Afghan Expedition

Afghan Expedition PDF Author: James Atkinson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781590482803
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
James Atkinson travelled to Afghanistan in 1838. A superb artist and famous scholar who had translated Persias national epic, this renaissance man had been designated the Superintending Surgeon of a massive British invasion force resolved to place a sympathetic ruler on the Afghan throne. The ill-fated British force fought its way through the Bolan Pass, swept through Kandahar and conquered Kabul. Soon afterwards Atkinson was released from duty, thereby escaping the catastrophe which awaited his comrades. During the subsequent rebellion the British political agent was beheaded and an estimated 16,000 British soldiers and their dependents were slaughtered in a week by the vengeful Afghans. After the English captured Kabul, Atkinsons eyewitness account of these turbulent events was rushed into print while British interest was at its peak. The astonishing true chronicle of events was a best-seller. Yet though the surgeons observations remain important, his forgotten artistic depictions are priceless. Once again the ravages of war are taking a toll as a new generation of British soldiers struggles against formidable Afghan warriors in that notoriously difficult country. In an ironic literary twist a serving British cavalry officer currently stationed in Afghanistan, 2nd Lt. Merlin Hanbury-Tenison, provides a moving Introduction to Atkinsons tale, explaining how his forefather fought alongside the author in the conflict of 1838. With a special Foreword by the noted historian and author, Jules Stewart, this beautifully illustrated edition of Atkinsons inclusive work is released in the hope that its timely appearance will help bring about a deeper understanding between England and Afghanistan.

Afghan Expedition

Afghan Expedition PDF Author: James Atkinson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781590482803
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
James Atkinson travelled to Afghanistan in 1838. A superb artist and famous scholar who had translated Persias national epic, this renaissance man had been designated the Superintending Surgeon of a massive British invasion force resolved to place a sympathetic ruler on the Afghan throne. The ill-fated British force fought its way through the Bolan Pass, swept through Kandahar and conquered Kabul. Soon afterwards Atkinson was released from duty, thereby escaping the catastrophe which awaited his comrades. During the subsequent rebellion the British political agent was beheaded and an estimated 16,000 British soldiers and their dependents were slaughtered in a week by the vengeful Afghans. After the English captured Kabul, Atkinsons eyewitness account of these turbulent events was rushed into print while British interest was at its peak. The astonishing true chronicle of events was a best-seller. Yet though the surgeons observations remain important, his forgotten artistic depictions are priceless. Once again the ravages of war are taking a toll as a new generation of British soldiers struggles against formidable Afghan warriors in that notoriously difficult country. In an ironic literary twist a serving British cavalry officer currently stationed in Afghanistan, 2nd Lt. Merlin Hanbury-Tenison, provides a moving Introduction to Atkinsons tale, explaining how his forefather fought alongside the author in the conflict of 1838. With a special Foreword by the noted historian and author, Jules Stewart, this beautifully illustrated edition of Atkinsons inclusive work is released in the hope that its timely appearance will help bring about a deeper understanding between England and Afghanistan.

The Afghan Wars, 1839-42 and 1878-80

The Afghan Wars, 1839-42 and 1878-80 PDF Author: Archibald Forbes
Publisher: IndyPublish.com
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 376

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Book Description
This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.

The Military Operations at Cabul, which Ended in the Retreat and Destruction of the British Army, January 1842

The Military Operations at Cabul, which Ended in the Retreat and Destruction of the British Army, January 1842 PDF Author: Vincent Eyre
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Afghan Wars
Languages : en
Pages : 364

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Book Description


The Expedition Into Afghanistan

The Expedition Into Afghanistan PDF Author: James Atkinson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Afghan Wars
Languages : en
Pages : 456

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Book Description


Return of a King

Return of a King PDF Author: William Dalrymple
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307958299
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 494

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Book Description
From William Dalrymple—award-winning historian, journalist and travel writer—a masterly retelling of what was perhaps the West’s greatest imperial disaster in the East, and an important parable of neocolonial ambition, folly and hubris that has striking relevance to our own time. With access to newly discovered primary sources from archives in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Russia and India—including a series of previously untranslated Afghan epic poems and biographies—the author gives us the most immediate and comprehensive account yet of the spectacular first battle for Afghanistan: the British invasion of the remote kingdom in 1839. Led by lancers in scarlet cloaks and plumed helmets, and facing little resistance, nearly 20,000 British and East India Company troops poured through the mountain passes from India into Afghanistan in order to reestablish Shah Shuja ul-Mulk on the throne, and as their puppet. But after little more than two years, the Afghans rose in answer to the call for jihad and the country exploded into rebellion. This First Anglo-Afghan War ended with an entire army of what was then the most powerful military nation in the world ambushed and destroyed in snowbound mountain passes by simply equipped Afghan tribesmen. Only one British man made it through. But Dalrymple takes us beyond the bare outline of this infamous battle, and with penetrating, balanced insight illuminates the uncanny similarities between the West’s first disastrous entanglement with Afghanistan and the situation today. He delineates the straightforward facts: Shah Shuja and President Hamid Karzai share the same tribal heritage; the Shah’s principal opponents were the Ghilzai tribe, who today make up the bulk of the Taliban’s foot soldiers; the same cities garrisoned by the British are today garrisoned by foreign troops, attacked from the same rings of hills and high passes from which the British faced attack. Dalryrmple also makes clear the byzantine complexity of Afghanistan’s age-old tribal rivalries, the stranglehold they have on the politics of the nation and the ways in which they ensnared both the British in the nineteenth century and NATO forces in the twenty-first. Informed by the author’s decades-long firsthand knowledge of Afghanistan, and superbly shaped by his hallmark gifts as a narrative historian and his singular eye for the evocation of place and culture, The Return of a King is both the definitive analysis of the First Anglo-Afghan War and a work of stunning topicality.

