IOR/L/PS/10/291/2, f 263

Map labelled ‘Map No.4’, produced in July 1912 by the War Office. The map is the second of two sheets (the first being on f 263) covering the Shatt-al-’Arab, Bahmanshīr, Abbádán [Abadan] and Muhammareh [Khorramshahr]. The map shows the area immediately to the south of that shown in the first sheet. Notes under the title of the map state that it was compiled under the supervision of Lieutenant Arnold Talbot Wilson from plane table surveys made by surveyor Ali Ahmad of the Survey of India Department, and Muhammad Zamán Khán of the 34th Poona Horse, between June and August 1909.

The map details surveyed territory on the Persian side of the Turco-Persian boundary in the region along the Shatt-al-’Arab. Marked on the map are: rivers, canals and irrigation systems; date grove areas and the extent of cultivated lands; towns and villages; telegraph lines; the route of a proposed oil pipeline; marshlands. The locally recognised Turco-Persian boundary is indicated by a dotted-dashed black line. The boundary proposed by the British Government is marked by a solid green line.

The map is the last of four (the others being found at f 260, f 261 and f 262) referenced in a memorandum on the Mohammerah [Khorramshahr] frontier, dated 17 July 1912, and sent by Sir Edward Grey, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, to Sir George William Buchanan, the British Ambassador in Russia (f 259, f 264). The memorandum and maps were to be communicated to the Turkish Ambassador in London by Grey, and to the Russian Government by Buchanan.