When working with the India Office Records, it is not unusual to come across unexpected items.  One such example is within a volume of Public & Judicial Home Correspondence.  In the middle of a volume of correspondence and associated papers relating to the administration of India is a large poster of regulations for two coal mines in Scotland, the Titwood and Corkerhill Collieries: General & Special Rules for the Conduct and Guidance of the Persons Charged with the Management and of the several Workmen employed in and about this Colliery.

'The man engine at Cook's kitchen mine' from J C Burrow, 'Mongst mines and Miners (1893) British Library: C.194.b.213 plate 2 British Library Images Online

Dating from around 1861, the copies of the poster would have been pasted up around the sites making it clear what was required of anyone employed in the Collieries, and what they could expect in their working environment.  Both mines were located on the southwest of Glasgow and at the time of this poster were owned by Sir John Maxwell (1791-1865), a Scottish landowner and politician.  The Titwood mine in Pollock was worked from 1854 to 1875, and the Corkerhill mine was worked from 1860 to 1875.

'The man engine at Dolcoath mine' from J C Burrow, 'Mongst mines and Miners (1893) British Library: C.194.b.213 plate 2 British Library Images Online

The General Rules section of the poster covered such health and safety issues as ventilation, use of safety lamps, communication between the surface and the bottom of the mine shaft, and measures to prevent flooding of the mine.  The Special Rules section details the responsibilities of each occupation in the mine, the names of which are not always obvious:
• Brusher: responsible for maintaining the roof, sides and pavement of a passageway, usually done by an experienced miner.
• Bottomer: loaded and unloaded the cages at the bottom of a mine shaft and regulated the number of men ascending in the cages, making the signals which controlled the safe working of the cages.  In this case, only a maximum of 4 men at a time were allowed to ascend in a cage.
• Colliers were the underground workmen in a coal mine.
• Drawers took the coal from the working face to the mine shaft.  A Drawer might be assisted by a Putter to take his hutch (small wagon) past a difficult section of a drawing road (underground passage).
• Fireman: responsible for the supervision for the ventilation of the works.  He inspected the pit before each shift to make sure it was safe for the miners to work.
• Pitheadman: responsible for unloading the cages and weighing the coal at a pithead (the landing at the top of a shaft).
• Oversman: responsible for the underground operation of the Colliery and reported to the Manager.

Everyone working at the Collieries were issued with a set of the Rules, and pulling down or defacing the poster brought a fine of 40s.  A violation of the Special Rules brought a fine of £2 or three-months imprisonment.  The poster was sent to the India Office by Sir John Maxwell, with a covering letter, dated 15 February 1861, for the consideration of the Secretary of State for India.  Unfortunately, no reply, if any was given, was kept on file.

John O’Brien
India Office Records

Further Reading:
Titwood and Corkerhill Collieries on the Estate of Pollok, General & Special Rules for the Conduct and Guidance of the Persons Charged with the Management and of the several Workmen employed in and about this Colliery, 1861, reference IOR/L/PJ/2/157 File 23/1.
‘A Glossary of Scotch Mining Terms’ on the Scottish Mining Website

 

Amongst the Legal Adviser's Records in the India Office Records is an intriguing case which details the origin of a lease granted in 1852 for the village of Ghuthiwari.  The village was near Barwadih, Jharkhand, and it was given to Sri Raghavendra Guru in exchange for a daily service of reciting one chapter of the ‘Srimadbhagwat’ before the god Shaligram, one of the Hindu God Vishnu’s forms believed to manifest in fossilized stones.  The ‘Srimadbhagwat’, more commonly known as ‘Bhagavata Purana’, is one of the most Sacred Hindu texts.  The terms of this agreement were detailed in a ‘sanad’ (certificate) confirming the above terms which also stated that the lease could be passed down to the heirs of Sri Raghavendra Guru.

Shaligram - Fossilized stone or ammonite collected from the riverbed or banks of the Kali Gandaki, a tributary of the Gandaki River. Image from  Wikimedia Commons.

Case No.6 Kumar Kamakhya Narain Singh, (Appellant) Vs. Abhiman Singh; Jago Singh and others (Respondents) was heard by the Privy Council in 1931.  The Respondents were the heirs of Sri Raghavendra Guru.  Records of proceedings dated 1927 from the court in Hazaribagh detail the arguments presented by the appellant and respondents, as well as testimony given by three witnesses who lived in the nearby surrounding area.  They gave evidence that the daily recital ceased in 1920.  Key testimony and evidence for the case included written documents dated 1909 confirming the initial verbal agreement and a 1859 document amending the agreement to include an annual rent payment in addition to restating the condition of daily recital of the ‘Bhagwat before the God Saligram’.

A page of a Bhagavata Purana illustrated manuscript in Devanagari, supposedly prepared for Maharaja Pratap Simha of Jaipur (1779-1803). Image from Wikimedia Commons. 

