IOR/F/4/2660/176089

This item consists of copies of correspondence, resolutions, and consultations cited in, or enclosed with, extracts of Political Letters from the Government of Bombay to the East India Company Court of Directors, 3 October 1856. The enclosures are dated 27 March 1856-17 September 1856. It is the seventh in a series of seven items about the ‘slave trade’ [trade in enslaved people].

The correspondents are: the Government of Bombay; Commander Felix Jones, Acting Resident in the Persian Gulf; and Brigadier William Marcus Coghlan, Political Resident and Commandant at Aden.

The item concerns a report that imports to Bombay [Mumbai] from the coast of Africa have undergone a considerable increase. It is proposed to publicise this to local rulers and merchants in the Gulf and on the African coast, in order to persuade them of the benefits of pursuing ‘legitimate trade’ over continuing the traffic in enslaved people.

There is a short, quoted extract which dates from 30 September 1853. The rest of the material in the item dates from 1856.

The item contains a table of contents (f 303), and the title page (f 302) contains the following references: Draft Number ‘30 of 1857’, ‘Collection No. 6 of No. 78 of 1856’ and ‘Examiner’s Office’. The collection number was originally given as ‘4’ but this has been crossed out and replaced with ‘6’.