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‘Memorandum respecting the frontier between Mohammerah and Turkey.’ [16v] (32/82)
The record is made up of 1 file (41 folios, 5 maps). It was created in 3 Apr 1912. It was written in English and French. The original is part of the British Library: India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. Records and Private Papers Documents collected in a private capacity. .
Transcription
This transcription is created automatically. It may contain errors.
island of 111 Khizr, but not an inch of the sur
rounding territory.
He claimed, in fact, not only all the territory
immediately surrounding the town of Moham-
merah, hut also the extensive country to the east
of the island of El Khizr, and he justified his
demand by the terms of the Explanatory Note,
though, in point of fact, that document was
intended by its authors merely to refer to lands
above Mohammerah on the Shatt-el-Arab.
As an offset to these exorbitant demands, the
Persian Commissioner put in his claim as indi
cated by the blue line on the same map, on the
ground that the country so defined was actually
occupied, and had been occupied for untold years,
by Persian tribes.
The Mediating Commissioners pointed to the
terms of the Treaty as being obviously opposed to
the isolation of strips of territory belonging to
either State within the limits of the other,
involving, as it would, the absurdity of a triple
boundary to each.
Colonel Williams, in a despatch dated the Enclosure 1 in
_ , ,, , n n , Sir Stratford
4th Eebruary, ISoO, reported as follows to canning's No. 110,
Sir Stratford Canning : — March 31,1850.
Without discussing, in conference, the merits ot the
explanatory note upon which the Porte founds its
pretensions, we have sufficiently marked our estimation
of it, by the line drawn for the future boundary; my
colleague and myself believe that the note has had an
interpretation put on it by the Porte which was never
contemplated by the parties who drew it up ; its object,
as 1 understood at the time, teas to calm the suspicions of
the Divan relative to Persian pretensions towards Korna on
the Shatt-el-Arab
With reference to the line decided on by my
colleague and myself for the consideration of Your
Excellency and M. de Titow, we have arrived at that
conclusion after a careful inspection of the Shatt-el-
Arab and the waters flowing into it whilst on board
the " Nitocris" steamer, Avhere we were fortunate in
having the practical knowledge of Captain Jones, her
commander ; and, in combating Turkish pretensions to
the east of Mohammerah and the island of El Khizr, we
have carefully abstained from admitting Persian claims
to the islands in the Shatt-el-Arab, all of which lie to
the west of those two places :—
The enclosed diagram will, I trust, demonstrate the
justice of our award. Beginning from the mouth of
the Shatt-el-Arab, the proposed line (marked in red)
runs along the western bank of the island of El Ivhizr,
crosses the mouth of the HafFar Canal, and then
up the Shatt-el-Arab to the mouth of the Abu Djudei
Canal, a distance of a geographical league [it is
About this item
- Content
The memorandum concerns the border between Mohammerah [Khorramshahr] and Turkey, and was prepared by Alwyn Parker of the Foreign Office. There are a number of labels at the top of the first page: ‘Persia’, ‘Confidential’ and ‘Section 10’. The memorandum sections are as follows:
- Part I. A preface (folios 1-5), introducing the points at issue, with two maps, the first being a sketch map of the Mohammerah district, with the proposed Turkish, Persian and mediating commissioner’s lines indicated (folio 2), and a map compiled from plane table surveys by Lieutenant Arnold Talbot Wilson in 1909, with the frontier as defined by the mediating commissioners in 1850 (folio 4);
- Part II. An historical summary (folios 6-19) of British Government correspondence relating to the border dispute, with the chief focus being on correspondence exchanged during the period 1843-52, around the time of the Treaty of Erzeroum (c.1848). This part contains two copies of a map, a facsimile of a diagram of the disputed area, the original of which was enclosed by Colonel Williams in his despatch of 4 February 1850, indicating Turkish and Persian claims and the mediating commissioner’s proposal (folios 15, 19);
- Part III. Conclusion (folios 20-28), with a further map (folio 23), an exact copy of that found on folio 4.
The appendices that follow are:
- A: British assurances given to the Shaikh of Mohammerah, 1899 and 1902-10;
- B. Protocol of December 1911 (in French) for the proposal settlement of the Turco-Persian frontier question;
- C. An extract from Sir Austen Henry Layard’s Early Adventures in Persia, Susiana, and Babylonia , published in 1887. The extract is from volume 2, pp 431-439;
- D. Rough notes made by General William Monteith when in Persia, on the frontier of Turkey and Persia, as communicated to the Foreign Office in 1843;
- E. Observations by Sir Henry Rawlinson on a Persian memorandum relative to the situation of the cities of Mohammerah and Fellahiah [Fallāḥīyah], 1844;
- F. Text of the Treaty of Erzeroum, 31 May 1847, in English and French translation;
- G. Copy of a despatch from Sir Stratford Canning, the British Ambassador to Istanbul, to Lord Palmerston, Foreign Secretary, dated 30 May 1850;
- H. Copy of a despatch from Lord Palmerston to Lord Broomfield, dated 12 July 1850.
- Extent and format
- 1 file (41 folios, 5 maps)
- Arrangement
The memorandum is arranged into three parts, labelled I, II and III, which are followed by eight lettered appendices, A-H. Historic correspondence referred to in the memorandum is referenced in the inside page margin.
- Physical characteristics
Foliation: The foliation sequence commences at the first folio and terminates at the last folio; these numbers are written in pencil, are circled, and are located in the top right corner of the recto The front of a sheet of paper or leaf, often abbreviated to 'r'. side of each folio.
Pagination: The booklet contains an original typed pagination sequence.
- Written in
- English and French in Latin script View the complete information for this record
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‘Memorandum respecting the frontier between Mohammerah and Turkey.’ [16v] (32/82), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, IOR/L/PS/18/B380, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100024051501.0x000021> [accessed 18 December 2024]
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Copyright: How to use this content
- Reference
- IOR/L/PS/18/B380
- Title
- ‘Memorandum respecting the frontier between Mohammerah and Turkey.’
- Pages
- 1r:1v, 3r:14v, 16r:18v, 20r:30v, 33r:41v
- Author
- East India Company, the Board of Control, the India Office, or other British Government Department
- Usage terms
- Open Government Licence