Debate revolving around British Indian newspapers and travel diaries of British explorers before and during the conflict

Current research on newspapers in late nineteenth-century British India remains rather limited; to the best of my knowledge, not a single monograph or dictionary on the subject has been published to date. At the same time, reading of British Indian newspapers during this period reveals that the public sphere in British India was greatly concerned about the prospects of trade and possibility of conflict with Tibet, even engaging in heated debate on the issue. During this debate, the hawkish camp represented by The Pioneer based in Allahabad gained the upper hand and garnered support for waging war, hence providing popular support for starting the conflict. Scholars have conducted impressive research on the influence of British public opinion on British public policy in other contexts. In his Merchants of War and Peace, Chen Song-Chuan examined how British merchants based in Canton used their expertise and understanding of China to influence British policy toward China.Footnote ⁶ Recent research has also shown that during the Urabi revolt in Egypt, British public opinion legitimised the authorities’ decision to intervene militarily, in addition to directly shaping opinion toward Egypt in the House of Commons.Footnote ⁷

Similarly, many signs have pointed to the fact that besides the British India government, Chinese diplomats in Britain as well as the Foreign Office also followed public opinion very closely in both British India and Britain itself. The British Foreign Office archives, for instance, include a telegram sent by the Secretary of State to Lord Dufferin, the Viceroy, in Simla on 28 May 1888 informing him that the Chinese Minister to Britain Liu Ruifen had inquired “whether authority has been given for pursuit of the Tibetans across the frontier, as alleged in Times’ telegram of 24^th May”, and asked advice on how to respond if the question was repeated.Footnote ⁸ On 17 August that same year, Counsellor of the Chinese Legation in London Sir Halliday Macartney and Assistant Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Sir P. Carrie discussed recent newspaper articles on the Sikkim conflict.Footnote ⁹ On 25 February 1889, the Foreign Office sent a telegram to the Governor-General of India with an article from the Chinese newspaper Shenbao on the Sikkim question enclosed, while requesting that the newspaper article be returned to the Foreign Office for record keeping once done with.Footnote ¹⁰ On 22 April 1889, the British Minister to China John Walsham sent a telegram to the Indian Office blaming the failure of peace negotiations on “exaggerated statements in English and Indian press respecting pretensions of Resident and failure of negotiations”, even referring to their effect as being “most injurious” to reaching a compromise.Footnote ¹¹

Especially worthy of note is the fact that in 1848 the Governor of the Northwest Provinces James Thomason had begun a deliberate and systematic attempt to censor local newspapers in India, paying especial attention to articles that were considered to be seditious in nature. Up to the 1920s, the government consistently published a weekly Report on Native Papers that translated selected articles from Bengal (1863), the Northwest Provinces and Punjab (1864), Bombay (1868), and Madras (1872).Footnote ¹² In the years leading up to the war, this Report on Native Papers included numerous articles on Tibet and Sikkim, suggesting that the British India government did not merely follow English newspapers founded and managed by Englishmen, but also paid close attention to newspapers set up by Indians and published in local languages. Between 1813 and 1835, English education was extended, jury service was opened to Indians (first to Christianised Indians and later to Hindus and Muslims), and British interest in Indian activities and opinions increased. These social and political changes boosted the growth of Indian journalism and in fact inaugurated the golden age of the field. It was precisely these developments that led to more stringent censorship in the Northwest Provinces in 1848 and the implementation of the notorious Vernacular Press Act of 1878.Footnote ¹³

However, the British India government quickly came to realise that the strict implementation of the Vernacular Press Act had stifled Indian public opinion, hindering the authorities’ understanding of public sentiment. Thus, merely four years into its implementation, the Governor-General Ripon repealed the Act in 1882. As a result, the 1888 Sikkim Expedition coincided with a state of renewed vigour in Indian journalism and public opinion after the previous phase of severe suppression. Somasekhara has pointed out that:

In view of this background, an analysis of Indian public opinion towards the Sikkim Expedition can throw new light on the reasons for the outbreak of conflict. Hence, one focus of this article is the content of relevant articles in The Pioneer and The Madras Mail, both of which were edited by British expatriates in India and advocated adopting a firm stand towards Tibet. They started to adopt this stand from at least 1886, building up momentum for the conflict. In the opposing camp were anti-war newspapers founded by Indians, which only devoted attention to the coming war on the eve of the actual conflict itself. Unfortunately for them, these newspapers were far less influential than their British-managed counterparts, with their opinions carrying less weight in policymaking. As a consequence, they proved powerless to avert the coming of the conflict.

As mentioned earlier, The Pioneer was based in Allahabad and was founded by wealthy merchant George Allen who had grown rich from managing tea plantations in northern India from 1855 onwards.Footnote ¹⁵ In 1872, the experienced journalist Anthony Sinnett was appointed its editor, which propelled the newspaper to new heights, so much so that contemporaries hailed it as the most influential and powerful Anglo-Indian journal.Footnote ¹⁶ Retired British Indian public servant C. E. Buckland included both Allen and Sinnett in his Dictionary of Indian Biography published in 1906, underlining that both men enjoyed fame and prestige.Footnote ¹⁷ The fact that the founder of The Pioneer was a tea magnate is particularly worthy of note: this background, together with the vested interests concerned, set the general tone for the Pioneer on the opening of the Tibetan tea trade.Footnote ¹⁸ Similarly, The Madras Mail, the first evening paper in that city, represented the interests of the “wealthy section of the Europeans”; most of its editorial staff were from England, and it “was to begin with, efficiently managed and adequately financed”.Footnote ¹⁹ These favourable circumstances endowed The Pioneer and The Madras Mail with enormous influence.

