'Memorandum on the Turkish claim to sovereignty over the eastern shores of the Red Sea and the whole of Arabia; and on the Egyptian claim to the whole of the western shore of the same sea, including the African coast from Suez to Cape Guardafui.' [‎21r] (41/70)

37
No. 576.
Sir H. Bulwer, No. 329 ;
May U, 1859.
No. 282, May 12.
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. , May 21, 1859.
June 23.
force in the Red Sea, but of causing the principal
ports to be visited by Her Majesty's cruizers; and
instructions were at once issued by the Admiralty
for this to be done.
A similar suggestion respecting the presence of a
British naval force in the Red Sea had been made
by Consul Plowden in the previous year.
In May of this year (1859) another question
arose, which has an important bearing on the present
question.
A French Company at Constantinople made an
offer to a certain person there to go to the Red Sea
and purchase "an island called Socotra, which com
manded its mouth, and which belonged to an Arab
Chief." «
On hearing of this proposal, the following telegram
was sent by Lord Malmesbury to Sir H. Bulwer:—
"Make the Porte refuse the island to which the
following reply was returned :—"Fuad Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. thinks
that the island of Socotra at the mouth of the Red
Sea belongs to the Imaum of Muscat, but if it turns
out that the Porte has jurisdiction over it, he will
give the order required."
Upon this, the 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. was asked whether it
would not be advisable that some steps should be
taken to influence the Imaum of Muscat against the
sale of Socotra ; to which they returned the following
reply
" It appears from the records of the 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.
that, in the year 1835, an attempt was made on the
part of the British Government to purchase the
island from the # Sultan of Kisseen, and that, in
anticipation of the completion of this arrangement, a
British detachment was posted on the island. The
Sultan, however, refused to sell the island, and the
detachment was withdrawn.
" A very interesting memoir on the island of
Socotra, communicated by the late Lieutenant J. R.
Wellsted, of the Indian navy, was published in the
Journal of the Royal Geographical Society for 1835
(Vol. V). The island, from its position 'directly
in the route of the trade from India by way of the
Red Sea (the entrance of which it may be said to
command), and close to the track of our ships by
the way of the Cape,' must be of more than ordi
nary political importance. In 1800, when the
French army were in Egypt, it is alleged that
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