1863 anti-Pashtun military campaign in British India
Ambela expedition
Date
1863–1864
Location
Buffer zone between the Emirate of Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier Province of British India
Result
British Indian victory[3][4]
Belligerents
British Empire
India
State of Swat Bunerwal tribe Yusufzai tribes[1][2]
Commanders and leaders
Neville Bowles Chamberlain (WIA) John Garvock John Paton Davidson † Henry Howard Chapman †
Saidu Baba Sultan Muhammad Khan Sardar Darwiz khan
Strength
6,000
reinforced by 4800
15,000 men
Casualties and losses
3,000+ killed including 1,000+ British [5]
Unknown
The Ambela campaign (also called Umbeyla, Umbeylah, and Ambeyla) of 1863 was one of many expeditions in the border area between the Emirate of Afghanistan and the Punjab Province of British India (renamed the North-West Frontier Province in 1901, present-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) against the Hindustani Fanatics at Malka, a colony of malcontents or bigoted Muslims from Hindustan.[6]
The Pashtuns had been a constant thorn to the British government since the annexation of the region, who had raided and ravaged until it invited expeditions to subdue them. [7] However, in previous expeditions the Pashtun Tribesman had always managed to escape into the hills.[8] In 1858, an expedition led by Sir Sydney Cotton drove them from their base.
By 1863, however, they had regrouped around the mountain outpost of Malka. A force led by Neville Bowles Chamberlain planned to destroy Malka. They set up an operational base in the Chamla Valley which could be reached via the Ambela Pass, but they were soon bogged down by a numerically superior local force, and were attacked by the Swati, Bunerwal and Hindustani tribesmen.[9] Reinforcements drafted in by the local Commander-in-Chief eventually broke through the pass, received the surrender of the Bunerwals and went on to burn Malka. The expedition resulted in 1,000 British casualties and an unknown number of Indian casualties.
^Karimi, Christine Noelle (1997). State and Tribe in Nineteenth-century Afghanistan: The Reign of Amir Dost Muhammad Khan (1826-1863). Psychology Press. p. 185. ISBN 9780700706297. Retrieved 6 June 2022.
^N.-W.F. Province Gazetteers: Volume 6, Part 1. the University of California. 1931.
^Stewart 2006, p. 183.
^Jalal 2009, p. 115.
^State and Tribe in Nineteenth-century Afghanistan: The Reign of Amir Dost Muhammad Khan (1826-1863)
^Indian State Railways Magazine:Volume 7, Issues 1-3. Indian State Railways Magazine. 1933.
^Nag, Moni (12 May 2011). Population and Social Organization. Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 9783110822168.
^"Journal of the Royal Central Asian Society". 7 October 2023.
^T. Moreman · (1998). The Army in India and the Development of Frontier Warfare, 1849-1947. p. 24.
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