The British Indian authorities’ development of Darjeeling and the obstruction of Indo-Tibetan trade by the Qing court and Nepal also contributed to the eagerness of British merchants in India to open up the Tibet market. British scholar Alastair Lamb has pointed out that “The idea of selling Indian tea to Tibet was an inevitable consequence of the development of a tea industry in the foothills of the Himalayas”; as early as the 1850s, “this possibility was being discussed by such Darjeeling residents as Dr Archibald Campbell, the then Darjeeling Superintendent and B. H. Hodgson”.Footnote ²⁰ Indeed, the relevant statistics paint a picture of a vibrant and rapidly expanding tea industry in Darjeeling: while its tea production in 1866 was a mere 433,715 pounds, this had grown dramatically to 6,596,456 pounds by 1882, in under two decades.Footnote ²¹

As early as 1873, Darjeeling Superintendent J. Ware Edgar pointed out what he saw as absurd practices en route to Sikkim: despite the burgeoning production of Darjeeling tea, there is the “almost incredible fact that Chinese tea is imported through [Tibet] into Darjeeling for the consumption of the native inhabitants of the district, who are practically unable to obtain the tea grown on the spot”; at the same time, despite the abundance of Tibetan cattle and sheep, beef and wool could not be exported to India. As a result, he recommended that “no time be lost” in the construction of a bridge over the River Teesta and the building of a road through Sikkim, all the way to the Chola range, thus linking India and Nepal to Tibet.Footnote ²² A couple of years later in 1875, the Royal Geographical Society made the following appeal on its journal:

Worthy of note is the fact that both reports by Edgar and the Royal Geographical Society enjoyed semi-official status, and hence were capable of swaying public opinion.

Armed conflict between Tibet and Nepal from 1883 to 1885 closed the trade route through Nepal temporarily. In January and February 1886, The Madras Mail and The Pioneer rejoiced at the resumption of trade after the hiatus. On 12 January 1886, according to The Madras Mail, the Deputy Commissioner of Darjeeling claimed that the volume of all goods and commodities being traded experienced an increase, with the sole exception of salt.Footnote ²⁴ The Pioneer even proclaimed jubilantly,

However, this resurgence of trade proved to be short-lived. In the summer of 1885, the Bengal Government's Financial Secretary Colman Macauley, while on leave in England, took the opportunity to bypass his direct superiors in the British India government and directly convinced the newly-appointed Secretary of State for India Lord Randolph Churchill to support him in an attempt to lead a trade mission into Tibet. Macauley proceeded to Beijing to apply for a passport to visit Tibet, then went to Darjeeling in the spring of 1886 to prepare for his mission. This was seen by Tibetans as a potential invasion since Macaulay's initial plan was to include seven Europeans, an armed escort, and Sarat Chandra Das, the Bengali who was known to have spied for the British on his visit to Tibet in the early 1880s. In response to this perceived threat, the Kashag or the governing council of Tibet, sent troops to Lingtu at the Tibet-Sikkim border. The Lingtu garrison promptly erected a fort aimed at stopping Macauley's Tibetan mission, resulting once again in the stoppage of the Indo-Tibetan trade.

This incident ignited the fuse of the British-Tibetan conflict; from then onwards, newspapers founded and managed by British editors in India, of which The Pioneer and The Madras Mail were most prominent, adopted an increasingly hostile stance toward Tibet. Between 1886 and 1888, despite occasional calls for settling the dispute peacefully, their overall stance grew more and more belligerent. From this point onwards, the British-Tibetan dispute revolved around two issues: Sikkim and trade.

Regarding the Sikkim issue, The Pioneer featured an article from the Darjeeling News in August 1886, which claimed,

By October 1887, The Pioneer further claimed,

All in all, The Pioneer, through its painstaking efforts, cultivated a weak and cowardly image of the Sikkim Raja while portraying Tibetan aristocrats as scheming and devious characters—the Tibetan aristocrats “took the king hostage to issue orders to the feudal lords”, committing all kinds of terrible acts in the name of the Sikkim Raja. Indeed, the October 1887 report mentioned, in particular, the involvement of the Deputy Commissioner of Darjeeling, hinting that the British Indian authorities had to eradicate the insidious influence of the Tibetan aristocrats and uphold justice for the Sikkimese people.

On the question of trade, on 29 July 1886, The Pioneer compared the state of trade between British India and Tibet with that of Kashmir, claiming that,

In addition, The Pioneer criticised the British India government for offering too many concessions to China. A report in the newspaper on 21 August 1886 claimed,

On 5 June 1886, The Pioneer claimed, “Nepal is, of course, rather interested in the Mission coming to naught, as trade would be diverted more or less from Khatmandu to Darjeeling if the Mission were successful, and hence the rumours of a hostile attitude on the part of the Tibetans circulate freely among the Nepalese and filter down to India”.Footnote ³⁰

By the winter of 1887, The Pioneer further asserted that the British India government should not be contented with conducting trade with Tibet via Nepal, because the direct journey from Calcutta to Lhasa only took 22 days, as opposed to being “condemned to the monstrous burdens of having to follow the 45 days’ journey through [Kathmandu] and Nepal, in addition to being at the mercy of the Nepalese authorities”.Footnote ³¹ If the 5 June 1886 article had merely expressed the dissatisfaction of the British Indian merchants at the suspension of trade after a brief revival, this December 1887 article stated in no uncertain terms that they were not going to be contented with a mere reversion to the status quo, but instead desired a fundamental change.

