IOR/L/PS/20/CA13

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 1873. The letters are dated December 1872-December 1873. The abstracts each have one of the following titles:

• Abstracts of Letters received from India
• Abstracts of Letters received from Sir B Frere
• Abstracts of Letters received from Aden
• Abstracts of Military Letters received from India
• Abstracts of Secret Letters received from India
• Abstracts of Letters received from Zanzibar, Bushire [Bushehr] and Aden
• Abstracts of Letters received from Bushire and Aden
• Abstracts of Letters received from Bushire.

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 covers issues including:

• Arrangements for preserving the historical records of the Government of India
• Judicial affairs, including the detention of Kooka [Namdhari/Kuka Sikh] insurgents as political prisoners and the question of jurisdiction over British subjects in Persia [Iran] and the Persian Gulf
• Land issues, including plantations of tea, cinchona, and opium poppy, exploration for coal deposits, and land revenue settlements
• Revenue, expenditure, and taxation
• Pay, pensions, recruitment, and other personnel issues in the Indian Civil and Military establishments
• Public works, including railways, canals and irrigation
• Education
• Telegraphy, including international telegraphic links with India
• Affairs concerning Princely States, including issues of succession, internal administration, the education of heirs, debts, and railways
• Anticipated famine in Bengal
• Issues concerning emigration from India to British, French, and Dutch colonies, including the proposed emigration of Indian labourers to Fiji
• Military affairs, including the organisation and supply of military units
• Military operations, including an expedition in the Garo Hills and counter-insurgency operations against the Moplahs [Mappilas] in Malabar
• Affairs in Persia, including: requests from the Persian Government for seconded Prussian and French army officers; frontier disputes between Persia and Turkey; the arbitration of the Mekran [Makran] and Seistan [Sistan] borders; a proposed railway from the Caspian Sea to Teheran [Tehran]
• Affairs in the Persian Gulf and Arabian Peninsula, including: conflict in Nejd [Emirate of Najd] between Saood [Sa’ūd bin Fayṣal Al Sa’ūd] and Abdullah [‘Abdullāh bin Fayṣal Al Sa’ūd]; the Turkish [Ottoman] occupation of Lahsa [Al Hasa] and suspected Turkish designs on the Gulf coast; and the slave trade
• Affairs in and around Aden Settlement, in particular Turkish activity in the region
• Affairs in the Sultanate of Muscat and Oman, in particular the consolidation of and challenges to the rule of the Sultan Syud Toorkee [Sayyid Turkī bin Sa’īd Āl Bū Sa’īd]
• Affairs in Zanzibar, including the slave trade, the Zanzibar Subsidy to Muscat, and contact with the mission of Dr David Livingstone in Central Africa
• Affairs in the Red Sea, including the illegal destruction of dhows by the British ship Thetis and suspected Egyptian designs on Berbera,
• Sir Bartle Frere’s mission to investigate the slave trade in East Africa, negotiations with the Sultans of Zanzibar and Muscat for treaties to suppress the slave trade, and recommendations for other anti-slavery measures
• Affairs in Turkish Arabia [Ottoman Iraq], including the administration of Reouf Pasha [Muḥammad Ra'ūf Pāshā], a steamer service operated by the British India Steam Navigation Company between Bussora [Basra] and Bagdad [Baghdad], and a prohibition on the export of Arab horses
• Affairs in Central Asia, including: arbitration of the northern border of Affghanistan [Afghanistan]; discussions with Russia concerning spheres of influence in the region; affairs in Eastern Turkestan [Xinjiang] and the proposed expedition of Thomas Forsyth to Yarkund [Yarkant]; a Russian expedition against Khiva; the visit to India of envoys from Affghanistan and Bokhara [Bukhara]
• Affairs in Burmah [Burma/Myanmar]
• Affairs in Siam [Thailand], Nipal [Nepal], and Thibet [Tibet]
• The Panthay Rebellion in China.

The primary correspondents are:

• The Government of India
• The Viceroy and Governor-General of India
• The Resident at Aden
• The Political Resident in the Persian Gulf
• The Political Agent in Muscat
• The Political Agent in Zanzibar
• Sir Bartle Frere.