Page 271 - Gulf Precis(VIII)_Neat

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the duties of the officers in command of the vessels employed on the service
above referred to, was transmitted for the consideration of the Duke of Argyll—
Draft Instructions for the Senior Officer on the East India Station.
You are to place yourself in communication with the Governor-General of India, the
Governors of the Presidencies of Bombay and Madras, the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal,
and the Governors of Mauritius and Ceylon, and you arc to communicate with them freely as
occasion may require, co-operating with them in the most cordial manner for the benefit
of the Queen’s service and for the protection ol British trade and possessions.
2. You will comply with any requisitions for naval assistance which they may make
upon you, and which it may be in your power to afford consistently with your opinion of
the other requirements of the service on the station. Should the nature of those require­
ments render non-compliance with the demands of the local authorities at any lime
inevitable, you will, on all such occasions, explain, as far as you consider your instructions
from the Admiralty will allow you, the nature of the circumstances which prevent a
compliance with requisitions from Indian authorities.
3. You will appropriate three of the small vessels under your orders for the suppression
of the slave trde on the cast coast of Africa,
4. In consequence of an arrangement with the Indian Government, a portion of tha
cost of the naval squadron on the Last India S'ation, consisting of six vessels in addition to
the three above mentioned, will be paid out of the Indian revenues.
5. Of those six, you at once will detach three gunvcsscls or gun-boats, steamers, for
constant and exclusive service in the Persian Gulf.
6. They will, when necessary, visit Bombay for repair or sanitary or other purposes
according to such orders as you may give from time to time.
7. These three vessels are to maintain the police of the waters of the Persian Gulf
and to prevent the Arab Chiefs of the coast from rendering the trade and navigation
insecure by their piratical expeditions. These Chiefs are bound by treaty not to engage
in hostilities at sea.
All expeditions for this purpose will be restrained by these gun-boats, and the Chiefs
will not be allowed to engage in the slave trade.
8. As difficulties are apt to arise suddenly, requiring prompt action, the Commanders
of these gun-boats are to consider themselves at the disposal of the British Resident, or
such other local authority as the Government of India may appoint, for the maintenance of
the maritime police of these waters, and for the support of British authority.
9. The Resident or other local authority will be well acquainted with the habits of the
people and well qualified to judge as to the course to be pursued in dealing with the
Native Princes and people, and Commanding Officers will understand that they are not to
adopt any aggressive measures without the sanction of such authority.
10. Commanding Officers will be themselves responsible if they undertake any hostile
operation without a reasonable prospect of success, or when the lives of the men under
their orders might be unduly exposed to danger.
11. Commanding Officers of ships employed in the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian and
Red Seas are to comply with the requisitions of the Viceroy of India and the Governors of
Madras and Bombay, and such other local authorities as the Government of India may
determine.
12. If compliance with these requisitions should, in exceptional cases, interfere with the
order of the Senior Officer, they must look to the relati/e importance of the services, and
exercise their own discretion, bearing in mind the Admiralty instructions, Article 44,
Chapter 44, page 336, and reporting their proceedings and their reasons for the course
they may adopt,
13. The general rule for.the guidance of Her Majesty’s Naval Officers on this station
as on all others is, that acts of hostility arc not to be engaged in without the authority of
the Senior Officer of the station, but it is so obvious that this rule cannot apply to the
vessels employed under the circumstances above explained in the Persian Gulf.
14. Native Princes and people with whom Naval Officers may have to communicate
are to be treated with courtesy and consideration,
15. You will be charged generally with the protection of trade, and the defence of the
coast and shipping, and the execution of measures for the suppression of the slave trade,
so far as these several duties depend on the assistance of ships of war.
16. The Senior Officer will make Bombay his head-quarters, visiting, from time to
time, Calcutta, Trincomallcc, the Mauritius, and other parts of the station, and will, as
far as possible, avoid keeping the squadron at Bombay during the rainy and unhealthy season
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