Catalogue description Returns of Deaths of Uncovenanted Servants and Other Officers

The returns, which are not 100% complete, relate to Europeans born in the UK and India, to a few Eurasians and to a very small number of Asians. The amount of detail varies but usually includes the date, place and cause of death, age, place of birth, details of the estate and names and addresses of surviving relatives. It thus provides more information than is obtainable from Burial Certificates [IOR N] and is a useful adjunct to the latter series.

In 1870 the India Office noted that no announcement was normally made to the Secretary of State for India of the deaths of persons appointed from the UK to the Uncovenanted Service (in the present context this means non-ICS civil servants both those in the lower branch of the general service and those in the special civil services e.g. Indian Forest Service, Survey of India etc). The India Office therefore instructed the Government of India to inform London at once of the deaths of those Europeans in active Government employ who were not members of the Covenanted Services.

The very first returns appear to be confined to non-covenanted civil servants but they were soon expanded to include military officers seconded to civil employment and army surgeons attached to civil hospitals or other civil institutions. From 1883 pensioners of most grades, civil and military, are listed (including Chelsea Pensioners). From 1910 the returns were extended to cover members of the ICS who died while still on active service.