Page 490 - Truncal States to UAE_Neat

Notes lo Chapter Eight

labourers from their tribes had to be employed, and secondly because
local people tended to work for short periods only, and new recruits
look their places.
01 From 1943/44 the British Government sponsored the search for the main
breeding grounds of the desert locust and the campaign to eradicate
these pests in Arabia as well as Africa and the Indian subcontinent. The
first European to travel to the LTwa, Wilfred Thesiger, was attached to
the Middle East Anti-Locust Unit, which had already been in operation
throughout Saudi Arabia, theTrucial Coast and parts of Oman under its
field officer Desmond Vesey-FitzGerald in the late 1940s. In the early
1950s the Trucial Stales were visited by several locust swarms, and
almost the entire crop of the LTwa oases was destroyed in 1951. In 1960 a
locust field officer was appointed by the British Government for liaison
duties from the Trucial Slates with the Pakistan Locust Mission which
had been set up in 1957 by the FAO. His presence was no longer
required in 1965.
82 This post witnessed a rapid turnover of officers: During the decade in
which this arrangement lasted, eight different people were Political
Officers in Sharjah: Capt. J.B. Howes (1937-40), Capt. R.D. Metcalfe
(1940-1). C.J. Pelly (1941-43), Capt. M.B. O’C. Tandy (1943-4), Capt.
R.E.R. Bird (1944-5)—later an employee of PCL, respectively IPC, Capt.
R.C. Murphy (1945-6), Capt. J.E.H. Hudson (1946-7), G.N. Jackson
(1947-8)—also an employee of PCL: see Hawley, Trucial Slates, p. 328.
83 He stayed in this post until 1951 and was succeeded by A.J. Wilton
(1951) and M.S. Weir (1952).
84 Political Agents resident in Dubai and responsible for all the seven
Trucial Stales were: C.M. Pirie Gordon (1954-5), J.P. Tripp (1955-8), D.F.
Hawley (1958-61)—ex Sudan Civil Service. The Political Agents who
were responsible for all the states with the exception of Abu Dhabi
were: A.J.M. Craig (1961-4), H.M. Balfour-Paul (1965-6), D.A. Roberts
(1966-8), J.L. Bullard (1968-71). After 1971 the post became that of a
Consul General. Political Officers in Abu Dhabi, under the Political
Agent in Dubai were: Hon. M. Buckmaster (1957-8), E.R. Worsnop
(1958-9), E.F. Henderson (1959-61) (on secondment from PCL). In the
decade when Abu Dhabi had a Political Agency, the post was filled by
three officers: Col. Sir Hugh Bouslead (1961-5)—ex Sudan Civil Service,
A.T. Lamb (1965-8), C.J. Treadwell—also ex-Sudan Civil Service;
Treadwell was Political Agent from 1968 to December 1971. when he
became the first British Ambassador to serve in the newly created state
of the UAE.
85 See below, pages 314ff.
86 See below, pages 311ff.
87 See below, pages 319ff.

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