A rebellion in Burma: the Sagaing Uprising of 1910

THIS paper examines the British reaction to a rebellion which took place in the Sagaing district of Upper Burma in November 1910. This occurred twenty-five years after the British annexation of the kingdom of Upper Burma and the deposition of King Thibaw, the last monarch of the Konbaung dynasty. It was led by a minlaung, a pretender or would-be king. About 800 men were said to have been involved in the rebellion which took the form of an abortive attack on a police post at Myinmu, a township in the Sagaing district. The paper is based on two principal sources within the records of the India Office: firstly, the police reports of the rebellion which appear in the Confidential Home Department Proceedings of the Government of Burma; secondly, transcripts of the trial judgements which were passed by the Sessions Court and the Judicial Commissioner for Upper Burma in the cases of those who were arrested by the British and charged with being the main conspirators in the rebellion. Copies of these transcripts were forwarded to London by the Government of India and are now deposited on a Public and Judicial Department file within the India Office Records. The paper begins by examining the precedents, proceeds to describe the rebellion and the trials and concludes with a discussion of the repercussions.