Remembering The Battle of Aberdeen: How the British Drove the Great Andamanese to the Brink of Extinction

Shradha M & Rajat Shankar Lall | Sri Vijaya Puram, 17 May 2025

May 17 is marked each year in Sri Vijaya Puram as a day of remembrance and redemption for the Great Andamanese tribe, once the dominant indigenous inhabitants of the Strait Island in North and Middle Andaman. On this day in 1859, over 400 tribal warriors launched a desperate and defiant assault against British forces in Port Blair, a confrontation that would set them on a slow and irreversible path to near-extinction.

Armed only with bows, arrows, and spears, the tribesmen attacked colonial outposts near what is now Aberdeen Bazaar, resisting the expansion of a penal colony established a year earlier. In response, the British retaliated with overwhelming firepower. The battle ended in a massacre. Oral traditions and colonial accounts suggest that as many as 500 Great Andamanese were killed, nearly a tenth of their population at the time.

On the occasion of the 166th anniversary of the Battle of Aberdeen, Chief Secretary of the Andaman and Nicobar Administration, Chandra Bhushan Kumar, paid homage to the Great Andamanese warriors at Marian Park in Sri Vijaya Puram.

Among the attendees was Olake, the first Junior Engineer from the Great Andamanese tribe, who paid a quiet but powerful tribute to his forebears. “I feel proud of my ancestors who fought bravely against the British for their motherland,” he told The Wave Andaman..

Though British colonial narratives hailed Tiwari as a hero and rewarded him with a pardon, nationalist interpretations continue to view him as a betrayer of indigenous trust. His rare and controversial account of life among the Great Andamanese remains one of the earliest written insights into the tribe’s culture and colonial contact.

The consequences of the failed uprising were severe. Vast tracts of forest were cleared, traditional lands were seized, and the Great Andamanese way of life was systematically dismantled. The tribe’s population, which was around 5,000 in 1858, declined sharply over the next decades due to disease, displacement, and loss of cultural autonomy. By the early 20th century, their numbers had fallen below 100.

As of 2024, only 74 members of the Great Andamanese tribe remain, residing on Strait Island in North and Middle Andaman, approximately 63 kilometers north of Sri Vijaya Puram (Port Blair). While many have gradually integrated into mainstream society, pursuing education and securing government jobs, the birth of each child is celebrated as a moment of collective joy, symbolizing cultural resilience and the enduring spirit of the community.

The Great Andamanese are one of several indigenous tribes native to the Andaman archipelago. Isolated for millennia, their lives were upended by the colonial intrusion following the 1857 Rebellion. While the Battle of Aberdeen ended in defeat, it continues to symbolize the Great Andamanese people’s brave stand to defend their land, identity, and heritage, a legacy that is now receiving long-overdue recognition and reverence.