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The Secret Committee of the East India Company, II

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

C. H. Philips
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Extract

In the seventies and early eighties of the eighteenth century the Secret Committee had shown, as we have seen, an increasing tendency to become subservient to the Ministry, and in consequence the Directors had begun to keep a careful watch on the Committee's activities. Although, in April, 1783, to please Fox they nominated the “Chairs”, Sir Henry Fletcher and Nathaniel Smith, to be the Secret Committee, with authority to conduct the Company's naval and military affairs and to consult with the Ministry, they at the same time cautiously enjoined that such powers should be valid for only one month. These powers were grudgingly renewed monthly until November, when Fox, with the approval of Fletcher, who was one of his best friends and firmest political supporters, produced his India Bills, which sought to destroy the Company's existing home government. That Fletcher had seen and yet silently acquiesced in these revolutíonary Bills was deemed by the majority of the Directors to be a betrayal of his trust as chairman, and they promptly sacked him. So great was the blow to their confidence in the “Chairs” that subsequent to the overthrow of the Coalition in late December they forbade the new Chairmen privately to interview the Ministers unless accompanied by Laurence Sulivan, the senior Director and trusted representative of the Indian interest, the strongest party in the Court.

Type
Papers Contributed
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , October 1940 , pp. 699 - 716
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 1940

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References

page 699 note 1 See my article, “The East India Interest, 1783–4,” Trans. B. Hist. Soc., 41h Series, xxGoogle Scholar.

page 699 note 2 Fox had nominated Fletcher as one of the seven Directors who by his plan were to manage the Company's business. Ibid.

page 699 note 3 See my article, “The New East India Board” English Historical Review, July, 1940Google Scholar.

page 699 note 4 Pitt's first India Bill had been defeated in January, 1784.

page 700 note 1 Chatham Tapers, P.R.O. 356, June, 1784.

page 700 note 2 Home Misc. 67, f. 39, December, 1770. Desps. of the Secret Committee, vol. 1, 1780–6.

page 700 note 3 The duty of safeguarding the Company's ships and soliciting the Admiralty for convoys was thenceforth vested in the Committee of Correspondence, which usually nominated a Committee of Secrecy of five of its members to perform this duty. This Committee must be distinguished from the Secret (Political) Committee. Previous to 1784 the two terms had been used indiscriminately to describe one and the same Committee. After 1784 no knowledgeable person confused the terms. In July, 1815. a separate Secret Commercial Committee of five was established to co-ordinate the Company's commercial and political policy. Directors' Court Book, 120, f. 4, 9th April, 1812. Cf. 121, f. 5. See Correspondence Memoranda, 42, 27th July, 1814; also Secret Commercial Minutes and Letters, 4 vols. The Court of Directors, the Committee of Treasury, and the Committee of Correspondence often sat in secret and kept Secret Minutes. Although on p. 4 of his Guide to the India Office Records Sir William Foster states that there are six volumes of Secret Committee Minutes, the India Office Record Department can produce only four volumes, 1778–1824.

page 701 note 1 24 George III, cap. 25, s. 15.

page 701 note 2 Cf. Cambridge History of India, v, 315, which refers to the Board's ”power of sending orders through the Secret Committee of the Directors, which the latter could neither discuss nor disclose….” “In matters of urgency the President himself might cause a dispatch to be prepared which was then sent to the Secret Committee, which could only sign it and send it off.”

page 701 note 3 The same source says (v, 201), “The Secret Committee nearly always consisted of two, the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of the Court.” On the contrary, the Court, in jealousy of the executive power of the “Chairs”, insisted on its third representative, usually the senior Director, attending and taking part in the Secret Committee's proceedings.

page 702 note 1 Between 1784 and 1858 there were thirty changes in the Presidency.

page 702 note 2 Parl. Hist., xxiv, 1092; xxvii, 89.

page 702 note 3 26 Geo. III, c. 16, s. 11. Cf. Auber, , Constitution of the E.I. Co., 189Google Scholar. Tierney, Seal Situation of the E.I. Co., 28. The obligation to take the oath was incorporated in the Charter Acts of 1793 and 1813. The form of the oath was changed in 1813. Copyists used by the Secret Committee also took an oath of secrecy.

page 702 note 4 A well-defined system of secret correspondence was established. The President, who often consulted the “Chairs” privately beforehand, sent the secret dispatch in draft form to the Secret Committee, whose Secretary, the Examiner of Indian Correspondence, turned the draft into a formal dispatch. It was then forwarded for the President's approval, signed by the Secret Committee members and sent to India. When the Secret Committee originated a secret letter, a draft in “previous communication” was first sent to the President. If he accepted it, the usual procedure was then followed. Secret letters from India were received and read by the Secret Committee before copies were forwarded to the Board. Cf. Register, Secret Committee of Correspondence, Nos. 219, 550, 551. Cf. also Board's Correspondence with Secret Committee, 2, f. 83. The clerks who transcribed dispatches were usually, though not always, taken from the Examiner's Department. Mill, Peacock, and Strachey, appointed Assistant Examiners in 1819, all took the oath of secrecy, which was required of all transcribers in the Secret Department. Secret Committee Minutes, 4, 27th April, 1821.

