The Pangkor Engagement
The need to restore law and order in Perak gave cause for a new British policy concerning intervention in the affairs of the Malay States which resulted in the Treaty of Pangkor.
On 20 January 1874, the Straits Settlements governor Sir Andrew Clarke convened a meeting aboard the H. M. S. Pluto anchored off Pangkor island. Documents were signed aboard the ship The Pluto at Pangkor Island to settle the Chinese dispute, clear the Sultan succession dispute and pave the way for the acceptance of British Residency - Captain Speedy was appointed to administer Larut as assistant to the British Resident. Abdullah was recognised as Sultan by the British and was to be installed on the throne of Perak in preference to his rival, Sultan Ismail.
In actuality there were two distinctive agreements made. The primary agreement was intended to ensure an end to the fighting between Ghee Hin and Hai San and pave the way for peaceful coexistence in future. The second, to settle the issue of succession in Perak.
Tate in The Making of Modern South-East Asia says of these that "the first one, which had been ready for over a week prior to the signing, concerned Larut and provided for a settlement between the Hai San and Ghee Ghin which both sides respected and carried out satisfactorily. The second (more recently drafted) agreement concerned the succession dispute around the Perak throne and was unsatisfactory from the very beginning."
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