Battle of Ali Masjid

Ali Masjid fortress after the British conquered it

date	21st bis 22. November 1878
place	Khyber Pass
output	British victory

Parties to the conflict
United Kingdom 1801 United Kingdom	Emirate of Afghanistan
Commander
Sir Samuel J. Browne	Ghulam Haider Khan Mir Akhor
Troop strength
3,000 infantrymen 600 militiamen 200 cavalrymen	3,000 infantrymen 600 militiamen 320 riflemen 200 cavalrymen
losses
16–37 killed 34 wounded	approx. 40 dead approx. 300 prisoners

The battle of Ali Masjid , also Ali Masjid , began on November 21, 1878. This battle marked the beginning of the Second Anglo-Afghan War . The battle is named after the Ali Masjid fortification on the Khyber Pass , which is located in a central strategic location. The fort was built by Dost Muhammad Khan in 1837 .

An alleged attack and the refusal of the Afghans to allow the British to enter their country, they responded with an attack on Ali Masjid's fortress. The battle took place between the British forces led by Lieutenant General Sir Samuel James Browne and the Afghan forces led by tribal leader Ghulam Haider Khan .

The battle was short and relatively bloodless, as the Afghans abandoned the fort and withdrew on the night of the first day of the attack.

prehistory

After the Battle of Jamrud in 1837, Dost Muhammad Khan built the Ali Masjid fortress. He tried to assert his sovereignty in the Khyber region. However, the fortress was captured two years later by Lieutenant Colonel Claude M. Wade with 11,000 men on July 26, 1839.

On September 21, two months after this battle, the British General Neville Bowles Chamberlain tried to reach Kabul and failed in the face of resistance from Faiz Muhammad , the commander of the Ali Masjid fortress. The British then issued an ultimatum in anticipation of Shir Ali apologizing for the incident.

battle

preparation

British camp on the Shagai Mountains

The First Brigade began practicing the attack that summer when stationed at the Miree Hills. On October 23, a group of scouts was sent to Ali Masjid Fortress to see that the Afghans were preparing for the invasion. On the evening of November 20, about 1,700 soldiers from the Second Brigade of the Peshawar Valley Field Force began a march to assist Browne's forces in the attack on Ali Masjid Fort, which protected the Khyber Pass. In the dark, teams and animals were misled as they approached and it was already 10 p.m. when the troops reached the settlement of Lahore. Lahore is only 5.5 km from Ali Masjid Fortress.

The First Brigade, which consisted of about 1,900 men, was prevented from marching through unsuitable clothing such as gaiters, and the soldiers also had leg cramps. So they arrived in Lahore at 6:00 a.m. on November 21, just as the First Battalion was preparing to leave. Colonel Jenkins led the brigade's scouts. Because of the heat, inadequate water supply, and lack of shade, Brigadier General JA Tytler ordered to stop at Pani Pal. While the men rested, Tytler investigated the situation and found that the attackers' left flank was in danger. As Jenkins led a scout group up the hill, they saw the air vibrate from the firing of heavy shells. Then Tytler decided that he would go with several men behind Pani Pal and Jenkins should defend and protect the endangered flank with the other soldiers.

Afghan Defense

The guns of the Afghans

Yorkshire Infantry soldiers

The Afghans had 24 cannons. When Brown's troops spread out on the Shagai Mountains, eight Afghan cannons had already been set up there for defense and two to the south of the fort, and another was set up to defend against attacks from the Kyber River.

Beginning of the battle

Afghan horsemen were positioned on the heights of the Shagai Mountains. Browne ordered single fires at 10am, which resulted in the Afghans responding with rifle fire from the mountains and the 81st Foot , 14th Sikhs and an artillery battery to retreat out of sight of Ali Masjid Fortress. Major HB Pearson gave the signal to hold the Sarkai Mountains and used heliographs to transmit messages to communicate with the command in Jamrud .

The artillery began to fire in the afternoon, although it could not be confirmed which side was receiving fire. After the British brought their own heavy cannons down the hills, MacPherson opened fire on the right flank of the fortress. The British had managed to get both 40lb and 9lb cannons into position using artillery horses. Since the Afghans only fired cannonballs instead of grenades, heavy British 40lb cannons could fire into the center of the fort at 2 p.m., destroying Afghan 7lb cannons.

This coup enabled the infantry to advance to the fort. The Third Brigade was approaching from the right, while the Fourth Brigade was coming from the hills from the left. Since the Third Brigade did not come within the required distance to storm the fort, the order was given to not continue the military operations when it was dark, but to wait until the next morning. This had disastrous consequences for the Third Brigade, which marched forward, for a number of the soldiers did not receive this order and marched on without their comrades.

Captain JG Maclean took the right side of the range and Major Henry Holwell Birch the left with his Sikhs of the 27th Bengal Native Infantry he commanded. They soon got caught in the fierce Afghan fire and Maclean was shot injured in the shoulder. Birch and some men tried to protect him and bring him to safety, but they were hit or shot. Lieutenant Thomas Otho Fitzgerald took 15 men from the 27th Punjab and charged forward to help Birch. This did not succeed because four of them were shot and six were wounded. Birch and Fitzgerald were dead, Captain Maclean was wounded, as were four riflemen and 20 sepoys .

When the British withdrew in the night, Jenkins took his scouts to the heights of the Turhai Mountains and when the British wanted to continue the battle in the morning, Lieutenant JJS Chisholme of the 9th Lancers reported that the Afghans had fled the fortress during the night were. The Afghans who fled left about 40 wounded, 21 cannons and food. Since the Afghans did not know where Browne was positioned, 300 Afghans fled to the positions of the First Brigade, which they had reached during the night, and were captured. Browne had received orders not to operate in the south of the Khyber area, so that he was unable to follow the fleeing Afghans on their way through the Bazar Valley .

During the battle, the British fired 639 artillery shells and 11,250 rounds of cartridges.

Battle memorial plaque

The bodies of the dead British soldiers were buried in a small cemetery near the fort, which still commemorates the battle today, while the officers were buried in Peshawar.

After the battle

The victory of the British meant that the north of Kabul was neither protected nor could it be defended by Afghan troops. Browne was able to reach Dakkah with relative ease and could stay safely in Jalalabad through the winter .

Eight of the native soldiers who fought with the British were awarded the Indian Order of Merit .

After the battle, Shir Ali asked the Russians for military help so as not to have to surrender to the British.

Individual evidence

^ ^A ^b Frank A. Clements: Conflict in Afghanistan. A Historical Encyclopedia. ABC-Clio, Santa Barbara CA 2003, ISBN 1-85109-402-4 , u. a. P. 285.

^ Christine Noelle: State and Tribe in Nineteenth-Century Afghanistan. The Reign of Amir Dost Muhammad Khan (1826-1863). Curzon, Richmond 1997, ISBN 0-7007-0629-1 , p. 168.

^ John F. Riddick: The History of British India. Praeger, Westport CT et al. a. 2006, ISBN 0-313-32280-5 , p. 43.

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q Henry B. Hanna: The Second Afghan War. 1878-79-80. Its causes, its conduct and its consequences. Constable, Westminster 1904.

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e BritishEmpire.co.uk, Ali Masjid .

^ ^A ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f New York Times , The War on the Afghans: Fort Ali-Musjid Captured , November 23, 1878.

^ Irish Times, The Afghan War , Nov. 25, 1878.

↑ ^a ^b The Afghan Wars

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