Precedence

Status has often (always?) been a thorny subject, and seldom more so than in British India where the problem was more or less solved by having a well defined official list of precedence which covered every military and civilian rank and appointment. For example, when working out seating plans at official functions and the order in which those invited to levees should be introduced, to avoid any recriminations the Order of Precedence had to be followed to the letter. But the problem was only more or less solved as there would be anomalies and special cases. Aden had its fair share of these.

In 1911 the civilian rank of Chairman of the Port Trust at Aden was that of Executive Engineer, which meant his precedence was only 78. This was a problem as this put him below the salt of some of the members of his port trust (Majors, for example being Precedence 74). The previous chairman had been a Superintending Engineer whose precedence was 73. It was suggested that for Aden the Chairman of the Port Trust should be Precedence 69. In 1924 a new Order of Precedence was issued for India. The Chairman of a Port Trust was now listed as Precedence 44, which was going to cause a big upset in Aden as the 1^st Assistant had a precedence rating of only 55. The Resident was adamant that unless there was a full Colonel on the Station his 1^st Assistant must rate as the second senior government personage. He suggested to India that the Chairman should be re-rated as 56, and this was agreed.

For those of the same military rank, for instance Majors – 74 in the list – it was easy to put them in order of precedence by seniority. One must not forget that although on a number of occasions the 1^st Assistant at Aden had the rank of Major, he was no longer a serving officer in the Army but a civil servant. His rating was according to his appointment. In 1905, following a period when the 1^st Assistant had been a Colonel, the appointment of a Major caused the Resident to write to Bombay to suggest that his 1^st Assistant should be made a special case. The Governor-General himself dealt with this one: he was inclined to think that questions of precedence  received rather more attention than they deserved! (How true!) But he agreed that Aden was a special case as regards the 1^st Assistant, but definitely not the number 40 that had been suggested

A group that caused some head-scratching was those accredited as Consuls in their various forms. In the early years of the 20^th Century Aden had only two professional consuls, the Italian Consul-General and the American Consul. In 1908 the former had a rating of 38 (immediately after Brigadiers-General) and the latter 42, which was immediately after those on entry 41, Indian Civil Servants of 23 years standing. If Aden had had any career Vice-Consuls they would have rated as 75, immediately following Majors.

In 1908 Aden had asked Bombay for advice on how they rated and treated their Consuls, especially the honorary Consuls and those paid but not in the consular service of the country concerned. The reply was that only the professionals were invited to important State banquets. For Durbars and levees where all consuls were invited ‘by Notification’, all had to be treated according to their rank.