Of course, it would be an overstatement to say that The Pioneer and The Madras Mail clamoured openly for an invasion of Tibet at this stage. Up to late 1887, although both newspapers highlighted a strong desire on the part of British Indian merchants to trade with Tibet, their views remained relatively conciliatory. But as tensions flared in 1888, and the prospect of a British expedition into Tibet became increasingly likely, both newspapers grew more radical; at the same time, several vernacular newspapers in India voiced their opposition, to no avail.

The Madras Mail and The Pioneer reported the disappointment of the British Indian merchant community at the resolution of the crisis through diplomatic means, and on 13 and 16 January 1888 respectively started to advocate the use of force against the Tibetans. The former stated,

Likewise, according to the latter,

By this point, public opinion had exerted enormous pressure on the British India government to take punitive military action against Tibet. Charles E. Drummond Black, biographer of the Governor-General of India Lord Dufferin—Black had met Dufferin in person and checked specific details in his biography—mentioned that Dufferin was initially opposed to the Macauley Mission to Tibet, but acquiesced under pressure from Randolph Churchill.Footnote ³⁴ As late as July 1888, after the outbreak of war, Dufferin wrote to Walsham, the British Minister to China, to make clear his stand on the war in Tibet:

In view of this discussion, it is evident that Dufferin faced pressure from at least two quarters, namely Randolph Churchill and the Bengal Government, while the public opinion expressed in British Indian newspapers also exerted a palpable influence on him. Finally it should be pointed out that British Indian newspapers were divided into two opposing camps: the largest newspapers founded by the British mostly advocated adopting a firm stand against Tibet, even the use of force if necessary, while newspapers founded by locals mainly belonged to the pacifist camp, opposing military conflict with Tibet and even fearing Chinese military intervention.

For example, on 29 February 1888, Urdu Guide pointed out that the recently concluded Burmese Wars had led to financial difficulties, and this coupled with the possibility of Chinese intervention made British victory far from a foregone conclusion. Hence, the British India government ought to banish the thought of sending troops into Sikkim. On that same day, Sahachar pointed out that should the conflict with China turn into a protracted war, the Indian people would definitely be forced to shoulder an ever-increasing burden. On 3 March Bangabasi, in addition to mentioning the financial burdens entailing from the conflict, commented provocatively that the British government's sole reason for waging war was to satisfy its ego, while bringing hardship to the Indian people.Footnote ³⁷ These comments elicited a harsh response from D. C. Boulger, the editor of the Asiatic Quarterly Review, who referred to them collectively as “seditious vernacular papers of India”.Footnote ³⁸ As it turned out, Boulger overestimated the influence of Indian vernacular newspapers. Their circulation was limited, which in turn limited their influence: for instance, during the period in question, Sahachar and Urdu Guide only had a circulation of 500 and 212 respectively.Footnote ³⁹ That was undoubtedly a far cry from The Pioneer, which enjoyed a circulation of 5,000 copies.Footnote ⁴⁰ Moreover, “vernacular newspapers in the seventies led a hand-to-mouth existence”, and “high postal rates tended to limit their circulation to local or nearby areas”.Footnote ⁴¹ By the 1880s, the reach and circulation of vernacular newspapers remained small, so their richer British-founded counterparts enjoyed an overwhelming advantage.

Chinese scholar Li Fusen has contended that “the opening up and control of Tibet has been the longstanding policy of the British colonialists; sensing their failure to cow the Chinese into submission, they assembled their troops… thus brazenly launching the first invasion of Tibet”.Footnote ⁴² So-called ‘British’ or ‘British colonialists’ however, were never a monolithic whole; so the use of such fuzzy concepts in much Chinese scholarship has led to generalised and ambiguous discussions that have tended to equate the “British government” with the “British Indian government”. Qin Heping, for instance, has written that “the invasion and annexation of Tibet as well as the splitting up of China have been the long-cherished wish of the British colonialists”; hence “to fulfill this dream, the British colonialists plotted really hard and engaged in foul play, capitalising on every opportunity to further their expansionist interests”. In this case, the term “British colonialists” is arguably too generic and all-encompassing.Footnote ⁴³ As Alex McKay has pointed out,

From an exploration of British Indian newspapers of the period, it is clear that Governor-General Lord Dufferin launched the Sikkim Expedition reluctantly, in spite of his deep reservations. To the British India government, the pressing issue at hand was to consolidate its rule in newly-conquered Burma; however, in the face of mounting pressure in the form of direct orders from London and public opinion within the Anglo-Indian community, Dufferin did not have much of a choice. Events moved so quickly that by the time that Tibetan troops garrisoned Lingtu, Dufferin was compelled to consider its impact on Sikkim as well as neighbouring Nepal and Bhutan.Footnote ⁴⁵ It is perhaps instructive to note that even at this juncture, Dufferin still adopted a conservative mindset; his primary concern was the impact of the Tibetan garrisoning of Lingtu instead of the act of garrisoning itself. It is thus inaccurate to claim that he participated in the policymaking behind the expedition; instead, we could argue that he merely responded to events passively. On 14 March 1888, a day before the British ultimatum expired, British troops were poised to advance. As the Secretary of State for India explained, Dufferin had been forced into a tight spot:

On 11 June 1888, Schwann, Member of Parliament for North Manchester, questioned Sir John Gorst, the Under Secretary of State for India, “whether it is the intention of the Indian Government to carry out, with regard to [Tibet], the policy of aggression advocated by various Anglo-Indian journals under the name of the forward policy?” In response Gorst replied emphatically, “I can assure the Hon. Member that the Government of India have no intention of pursuing a policy of aggression towards [Tibet]”.Footnote ⁴⁷ Given a fuller understanding of the entire event, Gorst's reply does not seem particularly surprising.

