IOR/L/PS/5/227, ff 195-210

This part of the volume consists of copies of enclosures to a secret despatch from the Government of India Foreign Department to the Secret Committee, Number 17 of 1856, dated 22 April 1856. The enclosures are numbered 3-5 and are dated 4 January-1 February 1856.

The enclosures chiefly comprise copies of despatches from Richard W Stevens, HM Consul at Tehran, to the Secretary to the Government of India. Stevens encloses, with his own commentary, copies of his letters to Charles Murray, HM Minister to the Court of Persia [Iran], on affairs in Persia since Murray’s departure from Tehran with the British Mission. They notably cover the following:

• Stevens’s analysis of the ‘manifesto’ published in the Tehran Gazette stating Persia’s intentions towards Herat
• Persian military movements towards Afghanistan, including: the mission of Sultan Moorud Meerza [Prince Sulṭān Murād Mīrzā] eastward; the Persian Prime Minister’s letters to local governors ordering them to muster forces for duty on the Persia-Afghanistan frontier; and Persian political manoeuvres to delay Dost Mahomed Khan [Dūst Muḥammad Khān Bārakzāy] arriving at Herat before the Persian force
• Unverified rumours of Dost Mahomed Khan’s death at Candahar [Kandahar]
• Matters relating to food and trade, including the treatment of British Indian wool merchants in Persia
• The nationality of an individual wanted by the British legal authorities in India, who has recently been granted Persian status despite previously claiming British nationality
• Allegations of anti-Persian bribes made by William Taylour Thomson, former Chargé d’Affaires at the Court of Persia, and Stevens’s belief that the ‘evidence’ has been forged
• The return from St Petersburgh [Saint Petersburg] of the First Interpreter of the Persian Embassy, ostensibly due to ‘intolerable’ conditions there and contrary to suspicions of his bringing secret proposals for a Russia-Persia alliance.