[🇵🇰-Land] History of Pakistan Army

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The British Army in India

Another legacy of the Indian Mutiny was the deployment of a large number of British Army units (mainly infantry) in India. These units were not part of the Indian Army, but came under operational command of the Indian Army. With the partition of British India on 15 August 1947, the British maintained a military presence in the two new countries for a short period. The last British Army unit to leave independent India was the 1 Bn. The Somerset Light Infantry, which left Bombay on 28 February 1948, with the British Headquarters, The Army in India closing on the same date. The last unit to leave Pakistan was the 2 Bn The Black Watch, which sailed from Karachi on 26 February 1948.

Structure of the Army in India
Pre-war, India Command was divided into four commands, each headed by a General or Lieutenant General, namely:

• Northern Command;
• Southern Command;
• Eastern Command;
• Western Command.

In late 1938, Western Command was downgraded to become the Western Independent District. Each command had a number of Districts under command, each being a Major General’s command. In April 1942, with the threat of Japanese invasion, Eastern Command and Southern Command were given a more operational focus and were redesignated as Eastern Army and Southern Army respectively. Also in April 1942, the Western Independent District was absorbed by Northern Command, which itself was redesignated as the North Western Army. In May 1942, a new command was established to control the central part of India. This meant that the higher level formations from May 1942 until the end of the war were:

• North Western Army;
• Southern Army;
• Eastern Army;
• Central Command.

With the end of the war, in 1946 the Armies reverted to being Commands, and British India moved back onto a peacetime setting with Central Command being disbanded. However, India quickly moved towards partition, with Northern Command becoming the Army Headquarters of the new Pakistan Army, and the other commands passing to the new Indian Army.

Western Command was one of the four pre-war commands in the Army in India. In 1938, this command was downgraded to become an independent district.

This district had its headquarters based in Quetta. It had four brigades under command namely:

Quetta Brigade: HQ Quetta
Khojak Brigade: HQ Quetta
Zhob Brigade: HQ Loralai
Sind Brigade Area: HQ Karachi

In April 1942, it was redesignated as the Baluchistan District under command of the North Western Army.

 

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Headquarters, The Army in India

The Headquarters The Army in India (A.H.Q. India), was based at Delhi. During the summer months, some elements of the headquarters moved to Simla in Himachal Pradesh state in order to be alongside the government which moved there due to the stifling heat in Delhi. The name, ‘The Army in India’ was used as the headquarters had operational control over British Army and Indian Army units serving in the sub-continent.

Headquarters of the Army in India was a pre-war command covering the entire country of British India. The headquarters consisted of six branches:

Military Secretary’s Branch;
General Staff Branch;
Adjutant General’s Branch;
Quarter-Master-General’s Branch;
Master-General of the Ordnance Branch;
Engineer-in-Chief’s Branch.

The Commander-in-Chief was a General’s appointment. This was usually a four year posting. It usually alternated between an officer of the British Army and one of the British Indian Army.

At the beginning of the Second World War, the headquarters was redesignated as the General Headquarters (G.H.Q.), India Command. The initial focus was to raise divisions for deployment overseas, in particular in the Middle East. The entry of Japan into the war on 8 December 1941, and the subsequent capture of Burma, moved the focus of G.H.Q. India very firmly back to the defence of India. This was the period of most significant growth in G.H.Q. India, until by the end of the Second World War, just over two and a half thousand service personnel were based there.

Principal Administrative Officer’s Office

In October 1943, with the growth of the Indian Army and the growth of the G.H.Q. India, it was decided to appoint a Principal Administrative Officer whose main function was to coordinate and audit the administrative arrangements in G.H.Q. The post continued to exist until abolished in the run up to partition.