page 703 note 1 Ibid., 1, 15th August, 1785.

page 703 note 2 Its last meeting was held on 19th October, 1805, when Castlereagh was President. By that time the President was in fact the Board. In the last few years of the Secret Board's life, the President was often the only member present at its meetings. Secret Board Minutes, vol. 1.

page 703 note 3 Dundas, to Baring, , Home Misc., 413, f. 241Google Scholar. See my book, The East India Company, pp. 71-5Google Scholar.

page 703 note 4 Charters, India Office, vol. 10, December, 1792. Cf. Bruce, , Finns for the Government of India, 620Google Scholar.

page 704 note 1 See Index of Dissents, India Office, 22nd August, 1786. Board to Court, 1, ff. 351, 357. In 1815 a Secret Commercial Committee was established to co-ordinate political and commercial policy.

page 704 note 2 As one might have expected, during the war the Secret Political Committee managed the affairs of the convoys and issued secret shipping signals. Cf. Board's. Secret Drafts, 2, 19th February, 1796.

page 704 note 3 Add. MSS. 34447, f. 273. Cf. Secret Committee Minutes, 28th January, 1793.

page 704 note 4 Ibid., 3, 16th September, 1793, 22nd February, 13th June, 1794. Board's Secret Drafts, 1, 29th October, 1795. Dundas considered the Mauritius expedition “a difficult and hazardous enterprise … and dangerous in the extreme”. But the island was easily captured in 1810. Hist. MSS. Comm. Dropmore, x, 53, 112.

page 705 note 1 The Secret Committee undertook to provide the bullion necessary to maintain the size of the Investment, which could not be maintained by the Indian Governments in wartime. This necessitated interference with the Company's remittances and trade and ultimately involved the home government in heavy losses. Cf. Minutes, Select Committee, Public, 1832, p. 144Google Scholar.

page 705 note 2 I have taken this quotation from one of Charles Grant's speeches of a later date, but it accurately expresses the Directors‘ opinions in 1800 and generally 1800–1834. Asiatic Journal, 1819, p. 286Google Scholar.

page 705 note 3 Secret Committee Minutes, 3, 21st October, 1802, and 17th November.

page 705 note 4 Ibid., 23rd December, 1803.

page 706 note 1 Cf. Castlereagh's admission to Wellesley, 9th October, 1805. Home Misc. 50.5, 300.

page 706 note 2 Secret Committee Minutes, 3, 10th April, 1804.

page 706 note 3 Home Misc. 504, ff. 52, 378, 7th January, 1804.

page 706 note 4 Ibid., f. 240; and 505, f. 238, 30th August, 1804.

page 706 note 5 Chatham Papers, P.R.O. 121, December, 1804. Ross, , Cornwallis, iii, 521Google Scholar. Court and Cabinets, George III, vol. iii, 403Google Scholar.

page 706 note 6 The Secret Committee was assisted by the frequent changes in the Presidency of the Board at this time.

page 707 note 1 Cf. Board's Secret Drafts, 3rd October, 1806, to September, 1807.

page 707 note 2 So eager and able was the Secret Committee to state its case and to debate the secret dispatches with the Board that a separate series of correspondence evolved— Board's Correspondence with the Secret Committee.

In 1814 in an investigation into the powers of the Directors by the Proprietors, it was revealed that the -Secret Committee's duties were “to receive and consider all communications of a particularly private and delicate nature in the Political Department, both with His Majesty's Ministers and the Indian Governments and also with the Board of Control, which it may be deemed inexpedient, at least in the first instance, to render liable to a general discussion”. Proprietors Committee, Allowances to Directors, 207. Cf. the statement of Auber, Secretary to the Company, before the Commons’ Select Committee in 1832: “Anterior to 1813, and during the whole proceeding of the Mysore War, and those of the Maratha Wars in the years 1802, 1803, and 1804, and likewise the expedition against the Cape, Manilla, the Moluccas, the French islands, and Java, various dispatches were proposed by the Secret Committee of the Court of Directors, and some also lately.” Minutes, Select Committee, Public, 133.

page 707 note 3 The Secret Committee originated five secret dispatches in 1816. Board's Correspondence with the Secret Committee, 1.

page 707 note 4 Cf. Drafts, Board's Secret, 5, 22nd May, 1819Google Scholar. See Secret Notes re India, 3, 1818–19, most of which contain extracts warning Hastings against interference in Native States’ internal affairs.

page 707 note 5 There were in the Court five men, Grant, E. Parry, Elphinstone, Cotton, Bosanquet, who had been in office over a quarter of a century.

page 708 note 1 Board to Secret Committee, 1, f. 93, 18th January, 1820. The Secret Committee appointed an advisory Secret Select Committee, consisting of the Chairmen, Pattison, and Marjoribanks, and the two senior Directors, Elphinstone and Grant.

