The Last Days of the Konbaung Dynasty at Mandalay, 1862–85

Mindon , who was a son of Tharrawaddy, had been twelve years of age when Arakan and Tenasserim were annexed in 1826. He was raised to the throne just after Pegu and a deep strip of territory to the north of the Burmese province had gone the same way. His kingdom was still a large one stretching many miles up the Irrawaddy and its great tributary, the Chindwin. It contained what was par excellence the Burmese homeland, together with a fringe of mountainous areas occupied by other peoples, principally Shans, Chins and Kachins. Of these the Shans were far the most important, and the thick wedge of their feudatory states paying allegiance to Burma stretched far across the river Salween to the borders of Yunnan, and in the case of Kengtung reached to the upper Mekong. But Mindon was painfully aware of his weakness. He was cut off from the sea; not a vestige of the old military strength of Burma remained, and he himself was a man of peace, not a soldier. He realized, therefore, that it was essential for him to remain on good terms with the British, and he did so.

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