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Andrew Roth was born in New York in April, 1919, to Jewish-Hungarian parents. He went on to study Far Eastern History and Chinese at Columbia University, pursuing his interest in the politics and development of the Far East. He went on to work as a researcher for the Institute of Pacific Relations before completing an intensive Japanese language course at Harvard at the behest of the UN Navy. Roth completed his enlistment after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, working as a Naval Intelligence Officer specialising in Japanese translations and code breaking. Before the end of his Navy career he was tried for pro-communist sympathies and leaking Naval documents to the Left-wing Amerasia Magazine, but was released without conviction.

After the War Roth successfully published his first book, titled Dilemma in Japan, in 1945. He then left America and travelled extensively across Europe, the Middle East and the Far East, acting as a roving correspondent for The Nation Magazine, a left-leaning US publication. He also worked as a freelance journalist for various US and Canadian publications, as well as most of the major newspapers of Asia, including The Hindu, India; The Pakistan Times; The Palestine Post; and The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon syndicate. Writing on topical issues and the post-war political developments of the Far East, Roth worked with and wrote about most of the major political and journalistic figures of the time.

The McCarthy anti-communist trials of the late 1940s prompted Roth to postpone returning to America, and he instead settled in England in 1950, remaining there until his death. He continued his journalistic outpourings, working predominantly for The Manchester Evening News (1972-1984), The New Statesman (1984-1997), and contributing regularly to The Guardian’s obituaries section. He continued to write for other foreign newspapers and magazines, and received regular speaking engagements to talk about his political views and experiences in post-war Asia. The focus of Roth’s work shifted towards European political research, resulting in the ‘Parliamentary Profiles’ series of political biographies, published from 1955 onwards. He also published seven books relating to various political figures, and created the weekly Westminster Confidential newsletter.

Roth died on 12 August 2010 of prostate cancer, aged 91.

As a result of Nikita Khrushchev's Secret Speech denouncing Joseph Stalin and the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956, many abandoned the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) and began to rethink its orthodox Marxism. Some joined various Trotskyist groupings or the Labour Party.

The Marxist historians E. P. Thompson and Ralph Miliband established the Communist Party Historians Group and a dissenting journal within the CPGB called Reasoner. Once expelled from the party, they began the New Reasoner from 1957. In 1960, this journal merged with the Universities and Left Review to form the New Left Review. These journals attempted to synthesise a theoretical position of a revisionist, humanist, socialist Marxism, departing from orthodox Marxist theory. This publishing effort made the ideas of culturally oriented theorists available to an undergraduate reading audience. In this early period, many on the New Left were involved in the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, formed in 1957.

Under the long-standing editorial leadership of Perry Anderson, the New Left Review popularised the Frankfurt School, Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser and other forms of Marxism. Other periodicals like Socialist Register, started in 1964, and Radical Philosophy, started in 1972, have also been associated with the New Left, and published a range of important writings in this field.

As the campus orientation of the American New Left became clear in the mid to late 1960s, the student sections of the British New Left began taking action. The London School of Economics became a key site of British student militancy. The influence of protests against the Vietnam War and of the May 1968 events in France were also felt strongly throughout the British New Left. Some within the British New Left joined the International Socialists, which later became Socialist Workers Party while others became involved with groups such as the International Marxist Group.The politics of the British New Left can be contrasted with Solidarity, UK, which continued to focus primarily on industrial issues.

Born, London, 1934; educated at King Alfred's School, Hampstead, and Balliol College, Oxford, where he was tutored by and became friends with historian Christopher Hill; during this time he became a Marxist, joining the Communist Party and the Communist Party Historian's Group; the latter an organisation formed by E.P.Thompson, Christopher Hill, Rodney Hilton, Eric Hobsbawm, Maurice Dobb and others and which was responsible for founding the journal Past and Present, which aimed to pioneer the study of working class history; left the Communist Party, 1956, and was one of the founder editors, together with Stuart Hall and Charles Taylor, of what was soon to become the New Left Review; appointed Tutor in Sociology at Ruskin College, Oxford, 1962; launched a series of national workshops, starting in 1966, on topics previously neglected including women's history, the history of childhood, empire and patriotism, the changing definitions of nations and the cultural diversity of Britain. Participation in these workshops was to remain extremely popular into the 1970s and 1980s, and many of its contributors became initial writers for the History Workshop Journal, founded in 1975; appointed Professor at the University of East London in 1996, although died shortly after. His publications include: Village Life and Labour (1975), Miners, Quarrymen and Saltworkers (1977), People's History and Socialist Theory (1981), East End Underworld (1981), Culture, Ideology and Politics (1983), Theatres of the Left: 1880-1935 (1985), The Lost World of Communism (1986), The Enemy Within: The Miners' Strike of 1984 (1987), Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity (1989), Patriotsm: Minorities and Outsiders (1989), The Myths We Live By (1990), Theatres of Memory (1996) and Island Stories: Unravelling Britain (1997).

