page_title: Dost Mohammad Khan
section_title: Second reign
hierarchical_section_title: Dost Mohammad Khan / Second reign
caption_attribution_description: Dost Mahommed, King of Caubul, and his youngest son This is lithograph is taken from plate 2 of 'Afghaunistan' by Lieutenant James Rattray. Rattray was in the Bengal Army and took part in the first Afghan War, from 1839 to 1842. This conflict saw Dost Mohammed deposed as Emir of Afghanistan. Rattray was granted an audience with the Emir in Peshawar in January 1841. At this time, Dost Mohammed was a prisoner of state and on his way to exile in Calcutta. Rattray was struck by the Emir's deep voice, open manner and intelligent countenance, and by his followers with their finely chiselled features and tall, handsome figures. The young boy with his head shaven in the manner "peculiar to the rosy-cheeked children of Caubul" was the Emir's son from his youngest wife. Rattray wrote that since Dost Mohammed had been "a ruler just and merciful and attentive to affairs of state ... the population of Peshawur considered him to be most unjustly treated by us." The decorations of this apartment were a facsimile of the Emir's former audience hall in the citadel of Ghazni.
context_page_description: Dost Mohammad Khan was the founder of the Barakzai dynasty and one of the prominent rulers of Afghanistan during the First Anglo-Afghan War. With the decline of the Durrani dynasty, he became Emir of Afghanistan from 1823 to 1839 and then from 1843 to 1863. An ethnic Pashtun, he was the 11th son of Sardar Payendah Khan who was killed in 1799 by Zaman Shah Durrani. At the start of his rule in March 1823, the Afghans lost their former stronghold of Peshawar Valley to the Sikh Khalsa Army of Ranjit Singh at the Battle of Nowshera. The Afghan forces in the battle were supported by Azim Khan, half-brother of Dost Mohammad Khan.
  The Musahiban family started with his older brother, Sultan Mohammad Khan, nicknamed "Telai", meaning "golden", a nickname he was given because of his love of fine clothing.
context_section_description: He was then set at liberty, in consequence of the resolve of the British government to abandon the attempt to intervene in the internal politics of Afghanistan. On his return from British India, Dost Mohammad was received in triumph at Kabul, and set himself to re-establish his authority on a firm basis. From 1846 he renewed his policy of hostility to the British and allied himself with the Sikhs. However, after the defeat of his allies at Gujrat on 21 February 1849, he abandoned his designs and led his troops back into Afghanistan. In 1850 he conquered Balkh, and in 1854 he acquired control over the southern Afghan tribes by the capture of Kandahar.
  On 30 March 1855, Dost Mohammad reversed his former policy by concluding an offensive and defensive alliance with the British government, signed by Sir Henry Lawrence, Chief Commissioner of the Punjab, first proposed by Herbert Edwardes. In 1857 he declared war on Persia in conjunction with the British, and in July a treaty was concluded by which the province of Herat was placed under a Barakzai prince. During the Indian Rebellion of 1857, Dost Mohammad refrained from assisting the insurgents. His later years were disturbed by troubles at Herat and in Bukhara. These he composed for a time, but in 1862 a Persian army, acting in concert with Ahmad Khan, advanced against Herat. The old amir called the British to his aid, and, putting himself at the head of his warriors, drove the enemy from his frontiers. On 26 May 1863 he re-captured Herat, but on the 9th of June he died suddenly in the midst of victory, after playing a great role in the history of South and Central Asia for forty years. He named as his successor his son, Sher Ali Khan.
caption: Dost Mohammad Khan in 1841 sitting with one of his sons.
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS5 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2012:04:05 17:30:02", "Image ExifOffset": "164", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "302", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "7459", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "4000", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3454"}