In addition to the armed villagers, about 4000 infantry and 500 mounted men, all from Swat, had opposed us, while the King and the Akhund had watched the fight from the crest of the Malakand Pass.
Shakot and Dargai were now completely destroyed, and the troops returned to Sherghar on the following day. On the 20th the whole of the Ranizai Valley was traversed, and eight villages and much grain were destroyed, no opposition being met with. On the 22nd a strong force of all arms visited and burnt the village of Hiro Shah, nine miles distant, being followed, on retirement, by a matchlock fire until quite clear of the hills and ravines, but no casualties were sustained. The force then marched back through Lundkhwar to Gujar Garhi, where it was broken up, and before the end of the next month the Ranizais had tendered unconditional submission.
It was very evident that Swat was the fountainhead of all this offending, and there were at this time some thoughts of despatching an expedition thither via the Malakand Pass. The idea was, however, eventually abandoned, and the necessity for an expedition did not again arise, for the Swatis seemed to realise how heavy had been the punishment inflicted on the Ranizais, and dreaded similar operations in their own valley. They abstained, therefore, from annoyance, and for some time at least the Peshawar districts enjoyed immunity from marauding, either instigated or perpetrated by men from Swat. Strangely enough, the troubles of the Mutiny year were not taken advantage of by the leaders in Swat. The King died on the very day that the first news of the outbreak at Meerut reached Peshawar, and the Akhund took no action inimical to British authority—on the contrary, as has been already stated, he deported the mutineers of the 55th Native Infantry who sought an asylum in Swat. In 1863, however, he adopted a different line; but thereafter he invariably advised his people to behave as good neighbours, to meet our just demands, and comply with our terms. When he died he left two rival factions in his country; one was headed by Sherdil Khan, chief of the Ranizais; the other by Abdul Manan, _alias_ Mian Gul, the eldest son of the Akhund.
With the death of the Akhund in 1877 the Ranizais again began to give trouble on our border, and the villagers of Shakot acquired a bad name for harbouring outlaws and disregarding the orders of our frontier officials. This state of things could not be permitted to continue, and on the 13th March, 1878, Colonel R. Campbell left Mardan to punish the men of Shakot, accompanied by the Hazara Mountain Battery, 249 sabres and 428 bayonets of the Corps of Guides, arriving unsuspected, within two miles of Shakot, at 2 a.m. on the 14th. Two companies of infantry were sent to seize a small detached hill commanding the village on the north-west, and when, at daybreak, the remainder of the force advanced, the headmen of Shakot, seeing the hopelessness of resistance, came forward and made an unconditional surrender, no shot having been fired on either side. All our demands were at once agreed to without demur, thirty-three hostages were selected, and no attempt to assist Shakot was made by any of the neighbouring villages, whose headmen now arrived to pay their respects. The troops remained in occupation of the village until 10 a.m., when the retirement commenced, and Mardan was reached the same evening, the men having marched nearly fifty miles in twenty-four hours.