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British History in the Rubenstein Library: Major Collections

Digital Collections

Manuscripts and Woodcuts: Visions and Designs from Bloomsbury

12 Woodcuts by Roger Fry and the manuscript of Elizabeth and Essex written in Lytton Strachey's hand with 7 miscellaneous ms. letters.

Slavery, Abolition and Social Justice
Database of primary sources from Adam Matthew, many of which came from the Rare Book, Manuscript and Special Collections Library, including the log book of the slave ship Christopher.

William Gedney Photographs and Writings

The 5,000 item collection documents Gedney's work from the 1950s to 1989. Subjects include photographs of  India; England; Ireland; France; and, a large number of nocturnal pictures.

Major Collections

  • John Backhouse papers, 1740-1956.
    Merchant and British Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.Business and personal correspondence of the Backhouse family, principally of John Backhouse. Material for the 18th and early 19th centuries reflects the family's mercantile operations, including efforts to collect pre-Revolutionary debts in America. Other papers relate to Backhouse's career as Commissioner and Receiver General of the Excise Office and Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, his service as private secretary to George Canning, his service with the diplomatic corps, his art collection, and his mercantile associates in Amsterdam and Hamburg.
  • John Wilson Croker papers, 1791-1899 (bulk 1809-1857)
    British barrister, politician, literary critic, and author.
    The John Wilson Croker Papers span the years 1791-1899, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1809 to 1857.
  • Malet Family papers, 1821-1908
    Chiefly letters addressed to Mary Ann Dora (Spalding) Malet, her husband, Sir Alexander Malet, and their son, Sir Edwin Baldwin Malet, British diplomats. Includes ca. 900 letters (1842-1877) from Queen Sophia of the Netherlands to Lady Malet relating to political and diplomatic matters
  • William Wilberforce Letters 1782-1837
    Mostly letters (1814-1815) by Wilberforce, relating to his activities in the anti-slave trade and abolition movements, with references to English politics, Catholicism, and personal affairs.
  • J Walter Thompson London Office Records
    Founded in New York, N.Y., in 1864, and one of the world's oldest and largest advertising agencies. The London Office first opened in 1926, was JWT's first international office as well as the first international office of any American advertising agency.
  • Bandinel Family Papers Papers, 1763-1940
    Papers concerning the families and ecclesiastical careers of Rev. Robert Hunter (d. 1815) and of his grandson, Rev. James Bandinel (1841-1893), Anglican clergymen. Includes personal letters of James Bandinel (1783-1849), clerk in the British Foreign Office, partially relating to his work; some papers concerning the consular work of James Julius Frederick Bandinel (b. 1845) at Newchang, China, 1887-1904; and diary (1794) of Rev. Thomas Le Mesurier's trip through Germany, Denmark, and Sweden.