For the period up to 1899, prolific correspondents for the Madagascar mission field include David Jones (1818-1831), David Johns (1826-1843) and Joseph Freeman (1827-1836) in the period before the great persecution (1835 to 1860) and William Ellis (1861-1865), Robert Toy (1862-1880), James Sibree (1863-1867, 1870-1877, 1883-1916) and many others thereafter. There is little missionary correspondence between 1835 and 1860, reflecting the expulsion of the missionaries and the repression of Christianity in Madagascar. However, during this time, some letters and reports of the situation are received from named Malagasy Christians. There are also copies of letters from the LMS directors to the Queen of Madagascar and her embassy in London. The flow of correspondence with the mission field resumes in 1861, including letters from the foreign secretary of King Radama II stating that there is no further hindrance for missionaries to come to Antananarivo. The 1862 correspondence file includes a translation of King Radama's grant of freedom of worship. From 1863/4, correspondence makes frequent reference to the building of the memorial churches, and includes copies of drawings and plans.
Early correspondence reveals the relationship between the LMS and other missionary societies in the Madagascar mission field. The LMS had contact with Anglican missionaries (SPG) in relation to respective districts; they worked well with the Quakers (Friends Foreign Mission Association) and ran a joint committee with them for medical mission, from which the reports by Tregelles Fox (1855-1937) as its chairman appear in the series from 1880 to 1887; and there is contact with the Norwegian Mission Association over a number of years and correspondence both from a missionary whose service with the Norwegians had been terminated but wished to join LMS (1880) and two letters from Christian Borchgrevinck in 1875 and 1898 – a senior official of the Norwegian mission. Towards 1896, when Madagascar became a French colony, there is correspondence with the Paris Evangelical Missionary Society.