In March 1824 the first in a series of three conflicts between Britain and Burma broke out. At the outset of hostilities Burma was an independent state ruled from Amarapura by the Konbaung dynasty; by 1886, following the conclusion of a brief, three-week war (the ‘Third’) and subsequent ‘pacification campaign’, Burma was subsumed as a province of British India. The British Empire, having ‘inherited’ India from the East India Company in 1858, had also inherited the Company’s problems with the Burmese, which were brought to a conclusion in 1885. King Thibaw Min, the last Konbaung king, travelled into exile in India; British rule in Burma would last until 1948.
