The Pacification of Burma

by C. H. T. Crosthwaite

The open season was now drawing to a close. It seemed unlikely that further action on the lines followed hitherto would have much more success. The Chief Commissioner asked Brigadier-General Gatacre to visit the country with Mr. Shaw and see if they could advise any other measures more adapted to the nature of the case. Early in March, with a strong force, General Gatacre visited Si-u Ton Hon and Lwèseng, north of the Shwèli, and then went southward through Molo to Manton. He reported the country through which he passed to be quiet and the people to be submissive. Leaving a party of one hundred rifles, including forty Mounted Infantry, at Sipein with Mr. Shaw, to work the circles north of the Shwèli, and Mr. Daniell with one hundred rifles at Manton to work south of that river, he withdrew the remainder of the troops. Proclamations were issued, with the Chief Commissioner's approval, warning the people of the consequences of opposing the troops and promising reduction or remission of the fines that had been imposed if the leaders of the revolt were surrendered. On the 28th of March the headmen gave Mr. Shaw a formal engagement to observe the terms of the proclamation, and he was able to withdraw the troops and return to Bhamo.

Before the close of the operations the headman of Manton, who was one of the most obstinate adherents of Hkam Leng and had hitherto evaded arrest, was captured by the Kachins of the neighbouring circles and delivered to Mr. Daniell. He was deported to Mogok, the headquarters of the Ruby Mines district. All this country, it should be remembered, known as the Myauk-Kodaung (the northern nine hills), estimated to contain 2,500 square miles, belongs to the Möng Mit State. On the withdrawal of the troops an official of that State was left in charge with a force of the Sawbwa's militia to keep order. Before the British troops left the Kachin Sawbwas entered into solemn engagements to keep the peace, to shut their hills against Saw Yan Naing, and to obey the Möng Mit Sawbwa to whom they are subject.

Some progress had been made by the middle of 1889 towards the establishment of order. The root of the trouble, however, lay in the weakness of the Möng Mit administration. The most effectual measure undoubtedly would have been to place the State directly under the administration of a British officer. This method of meeting the difficulty was considered and set aside by the Chief Commissioner. In the earlier years of our rule there were strong reasons against absorbing any of these quasi-independent territories. It was our settled policy to maintain the Shan States in the position they enjoyed under the Burmese Government. The absorption of one of them would have alarmed the others just when we were striving to win their confidence and to bring them peacefully into the fold. For this reason mainly the Chief Commissioner refused to wipe out the Kalè State, although in that case there were much stronger reasons for adopting this course (vide Chapter XXI., pp. 291, 292), and a desire not to depart from this line of policy led him to treat Wuntho with forbearance. In the present instance, moreover, the Möng Mit chief was a minor; his ministers might be accused of incapacity but not of dishonesty or hostility.

It was sought by other means to improve the administration of Möng Mit. Saw Möng, who had been ejected by his enemies from his hereditary State of Yawnghè (vide pp. 142-143), at the time of the annexation was selected as a man of some power and of known loyalty and placed as regent in Möng Mit. The experiment did not succeed. Whether from want of sufficient governing power or because, not being their hereditary chief, he met with little support from the people, Saw Möng[53] failed, and in 1892 it was found necessary to place the State temporarily under the Deputy Commissioner of the Ruby Mines, who governed it as part of his district until the year 1906, when the young Sawbwa came of age, and was entrusted with the administration of his State. He is doing well. Saw Yan Naing and Hkam Leng did not appear on the scene again. What has become of them is not known, and it is hardly necessary to inquire. It is hard to see what use they served except to try the endurance of our people and to harass the souls of their compatriots.

The narrative as regards Möng Mit and the territory once called Möng Leng, now known as the Upper Sinkan township of Bhamo, has been brought down to the year 1889-90.

It is now necessary to go back a year or two and deal with the range of hills known as Hpon Kan, lying about thirty miles to the south-east of Bhamo. The Kachins in these hills began to harass us from the first. Early in 1886 they attacked Sawadi on the Irrawaddy and exacted tribute from the Sinkan villages. They raided the open country near Bhamo several times, and on one occasion even made their way within our lines, killed some Indian soldiers and burnt some of the barracks.

They were in reality not of great account. But the first attempts to deal with them were unfortunate, and after a time they began to be regarded with a seriousness quite unmerited. Two military expeditions went from Bhamo in 1886, the objective being Karwan, the village of the most important chief of the tribe. The first expedition failed to reach the village and returned without doing anything. The second in the same year was well managed from a military point of view, and had forced its way against some opposition to a point close to Karwan, when the civil officer with the column, under some misunderstanding of the orders he had received from the Chief Commissioner, Sir Charles Bernard, stopped the advance, and the column retired without effecting the object for which it had been sent. The result was that the Karwan chieftain and his tribe were persuaded that the British were afraid to meet them. The chief would neither submit nor deign to visit the Deputy Commissioner, and his hill became a rendezvous for the restless and evil spirits around. Gatherings of Burmese and Chinese were reported, and it was apprehended at one time that they would join the rising in Upper Sinkan. They confined their action, however, to some small raids on insignificant villages below the hills. In the beginning of March, 1889, they again descended to the plains and stockaded themselves at a place named Kyawgaung, killed the headman and carried off his family. Some troops, sent out to cover a fatigue party building a post for the police at Mansi, about fifteen miles from Bhamo, were fired at from the jungle, and the village of Mansi, consisting of a few houses, was burnt by the Kachins, and two of the military police killed.

Marching into the Klang Klang Country.
Chin-Lushai Campaign.