British drive for a year-round India route shaped Palmerston’s Egyptian hostility

Evidence

From that time onwards and throughout the 1830s Palmerston’s hatred of the Pasha intensified. He came to see the Pasha as undertaking actions that could only attract the further interference of Russia in Ottoman affairs. This viewpoint was fueled by the blatantly Russo-phobic reports that his new ambassador in Istanbul, Ponsonby, was constantly sending him. Furthermore, as Palmerston had predicted, Mehmed Ali spread his influence further east and was threatening British interests in Mesopotamia. By the early 1830s these interests were centered around the exploration of the Euphrates river with a view to checking whether it was navigable. The British parliament had allocated the sum of £20,000 for such a project which a certain Colonel Chesney was to lead. Two steamships were especially constructed (appropriately called the Tigris and the Euphrates) which were to be shipped in pieces to the Syrian coast and then carried overland from there to be assembled on the Euphrates. The whole project was of considerable importance for British communication with India since it was expected to shorten the distance from Bombay to London and also reduce the time taken to cover the distance. Furthermore, if successful, it would prove that steamships would be able to reach India all year round instead of the eight months per year that they were restricted to by taking the Red Sea route. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 1577

Categorization

• XREF: Directly relevant to reader’s question on performance of Ottoman Pashas and British Lords; also connects to imperial-routes scholarship.