Battle of Gandamak
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Gandamak is a village in Afghanistan, 35 miles (56 km) from Jalalabad on the road to Kabul. During the retreat from Kabul of Major-General William Elphinstone's army in 1842, a hill near Gandamak was the scene of the massacre of the last survivors of the British force: twenty officers and forty-five soldiers of the British 44th Regiment of Foot.
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[edit] Prelude
The British force had been relentlessly pursued by Akbar Khan's Afghan forces during the slow retreat from Kabul that had gradually become a running battle through two feet of snow. The men had no shelter and little food for weeks. The ground was frozen and icy. Only a dozen of the men had working muskets, the officers their pistols and a few unbroken swords. When the Afghans surrounded them on the morning of the 13th the Afghans announced that a surrender could be arranged. "Not bloody likely!" was the bellowed answer of one British sergeant. It is believed that only two survived the massacre. Most notable was Captain Thomas Souter, who by wrapping the regimental colours around himself was taken prisoner, being mistaken by the Afghan as a high military official. The other was Surgeon William Brydon who made it as far as the British garrison at Jalalabad after riding his exhausted horse to the limit for days.
A vivid, if romanticised, depiction entitled "Last Stand of the 44th Regiment at Gundamuk" was painted by the artist William Barnes Wollen in 1898 which now hangs in the Chelmsford and Essex museum in Oaklands Park, London Road, Chelmsford.
[edit] The Battle
The final stand took place at Gandamak on the morning of 13th January 1842 in the snow.[1] 20 officers and 45 European soldiers, mostly of the 44th Foot, found themselves surrounded on a hillock.[1] The Afghans attempted to persuade the soldiers that they intended them no harm. Then the sniping began followed a series of rushes.[1] Captain Souter wrapped the colors of the regiment around his body and was dragged into captivity with two or three soldiers.[1] The remainder were shot or cut down. Only 6 mounted officers escaped. Of these 5 were murdered along the road.[1]
On the afternoon of 13th January 1842 the British troops in Jellalabad, watching for their comrades of the Kabul garrison, saw a single figure ride up to the town walls.[1] It was Dr Brydon, the sole survivor of the column.[1]
[edit] Aftermath
This disaster to British arms served to encourage the Indian nationalists who were leaders in the great mutiny in India (1857).
