Younghusband Francis Edward - Bayonets to Lhasa: Francis Younghusband and the British invasion of Tibet

Peter Fleming, OBE, (19071971) was a journalist and writer and one of the great travel writers of the twentieth century. He began his career as a special correspondent with The Times and later wrote for The Spectator. He served with the Grenadier Guards during the Second World War and from 1942 was in charge of military deception operations in Southeast Asia. He is the author of several classic travel books, which include Brazilian Adventure, To Peking (The Peter Fleming Collection, Tauris Parke Paperbacks), Ones Company and News from Tartary. Later he wrote accounts of historical events in lands through which he had travelled, namely The Siege at Peking, Bayonets to Lhasa and The Fate of Admiral Kolchak. In his memory, The Royal Geographical Society established The Peter Fleming Award for projects that seek to advance geographical science.

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The British Invasion of Tibet

Peter Fleming

To
Tony and Mary
Keswick

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S ome events in history seem, when we look back on them, to have been inevitable. Opinions may still differ as to whose foot dislodged the pebble that set the avalanche in motion; but we can all now plainly see that the avalanche was there, doomed sooner or later to a degringolade. The pebble may have been an accident or a caprice; but in the great scar on the hillside of our past we recognise the work of destiny.

There was nothing inevitable about the politico-military adventure described in these pages. Its main purposes were rooted in fallacy. By the time they were fulfilled they had been forgotten. Its achievements were largely disavowed and its staunch leader censured. The British incursion into Tibet was a fine feat of arms and a notable essay in diplomatic pioneering. Its outward aspect is swashbuckling, romantic and clear-cut; its inner history ambiguous and confused; its aftermath un-edifying. Over it there hangs, as over some indiscretion, an air of apology and embarrassment. Of all the little wars that set the frontiers of a great Empire, the march to Lhasa is the strangest, the most striking; but as an ebullition of Imperialism it is singularly out of character.

If the hand of Fate is not conspicuous in the enterprise, its fortunes and misfortunes were strongly influenced by an agency which, though less unpredictable, was scarcely less unaccommodating: the personality of Lord Curzon. It was his mind that conceived the expedition to Tibet, his statecraft that overcame the obstacles to its launching; and many of the handicaps it carried had their origins in the prejudice which this brilliant, difficult man seldom failed to arouse against his policies and against himself.

We do not here have the feeling of an impersonal destiny at work; nor can we descry across the valley of the past any scar upon the ravaged flanks of Central Asian history. No avalanche fell. The affair is marked only by a small, untidy scree, composed almost exclusively of pebbles. The purpose of this book is to arrange the pebbles into a commemorative and, I hope, a seemly cairn.

P ETER F LEMING

Nettlebed, Oxfordshire

September, 1960

S ir Francis Younghusband, who played a central part in the events to be described, left a miscellany of private papers. In addition to material which is also available in the India Office Archives, the Younghusband Papers relating to Tibet include a series of personal letters from Lord Curzon, several from Mr (later Sir) Louis Dane, the head of the Foreign Department in the Government of India, and a number from friends or acquaintances in England, some of which throw valuable light on Younghusbands treatment after his return from Tibet. But the most illuminating documents in this collection are forty letters which Younghusband wrote to his father between October 1903 and October 1904, for in these he revealed with complete frankness his thoughts and purposes. To Sir Franciss daughter, Miss Eileen Younghusband, CBE , I owe a deep debt of gratitude for placing these papers at my disposal.

I am beholden to Her Majesty the Queen for permission to consult the Royal Archives, and to Mr Robin Mackworth-Young, the Librarian at Windsor Castle, for facilitating my researches there: to the Marquess of Salisbury, KG , PC , for letting me see Kitcheners letters to his mother: to the Baroness Ravensdale and Lady Alexandra Metcalfe, Lord Curzons daughters, for granting me access to the private correspondence of their father and mother during the formers Viceroyalty: to the late Sir George Barnes for sending me several letters exchanged between his father (Sir Hugh Barnes, Lieutenant-Governor of Burma) and Lord Curzon: and to Lady Wilton, whose late husband, Sir Ernest Wilton, was Younghusbands adviser on Chinese affairs, for making his personal papers available.

To the many kind people who have lent me letters, diaries and photographs from their own or their familys archives I would like to repeat in public the thanks I have already given them privately. Among survivors of the Mission and its Escort who have helped me with their recollections I would like in particular to thank Lt-Colonel F. M. Bailey, CIE , Lt-Colonel A. C. Hadow, Lt-Colonel J. D. Grant, VC , and Lt-Colonel the Lord Kingsale, DSO .

To nobody, however, am I more deeply indebted than to Mr Alastair Lamb, of the University of Malaya. His definitive work on Britains relations with Tibet (Britain and Chinese Central Asia, Vol. I, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1960) was not available until my book was almost finished; but the guidance which he gave me in my quest for sources was of immense value. I had no claim on his kindness, but he did not stint it.

The whole of this book was typed, and the extensive correspondence dealing with it handled, by Miss Jane Clapperton, who also helped me with the research. I cannot thank her adequately for her services, without which the work, besides taking twice as long, would have been half as congenial.

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The main published official sources on the matters dealt with in these pages are three Blue Books: Cd. 1920 (