Background
After the second war of 1852 Britain held Lower Burma, and the Konbaung kingdom was confined to the dry zone of Upper Burma, cut off from the sea. King Mindon kept the peace and modernised his administration. His son Thibaw came to the throne in 1878 after a palace massacre of dozens of his relatives, which was widely reported in Britain and India and damaged relations. The British resident was withdrawn in 1879.
The pretext
In 1885 the Burmese court imposed a heavy fine on the Bombay Burmah Trading Corporation, a British timber company working the teak forests, for underpaying royalties and bribing officials. At the same time the court was negotiating with France, which was expanding in Indochina, and the British feared that a French presence in Upper Burma would threaten their position. The government of India, under the viceroy Lord Dufferin, sent an ultimatum in October 1885 demanding that the fine be submitted to arbitration and that Burma accept British control of its foreign relations. Thibaw refused.
The campaign
A force of about ten thousand men under General Harry Prendergast moved up the Irrawaddy by steamer from 14 November, taking the forts along the river with little resistance. On 28 November it reached Mandalay. Thibaw surrendered, and the next day he and his queen, Supayalat, were taken down river into exile. They were sent to Ratnagiri on the west coast of India, where Thibaw lived in a house built for him by the government and died in 1916.
Annexation and resistance
On 1 January 1886 Upper Burma was annexed and joined to British India as part of the province of Burma. The quick capture of the capital was followed by years of guerrilla resistance in the countryside, led by former officials, princes and local leaders, which the British called dacoity and suppressed with large forces and harsh measures until the early 1890s. The palace at Mandalay became a military headquarters, Fort Dufferin.
The end of the monarchy also ended the king's role as patron and protector of the Buddhist order, which some historians link to the importance later taken by monks in Burmese nationalism. Burma remained a province of India until 1937.
Further reading
- Metcalf, Barbara D. A Concise History of Modern India. Cambridge University Press, 2012
- Keay, John. India: A History. HarperCollins, 2000
- Wolpert, Stanley. A New History of India. Oxford University Press, 2009
See also
- Konbaung Dynasty — The Konbaung dynasty was the last royal house of Burma, founded by Alaungpaya in 1752, which reunited the country, sacked Ayutthaya, repelled Chinese invasions and expanded into Arakan, Manipur and Assam, before losing its kingdom to the British in three wars between 1824 and 1885.
- British Raj — The British Raj was the period of direct Crown rule over India from 1858 to 1947, following the East India Company's dissolution after the rebellion of 1857.
This entry was last revised on 12 November 2026.