Abstract: This item consists of copies of correspondence, minutes, and consultations, cited in, or enclosed with, political and secret letters from the Government of Bombay [Mumbai]. The main correspondents are: the Government of Bombay; Captain Atkins Hamerton, British Agent at Muscat; the Court of Directors of the East India Company; the Foreign Office; the Imaum of Muscat [Imam of Muscat, Sayyid Sa‘īd bin Sulṭān Āl Bū Sa‘īd]. It is the first in a series of three items concerning the trade in enslaved people (the others are IOR/F/4/1958/85479 and IOR/F/4/1959/85480). The enclosures to the letters are contained in the following items.The item concerns:The rescue of enslaved children and their subsequent placement in households or in a trade at Aden or Bombay, or their return homeThe prevalence of the trade in enslaved people at Lingah [Bandar-e Lengeh] and ZanzibarDiscussions of how frequently women and children were kidnapped from India and enslaved and sold at Zanzibar, and whether the Imaum of Muscat’s ships were involvedDiscussions of how involved the Imaum of Muscat was in importing enslaved people to IndiaThe difficulties of enforcing treaties abolishing the trade in enslaved people, and in persuading the Imaum of Muscat to agree to such treatiesThe system of importing free labourers from Zanzibar to Mauritius and the British attempts to persuade the Imaum not to permit this system because it was often used to perpetuate slaveryThe case of the
Joshua Carroll, a ship seized by the British on suspicion of it being a slaving ship, and the claims of the company which chartered it that it was engaged in legitimate trade to transfer free labourers to MauritiusThe request of the Nawaub of Sucheen [Nawab of Sachin, Ibrahim Mohammad Yakut Khan I] that the British return a dancing girl whom he had accused of theft and who had taken refuge at SuratAttempts of Neer Nusseer Khan of Sinde [Amir Nasir Khan Talpur] to persuade the British to pardon one of his officials who had been imprisoned for attempting to import nine children on his behalf.Affairs of the English brig
Maria:Captain Turner’s apology for confining one of the Imaum’s seaman in the
MariaThe false accusation of mate of the
Mariaof murderThe Imaum’s attempt to use the
Mariato obtain the inheritance of a man who died at Tamatava [Toamasina, Madagascar].The item includes a contents page and the title page of the item contains the following references: ‘Draft 596, P.C. [Previous Communication] 3593, [Season] 1842’ and ‘Examiner’s Office’.Physical description: Foliation: the foliation sequence (used for referencing) commences at the first folio with f 530 and terminates at f 694, as it is part of a larger physical volume; these numbers are written in pencil, are circled, and are located in the bottom right corner of the recto side of each folio.Pagination: the item also contains an original pagination sequence.
Abstract: The file contains a copy of a weekly Appreciation Political Report from P I Lake (Acting Consul-General, Antananarivo) on behalf of the British Consulate-General, Antananarivo addressed to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. A copy has also been forwarded to the War Office. The report includes information on recent local disagreements in the area of Tamative, an official visit to Tamative with Jules Marcel de Coppet (High Commissioner of Madagascar), local press interpretations of a planned visit by Marius Moutet, French Minister for Colonies, and the suggested scapegoating of the area’s Indian community by a local Communist newspaper.Physical description: Foliation: the foliation sequence (used for referencing) commencesat the front cover with 1, and terminates at the inside back cover with 5;these numbers are written in pencil, are circled, and are located in the topright corner of the recto side of each folio.