This is a letter written by Sir Stamford Raffles from Bencoolen on 20 April 1822. He had been serving as the Lieutenant-Governor of Bencoolen since 1818 and returned to the settlement in March 1820, before leaving for Singapore in September 1822. In this letter, Raffles notes the difficulties experienced as a result of the alteration of the rates of the Dutch-issued guider and the rupee (a currency more commonly utilised by the British), which were both accepted by the Bencoolen Treasury. At the time of writing, there were a variety of currencies being circulated in the East Indies, some of which included the Netherlands guilder, Indian/Sicca rupee, Java rupee, and Spanish dollar.Bencoolen ceased to be a British settlement after the signing of the Anglo-Dutch Treaty on 17 March 1824, which established the separate spheres of influence of the British and the Dutch. It also resulted in the Dutch recognising British control over Singapore and the exchange of British Bencoolen for Dutch-controlled Malacca.
