THE ANGLO-SIKH WARS & THE BATTLE OF CHIILLIANWALA
The Northwest Frontier The Three Swords of Meer Jaffir (Part 1 & Part 2) Gun Running to the Northwest Frontier A Tale of Subedar Major Mauladad (1822-1890) The Buddhist Road and The Storming of the Malakand Pass 1895 The Guides Saab Ka Risala 1846-1900 Safe Conduct – A tale about Syed Wazir Ali (Part 1 & Part 2) Under The Raj Revisiting the Great Arc of the Meridian Neither Freedom nor Salt The Lahore Cantonment of Mian Mir Vale Hunting in India and the Peshawar Vale Hunt Feeding the Armies of the Raj Eating Curries in London Signposts, Tablets & Way Markers of the Raj British Indian Army & State Forces Under Pelican Wings— Bahawalpur State Forces On the Departure of Gowhar-i-Taj’s Own Infantry Battalion to Burma. The Irregular Cavalry through the Lens of a Painting The Indian Mountain Artillery Soldiers of the Salt Range Subedar Major Mauladad The Anglo-Sikh Wars Ranjit Singh Ka Topkhana Part 1 Ranjit Singh Ka Topkhana Part 2 Ranjit Singh Ka Topkhana Part 3 The Anglo-Sikh Wars & The Battle of Chillianwala Finding Zamzama’s Twin The Death of Capt John Anderson, Bengal Artillery Roads, Railways & Bridges Bridging the Mighty Indus Crossing Rivers in Punjab On the Tracks of the Frontier Mail Pre Independence Personalities Who was Sahabzada Sir Abdus Samad Khan A Gnarled Oak with a Broken Heart Heritage Of Sahabzada Yaqub Dr Khalifa Abdul Hakim – The Islamic Cultural Renaissance Philosopher 24 Marris Road, Aligarh – Dr Abdullah Butt Maj Gen Syed Shahid Hamid An Indian Lieutenant at the 1936 Berlin Olympics The Power of a Mother’s Prayers A Muslim Instructor at Staff College Entering the Hallowed Ranks of the Indian Political Service. Edit Template THE ANGLO-SIKH WARS & THE BATTLE OF CHIILLIANWALA September 11, 2025 Major General Syed Ali Hamid The 38 years (1801-1839) that Maharaja Ranjit Singh ruled witnessed the evolution of the Sikh Army from a semi-feudal and disorganized force to an efficient fighting machine that would have been able to hold its own against the best European armies. Ranjit Singh prescribed the most exacting standards of efficiency in march, maneuver, and marksmanship, and under his watchful eye, the army developed into a balanced force with the infantry and artillery gaining in importance. It not only drove the Afghans out of the Peshawar Valley, but it was also by far also the most potent force faced by the East India Company. Ranjit Singh was conscious of the expansionist designs of the East India Company (EIC) and was careful not to provoke the British. The British too needed a strong and stable Punjab kingdom as a buffer against a Russo-French Alliance. In 1809 the Treaty of Amritsar was signed between the two in which the line of Sutlej became the de facto boundary which allowed the Maharaja to expand his kingdom towards Multan, Peshawar, and Kashmir. The cooperation between the two continued for the next 30 years, and in 1838, the two most powerful armies on the Indian subcontinent – that of Ranjit Singh and of the EIC, assembled in a grand review at Ferozepur. The following year Ranjit Singh died. Following the annexation of Sind in 1843, the arrows of the East India Company (EIC) pointed toward Punjab. It was a rich kingdom and the last remaining that had not succumbed. Politically and militarily there was great disorder and the army had emerged as an independent power base. Ranjit Singh’s wife, Jind Kaur who had become vice-regent was secretly cooperating with the EIC along with Prime Minister Lal Singh and Tej Singh the Army Chief. To break the power of the army, she goaded it to a contest with the EIC. Simultaneously, on the pretext that unstable conditions in the Punjab threatened the adjoining territories, the EIC prepared for war. In 1845, a Sikh army of 40,000 with 40 guns crossed over the Sutlej. One army under Tej Singh advanced towards Ferozepur but made no effort to surround and attack the British cantonment. Eighteen miles away, another under Lal Singh advanced on a British force that was resting at Mudki. The Sikh guns and infantry formed up in a dense jungle with the Ghorchurra (irregular cavalry) deployed on the flanks. Though better equipped than the British cavalry and highly skilled, they had never succumbed to the discipline imposed by Ranjit Singh on his infantry and artillery and proved to be the weakest link in most encounters. Their charge was repulsed by a counter charge of the British cavalry that then struck the Sikh artillery and infantry but they stood firm even against a subsequent assault by the main British force. As darkness descended, the Sikh artillery which mainly consisted of heavy guns inflicted substantial casualties on the EIC troops with grapeshot. Though the Sikhs were driven from the field, the gunners managed to save more than half their guns. Lal Singh now established a well-entrenched position at Ferozeshah with 47,000 troops and 88 guns of all calibers. The battle opened with a terrific artillery duel in which the Sikh artillery outperformed that of the enemy. Since the barrels of the Sikh guns were heavier and could fire a bigger charge, they outranged the British. Being better trained, the gunners also had a 3:2 advantage in the rate of fire. The artillery concentrated on the British battalions and the 4th Division broke. By the evening all four divisions of the Army of the Sutlej that had been assembled for battle by the EIC, had penetrated the Sikh ramparts but with heavy casualties. There now occurred a repeat of what happened a hundred years earlier at Plassey. During the night Lal Singh fled the camp with all his Ghorchurras and the crews of 60 guns and when Tej Singh arrived in the morning he declined to give battle. The British C-in-C General Gough remarked after the battle: “Never did a native army, having so relatively slight an advantage in numbers, fight a battle with the British in which the issue was