The Spitalfields Inventory was a project to detail the features of buildings in the Spitalfields area conducted by a group of researchers between 1990 and 1991. The area was divided into 8 blocks and surveys were conducted on a select number of buildings in that area recorded on a survey form and colour transparency of the building. No further information on the origins of the project is currently known.

The Society of Public Librarians (SPL) was founded in 1895 to promote the interests and professional status of chief librarians in and around London. The Society held monthly meetings at which papers would be presented on matters of professional interest or debate, including cataloguing, public access to library shelves, the selection of books and so on. The group also hosted an annual outing every summer out of London to a historic or cultural landmark or educational institution, along with an annual dinner in the Holborn area of London. The Society, along with leading members Charles Goss, John Frowde, Frank Chennell, William Bridle and Edward Foskett, remained one of the main vehicles of opposition to open access within the public library, with debate channelled through the correspondence pages of newspapers and periodicals. The Society folded in 1930.

The Spitalfields Trust was established in 1978 with the aim of saving the remaining Georgian houses in Spitalfields, London, which were under threat of redevelopment as the city’s financial centre expanded eastwards. The Trust's intervention helped to save a number of eighteenth century roads including Fournier, Princelet, Wilkes, Elder and Folgate Streets. By 1993 the Trust's successes in the East End led it to branch-out to other areas of the country, notably restoring and repairing Allt-y-Bela in Usk, Monmouthshire, a late medieval farmhouse.

Photographer Edward Thompson recorded the people and events of the Occupy London movement and demonstrations, 2011-2012.

The L and M series, and the Visitation records, represent the main collections of the College pre-dating the English Civil War, being mostly the work of Tudor heralds. Samson Lennard's 1618 list of the contents of the library indicates that these volumes were part of the collection then, although descriptions are usually somewhat too general to allow for precise identification. The volumes are listed in the 'Syllabus' of College of Arms' manuscripts, compiled in c 1780

Augustine Vincent, born c 1581-4, was the third son of a Northamptonshire gentleman, William Vincent of Wellingborough. He was a scholar and antiquary, and as a clerk of the Records in the Tower of London acquired a thorough knowledge of public as well as private records. He was appointed Rose Rouge Pursuivant Extraordinary in 1616, then Rouge Croix Pursuivant in 1621, and Windsor Herald in 1624. He conducted heraldic visitations as deputy to William Camden, Clarenceux King of Arms, and produced one publication, A discoverie of errours in the first edition of the catalogue of nobility, in which he attacked a work of Ralph Brooke, York Herald (A catalogue and succession of the kings, princes, dukes... of England), who had previously attacked a work of Camden's. He died in 1626 when he was no more than 45 years old and was buried at St Benet's, Paul's Wharf, traditionally the heralds' church. His son, John, inherited and added to the collection.

The Albert Dock Seamen's Hospital was established in 1890 as a branch of the Dreadnought Seamen's Hospital, Greenwich, which was founded in 1821. The London School of Tropical Medicine was established in the Albert Dock Hospital in October 1899, by Philip Manson-Bahr, and remained there until moving to Euston in February 1920. The Hospital became part of Newham Health District under the City and East London Area Health Authority (Teaching) in 1974 and was converted from acute to orthopaedic use. It came under the direct control of Newham Health Authority in 1981 and subsequently became a homeward bound mental handicap unit.

The hospital was founded in 1841, primarily through the efforts of Mr. (afterwards Sir Philip) Rose (1816 - 1883), a solicitor. At the age of 25, reputedly after one of the clerks at his law firm, who was suffering from consumption, now known as pulmonary tuberculosis, was refused admittance to several hospitals, Rose determined to establish a hospital for sufferers of tuberculosis without the financial means to pay for treatment. Rose was Honorary Secretary of the Hospital for Consumption and Diseases of the Chest, Brompton from its inception until his death. The charity's objects were to provide an asylum for in-patients for patients with pulmonary tuberculosis and a hospital for patients with other chest diseases and a dispensary to provide advice and medicine for less urgent cases to be treated on an out-patient basis.

The charity began work by converting Chelsea Manor House into a hospital for in-patients and opening an out-patient branch at 20, Great Marlborough Street. A purpose built hospital was opened on the Fulham Road in 1844. Ten years later a western wing was added giving a total in-patient accommodation of 200 beds. The hospital, which attracted Royal patronage from the time of its inception, was regulated by The Consumption Hospital Act of 1849 and became incorporated in 1850. The hospital continued to expand, supported by figures such as Charles Dickens, Benjamin Disraeli, and the famous singer Jenny Lind, who performed an in concert to raise £1,606 for the Building Fund (equivalent to over £90,000 in today’s money). A sizeable donation came from Cordelia Read, who left her personal estate to the hospital, including valuable paintings by John Opie, to the surprise of her family. After a long dispute, the hospital received £100,000 which was used to build a new extension in 1882, bringing the total number of beds to 368. It was again enlarged in 1900.

