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0272 Report of a Mission to Yarkund in 1873 : vol.1
Report of a Mission to Yarkund in 1873 : vol.1 / Page 272 (Color Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000196
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( 188

as the people were rousing from their sleep, with the cry of, " Welcome Buzurg M.V. Khan Tora ! "—he was the only son of Jahangir, and one whom the people had been expecting as a deliverer. Nûr Muhammad at once came forward to greet the Khoja with congratulations on his arrival, and delivering the city to him, installed him in the palace ; whilst the citizens rising en masse hunted, plundered, and murdered the Chinese everywhere. In the confusion Ahmad Wang, the Musalman governor on the part of the Chinese, with a few others, escaped by the opposite gate and took refuge in the Mcingshin or Ycrngishahr with the Chinese garrison.

Wall Khan inaugurated his rule in the city by appointing Andijan adherents to all the Government offices, and by executing a number of the Chinese officials and merchants who had flocked to him for protection from the mob ; and by distributing their wives and daughters amongst his partizans, and confiscating their property to himself. The first to join his party were the Aktaghluc Chiefs of Artosh and Beshkirim ; and Mir Ahmad Shekh, of the former place, in proof of his devotion, gave his daughter in marriage to the Khoja.

Their example was followed by the chiefs of the surrounding settlements, and P. Wall Khan soon had a force of 20,000 men at his command. He pressed a number of Afghan traders whom he found in the city into his army, and set all the iron-smiths and tailors in the place to work in the manufacture of arms and uniforms for his troops. At the same time he employed many thousands of the people to dam the Kizil River at Pakhtaghlic and turn its stream against the Y6,ngishahr Fort which was held by the Badari:n and Yehdarin, Arnbf ns, with 6,000 men.

Whilst thus employed at Kashghar he sent a force under Tila Khan to seize Yangi Hissar and Yarkand. At the former the Chinese garrison shut themselves up in the fort, and Tila Khan passing on invested Yarkand in June 1857. The Chinese issued from their fort to drive off the besiegers, but were defeated, and fled back to the shelter of their walls. The city meantime held out, though offering to surrender on the appearance of the Khoja himself, and Tula Khan, after plundering the suburbs, retired on the approach of Chinese succour.

In seventy-seven days after the fall of Kashghar—August—a Chinese force P. of 12,000 men, with the Ambans Fakhya from Ila, Shay Dann from Ortimchi, Changtay from Karashahr, and others arrived at Maralbashi to the relief of Yarkand.

Wall Khan sent out a force to intercept them, but it was defeated and driven back to Kashghar; and the Chinese advancing relieved Yarkand of the enemy. They halted here ten days to rest their meti and settle the city, and then taking most of the Yarkand troops with them proceeded against Wall Khan at Kashghar. At Kizili they were opposed by a force sent out by him to stop their advance, but immediately attacked and defeated it. The scattered troops, however, rallied and made a stand at Surat Bulac " Willow Spring " to contest the passage to Yangi Hissar. But they were again defeated and put to fli„rht, and the Chinese, carrying everything before them, at once pushed on and released the garrison shut up in Yangl Hissar.

They halted here four days, and then marched to recover Kashghar. But Wall Khan, now deserted by his chiefs and his army who were already disgusted at his licentiousness and terrified by his violent tempers and capricious judgments, fled from the city with only a few followers, without even waiting their arrival. He made good his escape to Darwaz, but was there made prisoner by the ruler, Ismail Shah, and delivered up to Khudayar Khan. And thus, after a rule of only a hundred and fifteen days, in September 1857 ended the last of the Khoja revolts under the most licentious tyrant and blood-thirsty maniac of that ambitious and selfish fraternity. In his short reign he committed more bloodshed, and more oppression, and more villany than either of his predecessors, from whom he only differed in the degree of his wickedness.

Waif. Khan was a degraded debauchee, and was seldom free from the intoxication of his favourite drug—bkang. His ruthless cruelties and capricious executions, his