief in the general fidelity of the narrative. It was written by the Shah’s Moonshee, under his Majesty’s superintendence. ”

“ But now the Ameer was a fugitive, the guns were in our hands, the Kuzzilbashes and native tribesmen had come in to salute their new ruler, and nothing remained but to enter the capital in triumph.
The entry took place on the 7th of August. The ceremony was an imposing one. Shah Soojah, after an exile of thirty years, rode at the head of the cortege, on a white charger with golden trappings. He wore a jewelled coronet, his arms and garments were ornamented with precious stones, and his waist encircled with a broad girdle of gold encrusted with rubies and emeralds. ”

“ The Early Days of Soojah-ool-Moolk—Disastrous Commencement of his Career—Defeat of Shah Mahmoud—Reign of Shah Soojah—The Insurrection of Prince Kaysur—Tidings of the British Mission.
From the fall of Zemaun Shah we are to date the rise of Soojah-ool-Moolk. They were brothers by the same father and mother. At the time of the political extinction of the elder, the younger was about twenty years of age. He had taken no part in the government; was but lightly esteemed for courage; and had little place in the thoughts of the people, except as an appendage of the reigning monarch. ”

“ In order to give a sort of political eclat to the steps taken to reinstate Shah Soojah on the throne of his ancestors, it was resolved that he should be solemnly inaugurated at Candahar, and nothing was omitted that could possibly tend to render the ceremony imposing. On [Pg 93] the morning fixed for its celebration, the whole of the British forces were paraded in review order on a large plain to the north of the city, whilst the Shah's troops were drawn up at a little distance. ”

“ The English were, it was said, gathering a great army in Scinde with the intention of placing Shah Soojah on the throne of Afghanistan instead of Dost Mahomed.
Of all the blunders that have been committed from the time of our first arrival in India, none is comparable, in point of injustice, hopeless blundering, or misfortune, to the policy thus inaugurated in Afghanistan. Shah Soojah was the head of the Dooranee tribe, and had been overthrown by the Barukzyes, who had gradually attained a power which the Dooranee monarch was unable to withstand. ”

“ A pensioner on the bounty of the British Government, Shah Soojah, ever since his last disastrous attempt to regain his empire, had dwelt there in the midst of his family as one not yet reconciled to a life of peaceful obscurity, but somewhat sobered down by the repeated failures which had beset his unfortunate career. It is probable that no political vicissitudes in Afghanistan, however favourable to the restoration of the monarchy, would have tempted him to head another expedition for the recovery of Caubul and Candahar. ”

“ While Pollock was halted opposite the throat of the Khyber waiting for the demolition of the Afreedi barricade, the ill-starred Shah Soojah was being murdered, on his way from the Balla Hissar of Cabul to review on the Siah Sung slopes the reinforcements which Akbar Khan was clamouring that he should lead down to aid that Sirdar in reducing Jellalabad before relief should arrive. Ever since the outbreak of November Shah Soojah had led a dog's life. ”

“ The main object of these letters appears to have been the extraction of money from the British treasury. The Shah continued to assert, that having no money he had no power, but that if money were sent to him he would be able to do great things for his late allies. Death makes many revelations. The death of Shah Soojah revealed the mendacity and the avarice of the man. Some twenty lakhs of rupees, besides jewels of large value, were found to have been in his possession when he died. ”

“ Cotton's transport is really insufficient for his own army; Shah Soojah has hardly any transport at all. Cotton cares not in the slightest about the Shah or the Shah's army, and, to say the truth, they are of no great value.
"Macnaghten, however, attaches, and reasonably from his point of view, great importance to the fact that Shah Soojah should appear as arriving to claim his throne as an independent prince with his own army, supported by his allies the British, and not as a mere puppet forced upon the Afghans by British bayonets ”

“ The exiled Suddozye Prince, Shah Soojah, weary again of inactivity, and undaunted by past failure, was about to make another effort to re-establish himself in the Douranee Empire; and, with this object, was organising an army in Sindh.
Had there been any sort of unanimity among the Barukzye brothers, this invasion might have been laughed to scorn; but Dost Mahomed felt that there was treachery within, no less than hostility without, and that [127] the open enemy was not more dangerous than the concealed one. Jubbar Khan, Zemaun Khan, and others, were known to be intriguing with the Shah. ”

“ A chuprassie from Captain Ross attended us; the hill ranas paid us every attention; and we soon reached Loodhianah, where we found our family treated with marked respect, and enjoying every comfort after their perilous march from Lahore.”
It was in the month of September, 1816, that Shah Soojah joined his family at Loodhianah. He sought a resting-place, and he found one in the British dominions. Two years of quietude and peace were his. But quietude and peace are afflictions grievous and intolerable to an Afghan nature. ”

“ The Shah gratefully acknowledged the friendly hospitality of the British, but the burden of a life of inactivity was not to be borne. The Douranee Empire was still rent by intestine convulsions. The Barukzye sirdars were dominant at Caubul; but their sovereignty was threatened by Shah Mahmoud and the Princes of Herat, and not, at that time, professing to conquer for themselves, for the spirit of legitimacy was not extinct in Afghanistan, they looked abroad for a royal puppet, and found one at Loodhianah. Azim Khan invited Shah Soojah to re-assert his claims to the throne ”

“ If I could sell everything that I possess, I should not be able to raise a lakh of rupees.”
[234] The Newab had little money; but the most valuable jewels of Shah Soojah were in his possession. The Shah was wont to carry them about with him in a bag; and he had them in his possession at the time of his murder. “Mahomed Zemaun Khan,” wrote Mohun Lal to Sir Richmond Shakespear, “has got hold of the most valuable jewels of the late King, who, report said, had them thrown into a ditch when Soojah-ood-Dowlah murdered him. ”

