IOR/R/15/1/389

The file concerns the decision by the Admiralty in 1935 to transfer the Royal Navy base at Henjam [Hengam] Island in the Persian Gulf to a site at Jufair (also spelled Jafair) in Bahrain.

The papers consist of copies of correspondence relating to the Admiralty's decision to evacuate the naval base at Henjam and to construct alternative accommodation at Bahrein [Bahrain] at an estimated cost of £25,000, March 1935; correspondence between the Adviser to the Government of Bahrain, Charles Dalrymple Belgrave, and the Political Agent, Bahrain relating to the purchase of property at Jufair, with list of payments made to individual landowners, April 1934; papers concerning the question of the levying of customs duty on articles imported by Royal Navy ships into the new naval base at Jufair, and the use of alcohol at the base by Royal Navy personnel, including correspondence between Belgrave and Captain George Ashmead Cole, Officiating Political Agent, Bahrain, and correspondence in Arabic and English between Cole and Sheikh Sir Hamad bin Isa al Khalifah, Ruler of Bahrain, April -June 1935; confidential letter from Belgrave to Cole, dated 8 June 1935, giving his opinions on the way in which the Sheikh had been treated by the British, and explaining how the price had been settled for the land bought from the Sheikh; and papers concerning the compensation to be paid to owners of fish traps adjacent to the naval area, July 1935 - January 1939, including receipts in Arabic, January 1939.

The covering dates of the correspondence (the main body of papers) in this file are 16 March 1935 - 17 January 1939. The closing date in the overall date range is provided by references in notes on documents at the rear of the file.