the 9th of September Mahommed Shah had “mounted his horse”
and gone from before the walls of the beleaguered city.
The siege of Herat, which lasted for nearly ten months, was the great event in the reign of Mahommed Shah. The British expedition in support of Shah Shujʽa, which may be called its natural consequence, involves a question foreign to the present narrative.
The remainder of the king’s reign was marked by new difficulties with the British government; the rebellion of Aga Khan Mahlati otherwise known as the chief of the Assassins; a new rupture with Turkey; the banishment of the asafu’d-daula, governor of Khorasan, followed by the insurrection and defeat of his son; and the rise of Bābiism (q.v.). The first of these only calls for any detailed account.
In the demands of the British Government was included the cession by Persia of places such as Farah and Sabzewar, which had been taken during the war from the Afghans, as well as reparation for the violence offered to the courier of the British legation. M‘Neill gave a certain time for decision, at the end of which, no satisfactory reply Difficulty with England. having reached him, he broke off diplomatic relations, ordered the British officers lent to the shah to proceed towards Bagdad en route to India, and retired to Erzerum with the members of his mission. On the Persian side, charges were made against M‘Neill, and a special envoy was sent to England to support them. An endeavour was at the same time made to interest the cabinets of Europe in influencing the British government on behalf of Persia. The envoy managed to obtain an interview with the minister of foreign affairs in London, who, in July 1839, supplied him with a statement, fuller than before, of all English demands upon his country. Considerable delay ensued, but the outcome of the whole proceedings was not only acceptance but fulfilment of all the engagements contracted. In the meantime the island of Kharak had been taken possession of by an expedition from India.
On the 11th of October 1841 a new mission arrived at Teherān from London, under John (afterwards Sir John) M‘Neill, to renew diplomatic relations. It was most cordially received by the shah, and as one of its immediate results, Kharak was evacuated by the British-Indian troops.
There had been a long diplomatic correspondence in Europe on the proceedings of Count Simonich and other Russian officers at Herat. Among the papers is a very important letter from Count Nesselrode to Count Pozzo di Borgo in which Russia declares herself to be the first to counsel the shah to acquiesce in the demand made upon him, because she found “justice on the side of England” and “wrong on the side of Persia.” She withdrew her agent from Kandahar and would “not have with the Afghans any relations but those of commerce, and in no wise any political interests.”
Aga Khan’s rebellion was fostered by the defection to his cause of a large portion of the force sent against him; but he yielded at last to the local authorities of Kerman and fled the province and country. He afterwards resided many years at Bombay, where, while maintaining among natives a quasi-spiritual character, he was better known among Europeans for his doings on the turf.
The quarrel with Turkey was generally about frontier relations. Eventually the matter was referred to an Anglo-Russian commission, of which Colonel Williams (afterwards Sir Fenwick Williams of Kars) was president. A massacre of Persians at Kerbela might have seriously complicated the dispute, but, after a first burst of indignation and call for vengeance, an expression of the regret of the Ottoman government was accepted as a sufficient apology for the occurrence.
The rebellion of the asafu ’d-daula, maternal uncle of the shah, was punished by exile, while his son, after giving trouble to his opponents, and once gaining a victory over them, took shelter with the Turcomans.
Before closing the reign of Mahommed Shah note should be taken of a prohibition to import African slaves into Persia, and a commercial treaty with England—recorded by Watson as gratifying achievements of the period by British diplomatists. The French missions in which occur the names of MM. de Lavalette and de Sartiges were notable in their way, but somewhat barren of results.
In the autumn of 1848 the shah was seized with the malady, or combination of maladies, which caused his death. Gout and erysipelas had, it is said,[1] ruined his constitution, and he died at his palace in Shimran on the 4th of Sefptember. He was buried at Kum, where is situated the shrine of Fatima, daughter of Imam Riza, by the side of his grandfather, Fath ʽAli, and other kings of Persia. In person he is described as short and fat, with an aquiline nose and agreeable countenance.”[2]
On the occasion of his father’s death, Naṣru ’d-Din Mirza, who had been proclaimed wali ʽahd, or heir apparent, some years before, was absent at Tabriz, the headquarters of his province of Azerbaijan. Colonel Farrant, then chargé d’affaires on the part of the British government, in the absence of Colonel Sheil, who had succeeded Sir John M‘Neill, had, Nasru ’d-Din Shah. in anticipation of the shah’s decease and consequent trouble, sent a messenger to summon him instantly to Teherān. The British officer, moreover, associated himself with Prince Dolgoruki, the representative of Russia, to secure the young prince’s accession.