Post-war Contraction and Partition
In November 1945 the number of officers based at G.H.Q. India was:

Lieutenant Generals = 8
Major Generals = 30
Brigadiers = 83
Colonels = 102
Others = 2,375

With the end of hostilities, the political pressure increased to reduce the number of personnel at G.H.Q.. There were already some vacancies as with the introduction of ‘Python’ leave for British Army personnel, there was a shortage of suitably trained and experienced staff officers. In the period from August 1945 to November 1945, three Brigadier’s posts had already been abolished, and by the end of the year, further reductions planned were:

Major Generals = 2
Brigadiers = 15
Colonels = 20
Others = 729

G.H.Q. India remained in existence until 15 August 1947, when it was disbanded upon the partition of India and Pakistan. A new Headquarters, Pakistan Army was formed by Northern Command, and a new Headquarters of the Indian Army took over the headquarters in Delhi. Field Marshal AUCHINLECK was appointed the Supreme Commander of the Army in India and Pakistan to transfer responsibilities to the new armies, and to organise the withdrawal of British Army units and British former officers and men of the British Indian Army.

The office of Supreme Commander closed on 1 December 1947 upon the formal retirement of Field Marshal AUCHINLECK. Major General L. G. WHISTLER had been appointed the General Officer Commanding British Troops in India in 1947, and remained in command until the last British unit, the 1 Bn. The Somerset Light Infantry (Prince Albert’s) left on 28 February 1948. The 2 Bn. The Black Watch (Royal Highland Regiment) had been the last British Army unit to leave Pakistan on 26 February 1948. Some British officers remained in senior positions in both the Indian and Pakistani Armies until well into the 1950’s.

 

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Cherat, located in the Nowshera District, was a hill cantonment and sanatorium for British troops stationed in the hot and malaria-ridden Peshawar Valley. Many of the troops sent there carved and painted their regimental insignia on to nearby rock faces to mark their service on the frontier.
From an album of 116 photographs compiled by Lieutenant Hugh Stephenson Turnbull, 57th Wilde's Rifles (Frontier Force) in India and Egypt, 1903-1906.

 

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Thal in the Kurram, Showing The Road Bridge Over The Kurram River To Parachinar, 1920 (c).

The fort at Thal guarded the strategically vital Kurram valley. On the outbreak of the 3rd Afghan War (1919), it was garrisoned by four under-strength battalions of Sikhs and Gurkhas and a squadron of Indian cavalry under the command of Brigadier-General Alexander Eustace.

They were soon besieged by a large Afghan regular force under the command of General Nadir Khan. The Afghans were able to occupy a tower 500 yards (460 metres) from the fort and from there they were able to set fire to several food dumps.

Although under constant attack for a week the garrison held out until they were relieved on 2 June 1919 by a brigade from Peshawar led by Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer.

 

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No.4 Company Bombay Sappers And Miners Workshop, Maidan, Tirah Valley, 1897-98 (c).

Many serious defects were exposed in the organisation, equipment and particularly the training of the Army in India throughout the 1897–98 frontier risings. During the most serious outbreak of resistance to British rule since the Mutiny, nearly the entire strength of the Field Army was mobilised, involving the deployment of over 59,000 regular troops, 4,000 Imperial Service Troops, and 118 guns in parts of the Pathan borderland that were still virtually terra incognita.

1) Imperial troops suffered 470 dead, 1,524 wounded and ten missing in action during the extended fighting, losses exceeding those suffered during the Second Afghan War.

2) Despite the benefits of Dum-Dum bullets, machine guns, search lights, a rocket battery, field and mountain artillery, the large Anglo-Indian force encountered serious, albeit uncoordinated, resistance from the trans-border Pathan tribes. The Tirah Campaign proved the most difficult and protracted military operation during the rising costing the Army in India 287 dead and 853 wounded. despite initial expectations in many quarters that British and Indian troops would only be opposed by lashkars still reliant on hand-to-hand combat supported by limited jezail or occasional rifle fire.

3) In his final report dated 24th February 1898 Major-General Sir William Lockhart summed up the difficulties encountered by imperial troops: "No campaign on the frontiers of India has been conducted under more trying and arduous circumstances than those encountered by the Tirah Expeditionary Force".

Article Reference - The Army In India And The Development Of Frontier Warfare, 1849–1947 By T. R. Moreman, Published 1998.

 

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Kakul Camp, Abbottabad,
Abbottabad was founded in 1853 by Major James Abbott, the first Deputy Commissioner of the Hazara District.