FINDING ZAMZAMA’s TWIN
The Northwest Frontier The Three Swords of Meer Jaffir (Part 1 & Part 2) Gun Running to the Northwest Frontier A Tale of Subedar Major Mauladad (1822-1890) The Buddhist Road and The Storming of the Malakand Pass 1895 The Guides Saab Ka Risala 1846-1900 Safe Conduct – A tale about Syed Wazir Ali (Part 1 & Part 2) Under The Raj Revisiting the Great Arc of the Meridian Neither Freedom nor Salt The Lahore Cantonment of Mian Mir Vale Hunting in India and the Peshawar Vale Hunt Feeding the Armies of the Raj Eating Curries in London Signposts, Tablets & Way Markers of the Raj British Indian Army & State Forces Under Pelican Wings— Bahawalpur State Forces On the Departure of Gowhar-i-Taj’s Own Infantry Battalion to Burma. The Irregular Cavalry through the Lens of a Painting The Indian Mountain Artillery Soldiers of the Salt Range Subedar Major Mauladad The Anglo-Sikh Wars Ranjit Singh Ka Topkhana Part 1 Ranjit Singh Ka Topkhana Part 2 Ranjit Singh Ka Topkhana Part 3 The Anglo-Sikh Wars & The Battle of Chillianwala Finding Zamzama’s Twin The Death of Capt John Anderson, Bengal Artillery Roads, Railways & Bridges Bridging the Mighty Indus Crossing Rivers in Punjab On the Tracks of the Frontier Mail Pre Independence Personalities Who was Sahabzada Sir Abdus Samad Khan A Gnarled Oak with a Broken Heart Heritage Of Sahabzada Yaqub Dr Khalifa Abdul Hakim – The Islamic Cultural Renaissance Philosopher 24 Marris Road, Aligarh – Dr Abdullah Butt Maj Gen Syed Shahid Hamid An Indian Lieutenant at the 1936 Berlin Olympics The Power of a Mother’s Prayers A Muslim Instructor at Staff College Entering the Hallowed Ranks of the Indian Political Service. Edit Template FINDING ZAMZAMA’s TWIN September 11, 2025 Major General Syed Ali Hamid There is a mystery about buried relics that excites the imagination and conjures up images of lost treasure hordes. In fact, treasure hunting is now an industry propelled by amateurs and professionals all questing for that ‘find’ that will make them rich. And there have been discoveries of great value, particularly on the seafloor from where treasure hunters have salvaged many fascinating and valuable artifacts from the wrecks of the Spanish treasure fleets, Chinese junks, and ships of the East India Company returning home with loot from the Indian Subcontinent. My quest is for an object which has lain buried under the bed of the River Chenab for the past 260 years. Its value in monetary terms may only be the price of the Copper and Bronze of which it was constructed but it would be of great historical value to the citizens of Pakistan. While I was serving in the Joint Staff Headquarters in 1999, I was fortunate that its library had a large collection of books of the late Syed Akhtar Ahsan, the brother-in-law of Syed Babar Ali which had been presented by his family. Akhtar Ahsan was a writer as well as a voracious reader and his collection included books on history and military campaigns. One of them authored by Ganda Singh in 1959, was on Ahmed Shah Durrani. In the latter part of the 18 century this Afghan Sadozai king conquered the lands of the River Indus and its tributaries and defeated the Marathas in the Third Battle of Panipat. Ahmed Shah is also remembered as the king who cast a great gun named the Zamzama and while reading the book I became aware of an interesting fact – according to the author, not one but two guns were cast. In the year 2000, I bought a book by the famous journalist and travel writer – Peter Hopkirk called ‘Quest for KIM. In search of the Kipling’s Great Game’. He too wrote that the Zamzama – ‘ …..once had a twin. However, this was lost during a river crossing while being dragged back to Kabul by Ahmed Shah’s victorious artillery men and today it lies, somewhere at the bottom of the Chenab river, forty miles west of Lahore.’Zamzama was one of the most magnificent cannons of its time with a barrel over 14 feet long, a bore at its aperture of 9½ inches and a weight of 4.5 tons. It was forged with copper and bronze of household utensils collected from residents of Lahore through jaziha – a tax levied on non-Muslim subjects. It was far superior to a cannon captured by the British during the Siege of Bhurtpore in 1826, which used to be displayed outside the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich. The Bhurtpore Cannon was cast in 1780 i.e. 25 years after the Zamzama and though the barrel had the same length, the estimated weight is two tons heavier with a caliber half that of the Zamzama. At its muzzle end the Zamzama bears the inscription: “By the order of the Emperor, DuriDurran, Shah Wali Khan Wazir made the gun named Zamzama or the Taker of Strongholds.” The longer inscription at the back eulogizes its bulk and invincibility: “A destroyer even of the strongholds of the heaven. For reason I enquire of the year of its manufacture; Struck with terror it replied, ‘Wert thou willing to surrender thine life, I would unfold unto thee the secret.’ I agreed, and it said, laden with innuendo: – ‘What a cannon! ‘Tis a mighty fire dispensing dragon!’” The last line of the second inscription forms a chronogram — a phrase who’s each letter has a numerical value which when added gives a specific date and adds up to 1169 Hijri (1755-56 AD). Four years after being manufactured, the guns aided Durrani in defeating the Marathas in the epic Third Battle of Panipat in 1761. While researching further on the guns I came across conflicting accounts by historians / writers regarding their fate. In his article “Why Abdali got such a huge Zamzama made”, published in the Dawn on July 20, 2014, Majid Sheikh states that both the guns were manufactured by Shah Nazir, an Armenian who had worked for the Mughal emperors. He set