Nature and Scope

“An important resource enabling students and scholars everywhere to trace in detail the rise of the East India Company, which laid the foundations of the British Raj in India.”

Prof. H. V. Bowen, Swansea University

 

The nature and organisation of the material in East India Company varies according to its class. There follows a summary of what users can expect to find in each class of documents.

For more detailed descriptions of the classes available in this resource, please see Margaret Makepeace’s introductory essay.

For full instructions on how to navigate and use East India Company, please see our user’s guide.

 

Module 1: Trade, Governance and Empire, 1600-1947

Module 2: Factory Records for South Asia and South-East Asia

Module 3: Factory Records for China, Japan and the Middle East

Module 4: Correspondence: Early Voyages, Formation and Conflict

Module 5: Correspondence: Domestic Life, Governance and Territorial Expansion 

Module 6: Board of Commissioners: Establishment of the Board

 

 

Module 1: Trade, Governance and Empire, 1600-1947

This module consists of the complete IOR classes A, B, C, and D and their associated Z-class indexes, comprising 932 volumes:

• IOR/A: The East India Company’s charters, statutes and treaties
• IOR/B: The minutes of the meetings of the Courts of Directors and Proprietors
• IOR/C: The minutes and memoranda of the Council of India
• IOR/D: The minutes and memoranda of the general committees and offices of the East India Company
• IOR/Z: Indexes to selected documents in classes B and D

 

Document types include:

• Minutes of council meetings (Court of Directors, Court of Proprietors and Council of India)
• Memoranda and papers laid before councils
• Council resolutions
• Proceedings of revenue boards
• Charters
• Text of legislation
• Printed books
• Correspondence
• Lists of administrative, military and ecclesiastical personnel

 

File classes:

IOR/A/1

(111 volumes, 1600-1947)

These manuscript charters, commissions of voyages, letters patent, indentures, letters of marque and other legal documents are mostly catalogued individually or in small bound bundles.

 

IOR/A/2

(27 volumes, 1720-1851)

This sub-series consists of larger, bound volumes, often printed, which deal with relations with a British Government which undertook ever-increasing scrutiny of the Company’s commercial and administrative activities as the eighteenth century turned into the nineteenth.

The volumes include an assortment of papers, most often to do with the periodic renewal of the Company’s charters and privileges, such as correspondence between Government and Company representatives, petitions, transcripts of evidence taken by Parliamentary committees, and statutes relating to the Company.

 

IOR/B

(275 volumes, 1599-1858)

These manuscript volumes are mainly minutes of meetings of the Court of Directors of the Company, with a minority of volumes relating instead to dissents to the Court, and others to the Court of Proprietors (which appointed the directors). The series ends with the transfer of authority from the Company to the Crown in 1858.

The B-class volumes are in date order by meeting; for ease of navigation we have subdivided each volume by month, quarter or year, as most appropriate.

Most B-class volumes have indexes to their content within them, but some do not. Some of these latter volumes are covered by a Z-class index or indexes (see below). All indexed volumes can be seen in conjunction with their indexes in our split-screen image-viewer.

 

IOR/C

(145 volumes, 1858-1947)

This series consists mainly of minutes of meetings of the Council of India, which succeeded the courts of the East India Company as the central executive authority for British India. Like the courts, it met in London. It ceased to exist in 1937, when India gained greater self-government under the Government of India Act 1935. The volumes from after this date are of minutes of meetings of the Secretary of State for India’s advisers, and volumes of miscellaneous correspondence. As in the B class, there are also volumes of dissents.

Minute volumes have been subdivided by month, quarter or year, as most appropriate. Many of the later volumes in this series are printed or in typescript and some have indexes, which can be seen in conjunction with the related content in our split-screen image-viewer.

 

IOR/D

(256 volumes, 1700-1858)

The majority of these records were produced by, or are closely associated with, the Committee of Correspondence, the most important of the standing committees of the Company appointed by the Court of Directors. They include minutes of the meetings of the Committee, its reports and resolutions, and its memoranda.

The D class also includes many volumes of ‘auditor’s references’, comprising assorted papers mostly relating to the financial claims of Company employees. There are also a few miscellaneous volumes of papers on topics such as ecclesiastical appointments and the legal proceedings against governor-general Warren Hastings.

Where these volumes are indexed, content and index pages can be viewed simultaneously in the split-screen image-viewer. Some volumes are indexed in Z-class indexes (see below).

Please note that volumes IOR/D/64-65 and 68-71 have been mislaid and so are not available in this resource.