Wartime relations between Britain and Sikkim, Bhutan and Nepal

Most mainland Chinese scholars have regarded Sikkim, Bhutan and Nepal as Tibet's allies in fighting the British. For instance, Lan Guohua, a researcher at the Tibetan Academy of Social Sciences, has pointed out that during the war “some Sikkimese gave intelligence regarding the British troops to the Tibetan forces at the frontline”, and likewise that “some Sikkimese voiced their criticisms of British imperialist aggression in Tibet out of a deep sense of solidarity with the Chinese”.Footnote ⁴⁸ Contemporary Sheng Tai, in his memorial to the court regarding the allegiance of the Bhutanese people, even mentioned that “when I visited the frontier, one of the Bhutanese chiefs sent 1,700 soldiers to serve under us”,Footnote ⁴⁹ which is corroborated by British sources. On 25 May 1888, the Sikkim Commissioner A.W. Paul, who was with the expeditionary force at that time, wrote to Chief Secretary of the Bengal Government Edgar that the Timpoo [Thimphu] Jongpen had led 200 Bhutanese soldiers to the Rinchagong [Rinchengong] front on 8 May, adding that he himself noticed some Bhutanese in the fight and that one of the Tibetan prisoners had confirmed this.Footnote ⁵⁰ On 9 July, Paul wrote to Edgar again, mentioning that “One thing is certain,—the people of Sikkim and the Tibetan lower classes are firmly convinced that China is not friendly disposed to the English, but will help the Tibetans”.Footnote ⁵¹ This is not to deny the fact that Sikkim, Bhutan and Nepal had rendered assistance to the Tibetan forces, but this is merely one dimension of many in the complex relationship between the Himalayan kingdoms and the British forces, and a deeper discussion is certainly due in this case. Moreover, Lan Guohua has contended that “The British strengthened their grip over Nepal in the political and economic fields, extending their reach into various regions in the Himalayas with Nepal as their base, and even established Gurkha units, recruiting Nepalese youth to fight on their behalf”, and that “many Gurkha soldiers served as cannon fodder for the British invaders”.Footnote ⁵² In view of the evidence, this statement is certainly questionable.

Scrutiny of available sources reveal that most Chinese scholars have conducted their research with certain preconceived notions: since Sikkim, Bhutan and Nepal were all Chinese vassal states, it has been assumed that it was only natural that they would side with Tibet against the British. Consequently, in explaining the reasons for British victory, Chinese scholars have usually drawn attention to the following factors: (1) the backwardness of Tibetan weapons; (2) tactical errors; and (3) the appeasement policy adopted by the Qing court.Footnote ⁵³ In fact, the steady advance of the British troops in Tibet can be attributed to a large extent to superior intelligence gathering, their source of intelligence being precisely so-called pundits and spies. The chief intelligence agent working for the British was a Sikkimese named Tendook Pulger (also spelt Tyndook Palgar). At the start of the war, the Pioneer proclaimed proudly, “Mr Paul, I may add, has in Tendook Pulger, manager of the Government estates in Darjeeling, a man well versed in all the affairs of Sikkim and the intrigues of the Tibetan monks”, and that “his intimate knowledge of the route has done much to contribute to the rapidity with which Colonel Graham has gained the objective points of the expedition”.Footnote ⁵⁴ Remarkably, at that time “almost all the managers and assistants on the estates [were] Europeans”, hence Pulger's appointment as the manager of tea estates in Darjeeling was truly unusual.Footnote ⁵⁵ The aforementioned 9 July 1888 letter from Paul to Edgar recommended “an early recognition by Government of the services Tendook Pulger has rendered in connection with Sikkim for many years past (quite apart from what he has done and is doing now in the present difficulties)”, noting that this would induce more Sikkimese to side with the British.Footnote ⁵⁶ The battle reports of the Derbyshire Regiment further pointed out that Pulger was conferred the title of Rajah for his outstanding contributions rendered in the Sikkim campaign.Footnote ⁵⁷ Another battle report prepared by the intelligence department heaped accolades on Pulger, remarking that “His local knowledge has been at times invaluable, especially during the advance on Lingtu fort, when, by means of his assistance, we were able to avoid the spot where, as we found on our arrival, the enemy had placed large boulders above the road”.Footnote ⁵⁸ Moreover, one of the Derbyshire Regiment's reports for 22–31 July 1888 also mentioned that native spies had offered news of “considerable movement amongst the enemy”.Footnote ⁵⁹ On 10 August, two Bhutanese spies revealed to the British that Tibetan troop strength between Kupup and Phari amounted to roughly 17,000, with an additional 3,500 Bhutanese reinforcements; they had observed 2,000 tents in one of the Tibetan camps, and based on that observation had deduced that Tibetan troop strength in that particular encampment was around 14,000.Footnote ⁶⁰

Clearly these spies who worked for the British possessed a fair degree of military knowledge and were not ordinary commoners. In that case, why were these Sikkimese, Bhutanese and Nepalis so eager to offer their services to the British troops? As mentioned earlier, Tendook Pulger, who had been won over by the British Indian government, enjoyed close relations with government officials and tea merchants, and a British victory would certainly serve to further his interests. As for the Bhutanese spies and Gurkha troops who directly participated in the fighting, besides being enticed by the pay offered by the British Indian government as mercenaries, a study of the huge influx of Nepali and Bhutanese migrants into Darjeeling and Sikkim is arguably necessary to understand their motivations for serving the British.