The queen-mother, as president of the council, showed much judgment and capacity in conciliating adverse parties. But the six or seven weeks which passed between the death of the one king and the coronation of the other proved a disturbed interval, and full of stirring incident. The old minister, Hajji Mirza Aghasi, shut himself up in the royal palace with 1200 followers, and had to take refuge in the sanctuary of Shah ʽAbdul-ʽAzim near Teherān. On the other hand Mirza Aga Khan, a partisan of the asafu ’d-daula, and himself an ex-minister of war, whom the hajji had caused to be banished, was welcomed back to the capital. At Isafahan, Shiraz and Kerman serious riots took place, which were with difficulty suppressed. While revolution prevailed in the city, robbery was rife in the province of Yezd; and from Kazvin the son of ʽAli Mirza otherwise called the “zillu’s-sultan,” the prince-governor of Teherān, who disputed the succession of Mahommed Shah, came forth to contest the crown with his cousin, the heir-apparent. The last named incident soon came to an inglorious termination for its hero. But a more serious revolt was in full force at Meshed when, on the 20th of October 1848, the young shah entered his capital and was crowned at midnight king of Persia.
The chief events in the long reign of Naṣru ’d-Din, fall under four heads: (1) the insurrection in Khorasan, (2) the insurrection of the Babis, (3) the fall of the amiru ’n-nizam, and (4) the war with England.
It has been stated that the asafu ’d-daula was a competitor with Hajji Mirza Aghasi for the post of premier in the cabinet of Mahommed Shah that he was afterwards, in the same reign, exiled for rising in rebellion, and that his son, the salar, took shelter with the Turcomans. Some four months prior to the Mahommed Shah’s decease Insurrection in Khorasan. the latter chief had reappeared in arms against his authority; he had gained possession of Meshed itself, driving the prince-governor, Hamza Mirza, into the citadel; and so firm was his attitude that Yar Mahommed of Herat, who had come to help the government officials, had retired after a fruitless co-operation, drawing away the prince-governor also. The salar now defied Murad Mirza, Naṣru ’d-Din’s uncle, who was besieging the city. In April 1850, after a siege of more than eighteen months, fortune turned against the bold insurgent, and negotiations were opened for the surrender of the town and citadel. Treachery may have had to do with the result, for when the shah’s troops entered the holy city the salar sought refuge in the mosque of Imam Riza, and was forcibly expelled. He and his brother were seized and put to death, the instrument used being, according to Watson, “the bowstring of Eastern story.” The conqueror of Meshed, Murad Mirza, became afterwards himself the prince-governor of Khorasan.
In the article on Babīism, the facts as to the life of the Bab, Mirza Ali Mahommed of Shiraz, and the progress of the Babīist movement, are separately noticed. The Bab himself was executed in 1850, but only after serious trouble over the new religious propaganda; and his followers kept up the revolutionary propaganda.Babīism.
In the summer of 1852 the shah was attacked, while riding in the vicinity of Teherān, by four Babis, one of whom fired a pistol and slightly wounded him. The man was killed, and two others were captured by the royal attendants; the fourth jumped down a well. The existence of a conspiracy was then discovered in which some forty persons were implicated; and ten of the conspirators were put to death—some under cruel torture.
Mirza Taki, the amiru ’n-nizam (vulgarly amir nizam), or commander-in-chief, was a good specimen of the self-made man of Persia. He was the son of a cook of Bahram Mirza, Mahommed Shah’s brother, and he had filled high and important offices of state and amassed much wealth when he was made by the young shah Naṣru ’d-Din, on his accession, Fall of Mirza Taki. both his brother-in-law and his prime-minister. The choice was an admirable one; he was honest, hard-working, and liberal according to his lights; and the services of a loyal and capable adviser were secured for the new régime. Unfortunately, he did not boast the confidence of the queen-mother; and this circumstance greatly strengthened the hands of those enemies whom an honest minister must ever raise around him in a corrupt Oriental state. For a time the shah closed his eyes to the accusations and insinuations against him; but at last he fell under the evil influence of designing counsellors, and acts which should have redounded to the minister’s credit became the charges on which he lost his office and his life. He was credited with an intention to grasp in his own hands the royal power; his influence over the army was cited as a cause of danger; and on the night of the 13th of November 1851 he was summoned to the palace and informed that he was no longer premier. Mirza Aga Khan, the “ ʽitimadu ’d-daulah,” was named to succeed him, and had been accordingly raised to the dignity of “sadrʽazim.” As the hostile faction pressed the necessity of the ex-minister’s removal from the capital; he was offered the choice of the government of Fars, Isfahan or Kum. He declined all; but, through the mediation of Colonel Sheil, he was afterwards offered and accepted Kashan. Forty days after his departure an order for his execution was signed, but he anticipated his fate by committing suicide.
When England was engaged in the Crimean War of 1854–55 her alliance with a Mahommedan power in no way added to her
