Brigadier General Sir Henry Montgomery Lawrence, was a British military officer, surveyor, administrator and statesman in British India. He is best known for leading a group of administrators in the Punjab affectionately known as Henry Lawrence's "Young Men", as the founder of the Lawrence Military Asylums and for his death at the Siege of Lucknow during the Indian Rebellion of 1857.
Major-General Sir Herbert Benjamin EdwardesDCL was a British administrator, soldier, and statesman active in the Punjab region of British India. He is best known as the "Hero of Multan" for his pivotal role in securing British victory in the Second Anglo-Sikh War.
Field Marshal Hugh Gough, 1st Viscount Gough, was a senior British Army officer. After serving as a junior officer at the seizure of the Cape of Good Hope during the French Revolutionary Wars, Gough commanded the 2nd Battalion of the 87th Regiment of Foot during the Peninsular War. After serving as commander-in-chief of the British forces in China during the First Opium War, he became Commander-in-Chief, India and led the British forces in action against the Marathas defeating them decisively at the conclusion of the Gwalior campaign and then commanded the troops that defeated the Sikhs during both the First Anglo-Sikh War and the Second Anglo-Sikh War.
The first Anglo-Sikh war was fought between the Sikh Empire and the British East India Company in 1845 and 1846 around the Ferozepur district of Punjab. It resulted in defeat and partial subjugation of the Sikh empire and cession of Jammu & Kashmir as a separate princely state under British suzerainty.
Major General Sir Alexander Cunningham was a British Army engineer with the Bengal Engineer Group who later took an interest in the history and archaeology of India. In 1861, he was appointed to the newly created position of archaeological surveyor to the government of India; and he founded and organised what later became the Archaeological Survey of India.
The Sikh Empire was a regional power based in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent. It existed from 1799, when Maharaja Ranjit Singh captured Lahore, to 1849, when it was defeated and conquered by the British East India Company in the Second Anglo-Sikh War. It was forged on the foundations of the Khalsa from a collection of autonomous misls. At its peak in the 19th century, the empire extended from Gilgit and Tibet in the north to the deserts of Sindh in the south and from the Khyber Pass in the west to the Sutlej in the east as far as Oudh. It was divided into four provinces: Lahore, which became the Sikh capital; Multan; Peshawar; and Kashmir from 1799 to 1849. Religiously diverse, with an estimated population of 4.5 million in 1831, it was the last major region of the Indian subcontinent to be annexed by the British Empire.
The Cis-Sutlej states were a group of states in the contemporary Punjab and Haryana states of northern India during the 19th century, lying between the Sutlej River on the north, the Himalayas on the east, the Yamuna River and Delhi District on the south, and Sirsa District on the west. The small Punjabi kingdoms of the Cis-Sutlej states paid tributes to the Marathas, until the Second Anglo-Maratha War of 1803–1805, after which the Marathas lost this territory to the British.
The Battle of Sobraon was fought on 10 February 1846, between the forces of the East India Company and the Sikh Khalsa Army, the army of the Sikh Empire of the Punjab. The Sikhs were completely defeated, making this the decisive battle of the First Anglo-Sikh War.
The Battle of Aliwal was fought on 28 January 1846 between the British and Sikh forces in northern India. The British were led by Sir Harry Smith, while the Sikhs were led by Ranjodh Singh Majithia. Britain's victory in the battle is sometimes regarded as the turning point in the First Anglo-Sikh War.
The Battle of Mudki was fought on 18 December 1845, between the forces of the East India Company and part of the Sikh Khalsa Army, the army of the Sikh Empire of the Punjab. The British army won an untidy encounter battle, sustaining heavy casualties.
The Battle of Ferozeshah was fought on 21 December and 22 December 1845 between the British East India Company and the Sikh Empire, at the village of Ferozeshah in Punjab. The British were led by Sir Hugh Gough and Governor-General Sir Henry Hardinge, while the Sikhs were led by Lal Singh. The British emerged victorious.
Major-General Saunders Alexius Abbott was an English military officer in the Bengal Army and administrator serving in British India.
The Treaty of Lahore of 9 March 1846 was a peace-treaty marking the end of the First Anglo-Sikh War. The treaty was concluded, for the British, by the Governor-General Sir Henry Hardinge and two officers of the East India Company and, for the Sikhs, by the seven-year-old Maharaja Duleep Singh and seven members of Hazara, the territory to the south of the river Sutlej and the forts and territory in the Jalandhar Doab between the rivers Sutlej and Beas. In addition, controls were placed on the size of the Lahore army and thirty-six field guns were confiscated. The control of the rivers Sutlej and Beas and part of the Indus passed to the British, with the Provision that this was not to interfere with the passage of passenger boats owned by the Lahore Government. Also, provision was made for the separate sale of all the hilly regions between River Beas and Indus, including Kashmir, by the East India Company at a later date to Gulab Singh, the Raja of Jammu.
Sir Frederick Currie, 1st Baronet was a British diplomat, who had a distinguished career in the British East India Company and the Indian Civil Service. His posts included Foreign Secretary to the Government of India, Member of the Supreme Council of India, Resident at Lahore and Chairman of the East India Company.
Major George BroadfootCB was a Scottish army officer in the Madras Army of the East India Company.
Lieutenant-General Sir Joseph Thackwell was a British Army officer. He served with the 15th Hussars in the Peninsular War at the Battle of Sahagún in 1808 and the Battle of Vitoria in 1813, and he lost his left arm at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. He commanded the regiment from 1820 to 1832. He then served in India, commanding the cavalry in the First Anglo-Afghan War of 1838–89, and at the Battle of Sobraon in the First Anglo-Sikh War of 1845–46, and at the Battle of Chillianwala and Battle of Gujrat in the Second Anglo-Sikh War of 1848–9. He also commanded the 3rd The King's Own Dragoons, was colonel of the 16th Lancers, and was appointed Inspector-general of cavalry.
Ahluwalia was a misl, that is, a sovereign state in the Sikh Confederacy of Punjab region in present-day India and Pakistan. The misl's name is derived from Ahlu, the ancestral village of the misl leaders. The Ahluwalia misl was one of the 12 major Sikh misls, and held land to the north of Sutlej river.
Lieutenant-General Sir Michael White KCB was a British Army officer. The son of a major in the 27th Dragoons, he received a commission in the same regiment in 1804. White served in India on the Sikh frontier; during the 1817 Siege of Hathras; the 1817-18 Third Anglo-Maratha War and the 1825-26 Siege of Bharatpur. From 1839 he commanded the 3rd Light Dragoons and led them in the 1842 invasion of Afghanistan for which he was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath.
John Stafford Paton, (1821–1889) was an English general in the Indian Army. He served in the Sikh Wars of 1845–1846 and 1848–1849, and was severely wounded at Chillianwallah; served under Sir C. J. Napier against the Afridees and at the Kohat Pass in 1850; and in 1867 commanded the field detachment from Lahore sent to aid in suppressing the Gogaira insurrection during the Indian Mutiny.
Edward John Lake CSI was a British major-general in the Royal Engineers.