Existing scholarship has noted that “the actions of the British at Darjeeling made Sikkimese uneasy, especially with the labour migrants and slave trade brought about by free trade, which attracted large numbers of Nepalis and Bhutanese into Sikkim”.Footnote ⁶¹ Besides the genuine demand for workers, the British India government also took its political interests into consideration when encouraging and facilitating this influx of immigrants into Sikkim. A Sikkim gazetteer published shortly after the war in 1894 admitted frankly that “The influx of these hereditary enemies of Tibet [the Nepalis] is our surest guarantee against a revival of Tibetan influence”. The gazetteer's introduction was written by British India government official H. H. Risley, and can thus be taken to reflect the British Indian authorities’ intentions.Footnote ⁶² Indian scholar Kanchanmoy Majumdar has also noted that “[the Nepalese] served the British interests as being a counterpoise to the pro-Tibetan and anti-British elements in the Lepcha population of Sikkim”.Footnote ⁶³ I argue, therefore, that given the Tibetans’ garrisoning of Lingtu and possible invasion of Darjeeling (such rumours were rife at that time and led to much panic among Darjeeling residents), the Nepalese and Bhutanese immigrants in Sikkim had a strong incentive to serve the British and defend their homes and property there (contrary to existing arguments that they were conscripted forcibly to serve as cannon fodder for the British).

On the other hand, the Himalayan kingdoms of Sikkim, Bhutan and Nepal, which tried their best to survive in the increasingly perilous geopolitical environment, being sandwiched between Tibet and British India, were not as pro-Tibetan as has previously argued by existing scholarship. To the best of my knowledge, Qingdai xizang yu bulukeba [Tibet-Bhutan relations during the Qing dynasty] by Bkra-zhis Don-grub is the only monograph on Tibet-Bhutan relations to date; the author noted that “regarding the attitude of Bhutan towards the Tibet-British war, the narratives of the English language sources and Chinese language sources are completely different”, but did not proceed to elaborate or arrive at a conclusion.Footnote ⁶⁴ Alastair Lamb has pointed out that the Tibetan army suffered a series of defeats in the face of the British offensive, forcing the Tibetans to approach the Tongsa Penlop of Bhutan for assistance, which he refused on the grounds that helping the Tibetans would provoke the British into cutting off his subsidy.Footnote ⁶⁵ This incident illustrates aptly the pragmatism of the Bhutanese ruling class.

British scholar Michael Aris has uncovered a Tibetan poem composed by Bhutanese lamas at that time—the ambivalence expressed in its verses offers much food for thought:

By command of the Sahibs in Calcutta

• The heavenly field of the Land of Snows is filled with barbarians.

• Wherever one looks and ponders, sadness arises.

• The proud soldiers of Tibet

• Merely bellow forth like thunder their bragging din.

The story of how the appearance of those soldiers turned to corpses

Stops the tea and ale, though tasty, from going down one's throat,

• And though fresh fish and pork are eaten they are insipid.

• As for the way the Dalai Lama remains in holy retreat,

• It's like hearing a never-ending story.

• When you look at the nature of the present situation,

• A permanent settlement for the future can't be fixed,

• And so the time will come when the subsidy fetched from Buxa

• Will have instead to be fetched from the plain of Phari.

• Just as flowers are destroyed by hoar frost

• So does grief arise in the depths of one's heart and being.

• The fleeing Tibetans, lacking in intelligence,

• Have blundered no matter how you look at it.

• There's clearly no stopping those soldiers of the Sahibs,

• Like flies rushing in for the first draught of ale

Those three types [of Tibetans], the lame, rheumatic and limping, are killed straight off, Nor can the lassies, the girls, enjoy happiness.

• Alas, at a time when the Buddhist teachings are coming to an end

• This Land of Snow Mountains of the noble ones

• Is being destroyed by eaters of goat-meat.

• Those loveless, heartless Sahibs

• Who got here by crossing many passes and valleys

• Are delighted to gain just a tiny bit of land.

• The time comes near when those reckless soldiers of the Sahibs

• Will cause the utterly profound doctrine of the Great Perfection to decay.Footnote ⁶⁶

Judging from the content of this poem, the lama who composed it was evidently sympathetic to the Tibetans, but at the same time considered them to be rash and impetuous as well as “lacking in intelligence”, criticising them in a condescending tone. From the poem's ambivalence it would seem that this lama was experiencing conflicting emotions. Whether his attitude was representative of the entire Tibetan ruling class is open to conjecture and impossible to tell given the paucity of sources. Clearly this question warrants further investigation, perhaps with a focus on Tibetan sources.Footnote ⁶⁷

