Siege of Malaun

01The western front of the Gorkha war

When the Anglo-Nepalese war began in late 1814, the Gorkhas held the hills from Kumaon to the Sutlej, won in a generation of conquest. Amar Singh Thapa commanded in the west from a chain of ridge forts around Arki, Ramgarh and Malaun. Other Company columns were checked at Nalapani and Jaithak, but Ochterlony moved with care, hauling guns up the slopes with elephants and coolies and taking one height at a time, so that the Gorkha forts were cut off from each other.

02Bhakti Thapa at Deothal

By April 1815 the Company had seized the Deothal ridge, close under Malaun. On 16 April Bhakti Thapa, a veteran said to be past seventy, led the Gorkhas against it in a dawn attack. They came again and again at the guns and were thrown back; Bhakti Thapa fell in the charge. Ochterlony’s men returned his body wrapped in shawls, out of respect. With Deothal lost and the Company’s guns now in range, Amar Singh Thapa was shut inside Malaun with a shrinking garrison.

03The convention of 15 May

Kumaon had fallen to another Company force in late April, and Amar Singh’s own son Ranjor Singh was cut off at Jaithak. On 15 May 1815 Amar Singh signed a convention with Ochterlony. He and his men marched out with their arms and colours and went home to Nepal, and the Gorkhas gave up every fort west of the Kali. Many of the Gorkha soldiers chose to stay and take Company service, the beginning of the Gorkha regiments.