Submission of the Maharajah Dhuleep Singh, to Sir Henry Hardinge, at Kanha Cushwa, Feby 19, 1846

This engraving captures an essential moment in the history of the British empire in India. After Ranjit Singh’s death in 1839, the British in India recognized an opportunity to increase their steadily expanding colonial power. By 1849, after the second war that the Sikhs lost, the British had annexed all of the Punjab and the Sikh kingdoms. Eleven-year-old Dalip Singh, Ranjit Singh’s youngest and last-remaining son and heir apparent, handed over the famous Koh-i-Noor diamond to the British crown as a symbol of political submission. It remains in the British crown jewels today.
Here, the young Dalip Singh is officially surrendering a portion of the Sikh empire to the governor-general, Sir Henry Hardinge.