This district ran from the Himalayas in the north towards Rawalpindi in the south. Abbottabad was a cantonment, or permanent Army base, for the region; the garrison consisted of four Gurkha battalions and four mountain batteries.

General View Of Abbottabad, 1860's (c).

Photograph of Abbottabad, now in Pakistan, from the Macnabb Collection, taken by an unknown photographer in the 1860's.
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One Of The Earliest Cricket In British India.
19th Century Cricket at Kohat, a photograph by Major Charles Patton Keyes of the 1st Punjab Infantry, between 1862-1865 (c).
© Charles Patton Keyes

Many of the first cricket matches played in northern British India during the 19th Century were instigated by the British Army who were stationed there.

Kohat is described by Edward Emmerson in his book 'Across the Border' published in 1890, as a 'picturesque town'. He noted that Kohat boasted a church, an assembly room, a library, racket courts, a cricket ground, polo field and racecourse all within a ring fence "so that society can take its exercise, or afternoon tea, without going beyond the range of the mess; that Garrison mess whose doors are open to every one, whom duty or pleasure carries in its direction".

The British introduced cricket to India in the 18th century. Initially, Indians were only spectators to contests played between Army and Navy units, but by the late 19th century the game had acquired popular appeal. Both Hindu and Muslim native soldiers took up cricket with enthusiasum. For the British, cricket was part of their colonising mission.

The cricketing historian Cecil Headlam, travelling in India during the 1903 Delhi Durbar, reflected on its place in the imperial scheme: 'First the hunter, the missionary, and the merchant, next the soldier and the politician, and then the cricketer - that is the history of British colonisation. And of these civilizing influences the last may, perhaps, be said to do least harm. The hunter may exterminate deserving species, the missionary may cause quarrels, the soldier may hector, the politician blunder - but cricket unites, as in India, the rulers and the ruled. It also provides a moral training, an education in pluck, nerve and self-restraint valuable to the character of the ordinary native'.

Like their British counterparts, Indian Army regiments took part in competitions against both Indian and British units stationed on the sub-continent. Today, Pakistan and India are both cricket-mad nations.
© Charles Patton Keyes

 

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Fort Gulistan, Tirah Valley, North-West Frontier, 1897-98 (c).

The Battle of Saragarhi was fought before the Tirah Campaign on 12 September 1897 between Sikh soldiers of the British Indian Army and Pashtun Orakzai tribesmen. It occurred in the North-West Frontier Province (now Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan).

The British Indian contingent comprised 21 Sikhs of the 36th Sikhs (now the 4th Battalion of the Sikh Regiment), who were stationed at an army post attacked by tribesmen. The Sikhs, led by Havildar Ishar Singh, chose to fight to the death, in what is considered by some military historians as one of history's greatest last-stands. The post was recaptured two days later by another British Indian contingent.

Sikh military personnel commemorate the battle every year on 12 September, as Saragarhi Day.

Note - The Tirah Campaign proved the most difficult and protracted military operation during the rising costing the Army in India 287 dead and 853 wounded, despite initial expectations in many quarters that British and Indian troops would only be opposed by lashkars still reliant on hand-to-hand combat supported by limited jezail or occasional rifle fire.

3 In his final report dated 24th February 1898 Major-General Sir William Lockhart summed up the difficulties encountered by imperial troops, "No campaign on the frontiers of India has been conducted under more trying and arduous circumstances than those encountered by the Tirah Expeditionary Force".

 

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Karachi Barracks, 1920

 

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Governor-General of Pakistan Khawaja Nazim Ud Din (c) with the Army Officer.
Year: 1950

Seated left to right: (2nd) Maj. Gen. Ishfakul Majid, GOC, 9 Infantry Division (NWFP); (3rd) Gen. Sir Douglas Gracey, C-in-C, Pakistan Army; (4th) Khawaja Nazimuddin, Governor-General of Pakistan and (5th) Lt. Gen. Sir Ross Cairns McCay, CGS, Pakistan Army and others, Peshawar, Pakistan,