IOR/L/PS/20/CA1

Confidential printed abstracts of letters received by the India Office from the Government of India, and from senior officials in certain areas outside India, during the year 1861. The letters are dated 1 January 1861-29 December 1861. The abstracts are numbered 183-301 and each have one of the following titles:

• Abstract of Letters Received from India
• Abstract of Military Letters Received from India
• Abstract of Secret Letters Received from India
• Abstract of Letters Received from Zanzibar.

Each abstract contains summaries of one or more letters from the specified source, each with a title giving the subject of the letter. Letters from India are divided within each abstract by the branch or department of the Government of India they originated from. The correspondence included in the volume concerns events in British India, Oman, Aden and the coast of East Africa, including:

• Revenue and expenditure
• The retirements, dismissals and appointments of military and civil personnel
• Taxation and duties, including income and land taxes, and duties on salt, sugar, opium and saltpetre
• The reduction of the Indian Navy
• Communications, such as postal services and telegraph lines
• Transport and public works, including railways, canals and river navigation, irrigation, ports, roads and steam shipping
• The foreign relations of the Government of India, including with Nepal, Bhotan [Bhutan], Turkey [the Ottoman Empire] and Sikkim
• French activity on the coast of East Africa, including rumours of ‘aggressive designs’, alleged involvement in the trade in enslaved people at Zanzibar and the Comoro Isles [the Comoros Islands], and the alleged murder of a French consular agent at Aden
• The production of crops, particularly cotton
• Military affairs, including the recruitment and disbandment of military units, organisation and supply, military reform, the reduction of military expenditure, the distribution of prize money, and the amalgamation of the army and formation of a Staff Corps
• The pay and pensions of civil and military personnel in India
• The planned telegraph line linking England and India, including the construction of the line through the territory of Turkey and Persia [Iran]
• Disputes over the cultivation of indigo between ‘ryots’ and landlords in Bengal, including the publication of a subversive play concerning the disputes
• Legal affairs, including the appointment of judges to small cause courts and plans for the establishment of High Courts in India
• The trade in enslaved people at Zanzibar and on the coast of East Africa
• The British ‘expedition’ against Sikkim and the resulting treaty between Britain and Sikkim [Treaty of Tumlong]
• The machinery of the Government of India, including proposals for the establishment of Legislative Councils, and the composition of the Executive Council of the Governor-General
• The affairs of the Princely States and other local rulers and dignitaries, particularly concerning pensions and finances, including the affairs of the former regent of the Sikh Empire, Maharanee Chunda Kower [Maharani Jind Kaur]
• Famine in ‘Upper India’ and the response of the Government of India
• Affairs in the Persian Gulf, including: the British having compelled the Sheikh of Bahrein [Hakim of Bahrain, Shaikh Muḥammad bin Khalīfah Āl Khalīfah] to withdraw his blockade of the ‘Wahabee [Wahhābī] coast’; British arbitration in the sovereignty dispute between the Ruler of Muscat, Syud Thooenee [Sayyid Thuwaynī bin Sa‘īd Āl Bū Sa‘īd], and the Ruler of Zanzibar, Syud Majid [Sayyid Mājid bin Sa‘īd Āl Bū Sa‘īd]; and the conduct of the Political Agent, Muscat, Lieutenant William Pengelly, in a dispute between Syud Thooenee and Syud Toorkee [Sayyid Turkī bin Sa‘īd Āl Bū Sa‘īd].

The primary correspondents are:

• The Government of India (Ecclesiastical, Educational, Electric Telegraph, Financial, Foreign, Home, Judicial, Legislative, Marine, Military, Political, Postal, Post Office, Public, Public Works, Railway, Revenue, and Separate Revenue Departments)
• The Governor-General of India
• The Political Agent, Zanzibar.

The abstracts were printed and bound in London, and each one includes the following colophon: ‘LONDON: Printed by GEORGE E. EYRE and WILLIAM SPOTTISWOODE, Printers to the Queen’s most Excellent Majesty. For Her Majesty’s Stationery Office.’