Second Anglo-Burmese War
The Second Anglo-Burmese War was an armed conflict between Burma and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and lasted from 1852 to 1853.
Cause and course
In 1850, the governor of Rangoon Maung Ok forced a British trader to pay a fee of 16,000 rupees for a ship to be launched. The trader complained to the Governor General of British India, Lord Dalhousie . The following summer Maung Ok had two British captains arrested for murder and released on payment of £ 920 . The captains turned to Dalhousie with demands for compensation.
Lord Dalhousie had just ended the Second Sikh War and sent Commodore George Lambert to Rangoon with four ships to settle the matter. One day after his arrival, Lambert finally urged King Pagan Min to remove Maung Ok from his position and to pay compensation. Pagan Min removed the governor from office and promised to honor the demand for money. The new governor insultingly refused to meet with British officers. Lambert then blocked the port of Rangoon and brought down Burmese ships. Burmese coastal batteries opened fire but were quickly silenced by HMS Fox .
On March 15, 1852, Lord Dalhousie sent an ultimatum and a demand for one million rupees to the king and announced fighting if his demands were not met by April 1, 1852. The Army of Ava was sent to Rangoon with 8,100 men under the command of General Henry Thomas Godwin . Commodore Lambert commanded the fleet. When there was no reply to the ultimatum, the British began fighting with the capture of the port of Martaban on April 5, 1852 by the 18th Regiment of Foot (Royal Irish). On Sunday April 11th, steamers opened fire on fortifications in Rangoon, on the right bank of the river and Dala on the left. Dala fell the same day. The attack on Rangoon began in the morning hours of April 12th. Two days later, on April 14th, the Shwedagon Pagoda in Rangoon was captured after heavy fighting .
Pathein fell on May 19, 1852, Bago on June 3. Pyay fell on October 9th . In December Dalhousie informed the king that the province of Pegu with the southern Irrawaddy valley had been annexed and further resistance would end with the annexation of the entire kingdom.
On January 20, 1853, the annexation of the province of Pegu to British India was officially announced. A peace treaty was not signed and minor fighting continued for months. In the meantime, a civil war had broken out in Burma, which ended with the removal of Pagan Mines. He was succeeded by Mindon Min , who had no choice but to accept the loss of the province of Pegu.
The conquest of Pegus closed the gap between the British possessions of Arakan and Tenasserim and brought them into possession of extensive teak forests.
literature
- Byron Farwell: Queen Victoria's Little Wars. Wordsworth, Ware 1999, ISBN 1-84022-215-8 .
- Donald Featherstone: Colonial Small Wars 1837-1901. David & Charles, Newton Abbot 1973, ISBN 0-7153-5711-5
- Daniel George Edward Hall: Burma (= Hutchinson's University Library. British Empire History ). 2nd edition. Hutchinson's University Library, London 1956.