 

IOR/Z

(119 volumes, 1702-1858)

This series consists solely of volumes of indexes which relate to volumes in the B and D classes.

These index volumes have not been put together to a consistent pattern and can be difficult to navigate; some Z-class indexes relate to only one content volume whilst others relate to multiple content volumes.

In addition to this, some ‘Z’s refer to copies of minutes which have been lost – i.e. they are indexes to minutes of which the British Library holds a different (textually identical but differently formatted) copy to the copy they actually refer to.

To make navigation as easy as possible for users, we have cross-referenced each ‘Z’ index with the volume(s) it refers to and enabled users to look at content and index simultaneously through our split-screen image-viewer.

 

Highlights of Module 1 include:

• The East India Company’s foundational documents, including a contemporary transcript of the original letters patent granted by Elizabeth I (1600) and subsequent renewals by James I (1609) and William and Mary (1693)
• Early commissions to ships’ captains to command voyages to the East (IOR/A/1/6 and IOR/A/1/7)
• The details of the award of the English and Dutch commissioners under the Treaty of Westminster (1654)
• The grant of Bombay to the East India Company (1668)
• Letters of marque to East India Company ships to seize pirates (1732-7) (IOR/A/1/74 and IOR/A/1/75)
• Papers pertaining to the impeachment of Warren Hastings (1775-95)
• The grant to the East India Company of plunder taken in the war with Tipu Sultan (1793)
• An address to Queen Victoria from Indians in London, assuring her of the allegiance of her Indian subjects and deploring the events of the Mutiny (1857)
• A defence agreement between the British government and the government of Burma (1947)

 

 

Modules 2 and 3: Factory Records

The Factory Records consist of papers sent to London from the East India Company's 'factories', or trading posts, across Asia and parts of Africa, including letters sent and received, official trading diaries, accounts of the Company's embassies to rulers, proceedings of provincial councils and revenue boards, military documents and account books.

For a detailed guide to the Factory Records, see Margaret Makepeace and Antonia Moon's essay.

 

 

Module 2: Factory Records for South Asia and South-East Asia

This consists of 919 volumes from 34 factories or factory groups. 

Date range:

1613-1830

File classes:

IOR/G, Factory Records, 1613-1830

These relate to factories established in India and the East Indies during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The remainder of this class, dealing with factories elsewhere, principally in China and Japan, is covered in Module 3.

Document types include:

• Correspondence
• Consultations (public and military)
• Ledgers
• Proceedings of governors' councils and courts
• Trading journals
• Wills
  
  

IOR/L/PS, Political and Secret Department records

Included in this module are some of IOR/L/PS/9: Political and Secret Department Records: Correspondence relating to areas outside India, 1781-1911.

The Secret Department was reserved for highly sensitive correspondence involving war, peace and diplomacy, whereas the Political Department dealt with the everyday matters involving relations with the Indian states and foreign governments. This distinction was blurred after 1875, with records from both departments filed together in the same volumes.

Document types include:

• Correspondence
• Minutes

Highlights of Module 2 include:

• Correspondence on rivalries between the English and Dutch East India Companies in Java (1618-54)
• A translation of the Sultan of Sulu’s cession of Banquay (1765)
• Accounts of three East India Company embassies to Ceylon (1762-95)
• Letters giving an account of the siege of the Karwar factory by the Sonja Raja, 1717
• Papers related to Sir Stamford Raffles (1812-27) (IOR/G/35/50 and IOR/G/35/51)

Please note that the following volumes have been mislaid or have been deemed by the British Library curators to be too fragile to scan, and so are not available in this resource: IOR/G/1/2A-C, IOR/G/21/67, IOR/G/21/69, IOR/G/35/28, IOR/G/35/49, IOR/G/35/55, IOR/G/35/61, IOR/G/36/35, IOR/L/PS/9/219.

 

Module 3: Factory Records for China, Japan and the Middle East

This consists of 641 volumes from 7 factories or factory groups.

Date range:

1608-1870

File classes:

IOR/G, Factory Records, 1608-1858

These are the IOR/G volumes relating to factories in east Asia, the Middle East and Africa, from the early seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century.

Document types include:

• Correspondence
• Consultations (public and military)
• Ledgers
• Proceedings of governors' councils and courts
• Trading journals
• Wills
  
  

IOR/R, India Office records transferred later through official channels

Module 3 also includes the complete run of volumes from IOR/R/19, Records of East India Company and India Office Agencies in Egypt (1832-1870).

The volumes in this class consist mostly of correspondence and accounts.

