It began with a rebellion against a ruler imposed by the East India Company, which precipitated the Second Anglo-Sikh War, and ended when the last defenders of the city surrendered to British forces.

There was an uneasy peace for three years, during which Mulraj attempted to maintain practical independence while being nominally subject to the East India Company.

Early in 1848, the newly appointed Commissioner in the Punjab, Sir Frederick Currie, demanded that Mulraj pay duties and taxes previously paid to the central Durbar of the Sikh Empire and now in arrears.

Currie nevertheless decided to impose a compliant Sikh ruler, Sardar Khan Singh, who was to be accompanied by a British Political Agent, Patrick Vans Agnew.

On 18 April, Vans Agnew and another officer, Lieutenant Anderson from the East India Company's Bombay Army, arrived outside Multan with a small escort of Gurkhas.

The next day, Mulraj conducted Khan Singh and the two British officers to the citadel and handed over the keys, with no sign of hostility.

This was partly for reasons of economy and lack of preparation, but he was supported by the Governor General of India, Lord Dalhousie and the Commander-in-Chief of the Bengal Army, Sir Hugh Gough, who did not wish to expose European troops to a campaign during the harsh weather.

Mulraj's infantry and cavalry began to advance but Edwardes was reinforced by two regiments of the Khalsa under Colonel Van Cortlandt, an Anglo-Indian soldier of fortune.

Once Currie learned of this victory, he at last ordered a comparatively small force from the East India Company's Bengal Army under General William Whish to begin the siege of Multan.

As it was too small to encircle the city, Currie decided to reinforce them and Edwardes with a substantial detachment of the Khalsa under Sher Singh Attariwalla.

At a meeting at a neutral mosque outside the city, it was agreed that Sher Singh would move north into the mainly Sikh-populated areas of the Punjab.

Some observers claimed that the sepoys of the Bombay contingent, being of generally lower caste than those of the Bengal Army, were more willing and skilled at comparatively menial tasks such as digging trenches.

The attackers successfully scaled the breaches, and the battle became a bloody house-to-house fight in the city, in which many defenders and civilians were killed indiscriminately.

Whish ordered the civilians to be herded into the main square; he may have intended to spare them from further fighting but the action of corralling them was also accompanied by further casualties.

Corporal John Ryder of the (European) Bombay Fusiliers later wrote of the city after the siege, Mountains of dead lay in every part of the town, and heaps of human ashes in every square, where the bodies had been burnt as they were killed.

In August 1849, the Indus and Chenab rivers overflowed, and the heavily damaged citadel was washed away, eventually resembling an "island of mud" amidst the floods.