Although primarily associated with tuberculosis, Brompton Hospital had a number of departments which dealt with other diseases of the chest. A throat department was started in 1889, and expanded in 1922, and a radiological department was instituted in 1900, and expanded in 1925. The hospital provided post-graduate educational facilities in the form of lectures and clinical demonstrations by the medical staff. In 1905, the hospital established a sanatorium and convalescent home at Frimley, Surrey, with accommodation for 150 patients. The regime centred on a programme of 'graded exercise', which progressed from total bed rest to taking part in carefully defined physical labour. The advent of surgical procedures for treating tuberculosis in the twentieth century led to further improvement of radiograph and surgical departments. A cardiac department opened in 1919, and in 1934 a physiotherapy department opened, initially as a "breathing exercises" department; by 1948, the department had expanded to include six full-time and one part-time 'instructresses', due to the success of these techniques in patients with chest conditions.

The hospital became part of the National Health Service in 1948 and its management was put on a joint basis with the London Chest Hospital, Bethnal Green as the Hospitals for Diseases of the Chest. From the 1960s, as sanatoria became less important for the treatment of tuberculosis patients, Frimley Sanatorium transitioned into a convalescent home, looking after post-operative cardiac and respiratory patients from Brompton Hospital, London Chest, and National Heart Hospital, and other London teaching hospitals, until its eventual closure in the 1980s.

In 1988, Queen Elizabeth II awarded a 'Royal' title to the Brompton and its associated hospitals and the hospital was henceforth known as the Royal Brompton Hospital. In 1994 The Royal Brompton became an NHS Trust (at the same time the London Chest Hospital joined St. Bartholomew's and The Royal London Hospital to form The Royal Hospitals NHS Trust, afterwards known as Barts and The London NHS Trust). In 1998, the Royal Brompton merged with Harefield Hospital NHS Trust to form The Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Trust.

In 1994 a merger between The Royal London Hospital and Associated Community Services NHS Trust, St Bartholomew's Hospital and The London Chest Hospital resulted in the creation of The Royal Hospitals NHS Trust. In 1999 the Trust's name changed to Barts and The London NHS Trust. The Trust continued until a further merger with Whipps Cross University Hospital NHS Trust and Newham University Hospital NHS Trust in 2012. Management of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children came under the Trust in 1995 and the hospital was formerly part of the Trust from April 1996 until the hospital's closure in 1998 whereupon services transferred to The Royal London Hospital.

The Trust initially came under the North East Thames Regional Health Authority and East London and The City District Health Authority more locally. From 1996-2002 it fell under NHS London Regional Health Authority and then North East London Strategic Health Authority until this was subsumed into NHS London Strategic Health Authority in 2006.

The London Infirmary, as it was originally named, was established in the autumn of 1740 in Featherstone Street and occupied premises in Prescot Street 1741 to 1757. In 1752 the foundation stone of the hospital building on Whitechapel Road (later known as Front Block) was laid. The first patients were admitted in 1757, and the building of the front block was completed in 1759. There were subsequent alterations, developments and extensions, but parts of the original building remained in use until 2012. East and West Wings were added in 1770 and extended in the 1830s. Both these extensions were demolished in 2007, together with the remainder of East Wing. The Grocers Company Wing was opened in 1876 and the Alexandra Wing in 1982: the latter replaced an earlier Alexandra Wing, opened in 1866 and was opened as a Dental Hospital in 2014. In 1755 and 1772 the Governors of the Hospital were able to purchase the two moieties, or halves, of Red Lyon Farm, which lay immediately behind the Hospital, between Whitechapel Road and Commercial Road. Many of the Hospital's departments were built on parts of the former London Hospital Estate. Notable hospital buildings on the Estate included the Out Patients Department, designed by Rowland Plumbe and opened in 1902 and the Dental Institute, opened in 1965 and closed in 2014. The new Royal London Hospital building, designed by HOK Architects, was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 2013. The London Hospital had been granted Royal title by HM Queen Elizabeth II in 1990 to celebrate the 250th anniversary of its opening on the Whitechapel site, allowing it to be known as The Royal London Hospital.

Management of the Charity was originally in the hands of all the subscribers but, as they increased in numbers, this became impracticable. As early as April 1741 a Grand Committee was appointed to meet weekly, to transact the general business of the Hospital; this Committee developed into the House Committee, which exercised effective control, until its abolition in 1948. The subscriber's meetings became the Court of Governors, which normally met quarterly, and to which the House Committee reported. In 1758 the Hospital was granted a Royal Charter, which gave the Governors corporate status. Under the terms of the National Health Act, 1946, the Court of Governors and the House Committee were replaced by a Board of Governors in 1948. This Board was itself dissolved in 1974, when the Hospital became a part of the Tower Hamlets Health District in the City and East London Health Authority (Teaching).

Executive authority was at first split between several officers: the Secretary, the Steward, the Apothecary and the Chaplain; all exercised varying degrees of authority at different times. In 1806 a Superintendent was appointed and thereafter this officer, later called the House Governor, was the principal Executive Officer.

