IOR/L/PS/6/560, Coll 1/1

This item is a collection to India Political Despatch No. 1 of 6 January 1869, from the Secretary of State for India to the Government of India Foreign Department (the Political Despatch itself is not included in this item).

The collection consists of papers forwarded with the Government of India Foreign Department Letter Political No. 107 of 22 June 1867 to the Secretary of State for India (received 5 August 1867). The papers cover the refusal of the Sultan of Zanzibar [Sayyid Mājid bin Sa‘īd Āl Bū Sa‘īd, various spellings of his name feature in the papers’] to pay his annual subsidy to the new Sultan of Muscat [Sayyid Sālim bin Thuwaynī Āl Bū Sa‘īd]. In addition, the papers document the Government of India’s attempts to persuade the Sultan of Zanzibar to make the payments. The correspondence also includes reports regarding trade in the Persian Gulf. The collection was compiled for information purposes for the Secretary of State for India to compose the answering Political Despatch.

The main correspondents are the following: the Government of Bombay, the Political Agent and Consul at Zanzibar, and the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf. Other correspondents include the Government of India Foreign Department, the Sultan of Muscat and the Sultan of Zanzibar.

The papers also include memoranda by Sir John William Kaye (ff 25-27, ff 60-61 and ff 65-66); Captain William Eastwick (ff 28-32); Henry Bartle Frere (ff 33-43, ff 67-81 and ff 82-106); Henry Thoby Prinsep (ff 49-52 and ff 115-126); Frederick Currie (f 53); Major General Sir William Coghlan (ff 54-58); and William Mackinnon (ff 137-138). Also included is a ‘Précis regarding Muscat and its relations with the Wahabee [Wahhābī] power’ (ff 150-176).