In 1814, who led the English forces in the 'Dehradun Military Campaign' of the Anglo-Gurkha War ?
- (a)Octor Loni
- (b)Major General Gillespie
- (c)Major General Wood
- (d)Major General Morley
Correct — B, Major General Gillespie.
The British invasion of Nepal in 1814 went in as four separate divisions, each under its own general and each with its own line of advance. The division that came down on the Dehradun valley marched from Meerut under Major General Gillespie — Robert Rollo Gillespie — ordered to reduce the Gorkha forts in the Doon.
His target was Kalanga, the hill fort at Nalapani above Dehradun, held by Balbhadra Kunwar with about 600 men. Gillespie was shot dead on 31 October 1814, the first day of the assault, while rallying his troops near the fort's gate.
Colonel Mawbey took over the sector. The fort was ringed and its outside water supply cut, and the surviving garrison broke out on 30 November 1814 rather than surrender.
Fix each general to his own front: the Doon column is Gillespie's, and the other three names in this option set belong to three other sectors of the same war.
- (a)Octor Loni — The name as printed renders Ochterlony. David Ochterlony led the division that moved from Ludhiana against the chain of posts Amar Singh Thapa held in the Sutlej hills — the far western front, a different sector from the Doon.
He is the right answer to who broke Amar Singh Thapa's defence at Malaun in 1815 and then occupied the Makwanpur valley, the pressure that brought Nepal to ratify the Treaty of Sugauli.
Ochterlony's work belongs to the end of the war — Malaun in 1815 and the advance that followed. The Dehradun forts, at its opening, were another division's assignment.
- (c)Major General Wood — John Sullivan Wood commanded the division that assembled around Benares and Gorakhpur, with orders to enter the hills on the Butwal side and work eastward towards Kathmandu.
He is the right answer to who led the Gorakhpur division against Butwal and Palpa. His advance stalled early in 1815 and he stayed cautious for the rest of the campaign.
The rank, the war and the year are the same as Gillespie's, so the sector is what separates the two men.
- (d)Major General Morley — The officer of this name — Bennet Marley in British records — led the first division out of Dinapur, the largest of the four, aimed at the Makwanpur pass and at Kathmandu beyond it.
He is the right answer to who commanded the Dinapur division sent against Makwanpur. After Gorkha raids broke up his forward posts he abandoned his command early in 1815.
That column was about 8,000 strong and carried the main thrust of the plan. The Doon lay at the other end of the front, in another division's sector.
A war fought along a long hill frontier is not run by a single commander. The British plan of 1814 cut the front into sectors and gave each to a separate division with its own general, its own starting station and its own objectives.
A question built on that plan is therefore asking you to place a name on a map, not merely inside a war. The unit of memory is the triple: general, station of departure, target.
The Anglo-Nepalese War is the hinge on which Uttarakhand's modern history turns. Gorkha rule over Garhwal and Kumaon ended with it, and the Treaty of Sugauli put both under British administration with the Kali river as the western boundary.
Dehradun is where the fighting opened for the British, and Nalapani is the ground on which that opening failed at heavy cost. Two obelisks raised at the site still mark the action.
- The British invaded Nepal in 1814 in four divisions, setting out from Dinapur, Benares–Gorakhpur, Meerut and Ludhiana.
- Major-General Robert Rollo Gillespie's Meerut division was assigned the Dehradun valley; he was killed at Nalapani on 31 October 1814.
- Balbhadra Kunwar held Kalanga, the fort at Nalapani, with roughly 600 men against a force of about 3,500 (3,513 men).
- Colonel Mawbey succeeded Gillespie; the garrison abandoned Kalanga on 30 November 1814 after its outside water supply was cut.
- One of the two obelisks at Nalapani is inscribed to the defenders as 'our brave adversary Bul Buddur and his gallant men'.
- David Ochterlony's division, out of Ludhiana, faced Amar Singh Thapa in the Sutlej hills and reduced Malaun in 1815.
