William Nott - Military History

Military History

In 1825 Nott was promoted to the command of his regiment of native infantry; and in 1838, on the outbreak of the First Afghan war, he was appointed to the command of a brigade. From April to October 1839 he was in command of the troops left at Quetta, where he rendered valuable service. In November 1840 he captured Khelat, and in the following year compelled Akbar Khan and other tribal chiefs to submit to the British.

On receiving the news of the rising of the Afghans at Kabul in November 1841, Nott took energetic measures. On 23 December the British envoy, Sir William Hay Macnaghten, was murdered at Kabul; and in February 1842 the weak and incompetent commander-in-chief, General Elphinstone, sent orders that Kandahar was to be evacuated. Nott at once decided to disobey, on the supposition that Elphinstone was not a free agent at Kabul; and as soon as he heard the news of the Massacre of Elphinstone's army, he urged the government at Calcutta to maintain the garrison of Kandahar with a view to avenging the massacre and the murder of Macnaghten. In March he inflicted a severe defeat on the enemy near Kandahar, and in May drove them with heavy loss out of the Baba Wali Pass.

In July he received orders from Lord Ellenborough, the Governor-General of India, to evacuate Afghanistan, with permission to retire by Kabul. Nott arranged with Sir George Pollock, now commander-in-chief, to join him at Kabul. On 30 August he routed the Afghans at Ghazni, and on 6 September occupied the fortress, from which he carried away, by the governor-general's express instructions, the gates of the temple of Somnath ; on the 17th he joined Pollock at Kabul. The combined army recrossed the Sutlej in December.