IOR/R/15/1/212

The volume contains correspondence relating to in excess of 100 manumission requests heard by the Residency Agent at Sharjah ('Abd al-Razzaq Razuqi). The manumission statements were sent to the Political Resident for reference purposes only, all decisions on manumission cases in Sharjah now being made by the Political Agent in Bahrain. The vast majority of manumission cases are straightforward requests for manumission from slaves, employed as domestic servants and pearl divers, on the grounds of ill-treatment, being given insufficient earnings from pearling, or the fear of being sold to another owner. A few isolated cases are more complex, and involve the kidnap or sale of individuals. In such cases, the Residency Agent wrote to the shaikh in whose dominions the incident took place, requesting action and reminding him of his obligations in relation to the historic slave trade treaties signed by his predecessors. In one instance the Residency Agent sent a letter to the Shaikh of Ajman [Rashid bin Humaid], demanding his intervention. Shaikh Rashid retrieved the kidnapped woman in question, but demanded sixty rupees from her family to cover the costs associated with the woman's restoration. The family were warned by the Shaikh to leave Ajman, in light of the debt not being paid.

The manumission statements show that an increasing proportion of female slaves were being manumitted on the grounds that they understood that they were to be sold (which would constitute a trade in slaves; an illegal act). Pearl divers represented a significant proportion of those men seeking manumission, often on the grounds of insufficient earnings being given to them by their masters.