IOR/R/15/2/13-18

The confidential commercial subject files deal with matters of commercial concern arising in Bahrain, as follows: the discovery and survey of bitumen and oil deposits in Bahrain; the efforts by British and foreign concerns to gain concessions for sponge fishing, pearl fishing, and pearl exports, in Bahrain and the wider Gulf; efforts to secure permission from Shaikh ‘Īsá bin ‘Alī Āl Khalīfah, ruler of Bahrain, by British and German steamship agents, to fly their company flags at Bahrain; tea smuggling from Bahrain to the Persian coast; the harvest and export of oyster shells by the German firm Wonckhaus and Company at Bahrain, and British efforts to undermine the enterprise; efforts to establish a branch of the Eastern Bank at Bahrain, with the consent of Shaikh ‘Īsá.

Because the files cover the period immediately before, during and after the First World War, most of the files document British concerns at the increasing German commercial presence in the Gulf, and British efforts to counter this presence either through Government regulation or British commercial competition. The second key theme is British officials’ efforts to overcome Shaikh ‘Īsá’s reluctance to introduce or give consent to commercial enterprises in Bahrain.