The First Anglo-Afghan Wars

The First Anglo-Afghan Wars PDF Author: Antoinette Burton
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822376695
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 399

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Book Description
Designed for classroom use, The First Anglo-Afghan Wars gathers in one volume primary source materials related to the first two wars that Great Britain launched against native leaders of the Afghan region. From 1839 to 1842, and again from 1878 to 1880, Britain fought to expand its empire and prevent Russian expansion into the region's northwest frontier, which was considered the gateway to India, the jewel in Victorian Britain's imperial crown. Spanning from 1817 to 1919, the selections reflect the complex national, international, and anticolonial interests entangled in Central Asia at the time. The documents, each of which is preceded by a brief introduction, bring the nineteenth-century wars alive through the opinions of those who participated in or lived through the conflicts. They portray the struggle for control of the region from the perspectives of women and non-Westerners, as well as well-known figures including Kipling and Churchill. Filled with military and civilian voices, the collection clearly demonstrates the challenges that Central Asia posed to powers attempting to secure and claim the region. It is a cautionary tale, unheeded by Western powers in the post–9/11 era.

The March to Kandahar

The March to Kandahar PDF Author: Rodney Atwood
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1844689476
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 254

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Book Description
The story of the British commander who led a three-hundred-mile march from Kabul to Kandahar and became the toast of Victorian England. This book examines the role of Frederick Roberts in the Second Anglo-Afghan War, culminating in his famous march in 1880 with ten thousand British and Indian soldiers, covering three hundred miles in twenty-three days, from Kabul to Kandahar to defeat the Afghan army of Ayub Khan, pretender to the Amirship of Kabul. The march made Roberts one of late Victorian England’s great military heroes, partly because of the achievement itself, partly because the victory restored British prestige after defeat, and finally because of Roberts’ astute use of the press to puff his victory. This overcame the earlier damage done to his reputation by the political storm that followed his hanging of over eighty Afghans in revenge for the massacre of a British envoy and his escort. It enabled the liberal Viceroy of India, Lord Ripon, to extract his forces from an Afghan imbroglio with prestige restored and an emir on the Afghan throne who for thirty-nine years maintained friendship with British India. Roberts (or Bobs as he was known) subsequently advanced to command the Indian Army, working closely with future viceroys to influence Indian defense policy on the North-West Frontier, and being hymned by Rudyard Kipling, poet of empire. His bestselling autobiography, Forty-One Years in India, established his image before the British public and he remains one of Britain’s best known, if least understood, military figures

Afghanistan

Afghanistan PDF Author: Stephen Tanner
Publisher: Da Capo Press
ISBN: 0786722630
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 394

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Book Description
For over 2,500 years, the forbidding territory of Afghanistan has served as a vital crossroads for armies and has witnessed history-shaping clashes between civilizations: Greek, Arab, Mongol, and Tartar, and, in more recent times, British, Russian, and American. When U.S. troops entered Afghanistan in the weeks following September 11, 2001, they overthrew the Afghan Taliban regime and sent the terrorists it harbored on the run. But America's initial easy victory is in sharp contrast to the difficulties it faces today in confronting the Taliban resurgence. Originally published in 2002, Stephen Tanner's Afghanistan has now been completely updated to include the crucial turn of events since America first entered the country.

Into the Land of Bones

Into the Land of Bones PDF Author: Frank L. Holt
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520953754
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
The so-called first war of the twenty-first century actually began more than 2,300 years ago when Alexander the Great led his army into what is now a sprawling ruin in northern Afghanistan. Frank L. Holt vividly recounts Alexander's invasion of ancient Bactria, situating in a broader historical perspective America's war in Afghanistan.

The Anglo-Afghan Wars 1839–1919

The Anglo-Afghan Wars 1839–1919 PDF Author: Gregory Fremont-Barnes
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1472810082
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 144

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Book Description
During the 19th century Britain entered into three brutal wars with Afghanistan, each one saw the British trying and failing to gain control of a warlike and impenetrable territory. The first two wars (1839–42 and 1878–81) were wars of the Great Game; the British Empire's attempts to combat growing Russian influence near India's borders. The third, fought in 1919, was an Afghan-declared holy war against British India – in which over 100,000 Afghans answered the call, and raised a force that would prove too great for the British Imperial army. Each of the three wars were plagued by military disasters, lengthy sieges and costly engagements for the British, and history has proved the Afghans a formidable foe and their country unconquerable. This book reveals the history of these three Anglo-Afghan wars, the imperial power struggles that led to conflict and the torturous experiences of the men on the ground. The book concludes with a brief overview of the background to today's conflict in Afghanistan, and sketches the historical parallels.