THE KASHMIR IMPERIAL SERVICE ARTILLERY. 525 
with old and obsolete equipment and old horses contrive to make a 
very creditable appearance. : 
Of the Imperial Service force, 3 battalions and 1 Mountain battery 
serve always in the Gilgit district and the remainder at Jammoo, the 
Maharajah’s capital. 
The Kashmir Imperial Service artillery consists of 2 Mountain 
batteries, armed with 4 guns each of 7-prs. R.M.L. of 200 lbs., clothed, 
equipped and organized exactly as the native Mountain batteries of the 
Indian Army. 
Their history is as follows:—The Maharajah’s offers of troops in- 
cluded artillery and, as we were then beginning to look anxiously to 
the Pamir passes into Gilgit and had revived the British agency in that 
district, it was decided to stiffen with a certain amount of equipment 
one of the old Mountain batteries such as they were, of which many 
existed in the Kashmir Army for service on the Gilgit frontier. 
Captain C. W. Brownlow, R.A. was deputed to report on the state 
of the Kashmir battery (No. 1) and its requirements to bring it to 
any sort of efficiency, a smart native officer from No. 4 Hazara 
Mountain battery having been attached to it, while an R.A. officer was 
sent to Jammu for three months to supervise the training of the battery 
prior to its moving to Gilgit. 
It was armed with old bronze 7-prs. of 224 1lbs., which had been 
given to the Maharajah some years before by Government and at this 
period only a few essentials in the way of equipment were issued. 
No. 1 Mountain battery finally proceeded to Gilgit in time for a 
portion of it to take part in Colonel Durand’s successful campaign 
against Hunzaand Nagyr. During and after this campaign it was found 
that an effective artillery cannot be maintained on the “ catch ’em alive 
oh” system, and it was decided to thoroughly equip and remodel another 
Mountain battery to relieve No. 1 at Gilgit. An artillery inspecting 
officer was appointed to Colonel Melliss’ staff to advise on and super- 
intend artillery affairs and No. 2 Kashmir Mountain battery was 
thoroughly organized and received an almost complete equipment as 
detailed for native Mountain batteries in India. In 1892 No. 2 
Mountain battery accordingly marched to Gilgit, complete and very 
well muled, save that all the mules, bought by the inspecting officer, 
were necessarily full young for immediate hard work. 
No. 1 Mountain battery, on its return from Gilgit, was practically 
disbanded, all its very old soldiers, of whom there were many, dis- 
charged, its mules got rid of and its old guns, found too unwieldy for 
field work, distributed in the forts in the Gilgit district. In the 
autumn of 1893 a new equipment with the 7-pr. of 200 lbs. was drawn 
from the Rawal Pindi Arsenal and the reformation of the battery was 
commenced under Captain R. A. Kaye’s supervision. In May 1894 
the battery, of whom officers, mules and men with a few exceptions 
had never marched before, proceeded to Gilgit vid Kashmir, relieving 
No. 2 Mountain battery, which returned to Jammu, near Sialkot in 
the Punjab. In 1895 the right section of No. 1 Kashmir Mountain 
battery formed a portion of Colonel Kelly’s force in his long forced 