British casualties during the war and the morale of the Tibetan population

In 2013 the Chinese scholar Li Fusen asserted that “Both Chinese and foreign sources have chronicled the first British invasion of Tibet in 1888 in detail, and existing scholarship has given much attention to the war, but research on the causes of the war, British economic invasion of Tibet after the war and its political, economic and societal consequences on Tibet is still lacking”. In fact, research on the war itself also remains rudimentary.Footnote ⁶⁸ Italian scholar Luciano Petech in his Aristocracy and Government in Tibet, 1728–1959 has made a laudable attempt to uncover the identities of Tibetan commanding officers during the war, but he does not discuss the war itself in detail.Footnote ⁶⁹ A greater cause for concern is that several Chinese scholars have failed to consult English language sources, taking the memorandum of the Amban Wen Shuo at face value, when he claimed at the beginning of the war: “(In the second month of the 14^th year of Guangxu's reign) the British troops made two attacks on our fort; the rtsis-dpon (Tibetan official) in command of the garrison rallied his troops in resistance, killing the British officer leading the charge, in addition to 100 odd British and Nepalese soldiers in two days of fighting”.Footnote ⁷⁰ Later scholars have accepted these figures unquestioningly; as recently as 2016, even Xizang tongshi [A complete history of Tibet], edited by leading experts in mainland Chinese academia, adopted this erroneous account unquestioningly.Footnote ⁷¹ A close examination of various sources is necessary to reconstruct the conflict itself.

Regarding the opening battle of the war at Lingtu, Yu Su wrote the following account in his Qingji yingguo qinlue xizang shi [The history of British invasion of Tibet during the late Qing]:

The vast majority of later Chinese scholars have accepted this narrative uncritically; even the much acclaimed work Xizang tongshi published in 2016 accepted Yu Su's claim that “the Tibetans killed and wounded 100-odd British troops”.Footnote ⁷³ According to this narrative, the outnumbered and outgunned Tibetan forces achieved an impressive kill ratio of 1:5. This begs the following questions, however: Are these figures reliable? If not, when did this myth arise, and how did it become so widely accepted in Chinese academia, so much so that it became the consensus?

Fig 1: Route of advance of the British forces, 1888.Footnote ⁷⁴

Close scrutiny of the British army battle reports reveals that total casualties on 20–21 March at Lingtu were only one officer and four men wounded; both sides clashed again at Gnathong on 22 May, resulting in three dead and eight wounded for the British; another two officers and three men were wounded in the occupation of Chumbi in September (see Table 2).Footnote ⁷⁵ Hence, the grand total of all the entire war amounted to only three dead and 18 wounded for the British. After the conflict had ended, the intelligence department of the British forces in India prepared a report on the lessons learnt in the war and concluded that the chief military difficulties encountered in the 1888 Sikkim expedition were: (1) unhealthy climate of Siliguri, the base depot; and (2) sickness among the transport mules, without even mentioning Tibetan resistance.Footnote ⁷⁶ Compared to Chinese language sources, these battle reports are more reliable. First, the battle reports cited earlier were compiled mainly to learn from past experiences; given that the war was already long over by then, there was little incentive for the intelligence department to falsify casualty figures. Second, the battle reports were far more detailed—it would not be an overstatement to say that the reports were prepared meticulously to the last detail. In addition, under normal circumstances, had the small British force at Lingtu, only a few hundred strong, suffered a casualty rate of 20 per cent or more, their combat effectiveness would have been greatly diminished. Under such circumstances, it would have been almost impossible for the British commander to press on to Gnathong; a far more logical choice would have been to retreat or rest while waiting for supplies and reinforcements. How, then, did the highly inflated British casualty figures come about?

Tracing its origins, I have found that it first appeared in a memorial from Wen Shuo to the Qing court entitled “Translation of orders issued by Demo kutuktu [the regent of Tibet] to Dorje Rigzin, cautioning against carelessness resulting from two minor victories, potentially losing previous gains”.Footnote ⁷⁷ As a secondary source, it is less reliable to start with. Tracing the flow of events, the situation at the time can be reconstructed with little difficulty: the Tibetan commander on the field Dorje Rigzin reported the inflated casualty figures to the regent, claiming to have killed over 100 British soldiers; in response, the regent, doubting the credibility of that report, cautioned Dorje Rigzin against underestimating the enemy, while Wen Shuo, upon receiving the relevant documents, was only too happy and eager to have them translated into Chinese and sent to Beijing. By the time of the second battle at Gnathong in May, the Tibetan forces retreated steadily; and Wen Shuo, who had already been dismissed from his post, could no longer boast about successes on the battlefield, even if he had wanted to. Thus, he claimed,

This probably represents Wen Shuo's attempt at obfuscation by using the ambiguous expression “casualties on both sides”, in his bid to downplay the severity of the defeat and try to appear as consistent as possible with his earlier claim of having killed and wounded over a hundred British soldiers.