The original object of the Hospital was the "The relief of all sick and diseased persons and, in particular, manufacturers, seamen in the merchant service and their wives and children". The London Hospital has always been a general one and, by the end of the nineteenth century, was the largest voluntary, general Hospital in the United Kingdom. In the early years of the 20th Century the number of beds passed 1,000 on several occasions. In 2014 the new hospital provided 611 beds.

From the 1740's pupils had been taken on by members of the medical staff to "Walk the wards". In 1783 William Blizard and Dr. James Maddocks sought the Governors' support for the erection of a Lecture Theatre, so that both practical and theoretical education could be received on the same site. As a result a Lecture Theatre, which later developed into the Medical College, was opened in 1785. Until 1854 it remained largely independent of the Hospital but, from then until 1948, the Hospital House Committee exercised ultimate authority over the College. The College's records are kept by the College and are not included in these lists.

For many years the London Hospital had a number of Annexes and Convalescent Homes associated with it. At various times the Hospital managed the Zachary Merton Home, Banstead; the Brentwood Annexe; the Herman de Stern Home, Felixstowe; the Catherine Gladstone Home, Mitcham; the Croft and Fairfield Annexes in Reigate and the Hore and Marie Celeste Homes in Woodford. There was also Hayes Grove, a Home for Sick Nurses.

From 1945 until 1972 Queen Mary's Maternity Home, Hampstead, was managed by the Hospital. Its records are in the Royal London Hospital Archives, but are listed separately.

In 1968 Mile End and St. Clement's Hospitals were transferred to the management of the Board of Governors and were designated to the London Hospital (Mile End) and the London Hospital (St. Clement's). Some records of both these Hospitals are in the Royal London Hospital Archives, but are listed separately.

The "Marie Celeste" Samaritan Society was founded in 1791 to provide for London Hospital patients various welfare benefits, such as artificial limbs, periods of convalescence or special diets, which were beyond the resources of the Hospital. The records of this Society are in the Royal London Hospital Archives, but are listed separately.

The London Jewish Hospital was first planned in 1907 and opened in 1919. It was extended in 1926 and 1927, and in 1928 had 92 beds. In 1948 it ceased to be a Voluntary Hospital and became part of the National Health Service as a general hospital of 130 beds. From 1948 to 1966 it was managed by the Stepney Group Hospital Management Committee, and from 1966 to 1974 by the East London Group. The London Jewish Hospital was closed in 1979. Records survived the destruction of the office by a bomb during the Second World War.

The origins of the London Hospital Medical Council date from 1831, when the medical practitioners teaching in the Medical College formed themselves into an association of "Lecturers on and Teachers of Medicine, Surgery and Anatomy and other Sciences connected therewith at the Theatre attached to the London Hospital". The deed of covenant which created the body also set out basic rules for the Association and the ownership of the college museum. Records of the Association from 1831 to 1846 are lost, although some information from the minutes is recorded in a notebook by James Luke.

The Association became the Medical Council of the London Hospital School in 1847, and membership was extended to include the assistant physicians and surgeons. The old Medical College premises were now proving inadequate and in 1854 the Governors of the Hospital agreed to erect a new building. In the resultant administrative changes, the medical and surgical officers of the Hospital took over the management of the College from the Medical Council, as the London Hospital College Council. In practice, the Medical Council and the College Council consisted of the same people.

The management of the College was in the hands of the College Council (called, by 1868, the Medical Council of the London Hospital School) from 1855 to 1876, and the Medical Council continued to be heavily involved with the affairs of the college. In 1876 the Medical Council and the Board of Governors jointly established a College Board, comprising members of the House Committee and Medical Council. The Medical Council became less involved with the Medical College's affairs, and transferred its executive functions to the College Board. In 1888 membership of the Council comprised the physicians and surgeons of the hospital and lecturers at the Medical College of two years standing. In 1901 membership of the Council was extended, making it the sole channel through which views of the medical staff were expressed. The principal role of the Council was to advise the governors and the House Committee on all matters which affected the medical staff.

The Council had the power to create committees for particular purposes, but from 1960 its committee structure consisted of a Medical Committee and a Surgical Committee, and a Standing Committee to which they reported. In the late 1960s, the Medical Council's Medical and Surgical Committees were replaced by Divisions. Between 1969 and 1978 further divisions of Anaesthesia, Dentistry, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Pathology and Radiography (later Medical Imaging), Scientific and Technical Services and Paramedical Services were created. In 1971 the Standing Committee was abolished and replaced by the Final Medical Committee, which acted as the medium for transmitting advice between the Board of Governors (later District Management Team) and the consultant medical and dental staff. In 1974 the scope of the council was extended to include the whole of the new Tower Hamlets Health District, becoming the Medical Council of the London and Tower Hamlets Hospitals.

The Dental Council developed from the Dental School Committee, which was formed in 1911 to manage the Dental School. The Dental Council became known as the London Hospital Dental Board from 1913 to 1921, and from 1922 onwards the Dental Council. In 1974 the Council became the Division of Dentistry, reporting to the Final Medical Committee.