“ They were not bound to support Shah Soojah, for the Shah himself declared that he wanted nothing but our money, and was evidently compromised with his own countrymen by our continued occupation of Jellalabad. The safety of the prisoners appeared more likely to be secured by our departure from Afghanistan than by our continuing in a hostile attitude in one of the chief places of the kingdom. And it was at least doubtful whether the policy of the Government at Calcutta would not be aided rather than embarrassed by the withdrawal of the garrison to Peshawur. ”

“ Moreover, he was continually applying for money to meet the expenses of Shah Soojah's government. As if the drain that these demands would entail upon the Indian treasury and upon the Indian army were not sufficient, he insisted upon the necessity of conquering the Punjaub, where, since the death of Runjeet Sing, the attitude of the population had been increasingly hostile.
It is difficult to understand how any perfectly sane man could have made such propositions. It would have needed the whole army of India to carry them out, to say nothing of an enormous outlay of money. ”

“ The sympathies neither of the Afghans nor of the English were with him. All men suspected him. None loved him. When, therefore, he talked about leaving Caubul, he was probably not insincere; but he may have thought sometimes that if the English would leave Caubul, he might enjoy his sovereignty more. If to have desired to rid himself of an incubus, which sate so heavily upon him, was to be faithless to the British, Shah Soojah was unquestionably faithless ”

“ From the very outset of the campaign the popular feeling throughout the army had been strong against Shah Soojah, and the conduct of his Majesty himself had not tended to lessen it. [45] And the worst of it was, that all kinds of stories [64] about the haughty exclusiveness of the Shah, and the low estimation in which he was held both by the British officers and by his own subjects, were perpetually making their way to Government House, and there finding ready acceptance. It irritated Macnaghten to receive letters from Colvin, commenting on failure, and hinting at mismanagement in Afghanistan. ”

“ No, there is much disaffection among the lower class in the city. The tribesmen are restless and discontented. It was a great mistake to allow Shah Soojah the entire control of all civilian matters; the consequence is that the people are grievously oppressed by the tax-gatherers. The Ameer himself is impatient at the slightest attempt to control him. He renders himself intensely unpopular by hardly ever appearing in public, by his refusal to grant audiences, and by his haughtiness and arrogance to those whom he does admit to his presence. ”

“ As for the other plea, the tripartite treaty contained no covenant that we should send a corporal's guard across our frontier. If Shah Soojah had a powerful following in Afghanistan, he could regain his throne without our assistance; if he had no holding there, it was for us a truly discreditable enterprise to foist him on a recalcitrant people at the point of the bayonet. ”

“ Macnaghten, a little time before, had been commending the humane instincts of the King. The humanity of Shah Soojah was nowhere to be found except in Macnaghten’s letters. It is enough simply to recite the circumstances of a deed so terrible as this. It was an unhappy and an ominous commencement. The Shah had marched all the way from Loodhianah without encountering an enemy. And now [462] the first men taken in arms against him were cruelly butchered in cold blood by the “humane” monarch. The act, impolitic as it was unrighteous, brought its own sure retribution. ”

“ He expressed his suspicion that Shah Soojah had countenanced Uktar Khan's rising, and spoke of intrigues of dark and dangerous character. Macnaghten scouted Rawlinson's warning, and instructed him that 'it will make the consideration of all questions more simple if you will hereafter take for granted that as regards us "the king can do no wrong."' However, he and the Shah did remove from Candahar the Vakeel and his clique of obnoxious persons, who had been grinding the faces of the people; and the Envoy allowed himself to hope that this measure would restore order to the province of Candahar. ”

“ In 1838, therefore, according to the new policy, a large British force was collected on the northern frontier of India, in order to march via Candahar to attack the southwestern portion of Afghanistan; with these Shah Soojah and whatever troops he could collect, was to march, while Captain Wade, and the son of Shah Soojah, were to advance with the Sikh troops, our allies, through the Khyber pass. ”

“ He demanded the surrender to him of the hostages. The Nawab steadily refused, and as threats of force were used against him, raised a body of three thousand men for their protection. These, however, were corrupted by Aneen, but the Nawab remained faithful to his trust. On the 4th of April Shah Soojah left the Bala Hissar with his retinue to go down to join Akbar Khan. An ambush was laid for him by one of the sons of the Nawab. These poured in a volley, and Shah Soojah fell dead, shot through the head. ”

“ But he had been early doomed to destruction. The recommendations of the British diplomatists in Afghanistan had been adopted by the Governor-General; and the deposition of Mehrab Khan, and the annexation of Shawl, Moostung, and Cutchee, had been decreed in the Simlah Council Chamber. [22] It was true that Shah Soojah had, in the hour of need, been succoured by Mehrab Khan. A statesman in whom the kindly instincts of humanity were so strong as in Lord Auckland, was not likely to forget the obligations which so essential a service at such a time imposed upon the restored monarch. ”

“ It is, indeed, in my opinion, by such a course alone that our interests can be secured, and your Lordship’s past policy justified. By annexing Herat to the crown of Caubul, and by insisting upon the concession of our rights from the ruler of the Punjab, your Lordship will at once provide for the consolidation of Shah Soojah’s power, and show to the world that the attainment of all the advantages contemplated from the movement across the Indus, has been hitherto opposed only by the perfidious intrigues of the two powers professing to be our friends and allies. ”