"Believe me to be, with much regard,
"Yours very sincerely,
"G. F. Edmonstone."
Camp in Huzára, Dec. 16th, 1852.
I took command of the Guides on the 1st November, and twenty-four hours afterwards marched "on service" to this country, which is on the eastern or left bank of the Indus, above the parallel of Attok. We are now in an elevated valley, surrounded by snowy mountains, and mighty cold it is, too, at night. We have come about 125 miles from Peshawur, and having marched up the hill, are patiently expecting the order to march down again. We have everything necessary for a pretty little mountain campaign but an enemy. This is usually a sine quâ non in warfare, but not so now. Then we have to take a fort, only it has ceased to exist months ago; and to reinstate an Indian ally in territories from which he was expelled by some neighbors, only he wont be reinstated at any price.
My regiment consists of five English officers, including a surgeon, Dr. Lyell, a very clever man. Then I have 300 horse, including native officers, and 550 foot, or 850 men in all, divided into three troops and six companies,[15] the latter armed as riflemen. My power is somewhat despotic, as I have authority to enlist or dismiss from the service, flog or imprison, degrade or promote any one, from the native officers downwards, always remembering that an abuse of power might lose me the whole. This sort of chiefdom is necessary with a wild sort of gentry of various races and speeches, gathered from the snows of the Hindoo Koosh and the Himalaya, to the plains of Scinde and Hindostan, all of whom are more quick at blows than at words, and more careless of human life than you could possibly understand in England by any description. I am likely to have civil charge as well as military command of the Euzofzai district, comprising that portion of the great Peshawur valley which lies between the Cabul River and the Indus. So you see I am not likely to eat the bread of idleness at least. I will tell you more of my peculiar duties when I have more experience of their scope and bent.... I am, I should say, the most fortunate man in the service, considering my standing. The other candidates were all field-officers of some standing.
Our good friend and guest, Captain Powys, of the 60th, who has spent the first six months of our married life under our roof, is on the way to England. He will see you very soon, and give you a better account of us than you could hope for from any one else.
Notwithstanding all appearance to the contrary at its opening, the campaign lasted seven weeks, and supplied plenty of fighting. It was afterwards characterized by my brother as the hardest piece of service he had yet seen. One engagement lasted from sunrise to sunset. He had thus an opportunity of displaying his usual gallantry and coolness, and showing how well he could handle his "Guides" in mountain warfare. They suffered much from cold, as the ground was covered with snow for a part of the time, and from want of supplies.
Colonel (now Sir R.) Napier, speaking afterwards of this expedition, said:—
"Your brother's unfailing fun and spirits, which seemed only raised by what we had to go through, kept us all alive and merry, so that we looked back upon it afterwards as a party of pleasure, and thought we had never enjoyed anything more."
In reply to congratulations on his appointment, my brother wrote from—