Poplar Hospital was founded in 1855 to provide for the many accidental injuries occurring in the Docks, and was officially called the Poplar Hospital for Accidents. Many of those prominent in the foundation, such as Samuel Gurney and Money Wigram, were actively connected with the London Hospital and, in 1854, it was suggested that the proposed hospital should be attached to the London. This suggestion was again revived in 1868 but to no effect. Sydney Holland, later 2nd Viscount Knutsford, became Chairman of the Hospital in 1891 and President in 1920. The Hospital was rebuilt between 1891 and 1894, and women's wards were provided for the first time. With the advent of the National Health Service in 1948, the Hospital became part of the Bow Group of Hospitals within the North East Metropolitan Board. In 1963 the Group was amalgamated with another to form the Thames Group. Poplar Hospital closed in 1974.

This hospital was founded in 1867 by Miss Mary Elizabeth Philips and Miss Ellen Philips, who were members of the Society of Friends. A house in Virginia Road, Bethnal Green, opened on 12 July 1867 as the Dispensary for Women and Children. It was soon decided that only children would be treated and as the North Eastern Hospital for Children the work was transferred to 125 Hackney Road, providing 12 cots. In 1870 the freehold of 327 Hackney Road was purchased and the hospital grew on that site, on the corner of Hackney Road and Goldsmith Row. The hospital was re-named the Queen's Hospital for Children in 1907. It opened a country branch called the Little Folks Home (named after the Little Folks magazine) at Bexhill -on -Sea in 1911. This was evacuated to Woking during World War II.
The Hospital merged with the Princess Elizabeth of York Hospital, Shadwell in 1942, and re-named the Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children. Thereafter the hospital functioned on two London sites: Queen Elizabeth, Hackney Road; and Queen Elizabeth, Shadwell. A further site was opened at Banstead, Surrey, in 1948. The Shadwell site closed in 1963. The Queen Elizabeth Hospital Group was formed in 1948 to administer the Queen Elizabeth Hospital on its three sites at Hackney Road, Shadwell and Banstead. On closure of the Shadwell site in 1963 it was amalgamated with the Hackney Group to form the Hackney and Queen Elizabeth Group. This arrangement lasted until 1968 when the Queen Elizabeth was detached from Hackney and placed under the Board of Governors of the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street. The hospital functioned as part of the Hospitals for Sick Children until 1994 when Great Ormond Street became an NHS Trust. Queen Elizabeth was then managed by East London and The City Health Authority until April 1996 when it joined The Royal Hospitals NHS Trust (name later changed to Barts and The London NHS Trust). The Hackney Road site closed in 1998 when the bulk of its services transferred to The Royal London Hospital as the Queen Elizabeth Children's Service.

Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) was founded in 1787 - a fact gathered from a poster for a cricket match in 1837 between the North and South of England Box and Cobbet, announcing MCC's Golden Jubilee on 10 July 1837. As London's population grew, so did the nobility's impatience with the crowds who gathered to watch them play. In pursuit of exclusivity, they decided to approach Thomas Lord, a bowler with White Conduit CC, and asked him to set up a new private ground. An ambitious entrepreneur, Lord was encouraged by Lord Winchilsea to lease a ground on Dorset Fields in Marylebone - the site of the modern Dorset Square. He staged his first match - Middlesex (with two of Berkshire and one of Kent) versus Essex (with two given men) - on 31st May 1787. Thus the Marylebone Cricket Club was formed. A year later, it laid down a Code of Laws, which were adopted throughout the game - and MCC today remains responsible for the Laws of Cricket. After a short stay at Marylebone Bank, Regent's Park, between 1811 and 1813, Lord's moved to a new ground in St John's Wood in 1814. It remains MCC's home to this day.

In 1825 Lord sold the ground to a Bank of England director, William Ward, for £5,000. Having provided the Marylebone Cricket Club with a ground for 38 years, Lord retired and then died seven years later. Also in 1825, the Pavilion was destroyed in a fire and as a consequence the initial minute books and records were lost. Work commenced immediately on a replacement, which opened the following year. In 1866 MCC agreed to purchase the freehold of Lord's from Isaac Moses Marsden for £18,333 thanks to money advanced from William Nicholson. Then in 1867 MCC decided to build a Grand Stand and established the 'Lord's Grand Stand Company' - made up of figures including the MCC secretary and trustees - to achieve this aim. The Grand Stand was erected in 1867 at a cost of £1,435. In 1877 MCC accepted an application from Middlesex County Cricket Club to adopt Lord's as its county ground - an arrangement which continues today. Meanwhile, MCC in 1873 put forward plans to create a tournament for county cricket entitled 'Champion County Cup Matches', including regulations, and established county qualifications explaining that no cricketer was allowed to play for more than one county in the same season, and allowing players to choose between the county of birth and of residence at the start of each season. In 1888, the decision was made to erect a new Pavilion designed by the architect Thomas Verity and was built in 1889-1890 thanks to money borrowed from William Nicholson. Then in 1890 it was opened in time for the new season.

