IOR/R/15/2/1368-1390

The Shipping subject files comprise correspondence and papers relating to commercial shipping at Bahrain and in the wider Persian Gulf. The principal correspondents in the files are: the Political Agent at Bahrain; the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf; representatives of the Government of Bahrain (the Adviser to Government, Charles Dalrymple Belgrave, and the Directors of Customs, Claud Cranbrook Lewis DeGrenier and George William Reginald Smith); representatives of various shipping agents at Bahrain, including Gray, Mackenzie and Company, the Mesopotamia Persia Corporation, and Yusuf bin Ahmed Kanoo [Yūsuf bin Aḥmad Kānū].

Specific topics covered in the Shipping subject files include:

• shipping notices and regulations, including registration of vessels, safety regulations, merchant shipping acts and instructions to British consuls concerning merchant shipping;
• marine accidents, including shipwrecks, foundering, collisions, and the subsequent repatriation of crew where appropriate;
• incidents of injury, sickness and death (including suicide) amongst crews;
• activities of and applications for shipping agents at Bahrain;
• the arrival at Bahrain and the Arab coast of the Gulf, of country craft (native vessels) with cargoes from India, chiefly for the verification of shipping manifests to prevent the smuggling of goods back into India;
• incidents of piracy;
• proposals for the construction of docks and workshops at Bahrain;
• the deposit of ships’ articles at Bahrain.