IOR/F/4/2598/160731

This item consists of copies of correspondence, resolutions, memoranda, and consultations cited in, or enclosed with, extracts of Political Letters from the Government of Bombay to the East India Company Court of Directors dated 31 January, 16 and 28 February 1855. The enclosures are dated 28 December 1854-26 February 1855.

The main correspondents are: the Government of Bombay; Lawford Acland, Acting Company’s Solicitor, Bombay; Robert Leech, Solicitor, Supreme Court; Lieutenant Robert Austice Stradling, former Commander of the Company Ship Constance; and Rear Admiral Sir Henry John Leeke, Commander-in-Chief of the Indian Navy.

The item concerns the judgements made by the Vice Admiralty Court of Bombay [Mumbai] regarding two ships, the Saiad [Sa‘īd] and the Futtool Moombaruck [Fatḥ al-Mubārak], which are accused of participating in the ‘slave trade’ [trade in enslaved people]. The judgements concern what will happen to the ships themselves, the assessment of claims to the cargoes, and the payment of bounties to the captors of the two ships.

There are multiple spellings for both ships’ names in the text.

The item includes:

• Copy of an order made in the Vice Admiralty Court of Bombay (ff 1069-1070)
• Copy of a certificate produced by the Registrar of the Court (ff 1070-1072)
• Copies of the sentences of condemnation against the Saiad (ff 1079-1082) and the Futtool Moombaruck (ff 1083-1084)
• A letter from William Rothery, Slave Trade Adviser to the Treasury, to the Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty’s Treasury, 4 May 1855 (ff 1090-1094).

The item contains a table of contents (f 1062), and the title page (f 1061) contains the following references: Draft Number ‘605-1855’, and ‘Examiner’s Office’.