Newly Discovered Correspondence (1853-1868) from King Mongkut, Rama IV, and from Phra Pinklao, to Sir John Bowring and his son Edgar Bowring

Abstract

This article presents for the first time transcriptions with illustrations of eleven examples of Thai royal correspondence dated 1853-1868, including six previously unpublished and two published but minimally accessible handwritten letters from King Mongkut and from “Second King” Phra Pinklao to Sir John Bowring and his son Edgar Bowring. The letters, purchased in London in 1985 and now at the Library of Congress (Washington), substantively add to the corpus of primary source material on key historical figures from this period during which the “Bowring Treaty” of 1855, between Siam and the United Kingdom, played a role in transformations within Siam. Prior publications of such correspondence rarely included illustrations of the original letters; here, illustrations show not only the original handwritten missives but also the royal seals placed on them, which are discussed in this article. In addition to these eight letters, transcriptions and illustrations of three little-known other examples of related correspondence from King Mongkut are included. One of the eight letters (from 16 January 1868) consists of King Mongkut’s handwritten note on a two-page pre-printed New Year greeting dated 1 January that year. Finally, though Bowring himself transcribed and published examples of his correspondence with the “Major King” (Mongkut) and “Second King” of Siam in his two-volume The Kingdom and People of Siam (1857), he also included color lithographs of two letters, related to those published here, that he did not transcribe. Transcriptions and illustrations of both those letters are included here, from original 1857 lithographs in the Smithsonian Institution’s Cullman library.