According to sources that I have located, the claim that the Tibetans “killed and wounded over a hundred British troops” first appeared in scholarly works and compilation of historical sources in Yu Su's Qingji yingguo qinlue xizang shi and Xizang wenshi ziliao xuanji (published in the early 1980s).Footnote ⁷⁹ From that point onwards, the vast majority of Chinese scholars came to accept this without question, leading to more confusion and the obscuring of the background and circumstances under which the original memorial was written. In recent years, Sun Wenlang has described the Battle of Lingtu in vivid detail, writing that the battle began on 20 March, and eventually culminated in the following scene after four days of fierce combat:

From what I have managed to track down, this anecdote can only be found in the Xizang wenshi ziliao xuanji. If it is indeed ‘fact’, it would be illogical for the British army battle reports to omit such an important episode. Hence, it would seem that Sun Wenlang cited the Xizang wenshi ziliao xuanji directly, despite its questionable reliability, given the omission of footnotes attributing the origin of this anecdote.Footnote ⁸¹

In addition, Chinese scholarship is more or less unanimous in claiming that the entire Tibetan population was united in anti-British resistance and maintained high morale throughout the conflict. The following narrative by Su Faxiang can be regarded as typical:

Furthermore, the Xizang difang lishi ziliao xuanji [Selected historical materials on Tibet], edited by Peking University's History Department, also includes an official letter presented by the abbots and secular heads of all the main temples in the entire Tibet to the kashag, which reads as follows:

Thus, on the one hand, Chinese scholars have tended to paint a largely uniform narrative of an epic struggle and a lost cause, underlining that the entire Tibetan population resisted the Qing court's traitorous policies while fighting the British, as well as how their heroic efforts eventually came to naught. Western scholarship, on the other hand, has neglected the question of Tibetan morale and willingness to fight in this conflict. My reading of both Chinese and English language sources suggests that tension between the pro-war and pro-pacifist factions within the Tibetan camp has been obscured by the tensions between Tibet and the Qing court as well as Tibet and the British, which have tended traditionally to be emphasised in existing scholarship.

Besides ideological concerns, another key reason for this is a fixation on the Tibetan elites and selective use of sources. This has led to obvious contradictions in the narratives of some scholars. For instance, the Xizang bainian yanjiu has mentioned that when tensions escalated rapidly on the eve of the conflict, the Tibetans “geared up for war, mobilising the entire population to actively resist the British”. Even after the setback at Lingtu, “both the army and the civilian population were neither intimidated by the barbaric invasion of the British troops, nor taken in by their devious diplomatic manoeuvers; they prepared actively for the eventual counteroffensive”.Footnote ⁸⁴ According to this narrative, the morale of the entire Tibetan population was clearly extremely high as they were prepared to resist to the last man. However, when the author went on to analyse the reasons for Tibetan defeat, he pointed out that “the Tibetan soldiers were not mobilised sufficiently and did not undergo proper training, so they did not understand why they had to fight… as a consequence, Tibet's anti-British struggle was confined to the minority, that is, the aristocrats and monks who belonged to the elite, and was not carried out systematically or based on clear knowledge of self or the enemy”.Footnote ⁸⁵ The author also cited Sheng Tai's memorial to the Qing court, which mentioned that “since the outbreak of hostilities in Tibet, many Tibetans who were subject to corvée labour deserted to escape hard labour and heavy taxes, resulting in nine houses out of ten being emptied”.Footnote ⁸⁶ This narrative suggests that the Tibetan population had been hugely demoralised and had lost its fighting spirit. In that case, which narrative is a more accurate reflection of the situation at the time?

First, it can be established that the Tibetan elite, as represented by the Three Great Temples, was staunchly anti-British. The issue is that their belligerent rhetoric was unrepresentative of the sentiments of the entire Tibetan population. Stoddard has also suggested that during the initial stages of the conflict, the Tibetan authorities in Lhasa might have been deluded by the rnying ma pa yogins—religious leaders from northeastern Tibet who happened to be in central Tibet on a pilgrimage—into believing that the British had been defeated.Footnote ⁸⁷ In reality, even before the outbreak of war, the Zongli Yamen had already expressed doubts to Wen Shuo regarding the heroic claims made by the Tibetan clergy, pointing out that “the Tibetans are not necessarily united, and their pledges to fight to the last man should be taken with a pinch of salt”, after which Wen Shuo conveyed this message to the Tibetan clergy.Footnote ⁸⁸ These doubts were left unheeded, and came true eventually. As mentioned earlier, the Tibetan populace lost the will to fight very quickly, following the deterioration of the war situation. As the retreat turned into a rout, the discipline of the Tibetan forces quickly disintegrated. In Sheng Tai's words,

Closer inspection of the memorials sent to the Qing court during Sheng Tai's tenure as Amban reveals that this is far from an isolated case. In his later memorials, Sheng Tai complained “in times of war, it is most difficult to recruit porters and procure horses”, and that “after this defeat, the Tibetan barbarians conscripted men into the army throughout Tibet, causing civilians to flee upon hearing this news, making it difficult to recruit porters and procure horses, and the army rations procured have also yet to arrive, making me anxious all day and night”. As this shows, the Tibetan populace had truly lost the will to fight on, which seriously affected the logistics and supplies of the Tibetan army.Footnote ⁹⁰ Even more pointedly, Sheng Tai wrote, “based on my observation of the Tibetan situation, the Tibetans do not harbour a strong hatred for the enemy, many Tibetan soldiers have deserted to the enemy following their defeat, and civilians in areas touched by the war resent the authorities for conscription of labour; should the war resume when the entire populace is demoralised, the consequences are beyond imagination”. He added, “the entire Tibetan army is cowering in fear and has no wish to fight; upon hearing that those in power are still contemplating military action, every soldier curses them behind their backs and plans to desert the army”.Footnote ⁹¹

Logical reasoning might suggest that the newly-appointed Amban Sheng Tai ought to have tried his best to impress his superiors in Beijing by proving his ability to control the situation in Tibet. His memorials, which paint a dismal picture of the chaos in Tibet, runs contrary to this reasoning. Yet, surprising as it might seem, it appears to be more reliable for precisely this reason. Writing about the solidarity of the Tibetan army and civilians in resisting the British, Chinese scholars have pointed out that the kashag conscripted men from all over Tibet. For example, a biography of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama, published in the early 1980s, reads:

Most importantly, the conscription of militia throughout Tibet cannot be regarded as evidence of the Tibetans’ strong hatred for the British; from the plunder and looting of the routed Tibetan troops, it was precisely the conscription and heavy taxes that were responsible for the Tibetans’ resentment.Footnote ⁹³ The mere fact that the kashag was forced to mobilise manpower and resources throughout Tibet indirectly points to the rapidly deteriorating war situation in Tibet, because if the Tibetan troops in the vicinity of Lingtu and Chumbi alone were sufficient to defeat the British, the kashag would have had no need for such mass mobilisation.Footnote ⁹⁴ Sources from the British side from during and shortly after the war also indicate that the Tibetans’ morale was low, with some Tibetan soldiers even deserting to the British camp. In his letter to the Chief Secretary to the Government of Bengal, the Commissioner of Sikkim Paul mentioned that of the 140 Tibetans taken prisoner at the Battle of Tukola Pass, 27 came from Taya and 36 from nearby Chiamdo, whereas there were no regulars from Lhasa.Footnote ⁹⁵ This observation hints at the fact that the local militia from various regions of Tibet were demoralised, even if the regular forces at Lhasa, who were as yet unbloodied by the conflict, remained willing to fight. Major L. A. Waddell, serving in the British Indian Army at that time, recalled soon after the war that the locals at Chumbi had told him that Chinese and Tibetan officials did not receive any salary from Beijing and were rapacious; precisely for that reason, they welcomed the British occupation of Chumbi.Footnote ⁹⁶ The Gazetteer of Sikkim published after the war confirmed the breakdown of morale and supplies in the Tibetan army:

Analysing the reasons behind the Tibetan army's poor fighting capabilities, Chinese scholars have pointed out that:

While the authors referred to Sheng Tai's assessment of the Tibetan army as “a bit of an exaggeration”, they were unable to explain the reasons behind this “exaggeration” satisfactorily. The most likely scenario was that the authors had previously described how the Tibetan army possessed high morale and was united in the anti-British struggle, and hence struggled to reconcile this picture with Sheng Tai's description of the Tibetans as a mere “rabble”. Given such a situation, the authors were compelled to explain this incongruity by introducing ambiguity, that is referring to a source that reflected the true state of affairs in Tibet as “a bit of an exaggeration”.

Sheng Tai's performance at the peace negotiations

To date, Chinese scholars are nearly unanimous in denouncing Sheng Tai as the villain who implemented the Qing court's traitorous policies at the peace negotiations. For instance, Chinese scholars Wang Haiyan and Wang Xing have pointed out that:

Here the authors put the Tibetan authorities and Wen Shuo in one camp, with the Qing court and Sheng Tai in the opposing camp, thus arguably oversimplifying the issue and failing to do justice to Sheng Tai. Several scholars have even accused Sheng Tai of being “servile to the foreigners to sue for peace at all costs”, and “implementing the Qing court's pacifist policy faithfully and thoroughly”, claiming that “Sheng Tai's actions seem like that of a British Indian official, wanting to safeguard the British Indian Government's interests at all costs”, and vilifying him in the process.Footnote ¹⁰⁰ However, if Sheng Tai had been as compromising towards British interests as most Chinese scholars have claimed, why did the negotiations drag on for over a year? At that time one of the main points of contention was the Sikkim issue. As early as the early twentieth century, a British scholar, Bayley, noted that Sheng Tai first attempted delaying tactics in the negotiations, then insisted on Chinese suzerainty over Sikkim, causing the negotiations to break down in late January 1889.Footnote ¹⁰¹ Indian scholar Dhanalaxmi has also asserted that “In 1889 in [the] course of negotiations with the British Government regarding the Sikkim-Tibet boundary issue, China strongly asserted its suzerainty over Sikkim”.Footnote ¹⁰² Taiwanese scholar Feng Mingzhu has pointed this out still more clearly:

Thus, Sheng Tai's stand regarding Sikkim was even more intransigent than that of the Zongli Yamen. Based on accounts from the British diplomatic staff who were present at the negotiations, Sheng Tai discharged his duties reasonably well. British India's then Foreign Secretary Mortimer Durand recorded the following exchange in his diary with glee and gratification:

While Sheng Tai's image in the above encounter could hardly be described as bold and uncompromising, it was at least a far cry from being “servile to the foreigners to sue for peace at all costs”, as alleged in mainstream Chinese historical writing. Besides, despite having to negotiate from a position of weakness, Sheng Tai, in his role as the Amban, nonetheless won the grudging respect of the British, who, for instance, pointed out that “They [the Sikkimese and Bhutanese] will hardly be aware of concessions made in [Beijing], still less understand them as derogatory to ourselves: they will only see that the [Amban] has no power or authority with us, and he will consequently return to [Lhasa] discredited in their eyes”.Footnote ¹⁰⁵ Indeed, I have only managed to find three theses and journal articles which adopt a more sympathetic and empathetic attitude to Sheng Tai; as well as being few and far between, they lack support from English language sources as well as engagement with Western historiography.Footnote ¹⁰⁶ Since the role of Sheng Tai is crucial to our understanding of the Sikkim Expedition, it is imperative that we study sources from all sides to arrive at a more nuanced judgement.