"استطلاعات في بلاد الرافدين وكردستان وشمال غرب بلاد فارس ولرستان في الفترة من أبريل إلى أكتوبر ١٨٨٨، كتبها المقدم ف. ر. مونسيل، فرع الاستخبارات. يوجد مجلدان. المجلد الأول: تقرير سردي ووصف للمدن الكبرى والطرق المؤدية منها. شيملا: فرع الاستخبارات، إدارة قائد الإمداد والتموين، ١٨٩٠" [ظ‎‎١‎٣‎٢] (٣١٢/٢٦٩)

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influence. His aims seem to have been the creation of an independent province
of Kurdistan acknowledging- the suzerainty of the Sultan, but removing- all
the Turkish officials.
He accordingly made overtures to Mar Shimun, the Nestorian Patriarch
to assist him against the Tucks, and also asked the Armenians for assistance!
He professed to be friendly to the Christians, and said he would protect
them, although doubtless his real object was to gain their assistance against
the Turks and confirm his authority, which was by no means strono-, amono-
the Kurds.
There is no doubt that at first the Turkish Government connived at and
encouraged his views, and their attitude towards the Shaikh in 1879 seemed
likely to produce serious complications.
Instead of inflicting on him due punishment for rebellion, they heaped
favours on him, and encouraged him in carrying out his ambitious projects
with impunity.
His first effort was to conquer the fertile plain of Urmia and march on
Tabriz.
On 14th July 1880, the Shekak and Hyderanlu Kurds seemed to be in
Opposition to him, and sent raiding parties into Turkey.
Shaikh Obeidullah sent his son Abdul Kadir with a force to Baziro-a, on the
road to Baradostfrom Gavvar, to rebuild the fort there, and coerce these tribes
into allegiance.
The Shaikh said that the Shekaks and Herkis were all nominally
Persians, and had constantly robbed Persian caravans and his own, and he
now wished the three plains of Mergavvar, Tergavvar. and Baradost to be rented
to him, and that in case of refusal he would at once march against these tribes.
Abdul Kadir finally came to terms with Ali Khan, the chief of the Shekaks,
and built a fort at Gangachin in Baradost between the Shekak and Herki
lands.
The chiefs of Ushnu and Lahijan began negotiating with Shaikh Obeidul
lah to join him on the 8th October. It was reported in Tehran that a laro- e
body of Kurds, numbering 15,000, belonging to various tribes on both sides
of the frontier, headed by Abdul Kadir and Hamza Agha, a Persian
Kurd, had seized the town and surrounding district of Suj Bulak; that
the Persian authorities there had fled, and the rebels had moved on Marao-ha,
and pillaged numerous villages en route.
This was the first news which broke suddenly on the Persian Government.
The forces then available in Azerbaijan were three regiments, and five more
were at once called out.
o nnn he tro 1 °P^ wllicl1 eventually started to quell the rebellion, were a force of
d,000 regular troops, with irregular cavalry from Tabriz under the Itimad-es-
Sultaneh, which reached Maragha on the 21st October ; and another under
laimur Khan Pasha, Governor of Khoi, of some 5,000 men and six guns
from Khoi and Maku, which arrived at Salmas on the 24th, and expected to
reach Urmia on the 30th October. r
Irom Tehran a force of some 4,000 regulars under Hamza Mirza
Hukhmut-ed-Dauleh, an uncle of the Shah, were despatched by way of Biiar
on Suj Bulak with five Austrian officers and 1,200 Persian troops drilled by
Austrian instructors armed with Werndls, with a battery of rifled o-uns.
not her detachment started from Hamadan and the Geru country under
Hassan Ah Khan, with two regiments and 700 cavalry, towards Maragha.
Hamza Agha, the Kurdish chief who took an important part in the
rebellion, was chief of the Menkuri Kurds, and having quarrelled with the