The troops were warned only one hour before starting.
Each of the three columns effected its purpose without loss, the enemy being completely surprised and making no stand; a large number of sheep and cattle was seized, the towers of the villages were blown up and the crops destroyed; but, on the retirement commencing, the enemy followed up with great determination, and, as the skirmishers of the 2nd Punjab Infantry evacuated a commanding position, they were attacked and driven back by a sudden rush of swordsmen, when a native doctor and seven men were hacked to pieces. The enemy did not leave the hill in pursuit, and the whole force reached the camp, one mile south-west of Hangu, by sunset, having suffered a loss of eleven men killed and four wounded. The enemy sustained casualties to the number of twenty-four killed and wounded, among the former being four maliks. The troops had been under arms for over seventeen hours, had marched some twenty-eight miles, and had ascended and descended a rugged mountain nearly 4000 feet in height.
Within a few days of the close of these operations the Mishtis came to terms and gave hostages; the Rabia Khel then came in and submitted, bringing back many of the plundered cattle and promising payment for those not forthcoming; the Sheikhans also made submission, and the force was back in Kohat by the 7th October, when it was broken up.
After this the Orakzais did not again trouble our border until 1868, when complications arose with the Bizoti division of the Daulatzais. This being a small and insignificant branch with its chief settlements in Tirah, its members had hitherto been able to avoid punishment for any misdeeds of which they had been guilty. From the commencement of British rule beyond the Indus, the Bizotis were constantly engaged in cattle-lifting on our border, and had attacked and robbed travellers and others at every opportunity. In 1865–67 they continued to give trouble, plundered cattle, and made demonstrations against our police posts in the Ublan Pass, about six miles from Kohat. The representatives of the offending divisions—Bizotis, Utman Khels and Sipaias (the last of the Muhammad Khel clan) were summoned to Kohat, were informed that they were debarred from trade with British territory, and the Bizotis were further deprived of certain allowances which had been granted them some years previously. Finally, in March 1868, it was reported that the Bizotis intended attacking the village of Muhammadzai, at the southern foot of the Ublan Pass, and accordingly, during the night of the 10th and early morning of the 11th, Lieutenant Cavagnari, Deputy-Commissioner, occupied the hills on the left of the gorge with police and levies.