Archives
Identify where archival material is held within the UK and Greater Manchester
Finding Archives and Collections
Most primary source archival material is not available online, but is housed in, libraries, museums and archives across the world. This guide presents sources to help identify where archival material is held within the UK and lists some of the important archives found here in Greater Manchester.
The following websites may help you identify collections and the archives they’re held within:
Archives Hub
Search across descriptions of archives and their collections held at over 350 institutions across the UK.
Archives Portal Europe
“Provides access to information on archival material from different European countries as well as information on archival institutions throughout the continent.”
National Archives
More than 32 million descriptions of records held by The National Archives and more than 2,500 archives across the country. Over 9 million records are available for download.
Greater Manchester Archives:
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Manchester Central Library Archives
Manchester Archives and Local History
The Greater Manchester archive, including online catalogue. Large collection of books, pamphlets, ephemera, newspapers C18th onwards. Superb online photographic collection; access census data to 1911 for free.
Manchester Metropolitan University’s collection of over 5,800 moving images made in or about Greater Manchester, Lancashire, Cheshire, Merseyside and Cumbria. An absolutely fantastic resource!
5,600 accessible sound archives.
Greater Manchester County Record Office (GMCRO)
Holds a wide range of archives (hospitals, courts, businesses, estates, societies, clubs, families) relating to the Greater Manchester area.
Ahmed Iqbal Ullah Race Relations Resource Centre
Holds extensive secondary and unique primary resources telling the story of race relations in Manchester, the UK and wider. Collections include oral histories, life stories, statistics, photos and personal documents.
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Other Greater Manchester Archives
The oldest public library in the English-speaking world, Chetham’s Library holds a huge and eclectic collection of materials, particularly relating to the history of Manchester and the north-west. Materials range from title deeds and institutional records to family papers and everyday life ephemera, plus the very desk Karl Marx sat at.
Greater Manchester Police Museum
Personnel service records for police officers, including personal memorabilia including:
- Manuals and handbooks relating to police work and administrative records
- Records relating to the governing bodies of police forces prior to 1974
- Registers of Aliens residing in Salford from 1914 to 1969
They do not hold court records, records from the prison service or personnel records for police officers serving outside the Greater Manchester area.
“IWM’s collections cover all aspects of twentieth and twenty-first century conflict involving Britain, the Commonwealth and other former empire countries … Collections include a wide range of material, from film and oral history to works of art, large objects, and personal letters and diaries.” Do check material is held in Manchester however, and not London!
Rare books and manuscripts (but also a wide range of business records, family records etc) Includes the Christie Collection (Renaissance); the Manchester Guardian/Guardian (business records) See also their Special Collections (which includes Methodist archives, 20c youth magazines)
Local Studies Centre: Ashton (Tameside)
Material relating to the history of Tameside’s nine towns (Ashton-u-Lyne, Audenshaw, Denton, Droylsden, Dukinfield, Hyde, Longdendale, Mossley, Stalybridge) is centralised at Tameside Local Studies and Archives Centre. Includes: The Manchester Regiment Archives, Tameside Oral History Interviews, and Manchester Studies tapes. Over 1000 oral history interviews with people all over the north-west were recorded between 1974 and the early 1980s.
Collections relating to the Bolton area including, Humphrey Spender’s Worktown photographs taken as part of the Mass Observation project in Bolton in 1937-8. There are over 900 prints and negatives within this archive.
Also, the Oral History Collection: This collection consists of about 600 cassette tape recordings, the bulk of which were produced by the Bolton Oral History Project of 1981-1983.
The library’s extensive collection includes family history sources (from 1841), maps (from 1848), newspapers (from 1858), more than 70,000 photographs and a wide range of other useful material, including: Street directories for Manchester and Salford, Census returns for Salford, Maps and plans of areas of the city, over 70,000 historical photographs of the city and surrounding areas.
Includes the Gallery of Costume.
‘25,000 objects of fine art, decorative art and costume, painting, sculpture, drawings, watercolours, prints, posters and photographs, ceramics, glass and furniture to metalwork, wallpaper and dolls houses. Highlights include early English slipware, 17th century silver, and a growing collection of contemporary furniture and lighting design.
Also the Mary Greg collection of everyday domestic objects.
450 vols. of Manchester’s parish registers, the Capitular records and Royal charter documents.
Manchester District Music Archive
MDMA is a new and rapidly growing online archive of material relating to Manchester’s exceptionally rich musical heritage. Content ranges from flyers, posters and tickets to artist photos, fanzines and press articles. There’s also a busy Facebook Group!
Objects/photographs as they relate to Manchester Jewish experience
Holds approximately 4.25 million items, including thousands relating to archaeology (including artefacts from ancient Rome and Greece), anthropology and Egyptology.
Manchester Museum of Transport
Many public transport vehicles and loads of ephemera relating to public transport.
Manchester Metropolitan University local studies collection
On the 1st floor, West Wing of All Saints Library – books, pamphlets, ephemera relating to Manchester history.
Manchester Metropolitan University Special Collections
On the 3rd floor of All Saints Library. Holds a unique collection of artists’ and children’s books; archives from the Mcr School of Art; material on architectural history; C20th international posters; Victorian ephemera.
Manchester Royal Infirmary archives
The hospital is now on Oxford Road, but used to be on Piccadilly. Has a little cubby hole with a mostly uncatalogued archive going back to 1752. What is catalogued is listed via the link above.
Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI)
Holds a huge collection of material relating to Manchester’s industry history, business and personal archives include minute books, letters, trade literature, engineering drawings and photographs, textiles, cottons, transport, Ferranti, Cockshoot collection, pop art plus the Factory Records and Hacienda archives.
The Co-operative Heritage Trust
On the co-operative movement, eg advertising, education, fashion, film and photography, co-op societies, wartime, youth, photos, the Co-op Wholesale Society
“The National Football Museum holds the world’s finest collection of football artefacts and archives.” Includes major collections related to UEFA, FIFA and the FA.
The house where the Pankhursts lived in the early 1900s – small museum, but very useful for women’s rights/feminist history leads.
National centre for the collection, conservation, interpretation and study of material relating to the history of working people in Britain for over 200 years. Includes the archives of the Labour Party; the Communist Party of Great Britain; also material on Chartism, Peterloo and suffrage.
A predominantly C19th selection of travel literature, novels, biographies and history. Local history is an especial strength.
University of Salford Archives and Special Collections
Their coverage includes material on: Changing Face of Salford –a film record of the living conditions in the slums of Ordsall, Salford in the late 1960s, which were then in the process of being demolished.’ Salford Grammar School (opened as Salford Municipal Secondary School for Boys in 1904), British Election Campaign Material 1949-1974 compiled by the Conservative Party but including material used by Labour, Liberal, Conservative and Independent candidates.
Books, pamphlets, local newspapers, maps, censuses, parish registers and a collection of diaries, journals and letterbooks, donated by Edward Hall, a dealer and collector of books; and the original diary of Roger Lowe, 17c shopkeeper in Ashton.
Working Class Movement Library
“Records of over 200 years of organising and campaigning by ordinary men and women.” Covers – trade unions, suffrage, Peterloo, Spanish Civil War and the lives of ordinary people trying to make ends meet.
Thanks to Craig Horner.