page 708 note 2 Ibid., ff. 95–105, 4th February to 12th July, 1820.

page 708 note 3 Board's Secret Drafts, 5, 8th August, 1820. Cf. Dutch Records, 30, ff. 1–88, March, 1822.

page 708 note 4 Pad. Hist., xi. 1443, 17th June, 1824.

page 708 note 5 Ibid., xii, 1167, 24th March, 1825.

page 708 note 6 Register, Secret Committee, No. 504, 10th March, 1823.

page 708 note 7 Ibid., No. 506.

page 709 note 1 Recently the Direction had lost its most respected and reputable members by the death of Parry and Grant, and the retirement of Cotton, Elphinstone, and Bosanquet.

page 709 note 2 Part Hist., 3rd Series, xviii, 743. The President, Wynn, himself called Parliament's attention to the fact that of the seven successive Chairmen with whom he had to deal between 1822 and 1829, only one had resided in India.

page 710 note 1 Ellenborough's policy was to a large degree influenced by the ideas and information of Benjamin Jones, recently appointed Assistant Secretary to the Board. See my book, The East India Company, pp. 268–71.

page 710 note 2 Ellenborough's Political Diary, ii, 150.

page 710 note 3 Board to Secret Committee, 2, f. 222, Loch to Ellenborough, 15th September, 1829.

page 710 note 4 Ibid., f. 225, reply, 17th September, 1829.

page 710 note 5 Board's Secret Drafts, 7, 9th June, 1830.

page 711 note 1 Minutes, Secret Court of Directors, 30th June, 1830. Board to Secret Committee, 2, f. 244, 21st June, 1830.

page 711 note 2 Later he said that he gave it inadvertently. Minutes, Secret Court of Directors, 7th July, 1830.

page 711 note 3 In March, 1813, and again in April, 1824, when similar protests had been made, the President of the Board had withdrawn the offending secret dispatch, which was then brought forward as a public dispatch by the Chairman. Home Misc., 719, 5th March, 1813. Secret Committee Minutes, 4, 7th April, 1824. Court to Board,10, f. 225. Register, Secret Committee Correspondence, 15th September, 1830.

page 711 note 4 Ellenborough, op. cit., ii, 297.

page 712 note 1 In 1813 (53 George III, cap. 155, sec. 74), an addition was made to the Secret Committee oath, prohibiting the disclosure of all dispatches received from India addressed to the Secret Committee without authority from the Board. On the whole secrecy was kept; for an exception in 1815 see Add. MSS. 29189, f. 197.

page 712 note 2 Kaye, , Tucker, 484Google Scholar.

page 712 note 3 Law, , India under Ellenborough, 103Google Scholar. Colchester, , Indian Administration Ellenborough, 308, 318, 364Google Scholar. Since writing the above I have seen Professor Imlah's Ellenborough, which confirms the view that the Directors received encouragement from Ripon. The latter, for example, “when the final ticklish and difficult negotiations with the Chairs relative to Ellenborough's recall came on, took to his bed amid lamentations, leaving Peel, harassed as he was by other duties, to manage them.” Ripon also saw to it that Ellenborough's carefully written defence of his Governor- Generalship was not included in the official records. See the above volume, pp. 219- 228.

page 713 note 1 Kaye, , Tucker, 551Google Scholar.

page 713 note 2 Tucker, , Memorials of Indian Government, 36Google Scholar, f.n.

page 713 note 3 Ibid., 43–6.

page 715 note 1 Dalhousie wrote (Private Letters, ed. Baird, 292), "You are mistaken in supposing that the dispatch from the Court does all (and more) than the Secret Committee dispatch does. The Court's letter gives the opinion of the Court. But the Secret Committee dispatch is emphatically the opinion of His Majesty's Government, by whose officer it is always written at the Board of Control and sent for signature to the Committee at the India House, without consulting them or allowing them to say a word on the subject.”

Wood was positive in observing in the debates of 1853 that the responsibility for Indian foreign policy lay exclusively with the President of the Board and through him with the cabinet. Parl. Hist,, 3rd Series, cxxix, 764. Cf. Minutes of Evidence, Select Committee, H. of C, Xos. 3966–9, 4013–17, 4110–12, 5183.

page 715 note 2 Parl. Hist., cxlviii, 1287, 12th February, 1858.

page 716 note 1 21 and 22 Viet., c. 106, s. 1–26.

page 716 note 2 Unless they were orders for which a majority of votes of the Council was required. See sees. 23, 27, 28, 31, 32, 80, 89, 90, 94, 95. There were similar provisions as to dispatches from India. Ilbert (Government of India, 178), states that “secret” orders were usually communicated by the Secretary of State to the “Political and Secret Committee” of the Council.

page 716 note 3 Section 41 of the Act gave the Council the power of financial supervision, hence of imposing constitutional restraint on the power of the Secretary of State with respect to expenditure. Yet this restraint could not be effectively asserted in all cases, especially in the making of war (which involves expenditure), for which the decision would have been taken by the cabinet. See Parl. Hist., cli, 1469; exev, 1821–1846.