At the Court of the Amîr: A Narrative

by John Alfred Gray

The government of the country, therefore, with the exception of Herat, which was still held by Mahmûd Khan, fell from the power of the Durani Shah to that of the Durani Wazîr.

Dôst Mahomed took the title of Amîr of Kabul, or Military Commander, and to him British envoys were sent on missions of commerce and discovery.

At this time Russia was urging on Persia to take Herat, but as Herat commands Kandahar, and thus is, as it were, the gate of India, the British were compelled to make a counter-move. Then came the first Afghan war—the disastrous endeavour on our part to revive the extinct Suddozai Durani dynasty. Dôst Mahomed was taken prisoner to Calcutta; Shah Shujah was put on the throne at Kabul; and Mahmûd, with his son Kamran, as successor, acknowledged as Governor of Herat.

The Rule of Dôst Mahomed: a Standing Army.

The failure of the plan is a modern story. Shah Shujah was murdered by the Afghans in 1842, and Dôst Mahomed was released and allowed to find his way back to Kabul, where he was welcomed to the throne with acclamations.

The rule of Dôst Mahomed, compared with what had gone before, was a boon to Afghanistan; merchants and caravans could travel with some amount of safety through his dominions. Trade recovered considerably, and with its growth the revenues of the Amîr increased. For a long time he made no attempt to extend his dominions, but contented himself in rendering secure and prosperous those provinces he already possessed. His brothers lacked the power, though not the wish, to compass his overthrow, for though they were bold fighting men, they possessed neither the capacity nor the resolution of the Amîr. The danger to the sovereigns of Afghanistan had, hitherto, been the difficulty in retaining the allegiance of the great Chiefs—the Barons—those men who could call into the field the thousands of their clansmen to fight for or against the King. Dôst Mahomed, though not lacking in generosity towards them, nevertheless showed them that it would be both difficult and dangerous to attempt to throw off their allegiance. As a check to their power in the field he established, for the first time in Afghanistan, a standing army. The Chiefs submitted, though at first unwillingly, to the rule of the Amîr, for doubtless it seemed better to yield to a monarch both just and generous than to attempt revolts, the issue of which was in any case doubtful, and might place them under the insecure and cruel despotism of the Suddozais. Of the extension of his dominions to Kandahar, Herat, and Turkestan I will speak later.

Dôst Mahomed appointed a younger and favourite son, Shere Ali, to succeed him, the only one of his sons whose mother was of Royal blood. In 1868 Amîr Shere Ali was deposed by his elder brothers, Afzal Khan and Azim Khan.

Amîr Afzal Khan, eldest son of Dôst Mahomed, reigned but five months and died. He left one son only, the present Amîr, Abdurrahman.

He was succeeded by his brother, Azim Khan, who, however, was not recognized as Amîr by the British, and in the following year Shere Ali again obtained the throne. His estrangement with the British, their advance, and the Amîr’s death in Mazar, I have spoken of. Yakûb, who was Amîr when Cavagnari was assassinated, was son of Shere Ali. When Yakûb was deposed Abdurrahman Khan was invited by the British to ascend the throne.

Considering the line of men through whom he is descended, it is not so surprising a thing that Amîr Abdurrahman has shown talent as a ruler, politician, and general of so high an order. Dôst Mahomed and his brother, Fethi Khan, their father and grandfather, Paînda and Jummal Khan, were the type of men who change the course of history.