Sikh Infantry Punjab Frontier Force, history of the sikh infantry, strictly limited wooden soldier

Sikh Infantry Punjab Frontier Force.
- British Indian Sikh War

Sikh Infantry Punjab

My limited edition soldier depicts the Sikh Infantry Punjab Frontier Force c.1880 The Sikh state of Punjab was one of the most formidable military forces the British faced in India.

The First Sikh War 1845–46 followed an invasion of British India by Punjabi Sikhs. The Sikhs were defeated and part of their territory annexed. The Second Sikh War 1848–49 arose from a Sikh revolt in Multan. They were defeated and the British annexed the Punjab.

Maharaja Duleep Singh became the last ruler of an independent Sikh Punjab as a boy in 1843. Wars with the British led to the eventual annexation of the Punjab and the surrender by young Duleep Singh of his sovereign rights and property(including the world famous Koh-i-Noor Diamond), to the British crown in exchange for a pension. Maharaja Duleep Singh came to live in England where Queen Victoria befriended him. He bought the Elveden estate near Thetford in 1863 where he led the life of a country gentleman and followed his sporting interests. His pension was insufficient to support this lifestyle, however and relations with the Government became strained. He tried to return to India but this was refused and he died in Paris in 1863 and was buried at Elveden churchyard.

The input of the Sikh Nation to the British Empire is immense. Sikhs refused to join the Sepoy Indian Mutiny of 1857 remaining loyal and fighting alongside the British. In future the British were to raise most of her regiments in the Punjab. In the Great War of 1914 Sikhs joined en-masse to the ranks of the British Army and laid down their lives in the trenches. In the second World War the Sikh regiments played a pivotol role in defeating the Japanese in the Jungles of Burma. Whilst in British East Africa Sikhs were recruited on mass to police the territories.

Today Britain is home to over half a million British Sikhs a true legacy of the British Empire.

British Raj Colonial Soldier Collection

Click here for details of the hand carved wooden British Raj Soldiers.

Wooden Soldier Regimental Histories

All of my wooden soldiers are made in strictly limited editions, click here for a regimental history of each soldier.