Colonial Coolie Labor and Worker Intimidation in British Ceylon: Manuscript Labor Correspondence from Puttalam, 1922

Colonial Coolie Labor

Manuscript & Autographs

Puttalam labor correspondence dated October 1922 records coercion within British Ceylon’s colonial coolie labor system, where maistries and “coolie masters” controlled the recruitment and movement of South Indian migrant workers. One letter states that “your monthly Coolie Masteries” came to No. 44, 5th Street “with stick,” abused the writers, and warned them not to “send Coolies” on 24 October 1922. The second letter concerns a brother’s work and payment, negotiating “eighteen rupees” against “25 rupees,” placing wage bargaining beside intimidation in the same labor economy.

Puttalam, Ceylon. Two manuscript letters, October 1922. One letter, dated 24.10.1922 and signed by Narayana Sawmi, master, and Sootrich, master, petitions a superior for “favourable order” after threats by rival labor supervisors. The second letter, addressed to “Mr Martin Cave” or similar, uses deferential servant language and closes “your faithfully / I am your boy.” The verso of one sheet includes later pencil and colored markings, along with pasted newspaper scraps mentioning a “HUGE MASONIC FESTIVAL” and “Million Peace Memorial Fund.”

The letters belong to the aftermath of the nineteenth-century indenture and coolie-labor systems, when British colonial economies continued to rely on Indian migrant laborers routed through contractors, kanganies, maistries, and employers. Ceylon’s plantation and contract labor systems depended heavily on Indian immigrant workers, and colonial authorities were still regulating this field in the early 1920s through Indian emigration rules and labor ordinances. Their value lies in the everyday language of that system: house calls, sticks, threats, worker supply, wage negotiation, and petitions for protection. Folded, toned, stained, and edge-worn, with creases, small losses, and later markings; The verso of one sheet includes later pencil and colored markings, along with pasted newspaper scraps mentioning a “HUGE MASONIC FESTIVAL” and “Million Peace Memorial Fund"; handwriting remains substantially legible. Overall good condition.

Item #23428

Price: $585.00