24 February in military history: Battle of Karnal, 1739

24 February 1739 · 287 years ago

Nader Shah marches on India

Nader, who had risen as the general of the last Safavid shahs, took the crown of Iran for himself in 1736. In 1738 he crossed into the Mughal Empire and took Kabul, Peshawar and Lahore.¹

The Mughal army of the emperor Muhammad Shah moved north slowly and dug in at Karnal, where the Ali Mardan canal gave it water, behind a mud wall many miles round with its guns mounted along it. Sarkar judges the emperor himself harshly: on the day of battle, he writes, Muhammad Shah stood like a wooden figure and did nothing to save his throne.²

Lockhart, who converts the dates into the modern calendar, puts the battle on 24 February 1739. Sarkar's classic study dates it 13 February: the Julian calendar then ran eleven days behind the Gregorian, so both dates mean the same day.³

Numbers on paper and in the field

The sizes of the armies are among the most uncertain figures of the period. Nader's court historian put the Mughal army at 300,000 men. Sarkar thought the Mughal fighting force could not have been more than 75,000, and Lockhart put it at about 80,000. With servants, families and camp followers, both historians accept that the whole Mughal camp may have held nearly a million people.⁴

Nader's strength lay in firepower. His jazayirchis carried the jazayir, a heavy long musket, and the Persian swivel guns would decide the day.⁵

A battle of one afternoon

The battle began almost by accident. Saadat Khan, governor of Oudh, reached the Mughal camp with reinforcements at about midnight, and the next day Persian troops fell on his baggage. He rode out at once with only part of his men, chased Persian horsemen who pretended to flee, and was drawn into an ambush far from the Mughal guns. Khan Dauran, the Mughal commander in chief, followed him with some 8,000 horse.⁶

The fighting began a little after one o'clock in the afternoon. Persian musketeers and swivel guns cut down the Mughal troopers at close range, and the Mughal divisions, far apart, could not help each other. Khan Dauran was mortally wounded and carried back to the camp, and Saadat Khan, whose elephant was driven into the Persian ranks by another maddened elephant, was taken prisoner. The Nizam ul-Mulk, commanding the Mughal left, stayed idle all day; Sarkar suggests he hoped to take his rivals' places at court if they fell.⁷

Nader did not attack the fortified camp itself. How long the fighting lasted depends on the account: Nader's court historian, quoted by Sarkar, says less than three hours, while Lockhart has it over at five o'clock. Khan Dauran died soon afterward; the dates in the sources range from the day after the battle to four days later.⁸

Delhi and the Peacock Throne

Nader blockaded the Mughal camp, and within days Muhammad Shah came to the Persian camp in person. Nader then marched on Delhi with the emperor in his train. When a rumor spread there that Nader had been killed, crowds attacked his soldiers, and Nader answered with a massacre of the city's inhabitants.⁹

The plunder was immense. It included the Peacock Throne and the Koh-i-Noor diamond, which Nader carried back to Iran. Before he left, he placed the crown of Hindustan back on Muhammad Shah's head with his own hands. The struggles for India that followed, from Plassey to the Third Battle of Panipat, are covered in our guide to the battles of India.¹⁰

The losses are disputed. Nader's court historian claimed 30,000 Indian dead. Sarkar estimated about 8,000 killed and Lockhart about 10,000. For the Persians, a contemporary report gave 2,500 killed and 5,000 wounded, figures Lockhart thought on the high side.¹¹