!['Seistan' [‎373v] (748/782)](https://iiif.qdl.qa/iiif/images/81055/vdc_100000001452.0x0003bc/Mss Eur F111_352_0772.jp2/full/!1200,1200/0/default.jpg "'Seistan' [‎373v] (748/782)")
The record is made up of 1 file (388 folios). It was created in 17 Jan 1899-4 Apr 1904. It was written in English. 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.
t 6 ]
tbe^mosTdirect of her paths. Looking to the future of J^ 10 ^ 8 ^
a^jr^ttssssa.» .i 10 — « f ^ .m
doubtless follow the fortunes of the capital. .
18 South of this district comes that of Kam already possessing a
semi-independent chiefship, which might very well he S kefhe
between the opposing spheres. Seistan should, for all the reasons given, be
included in the British sphere of interest. It is no exaggeration to say
cannot afford to see it excluded. .
19 Secondly, a study of the history and features of Seistan, no less than
of all modern reports upon it, leads to the conclusion that the future of that
country will depend, as did its past, upon the proper employment of the
immense water-supply from the Helmand that now runs not and goes to waste
in vast lagoons, and reed-heds, and swamps. The greater part of Seistan is,
during several months in the year, under inundation. Captain Sykes, m one
of his letters, has estimated its present population at 60,000. In an °tJ ie L he las
said that, under a proper system of irrigation, the land would support pei haps c
tenfold population ”. In a third he has said that, if the Helmand were properly
controlled, the population might rise to a million or more. It is clear, therefore,
that the future of Seistan will lie with those who control the entire course of the
Helmand. It should he in their power to turn the desert into a garden, and
to make the wilderness blossom like a rose.
20 Now it can hardly be doubted that a day will come, when, in response
to an external challenge, Great Britain will be obliged to advance to Kandahar.
So fully is this probability admitted, that the arrangements for the advance,
including the rails, the mobilisation camp, and the water-supply at Chaman
have already been made. liV hen Kandahar is re-occupied, the valley of the
Helmand will be occupied with it. Then will come the time, when the channel
and the valley of that river, now running parallel to the British border, though
at no great distance from it, having passed under British control, the regenera
tion of Seistan will for the first time become practicable, and it will he possible
to revive its former fame as one of the granaries of that part of Asia. No wise
man can be anxious to precipitate or even to hasten that consummation. But
on the other hand no wisdom in the world can greatly retard it; and when the
hour strikes, it would seem to me to be as well that Seistan should be waiting
to be regenerated by us, instead of having already been absorbed in the regen
erative embraces of others.
21. Bor these reasons, I recommend that in the intervening years, the
Government of India should continue, by constant, hut unpretentious, activity
in fostering the trade route, in providing for its security, and in reducing its
discomforts, and by a steady assertion of British authority up to the borders of
Seistan and of British influence within it,—to build up an interest in Seistan
which shall save for India an area and a market of so much potential value.
With this object I urge that we should be willing to spend a little money—it
will amount at the most to only a few thousand pounds—upon a venture that
would be defensible, even if it were doomed to failure, but that appears, on the
contrary, to be attended with reasonable hopes of success.
22. There remains only to he considered the question of a possible railway
connection between India and Seistan. This question has been discussed at
intervals during the past 12 years, and the history of the discussion is not without
its lessons for the future. The first idea of some such railway appears to have
originated with the late Sir J. Browne, who, as early as 1881, advocated a line
About this item
- Content
The file contains papers relating to Seistan [Sistan] and Persia [Iran].
The file includes printed copies of despatches from the Agent to the Governor-General of India and HM Consul-General for Khorasan and Seistan (Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Martindale Temple), to the Secretary to the Government of India Foreign Department, with enclosed despatches from Captain Percy Molesworth Sykes to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (the Marquis of Salisbury). Skyes’s despatches regard matters including: Seistan; trade routes into South-East Persia; the boundary between Persia and Afghanistan, in relation to the River Helmund [Helmand] changing its course (in despatch No. 5, which includes four sketch maps, folios 12, 13, 14 and 15); Sykes’s journey to Birjand (in despatch No. 7, which includes a sketch map on folio 20); the ruling family of Kain, which also governed Seistan, Tabbas and Tun; Sykes’s journey from Seistan to Kerman [Kirman] (in despatch No. 11, which includes a sketch map); and the direct Kerman-Quetta caravan trade that Sykes was trying to establish.
The file also includes copies of the following papers:
- A despatch from Temple to the Secretary to the Government of India Foreign Department, enclosing a letter from Temple to Sir Henry Mortimer Durand (HM Minister, Tehran), with copies of enclosures, regarding the establishment of a Seistan and Kain consulate
- A letter from Charles Edward Pitman, Director General of Telegraphs, to the Secretary to the Government of India Public Works Department, enclosing a copy of a ‘Report on the Preliminary Survey of the Route for a Telegraph Line from Quetta to the Persian Frontier’ by H A Armstrong, Assistant Superintendent, Indian Telegraph Department, which includes six photographs of views along the route [Mss Eur F111/352, f 52; Mss Eur F111/352, f 53; Mss Eur F111/352, f 54; Mss Eur F111/352, f 55; Mss Eur F111/352, f 56; and Mss Eur F111/352, f 57], and a map showing the proposed route of the telegraph line [Mss Eur F111/352, f 59]
- Letters from Hugh Shakespear Barnes, Agent to the Governor-General in Baluchistan, to the Secretary to the Government of India Foreign Department, enclosing copies of the diary of the Political Assistant, Chagai, for the weeks ending 16 February, 28 February, and 8 March 1900
- Diary No. 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11 and 12 of Major-General George Frederick Chenevix-Trench, HM Consul for Seistan (Diary No. 6 includes a sketch map, folio 86)
- A copy of a ‘Report on Reconnaissances Made while Attached to the Seistan Arbitration Commission’ by W A Johns, Deputy Consulting Engineer for Railways, Bombay
- A copy of the report ‘Notes on Persian Seistan’, compiled by Captain Edward Abadie Plunkett, and issued by the Government of India Intelligence Branch, Quarter-Master General’s Department
- Two copies of map signed by Plunkett titled ‘Persian Seistan-Cultivated Area’ [Mss Eur F111/352, f 270]
- A booklet entitled ‘Notes on the Leading Notables, Officials, Merchants, and Clergy of Khorasan, Seistan, Kain, and Kerman.’
- Printed copies of letters from the Government of India Foreign Department to the Secretary of State for India (Lord George Francis Hamilton), relating to the maintenance of British interests in Persia, dated 4 September 1899 and 7 November 1901 (the former with an enclosure of a minute by the Viceroy on Seistan).
- Extent and format
- 1 file (388 folios)
- Arrangement
The papers are arranged in approximate chronological order from the front to the rear of the file.
- Physical characteristics
Foliation: the foliation sequence (used for referencing) commences at the front cover with 1, and terminates at the inside back cover with 390; 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. The file contains one foliation anomaly, f 301A
- Written in
- English in Latin script View the complete information for this record
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'Seistan' [373v] (748/782), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/352, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100069721606.0x000097> [accessed 26 June 2026]
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Copyright: How to use this content
- Reference
- Mss Eur F111/352
- Title
- 'Seistan'
- Pages
- front, front-i, 2r:51v, 58r:58v, 60r:112r, 113r:125v, 147r:218r, 218r, 219r:269v, 271r:301v, 301Ar, 301Av, 302r:388v, 389v:390r, 389r, back
- Author
- East India Company, the Board of Control, the India Office, or other British Government Department
- Usage terms
- Open Government Licence