By the early part of the twentieth century, the Board of Control for Test Matches (1898), the Advisory County Cricket Committee (1904) and the Imperial Cricket Conference (1909) had been established to oversee domestic and international cricket, while MCC in 1901 became responsible for administering England tours, which were known as MCC tours rather than England tours until 1977. In 1933, following the death of Lord Harris, former cricketer, President, Trustee and Honorary Treasurer of MCC, the Committee decided to set up a memorial for him and thus the Harris Garden was built, which remains at Lord's today. During the Second World War the MCC Committee, the principal committee responsible for club affairs, became known as an Emergency Committee, the ground was requisitioned for use by the Royal Air Force, and Stanley Christopherson remained as President for the duration of the war, thus becoming the longest serving MCC President (Presidents usually served for a term of one year). 1953 saw the Imperial Memorial Gallery opened by the Duke of Edinburgh (twice MCC President in 1949 and 1974) which was dedicated to all cricketers who died in the First and Second World Wars.

In 1967 the MCC committee were warned that a form of re-organisation was required to maintain its status as the governing body of cricket. Since MCC was a private club it could not receive public funds, so in 1968 it set up a Cricket Council as the governing body of cricket and the Test and County Cricket Board (TCCB, now known as the English Cricket Board) to administer professional cricket. It also established the National Cricket Association (NCA) to manage the recreational game. As a result, cricket started to receive financial help from the Government, but MCC's responsibility for the game was reduced. ICC became independent of MCC by 1993, while TCCB took control of the England team and arrangements for big matches including those held at Lord's. MCC celebrated its Bicentenary with a match between themselves and the Rest of the World in 1987, and elected to admit women among its 18,000 members in 1998. There have been fifteen secretaries of the MCC since 1825; Benjamin Aislabie, Roger Kynaston, Alfred Bailie, R A Fitzgerald, Henry Perkins, Francis Lacey, William Findlay, Colonel Rowan Rait Kerr, Ronald Aird, S C (Billy) Griffith, Jack Bailey, J R Stephenson, Roger Knight, Keith Bradshaw and Derek Brewer, who became Secretary and Chief Executive in 2012.

St Bartholomew's Hospital was founded, with the Priory of St Bartholomew, in 1123 by Rahere, a former courtier of Henry I. A vow made while sick on a pilgrimage to Rome, and a vision of St Bartholomew, inspired Rahere to found a priory and a hospital for the sick poor at Smithfield in London. Rahere was the first Prior of the Priory of Austin Canons in Smithfield and supervised the Hospital House. In 1170 a layman Adam the Mercer was given charge of the Hospital as the first Proctor and a certain amount of independence from the Priory was achieved. After 1170 grants were received by the Hospital, which attracted valuable endowments of property. However, relations with the Priory remained problematic throughout the medieval period. There were conflicts over several issues, including the admittance of brethren, lay-brethren and sisters who cared for the sick in the early medieval period. Gradually the Hospital became independent, and was using a distinctive seal from about 1200. By 1300 the title of Proctor used for the head of the Hospital was dropped in favour of Master. By 1420 the two institutions had become entirely separate. As well as caring for patients from the City of London and the country the brethren looked after small children and babies from Newgate Prison, and orphans. By the 15th century a school had been formed with a latin master, and a night shelter for pilgrims and travellers was provided.

The Priory of St Bartholomew was closed during Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries in 1539, and although the Hospital was allowed to continue, its future was uncertain as it had no income. The citizens of London, concerned about the disappearance of provision for the sick poor and the possibility of plague, petitioned the King in 1538 for the grant of four hospitals in the City including St Bartholomew's. In 1546-1547 St Bartholomew's Hospital was refounded as a secular institution and a Master and Vice-Master, Curate, Hospitaller and Visitor of Newgate Prison were appointed. Henry issued a signed agreement dated December 1546 granting the Hospital to the City of London, and Letters Patent of January 1547 endowing it with properties and income, comprising most of its medieval property. Along with Bethlem, Bridewell and St Thomas', St Bartholomew's became one of four Royal Hospitals administered by the City.

In 1546 four Aldermen and eight Common Councillors of the City of London became the first Governors of the Hospital. They administered the Hospital and appointed paid officials, including a Renter-Clerk, Steward, Porter and eight Beadles. The Board of Governors also divided work amongst themselves. Four were Almoners with responsibility for admitting and discharging patients, ordering stock and checking bills. They worked closely with the Treasurer, responsible for Hospital finances. The weekly meetings of the Treasurer and Almoners developed into an executive committee in the 19th century, reporting to General Courts of the Governors, and became the Executive and Finance Committee in 1948. Other Governors were Surveyors of the Hospital buildings and property. The first professional Surveyor was appointed in 1748. Some Governors had responsibility for inspecting financial statements, and worked closely with the Treasurer and Almoners. Their meetings developed into the House Committee in the 18th century, dealing with leases, appointments and reports of the Hospital Surveyor. The House Committee met frequently and eventually came to manage the routine running of the Hospital. The General Courts of Governors were held two or three times a year. The basic constitution of the Hospital remained the same until the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948. The Medical Council was formed in 1842 to give expert advice to the Governors, and comprised all physicians and surgeons serving the Hospital.