The judge ruled in favour of the original landowner, highlighting the key fact that according to several key witnesses the daily recital of a chapter from the ‘Srimadbhagwat’ was no longer taking place and that a shrine to ‘Saligram’ was not present in the defendant’s house.  The case was appealed to the Privy Council which was the highest court of appeals for British occupied overseas territories.  The Privy Council considered the case concluding that ‘the performance of the said service was a condition of the grant, and that inasmuch as the said service was discontinued in May 1919, the plaintiff became entitled upon such discontinuance to obtain possession of the said village’, ultimately ruling in favour of the appellant.

Case documents in IOR/L/L/8/893.

Court documents also include a survey conducted in 1912 offering details about village life and the type of produce that was cultivated.  It lists the castes of the 20 inhabitants, the presence of several wells, fisheries, the growing of sugar cane and lac resin.

Approximate location of Ghuthiwari village from Wikimedia Commons.

Nathan Silver
Cataloguer, Modern Archives and Manuscripts

Further reading:
IOR/L/L/8/893 - P.C. No. 2 of 1933 between Kumar Kamakhya Narain Singh, minor, through the Courts of Wards (Appellant) Vs. Abhiman Singh; Jago Singh and others (Respondents) regarding a land dispute.
IOL.1947.b.68 - Account of a legal dispute between the Maharaja of Bikaner and Raja Jeoraj Singh of Reri, concerning an exchange of villages
Verma, Gaurishanker G. 1922-1923.

 

Since cataloguing of the extensive Maggs Bros. archive started in October 2024, we have begun to uncover many fascinating stories about the global antiquarian book trade and the lives of those involved in it.  The Correspondence series is a particularly interesting window onto the business transactions between Maggs and its international clients, spanning both World wars, and The Great Depression of 1929-1939.

Maggs primarily deal in rare books and autograph manuscripts.  However, their dealings occasionally strayed into artifacts, should their owner be someone as illustrious as Napoleon Bonaparte I (1769-1821).

Whilst re-housing correspondence from the 1920s (the golden era of book-collecting) we found a 1926 letter from Ernest Maggs (1876-1955) to Dr Ludwig Pollak (1868-1943), an Austro-Czech archaeologist and antique dealer, regarding an anonymous delivery they initially refused from him as it had been sent without warning.  This turned out to be the ‘Bibliotheque Portative’ (travelling bookcase) of Napoleon I – although for bookdealers, it lacked its more prized contents!  This curious acquisition had been made with the help of Arthur Rau (1898-1972), who managed the Maggs Paris house from 1925 to 1931.

Maggs’ letter to Pollak 4 November 1926 [Add MS 89311/1/1240 Carbon Files]; Pollak’s letter to Maggs 27 October 1926 [Add MS 89311/1/897 Continental Files]

In the letter to Pollak, Maggs agree to stump up the £75 for it (roughly £4,000 today) but comment on its missing contents: ‘The case interests us very much, but what would interest us more is to find the books that were once in the case. Can you help us?’.

Napoleon was known to be a fervent book reader. He commissioned his librarian Antoine Barbier (1765-1825) to create a small portable library of one thousand volumes in duodecimo (a book size similar to Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit) to accompany him on his military campaigns.

Further investigation into the archive suggests that Pollak remained silent on the matter, possibly neglecting to answer. However we have been able to piece together a small chain of events, beginning with an earlier letter from Pollak regarding Maggs’ initial rejection of the delivery.

A week after receiving the case, Maggs attempted to sell it on for £250 to the Swiss bibliophile and leading book collector Martin Bodmer (1899-1971).  In this correspondence the wonderful detail of its opulence is glimpsed:
‘A morocco book shape case, bound by Doll [a book binding company] in crimson morocco, with Napoleon’s crown shield in gold on sides, having in the centre his initial N.  The sides have an elaborate gold border.  The back carries the title, as given, and top and bottom panels have his favourite emblem of the Bee 46 times repeated, with centre panel of floral decoration and another panel with his crown initial N...  The edges are gilt to resemble a book.  The cover is lined green with a very charming dentelle border of flowers...’.

An engraved portrait of Napoleon I by Henri Buguet depicting his crown initial and bee emblem cloak design [Egerton MS 3717, detail from f. 31] Images Online

Research suggests that this travelling library (owing to a section titled Russian customs) was perhaps created in preparation for Napoleon’s failed 1812 Russian campaign – where it probably perished. However, the Emperor was also notorious for throwing undesirable books out of his carriage windows or into fireplaces – so maybe this is why few of them survive today!

Detail from Maggs’ letter to Bodmer 12 November 1926 describing the French sections of the bookcase. [Add MS 89311/1/1241 Carbon Files]

Sadly, Bodmer turned down the offer of the case; so many questions remain.  Where or from whom did Pollak obtain the case? Did Maggs manage to sell it on?  And where is it now?  Perhaps further cataloguing will reveal something?

Bodmer’s reply to Maggs 15 November 1926 [Add MS 89311/1/898 Continental Files]

Jasmine Churcher
Library Information & Archives Apprentice, Modern Archives and Manuscripts