- The Treaty of Sugauli was drawn up in December 1815 and ratified in March 1816, ceding Garhwal and Kumaon to the Company.
Each name in the option set belongs to one of these four sectors. The highlighted line is the Dehradun campaign the stem names.
- Each of the four names belongs to a general of the same war in the same year, so the sector is the discriminator; knowing that Gillespie fought the Gorkhas does not by itself place him at Dehradun.
- Gillespie was killed on the first day of the Doon assault, so an account that has him carrying the campaign through to its end is wrong about the events, not about the appointment.
- Ochterlony's name runs through most accounts of how the war ended, but the close of the war is not its opening: this item names the Doon, a front he was not sent to.
- Kalanga and Nalapani are the same fort under two names, and a question may use either.
- The spelling 'Morley' in an option is the Marley of British records; a spelling that does not match your notes is not by itself evidence that the man is invented.
One shape is the direct name-the-commander item used here, with a campaign or a fort supplying the discriminator — the Dehradun campaign, Nalapani, Kalanga, Jaithak, Malaun, Makwanpur.
The other shape on the record here drops the war into a sequence of events of the period and asks for the chronological order, as UPPSC's 2024 Prelims did. That version turns on the years 1814–16 rather than on any commander's name.
UPPSC_2024_PRE_GSI_Q1372024The same war appears in both items, but there it is a date rather than a person. That question asks you to sequence the Anglo-Nepalese War against the Vellore Mutiny, Nana Fadnavis's death and Wellesley's recall, so it rests on knowing the war ran 1814–16. This one takes the date for granted and asks which of four generals of that war held the Dehradun sector. Gillespie in fact joins the two lists: he rode ahead of the relief force to Vellore and directed its recapture in 1806, before he was sent against Nepal.
UPSC_2025_GS1_Q162025Identical construction — a named campaign, four names, one commander to be matched. There the campaign is Rajendra I's naval expedition against Srivijaya, a thousand years earlier and beyond India's coast; here it is one British column in the Doon in 1814. What carries across is the method: the name has to be pinned to the specific campaign, not merely to the war or the dynasty it belongs to.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The Gorkha commander who defended the fort of Kalanga (Nalapani) near Dehradun in 1814 was:
- (a)Balbhadra Kunwar
- (b)Amar Singh Thapa
- (c)Bhakti Thapa
- (d)Ranjur Singh Thapa
Answera — Balbhadra Kunwar held Kalanga with roughly 600 men, threw back the first assault in which Gillespie was killed, and broke out with the survivors on 30 November 1814.Amar Singh Thapa commanded on the western front in the Sutlej hills. Ranjur Singh Thapa, his son, held Jaithak near Nahan. Bhakti Thapa served on that same western front under Amar Singh Thapa, not in the Doon.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The Anglo-Nepalese War of 1814–16 was brought to a close by which one of the following treaties?
- (a)Treaty of Amritsar
- (b)Treaty of Sugauli
- (c)Treaty of Titalia
- (d)Treaty of Yandaboo
Answerb — the Treaty of Sugauli was drawn up in December 1815 and ratified in March 1816. It fixed the Kali river as the western boundary and placed Garhwal and Kumaon under British administration.The Treaty of Amritsar, 1809, was with Ranjit Singh over the Sutlej line. Titalia, 1817, was with Sikkim. Yandaboo, 1826, closed the First Anglo-Burmese War.
- practice — not a real PYQ
In the British invasion of Nepal in 1814, the division that advanced from Ludhiana against Amar Singh Thapa's posts in the Sutlej hills was commanded by:
- (a)Rollo Gillespie
- (b)John Sullivan Wood
- (c)David Ochterlony
- (d)Bennet Marley
Answerc — Ochterlony's was the westernmost of the four divisions, sent against the cluster of posts Amar Singh Thapa held above the Sutlej, and it reduced Malaun in 1815.Gillespie's Meerut division had the Dehradun valley, where he was killed in October 1814. Wood's division worked from Gorakhpur towards Butwal. Marley's, from Dinapur, was aimed at the Makwanpur pass.