The nursing staff on the Hospital's re-foundation consisted of a Matron and twelve Sisters, and there were also three Surgeons who had to attend the poor daily. Nurses, or "Sisters' helpers", were first recorded in 1647. Although a Physician had been provided for in the Agreement of 1546, the first Physician was not appointed until 1562. A Medical School was gradually established from the end of the 18th century, but its foundation is generally attributed to the efforts of the surgeon and lecturer John Abernethy, who in 1822 persuaded the Hospital Governors to pass a resolution giving formal recognition to the School. Bart's was one of the first hospitals in the 19th century to encourage the use of anaesthetics, making a great many more kinds of operation possible. Understanding of infection and the importance of antiseptic procedures in surgery were only gradually accepted at Bart's, but once adopted did a great deal to reduce patient mortality. The development of medical science, particularly in pathology and bacteriology, led to an increased knowledge of disease. X-rays were first used in the Hospital in 1896 and by the end of the century the first specialised departments had been established. A School of Nursing at St Bartholomew's was founded in 1877. A notable early Matron was Ethel Gordon Manson, better known as Mrs Bedford Fenwick, who encouraged a high standard of training and campaigned for the state registration of nurses.

All the medieval hospital buildings were demolished during the 18th century rebuilding programme, carried out to the designs of architect James Gibbs. The staircase leading to the Great Hall in the North Wing is decorated with two huge paintings by the artist William Hogarth. Other buildings have continued to be added as the need has arisen, including Medical College buildings, nurses' accommodation and new ward blocks.

The Hospital remained open throughout the World Wars, although during World War Two many services were evacuated to Hertfordshire and Middlesex. In 1954 it became the first hospital in the country to offer mega-voltage radiotherapy for cancer patients. Cancer services remain a speciality today. Other notable medical specialities are endocrinology and immunology (particularly HIV/AIDS), while a Day Surgery Unit and state-of-the-art operating theatres were opened in 1991 and 1993.

In 1948 St Bartholomew's became part of the National Health Service, and following re-organisation in 1974 became the teaching hospital for the newly-formed City and Hackney Health District, which included several other hospitals. In the late 1980s, Bart's was planning to set up a self-governing hospital trust when its future was called into question by the publication in 1992 of the Tomlinson Report of the Inquiry into the London Health Service. Bart's was not regarded as a viable hospital and its closure was recommended. The Government's response to this report (Making London Better, 1993), laid out three possible options for Bart's: closure, retention as a small specialist hospital, or merger with the Royal London Hospital and the London Chest Hospital. This produced an intense public debate and a campaign to save the Hospital on its Smithfield site. The result was St Bartholomew's remained open, and joined with the Royal London and the London Chest to form the Royal Hospitals NHS Trust in 1994, which became Barts and The London NHS Trust in 1999. St Bartholomew's Hospital now provides specialist cardiac and cancer care. The Medical Colleges of St Bartholomew's Hospital and the Royal London Hospital merged with Queen Mary, University of London in 1989, to form the Central and East London Confederation (CELC). Following the recommendations of the Tomlinson Report (1992) and the governmental response to it (Making London Better, 1993), the colleges united with Queen Mary & Westfield College in December 1995, to become known as Barts and The London School of Medicine & Dentistry.

Originally founded 'for the reception of all poor Germans and others speaking the German language', the German Hospital also cared for the local English-speaking population in the case of emergencies. It was supported by subscriptions and donations, many from Germany or the German community in England, and was run by German nursing sisters and doctors.

It is estimated that in the 1840s some 30,000 Germans were living in England, making up by far the largest immigrant community. Many of them lived and worked in poor conditions in the East End of London, where poverty and the language barrier left them little chance to make use of the limited medical resources available at that time. The work of a German pastor and a doctor to establish a hospital for 'poor German sick' was taken up by the Prussian Ambassador, the Chevalier Bunsen. He succeeded in enlisting the support of the rich and influential in Germany and England, including both royal houses, so ensuring that the hospital was built. On 15 October 1845, the German Hospital opened with just twelve beds.

An early outstanding feature of the Hospital was the nursing care provided by the Protestant Deaconesses from the Kaiserswerth Institute near Wessendorf. It was their example at the German which prompted Florence Nightingale to visit the Hospital on two occasions and then to enrol for training at the Institute in Germany in 1851. New hospital buildings, constructed according to the highest standards in hospital design, were opened in 1864, and proved to be invaluable in the epidemics which swept London in the 1860s and 1870s. The German royal family took a keen interest in the Hospital, as did the von Schroder family who were often to provide funds for the Hospital over the years.

