Articles From Our Experts

During the American Civil War (1861–65) cotton supplies to Britain’s textile mills dwindled, causing a boom in production elsewhere in the Empire.

In the 1860s, speculation on Indian cotton, followed by failed harvests left Bombay’s banks in crisis and customers struggling to access funds. Lewis Pelly was one such customer.

Germany’s desire for ‘a place in the sun’ saw her challenge Britain’s commercial dominance in the Gulf in the early years of the twentieth century.

The dramatic decline of the Gulf’s pearling industry during the 1920s and 1930s, saw increasing numbers of pearl divers seek their freedom.

The culmination of extensive travel and research, George Curzon’s Persia and the Persian Question was a critical success. Yet was its author happy with it?

Until the 19th century, European powers considered much of the Gulf coastline to be hazardous, but the 1820 survey recorded vital details that contributed to later British involvement in the region.

How did an illustrated Arabic manuscript on the Art of War come into the possession of an illegitimate son of a King; his extraordinary and ultimately tragic life leading to its acquisition by the British Library?

Great Britain abolished the slave trade in its Empire in 1807, yet not only did it persist in the Gulf into the latter half of the nineteenth century, it flourished amid ineffectual British efforts towards its suppression.

The short-lived escapades of the Sponge Exploration Syndicate.

During the evacuation of British forces from Bushire, in the aftermath of the Anglo-Persian War (1856-57), tensions rose between two of Her Majesty’s public servants.

What is a kharita, what are its main components, and how was it dispatched?

Between the world wars, Reza Shah Pahlavi brought great changes to Iran and a challenge to British predominance in the Gulf, the legacy of which is still felt in the region.

Not all prisoners during wartime are soldiers. During the First World War, many countries interned “enemy” civilians.

Appearing in files from Bahrain in the 1930s, the terms ‘Holi’ (singular) and ‘Hawala’ (plural) are not immediately recognisable to most readers. Gulf History cataloguers take a closer look at the terms to decipher their meanings.

Former slaves employed in the Indian Navy’s crews in the mid-19th century often exploited the itinerant existence of naval vessels to escape servitude.

Over 800 manumission statements, collected by numerous British administrators in the Gulf over the course of three decades, offer invaluable insights into the lives and labours of the enslaved peoples of the Gulf region.

When the Residency ship Berenice was destroyed by fire on a trip to Muscat, the Resident in the Persian Gulf endured a ‘week of considerable anxiety’ over-seeing the rescue of 178 men, women, and children.

Only by mapping and surveying Aden fully were the British able to plan for its reconstruction and fortification, thereby facilitating trade and other shipping to and from India and beyond.

The 1948 visit of Shaikh Khalīfa bin Mohammed Āl Khalīfa to Britain on a training trip arranged by the British Council provides an early example of cooperation between Britain and Bahrain in matters related to policing and security.

The subject of railways appears time and again in the India Office Records. What was Britain’s obsession with them and how did they transform how Britain thought about, protected, and ran its empire?

What was the life of a diver like and how did the trade function? Papers in the India Office Records provide some fascinating clues.

In a pre-internet age of slow-travelling news, just how could a message be sent from London to Basra in 22 days?

How did a fourteenth century illustrated ‘Treatise on the Art of Riding and using the Instruments of War’ end up in the British Library’s Arabic manuscript collection? A ‘Nincumpoop’ of the Napoleonic era, who moonlighted as an antiquarian, holds the answer.

Although relatively little is known about the early years of Sultan Qaboos bin Sa‘id Al Bu Sa‘id, his experience of growing up secluded in Salalah may well explain the solitary nature of his fifty-year rule.

The India Office Private Papers offer a personal perspective on military, political, social and economic history over the period 1750–1947; in their private correspondence and diaries, people could write in different, often more open, ways.

A little known first-hand account, that the British Agents in Bahrain garnered by chance, sheds light on William Henry Irvine Shakespear’s death.

During the nineteenth century, the Gulf was a hive of economic activity, with merchant ships carrying precious cargoes back and forth to India, making fortunes for traders. But it could also be hazardous for sailors.

With pearling in decline and oil exploitation on hold, what drove Bahrain’s economy between the World Wars?

In recognising the importance of the trade, British colonial records cast light on the state of the ancient trade in Frankincense in the Dhofar region at the end of the 19th century, as well as some conflicts that emerged as a result.

Upon the death of Queen Victoria in 1901, instructions sent to the Native Agent at Sharjah on how to visibly mourn her death reveal aspects of the construction of empire via ritual mourning practices.

Lewis Pelly, Political Resident in the Persian Gulf 1862–72, witnessed rapid expansion in the value of trade in the region as well as political upheaval and crisis caused by famine.

Who were the Bania, and how are they depicted in the India Office Records?

The life and death of Claudius James Rich, author of 'Narrative of a Residence in Koordistan' and the East India Company’s Resident at Baghdad.

Qatar’s exploratory wells were drilled relatively late, although Major Frank Holmes sought an exploratory lease in 1922.

The shipwreck in 1852 of a merchant vessel off the Oman coast, led to the plunder and loss of enough indigo to supply the entire Gulf region for a year.

Prior to the construction of the Suez Canal, nineteenth-century British officials explored an alternative route between the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean.

How and why were the early voyages of the East India Company made? What were the challenges and first encounters?

The untimely death of John Gordon Lorimer, acting Resident in the Persian Gulf 1913–14, was seen as a tragedy. Yet, his legacy – in the form of his Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf, Oman and Central Arabia – emerged forty years later and has remained central to the study of the Gulf ever since.

Against the dramatic international backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars, the British in Constantinople, Syria and Persia ensured that they kept one step ahead of a mysterious French officer.