Hello List Noel said: What exactly were the 'Bengal Public Consultations'? I see them referred to quite often, but cannot find out what they were, other than published documents of some kind. The National Archives Access to Archives site says: >From the beginning of the 18th century down to 1860 the majority of the main records of the central and provincial governments in India supplied for the information of the East India Company and the India Office were known as Consultations. They usually comprise full manuscript copies of the official correspondence (both letters received and sent), minutes and resolutions considered or approved by the governments concerned: India, Bengal, Madras, Bombay, and Agra/North-Western Provinces. In addition copies of certain related records (such as letter books, commercial reports, journals and ledgers, and proceedings of local law courts) were also returned to London during the Company period In 1860 the old-style Indian consultations were discontinued and replaced by a new form of record usually referred to as Proceedings. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/a2a/records.aspx?cat=059-iorp_1-2&cid=1#1 or http://tinyurl.com/24f6bkn My guess is that the word "Public" refers to the Public Department which originally dealt with the affairs of trade, shipping, revenues, accounts and other matters of a public nature. C 1800 there were four groups of Departments. They were: a) The Secret, Political and Foreign Departments. b) The Revenue and Judicial Departments. c) The Public Department including Commercial branch. d) The Military Department. This latter information is from a link in the FIBIS Fibiwiki page East India Company http://wiki.fibis.org/index.php?title=East_India_Company called "Unit 2 British Administration:1757-1858" from the Indira Gandhi National Open University Cheers Maureen (Sydney)