Historedia
Episode 2 of 2

Massacre at Gandamak

When
January 1842
Where
Site of the massacre
Part of
Massacre of Elphinstone's army at Gandamak

The retreating force was annihilated at Gandamak, with only a few survivors escaping the slaughter.

The destruction culminated at Gandamak. Assistant Surgeon William Brydon reached Jalalabad on 13 January 1842 as the only survivor of the main column. Lance-Sergeant Philip Edwards also escaped, eventually reaching India. The event marked the catastrophic defeat of the British force.

Sources

  1. Wazir Akbar Khan Wikipedia, revision of 2026-06-11
  2. First Anglo-Afghan War Wikipedia, revision of 2026-10-04

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.