[1] He had an adventurous spirit, and was interested in exploring the then almost unknown country north of the Karakoram; after one or two tentative excursions, he started in May 1868 for Eastern Turkestan, travelling as a merchant.

At Kashgar on 11 January 1869 Shaw was escorted into the palace, and on the next morning conducted a successful meeting with Yakub Beg, who had recently overthrown Chinese rule and was head of the region.

[3] Shaw concurred with the theoretical land hunger of the Tsar for territorial expansion into Kashgaria; to invade India, the Russians would enter Chang Lung Pass, surmount past Leh to the Ladakh and down into the plains.

Prime Minister of England William Gladstone believed in a buffer state policy to protect British India from invasion; built on a network of diplomatic alliance and friendships.

Lord Mayo, the Viceroy of India authorised Shaw to join a new expedition in 1869 under Sir Thomas Douglas Forsyth, a senior political officer to cement the friendship with Yakub Beg and pre-empt Russian aggression.

Shaw was an enigmatic character, hard to know and little understood; when the party returned they learnt that how risky the strategy would be for Lord Mayo; the 1870s was a period of relentless Russian annexation.

But as a Forward Policy emerged after 1874 Shaw's warnings proved well-founded of India's vulnerability of the Pamir Passes and the significance of the Kingdom of Kashgaria to British Afghanistan.

[4] In 1872 the Royal Geographical Society awarded Shaw the patron's gold medal; Sir Henry Rawlinson stated that this distinction was given him "for the services he had rendered to the cause of geography in exploring Eastern Turkestan; and above all for his very valuable astronomical observations.

"[1] In recognition of his service to government, Lord Mayo appointed him to the political department, and he was made British joint commissioner in Ladakh (in the Himalayas in present-day northern India).