IOR/R/15/1/223

Twenty cases relating to individuals and small groups, kidnapped or transported from Baluchistan or India, to the Trucial Coast, in particular Dubai. Some of the cases are straightforward and involve the appearance or retrieval of slaves in the Dubai area, often initiated by the Sharjah Residency Agent ('Isa bin 'Abd al-Latif) and their manumission, plans for repatriation, and punishment of traders/kidnappers, where they are identified. Other cases are more complex, where the identification of slaves, their parents, or those who traded them, is more difficult. Of particular note in the volume:

Subject 8, relating to a young Persian boy kidnapped from Sind and brought to Dubai, which stretches over 100 folios. Difficulties are encountered in obtaining a photograph of the boy for purposes of identification. The extensive correspondence in the case is in part also cause by obstructions and procrastinations of al-Latif. Subject 16, relating to two Baluchi men kidnapped by Bedouins in the interior of the Trucial coast. The case reveals tensions between the coastal Sheikhs of the Trucial region, and the Bedouin chiefs of the interior. Questions over the control how much control Sheikhs, who have signed treaties with the British, have over actions of Bedouins from the interior. Subject 20, account of the capture of a dhow carrying slaves at Dubai, and the burning of the dhow by the British navy, off the Dubai coast.