JBO'C's Historical Reference

Abdur Rahman Khan, Amir of Afghanistan

Abdurrahman Khan, Amir of Afghanistan, is a Barakzai, and was born about 1830. He is the eldest son of Afzul Khan, and nephew of the late Amir Sher Ali. During the civil war in 1864, Abdurrahman played a leading part on the side of his father against his uncle, and gained several battles. The great victories of Sheikhabad and Khelat-i-Ghilzai were mainly due to his ability. He was entrusted with the Governorship of Balkh, where ho made himself popular by his moderation, and by marrying the daughter of the chief of Badakshan. In 18G8 he was unable, however, to offer a successful resistance to his cousin, Yakoub Khan, son of Sher Ali, who defeated him at Bajgah, near Barnaul, and Bamian finally at Tinah Khan. Abdurrahman then fled from the country, ultimately reaching Russian territory. General Kaufmann permitted him to reside at Samarkand, and allowed him a pension of twenty-five thousand rubles a year. He remained in Turkestan until 1879, when he slowly made his way through Balkh to the Kabul frontier, and in July of the following year ho was formally chosen by the leading men of Kabul, and acknowledged by the British Indian Government as Amir of Afghanistan. It has been pointed out by an eminent orientalist, "that he not only occupies the throne by right of heredity and national election, but that he is also a religious Sunni ruler, who reigns over a ' God- given ' country by the consensus fide- Hum." He has still further strengthened this strong position by the firmness and vigor of his administration. From the

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British Government ho receives a regular subsidy of £160,000 a year, with large gifts of artillery, rifles, and ammunition to improve his military force. On Dec. 26, 1888, he was shot at by a Sepoy, at Mazar-i-Sherif, but without injury. In September, 1893, the Amir cordially received a British mission headed by Sir Mortimer Durand. His sympathies are British rather than Russian, and in letters written both before and after the Durand mission, to his friend Dr. Leitner, and published by the latter, he has expressed warm friendship for England. He suffered from a serious illness in the autumn of 1894, which caused considerable anxiety in England and India.

Men and Women of the Time: A Dictionary of Contemporaries
By Victor Plarr
Published by G. Routledge and Sons, limited, 1895 Pages 3-4

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