Highlights of Module 3 include:

• Papers relating to Sir Thomas Roe’s embassy to the Mughal emperor Jahangir (1616)
• Diaries of the factory at Tonqueen (Tonkin) (1672-97) (IOR/G/12/17/1 to IOR/G/12/17/10)
• A narrative description of the Cape of Good Hope, advocating Britain’s annexation of the Cape as a supply station on the way to and from India (1785)
• Letters relating to Lord Macartney’s embassy to China (1787-1810) (IOR/G/12/91 Part 1 to IOR/G/12/93)
• Papers relating to Sir Harford Jones’s residency at Baghdad and mission to Persia (1794-1811)
• Letters relating to Napoleon Bonaparte’s removal to St Helena (1815-17)

 

Module 4: Correspondence: Early Voyages, Formation and Conflict 

This Module consists of 793 volumes, comprising original, draft and abstracted correspondence from IOR Class E plus their associated H- and Z-class indexes, and the Z-class indexes for the Madras and Bombay Presidencies.

It includes correspondence between the East India Company and the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India (the Board of Control), the Company’s various settlements and Presidencies throughout Asia, government departments, and European houses of agency. The records offer a fascinating insight into the early voyages of the Company and its shifting interests from trade to the gaining of territorial power, and are interspersed with a number of petitions, reports (including quarterly 'Narratives of Proceedings' produced by regional administrations), financial accounts, inventories and other documents.

Date Range:

1600-1858

File Classes:

IOR/E, East India Company General Correspondence, 1600-1858

This class of documents comprises correspondence relating to a wide range of subjects, regions, and the various administrative units of the East India Company. Series E is further divided into sub-series of original incoming and draft outgoing correspondence, arranged chronologically and/or geographically. The sub-series included in Module 4 are as follows:

IOR/E/2: Correspondence with the Board of Control, 1784-1858. IOR/E/2 comprises correspondence between the East India Company’s Court of Directors and the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India (generally shortened to the ‘India Board’ or ‘Board of Control’), the government body appointed to oversee the operations of the East India Company.

IOR E/3: Correspondence with the East, 1602-1753. IOR/E/3 comprises correspondence between the East India Company’s London offices and its overseas agents, factories, and presidencies. The correspondence covers both original letters received from ‘The East’ and copies of outgoing correspondence from London. The geographical scope of this sub-series is broad, covering the entire range of regions in which the Company maintained a presence.

IOR E/4: Correspondence with India, 1703-1858. The largest of the IOR/E sub-series, comprising original, draft, and summarised correspondence between the East India Company’s Court of Directors and its various administrations. E/4 documents featured in Module 4 concern the governance of India and Bengal; correspondence from 1785 onwards is arranged by administrative department.

IOR/H: Home Miscellaneous Series, c.1600-1900

This series comprises records collected by the India Office which did not fit within the regular archive series. The two Catalogues of Original Correspondence at H/711 and H/712 act as indexes to IOR sub-series E/3 (Correspondence with the East, 1602-1753).

IOR/Z/E: Indexes to minutes of the East India Company’s correspondence with India

These indexes cover selected volumes from the E series, many of which do not have indexes within the volumes themselves.

 

Highlights of Module 4 include:

•  Letters of William Adams (the first Englishman known to have visited Japan), Richard Cocks, and other Company agents in Japan (IOR/E/3/1/2, IOR/E/3/2/1, IOR/E/3/3, IOR/E/3/4/2, IOR/E/3/5/2)
•  Copies of letters from King Charles II of England (IOR/E/3/86)
•  An ‘Account, from his journal, of James Bearblock's voyage from Assada to Bantam in the Supply’ (IOR/E/3/22)
•  Documents relating to pirates, including William Kidd (IOR/E/3/52 and IOR/E/3/53)
•  Correspondence between the Board of Control and the East India Company's Board of Directors, concerning government oversight of the Company (IOR/E/2/1 to IOR/E/2/57)
•  Correspondence between the East India Company's Board of Directors and Governors-General of India (Throughout sub-series IOR/E/4)

Please note that some letterbooks in the E/3 sub-series (IOR/E/3/71 to IOR/E/3/83) have not been digitised, as they are duplicates.

 

Module 5: Correspondence: Domestic Life, Governance and Territorial Expansion

This module contains 987 documents, comprising the remainder of correspondence in the IOR/E class along with the IOR/Z/E/1 index volumes. 

