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Transfer of Small Arms from Great Britain to Iran (Persia) in the Nineteenth Century

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Early Global Interconnectivity across the Indian Ocean World, Volume I

Part of the book series: Palgrave Series in Indian Ocean World Studies ((IOWS))

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Abstract

In the nineteenth century, technologies concerning firearms evolved rapidly, and their diffusion made tremendous impacts all over the world. As far as the history of West Asia is concerned, except for few examples, this topic has never been seriously been examined. This chapter focuses on the transfer of arms and weapons from Great Britain to Iran (Persia) in the nineteenth century. It analyses the suppliers and recipients, transfer routes and modes of transportation, as well as kinds of weapons. The chapter introduces peculiarities and similarities of this arms transfer by comparing it with other regions and countries around the Indian Ocean and placing it into a broader context.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This attitude is best exemplified, for example, in Headrick’s following work. Daniel R. Headrick (1981) The Tools of Empire: Technology and European Imperialism in the Nineteenth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

  2. 2.

    Historical research on this development has recently been carried out in Japan, focusing on the transfer of naval technologies from Great Britain to Japan in the latter half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century. Yokoi Katsuhiko 横井勝彦; Onoduka Tomoji 小野塚知二, eds. (2012) Gunkaku to buki iten no sekaishi: Heiki wa naze yoi ni hiromatta no ka 軍拡と武器移転の世界史: 兵器はなぜ容易に広まったのか? (Tōkyō: Nihon keizai hyōronsha). We also have Grant’s work, focusing on the role played by private manufacturers in the arms transfer to the extra-Western world. Jonathan A. Grant (2007) Rulers, Guns and Money: The Global Arms Trade in the Age of Imperialism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press).

  3. 3.

    Emrys Chew (2012) Arming the Periphery: The Arms Trade in the Indian Ocean During the Age of Global Empire (London: Palgrave Macmillan).

  4. 4.

    Foreign Office (henceforth FO), FO60: Political and Other Departments: General Correspondence Before 190 (Kew: National Archives).

  5. 5.

    Malcolm Yapp (1980) Strategies of British India: Britain, Persia and Afghanistan, 1798–1850 (London: Clarendon Press), 1–2.

  6. 6.

    FO60/84, Secret Committee to Governor General, 7 December 1829, enclosed in Stark to Backhouse, 26 June 1841.

  7. 7.

    Jean Calmard (1989) “Les réformes militaires sous les Qâjâr (1794–1925)”, in Yann Richards (ed.), Entre l’Persia et l’Occident: Adaptation et assimilation des idées et techniques occidentales en Persia (Paris: Fondation de la Maison es sciences de l’homme), 21–25.

  8. 8.

    Harford J. Brydges [1764–1847] (1834) An Account of the Transactions of His Majesty’s Mission to the Court of Persia, in the 1807–1811, vol. 1 (London: James Bohn), xxviii; FO60/16, Memorandum by Ouseley, et al., 20 September 1819.

  9. 9.

    The subsequent arms supplies were as follows; 4000 small arms from London in 1810; 30,000 small arms along with 20 guns from British India in 1816 (FO60/16, Paper prepared by Wright, annexed to Memorandum by Ouseley etc., 20 Septembre 1819; Mīrzā Fażl allāh Shīrāzī Khāvarī (2001/2002) Tārīkh-e Ẕū al-Qarnein (Tehran: Sāzmān-e chāp va enteshārāt-e vezārat-e farhang va ershād-e Eslāmī), 2 vols., here 1:334; two occurrences from British India in 1828, 2000 and 3000 small arms, respectively. (FO60/84, Bill of Military Secretary, 23 February 1829, enclosed in Stark to Backhouse, 26 June 1841; FO60/40, Ellis to Meerza Massood, March 1836, enclosed in Ellis to Palmerston, 2 April 1836.)

  10. 10.

    FO60/4, Astell to Hamiliton, 9 May 1810; FO60/4, Privy Council to Hamilton, 12 May 1810; FO60/4, Admiralty Office to Hamilton, 15 May 1810.

  11. 11.

    Hormoz Ebrahimnejad (1999) Pouvoir et succession en Iran: Les premiers Qâjâr, 1726–1834 (Paris: Société d’Histoire de l’Orient), 289–295.

  12. 12.

    FO60/35, Memorandum by India Board, 25 February 1834, enclosed in India Board to Palmerston, 3 March 1834.

  13. 13.

    FO60/35, Memorandum by Backhouse, 16 May 1834.

  14. 14.

    FO60/35, Memorandum by Backhouse, 16 May 1834.

  15. 15.

    FO60/34, Palmerston to Campbell, 29 September 1834.

  16. 16.

    FO60/35, Memorandum by Backhouse, 16 May 1834.

  17. 17.

    FO60/35, Memorandum by India Board, 25 February 1834, enclosed in India Board to Palmerston, 3 March 1834.

  18. 18.

    FO60/35, Foreign Office to Commissioners of the Treasury, 7 July 1834; FO60/35, Foreign Office to Ordnance, 2 October 1834.

  19. 19.

    FO60/35, Treasury Chamber to Backhouse, 6 December 1834.

  20. 20.

    FO60/35, Byham to Backhouse, 5 December 1834.

  21. 21.

    FO60/37, Ellis to Palmerston, 5 September 1835.

  22. 22.

    FO60/40, Stoddart to Ellis, 21 January 1836, enclosed in Ellis to Palmerston 21 January 1836.

  23. 23.

    FO60/44, Memorandum by Bethune, 11 March 1836.

  24. 24.

    Malcolm Yapp, Strategies of British India, 138–139.

  25. 25.

    FO60/39, Bethune to Backhouse, 30 December 1835.

  26. 26.

