Amid the broader Indian Rebellion of 1857, British forces continued their grueling siege of Delhi through early September, working to recapture the city from rebel sepoys who had proclaimed the elderly Mughal emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar their symbolic leader. The eventual British recapture of Delhi later that month marked a turning point in crushing the rebellion, though at tremendous cost to the city's population and the end of Mughal rule.
By September 1857, the rebellion that had erupted in May among Indian sepoys serving the British East India Company had transformed Delhi into a fiercely contested symbolic battleground. Rebel soldiers, furious over new rifle cartridges rumored to be greased with pig and cow fat that violated both Muslim and Hindu religious practices, had seized the ancient Mughal capital and persuaded the reluctant, elderly emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar to lend his name to their cause.
British forces, having regrouped after the initial shock of the uprising, spent weeks bombarding and besieging the walled city, fighting through narrow streets and facing fierce resistance from rebel troops entrenched among Delhi's mosques, havelis, and bazaars. The siege exemplified the brutal, often merciless character the rebellion had taken on both sides.
When Delhi finally fell to British assault later in September 1857, the consequences were severe: the city was subjected to mass reprisals and looting, the last Mughal emperor was captured, tried, and exiled to Burma, and the East India Company's rule was subsequently dissolved in favor of direct British Crown control—the beginning of the British Raj that would govern India for another ninety years.
Key people: Bahadur Shah Zafar