IOR/R/15/2/724

The file contains copies of correspondence and other papers relating to investigations into the prospect of recruiting large numbers of labourers from the Persian Gulf, for non-combatant military work in Basra, and later on, civilian (oil refinery) labour at Abadan. The principal correspondents in the file are: the Political Agent at Bahrain (Edward Birkbeck Wakefield); the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf (Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Geoffrey Prior, and Lieutenant-Colonel William Rupert Hay as Officiating Political Resident); and Colonel Charles Marriot of the 3rd Auxiliary Pioneers, PAIFORCE [Persia and Iraq Force].

The file includes:

• correspondence dated May 1942, relating to an initial proposal from the War Council for the recruitment of men from the Persian Gulf states for (chiefly) non-combatant service, and enquiries made to the Political Agents in the Persian Gulf as to whether there would be any objection from the rulers in the region (ff 2-9);
• correspondence dated July to August 1942, relating to arrangements made by the Tenth Army for a recruitment tour to the Persian Gulf, and enquiries made to the Political Agents as the degree of success that such a tour might have (ff 10-14);
• correspondence relating to Colonel Charles Marriot’s visit in January 1943 to Bahrain to assess the prospects of recruitment in the Persian Gulf region (ff 16-18), his subsequent report on his visit (ff 30-31), and his subsequent correspondence with the Political Agent at Bahrain over the delays and increasing unlikelihood of the recruitment scheme taking place (ff 34-36, ff 40-41);
• a copy of a secret memorandum, dated 12 November 1942 entitled ‘Recruiting in the Persian Gulf’ (ff 20). Following the memorandum are several annexes: copies of letters from the Political Agents at Kuwait, Bahrain, and Muscat, offering assessments of the recruitment prospects in their respective areas (ff 21-22); copies of documents indicating rates of pay and allowances for recruits, clothing and equipment lists, field service ration schedules, and rates for permanent partial disability compensation for Iraq (ff 23-29);
• correspondence relating to assessments that up to 2,000 Bahrain subjects could be recruited to work in Basra or elsewhere, in light of the depressed economic situation and unemployment in Bahrain (f 33, ff-38-39, f 42);
• correspondence relating to a request from PAIFORCE, made in April 1943, for civilian labour to work at the oil refinery at Abadan, and the Political Agent at Bahrain’s response that there is now no surplus labour available at Bahrain, due to construction work at the Royal Naval and Royal Air Force bases in Bahrain, and the extension of the Bahrain Petroleum Company’s (BAPCO) refinery facilities (ff 44-57).