    FO60/46, Foreign Office to Ordnance Office, 6 July 1836; FO60/46, Byham to Backhouse, 16 July 1836.

  27. 27.

    FO60/43, McNeill to Palmerston, 1 December 1836.

  28. 28.

    British Foreign Office (1839) Correspondence Relating to Persia and Afghanistan (London: J. Harrison & Son), 161.

  29. 29.

    FO60/78, Memorandum Presented to Palmerston, 21 April 1841.

  30. 30.

    FO60/77, Palmerston to McNeill, 3 July 1841.

  31. 31.

    FO60/84, Sheil to Aberdeen, 24 May 1842.

  32. 32.

    Charles Issawi (1970) “The Tabrīz-Trabzon Trade, 1830–1900: Rise and Decline of a Route”, International Journal of Middle East Studies 1, 18.

  33. 33.

    FO60/35, Fairlie, Clark & Co. to Backhouse, 14 March 1834.

  34. 34.

    FO60/35, Foreign Office to Master General of the Ordnance, 5 March 1834.

  35. 35.

    FO60/35, Memorandum by Backhouse, 16 May 1834.

  36. 36.

    FO60/45, Principal Storekeeper to Office of Ordnance, 8 January 1835, enclosed in Treasury Chamber to Backhouse, 8 January 1836.

  37. 37.

    Denis Wright (1977) The English Amongst the Persians: Imperial Lives in Nineteenth-Century Persia (London: Heinemann), 57–58.

  38. 38.

    Stephanie Cronin (2009) “Building a New Army: Military Reform in Qajar Iran”, in Roxane Farmanfarmaian (ed.), War and Peace in Qajar Persia: Implication Past and Present (New York: Routledge), 63.

  39. 39.

    FO60/360, No. 144, Foreign Office to Thomson, 20 October 1874.

  40. 40.

    FO60/517, Foreign Office to Cowell, 24 January 1890.

  41. 41.

    FO60/511, No. 136, Memorandum by Gordon, 5 April 1890, enclosed in Wolff to Salisbury, 21 April 1890.

  42. 42.

    Denis Wright (1977) English Amongst the Persians, 98.

  43. 43.

    On this point, see, for example, Daniel R. Headrick (1988) The Tentacles of Progress: Technology Transfer in the Age of Imperialism, 1850–1940 (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 18–48.

  44. 44.

    Daniel Headrick (1981) The Tools of Empires, 96–104.

  45. 45.

    Emrys Chew (2012) Arming the Periphery, 80.

  46. 46.

    Besides Emrys Chew’s work, we have the following article on this topic: Mansure Ettehadieh (1999) “The Arms Trade in the Persian Gulf, 1880–1898”, in Richard Frye (ed.), Proceedings of the Second European Conference of Iranian Studies, Held in Bamberg, 30th September to 4th October 1991, by the Societas Iranologica Europaea (Roma: Istituto italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente), 177–184.

  47. 47.

    FO60/503, No. 188, Wolff to Foreign Office (tel.), 30 December 1889.

  48. 48.

    FO60/517, No. 57/8/5512, Deedes to Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 30 January 1890.

  49. 49.

    FO60/517, Imperial Bank of Persia to Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 17 March 1890; FO60/517, Chief Accountant of the Imperial Bank of Persia to Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 9 April 1890.

  50. 50.

    FO60/517, No. 57/8/5612, Deedes to Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 29 March 1890.

  51. 51.

    FO60/517, No. 57/8/6014, Thompson to Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 21 November 1890.

  52. 52.

    FO60/517, No. 57/8/6076, War Office to Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 5 December 1890; George Blake (1956) B. I. Centenary, 1856–1956 (London: Collins), 255.

  53. 53.

    Reza Ra’iss Tousi (1989) “The Persian Army, 1880–1907”, Middle Eastern Studies 24.2, 206–207.

  54. 54.

    FO60/511, No. 140, Memorandum by Gordon, 21 April 1890, enclosed in Wolff to Salisbury, 22 April 1890.

  55. 55.

    Edmund Ollier (1885) Cassell’s Illustrated History of the Russo-Turkish War, vol. 1 (London: Cassell & Co.), 491; Thomas E. Gordon (1896) Persia Revisited (London: E. Arnold), 17.

  56. 56.

    FO60/511, No. 136, Memorandum by Gordon, 5 April 1890, enclosed in Wolff to Salisbury, 21 April 1890.

  57. 57.

    FO60/511, No. 136, Memorandum by Gordon, 5 April 1890, enclosed in Wolff to Salisbury, 21 April 1890.

  58. 58.

    FO60/512, No. 255, Memorandum by Gordon, 2 August 1890, enclosed in Wolff to Salisbury, 4 August 1890. About the condition of the regular infantry at the time, see Reza Ra’iss Tousi (1989) “Persian Army”, 209–217.

  59. 59.

    Geoffrey Jones (1987) “The Imperial Bank of Persia and Iranian Economic Development, 1890–1952”, Business and Economic History, 2nd Series 16, 69–80.

  60. 60.

    FO60/517, No. 57/8/5572, Financial Secretary of War Office to Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 15 February 1890.

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  1. Tōkyō Bunko (The Oriental Library), Tōkyō, Japan

    Ichiro Ozawa

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  1. University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria

    Angela Schottenhammer

  2. Research Director of the Indian Ocean World Centre (IOWC), McGill University, Montreal, Canada

    Angela Schottenhammer

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Ozawa, I. (2019). Transfer of Small Arms from Great Britain to Iran (Persia) in the Nineteenth Century. In: Schottenhammer, A. (eds) Early Global Interconnectivity across the Indian Ocean World, Volume I. Palgrave Series in Indian Ocean World Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-97667-9_10

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