"دليل الخليج. مجلد I. القسم التاريخي. الجزء II. ج. ج. لوريمر. ١٩١٥" [‎٢‎٥‎٠‎٥] (١٢٦٢/١٠٢٢)

2505
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Residency Agent; accordingly, after he had produced nine of the slaves
in question, he was compelled to pay a fine of $^100 on account
of the estimated balance, most of whom were believed to have been
shipped to Qatar and to other places. Subsequently it was reported
that the Shaikh of Abu Dhabi, in consequence of this affair, had
formed a design against the life of the Residency Agent at Sharjah; and,
as the belief appeared to be not altogether unfounded, a warning
was conveyed to him. There was reason to think that the assertions of
the Shaikh of Abu Dhabi in regard to prevalence of the trade along
the whole Trucial Coast had a considerable substratum of truth, but no
definite proofs could be obtained. In the same year a party of Baluchi
slaves brought from Wudam were sold in Dibai, and two who escaped
from that place fell into the hands of Arabs at Khan; proceedings
however were taken which resulted in the conviction, as already men
tioned above, of a number of slave dealers in Batinah.
In December 1899 Colonel Meade, the Political Resident in the
Persian Gulf, visited the ports of the Trucial Shaikhs and urged them
pjj to take steps for more effectively suppressing the slave traffic; the
Shaikhs, however, were deaf to his exhortations, and with one voice
denied that there was any importation of slaves into their territories
by sea. The Shaikh of Sharjah alone went so far as to admit that
slaves were imported by Bedouins from ''Oman into Trucial ^Oman by
land. It was generally alleged on the Trucial Coast that large number
of slaves were being imported into Qatar by sea; but no means existed
of verifying the statement, which was considered to be in itself highly
jjj y probable.
tlieEei In August 1901 a slave girl was imported by sea from Ras-al- 1901 -
Laffll Khaimah to Sharjah; she was manumitted and a fine of $70 was
!' lH recovered. In 1904 two cases came to light of the sale at Umm-al-
Siri Qaiwain of Persian boys kidnapped by Baluchis from the opposite coast;
wki j in each case the buyer was fined $100 and was sentenced to imprison
ment. On the 5th of September 1901 two slaves obtained their freedom
on board H.M.S. "Sphinx" at Dalmah Island. They stated that
they had been kidnapped from Africa three years before and brought
to Sur, whence, two years later they had been re-exported to Sharjah.
This last case illustrated the well-known fact that the condition of slaves
in the Persian Gulf is not a hard one, except in so far as they are
employed by their masters for pearl-diving, and that on the Arabian
coast it is generally the fear of being sent to sea that drives slaves to
rr g]i abscond.
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Local history of the trade in Bahrain, 1873-1907.
rip(
In October 1889 the British Residency Agent in Bahrain reported 1889.
that more slaves than usual had been brought home by pilgrims return-
fa ing from Makkah; the Shaikh however, in this case, showed loyalty
^ to his engagements, and 15 of the new slaves were traced and set at
^berty with his co-operation.