IOR/R/15/1/29, ff 8-12

The letter is informing the Resident that the Chief Secretary will dispatch all necessary information on the Beni Boo Ali tribe [Banī Bū ‘Alī] as soon as possible; the records of the late Political Agency at Kishm [Qeshm] are considered to be defective.

It further urges the Resident that the Beni Boo Ali should be restored to their position prior to the 1821 British Expedition against them under Major-General Lionel Smith; the charges of piracy against them are not considered sound. To this end it explains that the prisoners taken to Bombay should not be released to Sa‘īd bin Sultān Āl Sa‘īd, the Imam of Muscat, and that any members of the Beni Boo Ali tribe currently in the custody of the Imam should be released to rejoin their tribe.

In response to the tribe's complaints against the destruction of their date trees and future means of subsistence, it is insisted that these were the acts of the Imam; the British do not therefore consider themselves the responsible party.

Enclosed is a letter from Major-General Lionel Smith to Francis Warden, Chief Secretary to the Bombay Government, dated 15 March 1815. The letter reports the number of prisoners taken by the British Expedition against the Beni Boo Ali tribe, and sent to Bombay aboard the Liverpool.