The module features correspondence between the East India Company and British Government Departments, and the East India Company’s Bombay and Madras Presidencies, in addition to the Home Correspondence series (IOR/E/1) containing letters between Company officials and merchants, traders, officials and members of the general public. These documents offer valuable insights into the Company’s relationships with the men and women who interacted with them, including merchants, traders, ship’s captains, soldiers and more.

Date Range:

1600-1859

File Classes:

IOR/E, East India Company General Correspondence, 1600-1859

This class of documents comprises correspondence relating to a wide range of subjects, regions, and the various administrative units of the East India Company. Series E is further divided into sub-series of original incoming and draft outgoing correspondence, arranged chronologically and/or geographically. The sub-series included in Module 5 are as follows:

IOR/E/1: Home Correspondence, 1699-1859. This shelfmark comprises two parallel series: Miscellaneous letters received (1701-1858), which consists of letters received by the Company's Court of Directors from correspondents in Britain and abroad; and Miscellanies (1688-1859), copies of official letters sent to Company agents, servants and Government departments.

IOR E/4: Correspondence with India, 1703-1858. The largest of the IOR/E sub-series, comprising original, draft, and summarised correspondence between the East India Company’s Court of Directors and its various administrations. E/4 documents featured in Module 5 concern the governance of Madras and Bombay; correspondence from 1785 onwards is arranged by administrative department.

IOR/Z/E: Indexes to minutes of the East India Company’s correspondence with India

These indexes cover selected volumes from the E series, many of which do not have indexes within the volumes themselves.

 

Highlights of Module 5 include:

• Letters from members of the public to the Company (throughout sub-series IOR/E/1)
• Letter relating to the foundation of the Parsee Benevolent Institution, an educational institution in Western India founded by Sir Jamsetji Jijibhoy, the first Indian man to receive a British knighthood (IOR/E/4/1084)
• Material relating to early inoculations with the smallpox vaccine in India (IOR/E/4/296)
• Letter from American naturalist, Thomas Horsfield, describing his discovery of a flying gecko (Ptychozoon horsfieldi) in Indonesia (IOR/E/1/255)
• Letter discussing a treaty signed with Tipu Sultan (1751-1799), ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore and a fierce opponent of Company expansion in India (IOR/E/4/322)
• Material relating to the 'Java Expedition', the British invasion of Java in 1811 (IOR/E/4/341)

Please note that IOR/E/4/448 has been mislaid, and so is not available in this resource.

 

Module 6: India Office Records, F: Board of Commissioners: Establishment of the Board

This module contains 1257 documents comprising of the correspondence of the Board of Commissioners along with IOR/Z/F/4 index volumes. These documents offer valuable insight into the Company’s decisions in the political, financial and military aspects of controlling the East India Company’s vast territory. It also places the India Office into the wider global context of the company’s influence.

Date Range:

1784-1827

File Classes:

IOR/F, Correspondence and papers of the Board of Commissioners

IOR/F/4: This class of documents comprises the records of the Board of Commissioners. Most of the documents are split into sections denoting changes of subject matter i.e. the first section is financial matters, the second section is correspondence with a specific individual.

IOR/W/F: These documents contain material that has been separated out as part of the conservation and digitisation process due to their size. Each IOR/W/F document is a small part of a larger whole; for example BL_IOR_W_F_4_18 has been separated from BL_IOR_F_4_18 and should be considered a part of BL_IOR_F_4_18. All the items are in excess of a metre long and are now listed as individual documents that form part of a full document. 

IOR/Z/F: Indexes to the correspondence of the Board of Commissioners

IOR/Z/F: Registers of Board's Collection 1794/5-1858; the indexes cover specific dates within the F series rather than serving the series as a whole.

 

Highlights of Module 6 include:

• Letters regarding vaccination in Bengal IOR/F/4/427/10455
• Letters discussing the sample of Bourbon cotton sent to the Directors IOR/F/4/840/22475
• Material about the establishment of Hindu Colleges at Nadia in Bengal IOR/F/4/408/10172
• Communications between the Nepal government and the Court of the Chinese Emperor at Peking IOR/F/4/809/21721
• Discussion of the plants and seeds sent from the Calutta Botanic Garden to the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew IOR/F/4/540/12989
• Documents relating ot the introduction of new native commissioned rank of Subador Major IOR/F/4/565/13914

 

Please note that due to their delicate condition BL/IOR/F/4/722 and BL/IOR/F/4/882 are unable to be digitised and as such, are not available in this resource.

 

For a very detailed guide to all of the IOR classes, including those available in this resource, please see Martin Moir’s book A General Guide to the India Office Records, available as a PDF here.