During the First World War, the German staff remained at the Hospital despite strong anti-German feelings in the country and a shortage of nurses and doctors in Germany. The period between the wars was one of great improvements and extensions to the buildings, the most important of which was the opening of a new wing in 1936. This housed maternity and children's wards, and the well-known and innovatory roof garden for convalescents, which provided a panoramic view of the entire city as far south as Crystal Palace. In May 1940, the staff of the German Hospital were interned on the Isle of Man. English staff assumed the running of the Hospital, which now became German in name only.

Before 1948, nursing matters at the German Hospital were dealt with by the Board of Household Management, later the Household Committee. When the Hospital was taken into the National Health Service in 1948, the newly formed House Committee took over from the Hospital Committee, the Household Committee and the Nursing Committee. The League of Friends of the Hospital was founded in 1956.

In 1974, the German became part of the newly-formed City and Hackney Health District. For its last thirteen years, the German Hospital cared for psychiatric and psychogeriatric patients. During this time it continued to develop its work, such as its provision of emergency night-shelter facilities for psychogeriatric patients from the community. However, it closed in 1987, as the services it offered were transferred to the new Homerton Hospital.

Before the Reformation there appear to have been five chapels within St Bartholomew's Hospital, but only one survived the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII. In the winter of 1546/7, when the Hospital was re-founded by royal charter, its precinct was established as the Anglican parish of St Bartholomew the Less and one of the medieval chapels became the parish church. The tower and part of the west wall of the church date from the fifteenth century and are the oldest structures which now survive within the Hospital precinct. The original parish boundary followed the line of the boundary of the Hospital in Henry VIII's day. However, since 1954, the parish boundary has extended to include land on which the Hospital has expanded to the south and east.

Bart's is now unique among English hospitals in being a parish in its own right. The parish has its own churchwardens and, since 1958, its own parochial church council, which functions independently of the Hospital authorities. The title of 'Anglican chaplain', found in practically every other hospital in England, does not exist at Bart's. The role is filled by the Vicar of St Bartholomew the Less, who is correctly known as the 'Vicar and Hospitaller'. In the sixteenth century, these were two separate offices: the Vicar of St Bartholomew the Less, who undertook pastoral care of the parishioners, and the Hospitaller to St Bartholomew's Hospital, who looked after the needs of the patients. However, in the time of William Orme, Vicar from 1670 to 1697, the two positions were combined and they have been held jointly by successive clergy down to the present day. In former times there were a number of tenanted houses in the Hospital precinct, but there are now no parishioners except resident Hospital staff, and the incumbent's main responsibility is for the spiritual welfare of the patients within the Hospital.

The medieval church remained largely intact until 1789-1791, when the roof and practically the whole of the interior were demolished and rebuilt to the design of George Dance junior, the Hospital Surveyor. Dance's structure, however, was rapidly attacked by dry rot, and the church was again rebuilt in 1823-1825. The architect of the second rebuilding was Thomas Hardwick and it is chiefly his work that is visible in the church today. Hardwick retained much of Dance's octagonal design for the interior of the church, but reconstructed it using more durable materials, and pulled down all that remained of the medieval building apart from the tower and the west end. Some of the monuments from the old building were preserved and reinstated, including memorials to Robert Balthrope, Queen Elizabeth I's sergeant surgeon (died 1591), and to Anne, wife of Thomas Bodley, founder of the Bodleian Library at Oxford, whose London house stood within the Hospital precinct in the early seventeenth century. A curious feature of the church is the height of the floor, most of which is some seventy-five centimetres above ground level. The reason for this appears to be unknown. Two of the three bells in the tower are medieval, and are very probably as old as the tower itself. The stained glass windows depicting the Virgin and Child with St Luke, St Bartholomew and Rahere, and also the war memorial windows, were designed by Hugh Easton and dedicated in 1951. They replaced Victorian glass destroyed in the Second World War.

In earlier centuries, attendance at church was compulsory for the nursing staff of the Hospital. Patients were also expected to attend every Sunday, unless they were too weak to do so. Regular Sunday and weekday services are held throughout the year, and the church is frequently used by members of staff for weddings, for the baptisms of their children, and for memorial services. The Vicar and Hospitaller works in close co-operation with the chaplains of other denominations and advises and counsels staff and patients, their relatives and other visitors.

The Church of St Nicholas Shambles was built off Newgate Street in the City of London sometime before 1196, next to an abattoir, and was demolished in 1547. The parish united with that of Christ Church Greyfriars, Newgate Street at the same time, and the endowments were transferred to St Bartholomew's Hospital by the charter of Henry VIII.

The Invalid Asylum for Respectable Females was established in 1825 by Miss Mary Lister, (an aunt of Joseph Lister, the founder of antiseptic surgery), to 'afford a temporary Asylum to Respectable Females, employed in shops and in other dependent situations, and Servants, obliged by illness to quit their places'. It was intended to provide nursing and medical attention for those women not ill enough for admittance to a large public hospital, but not well enough to enter a convalescent home. A certificate of good moral conduct was required of each woman before admittance, and patients were subject to strict rules and numerous requirements, including the care of their fellow patients and cleaning of the wards.

The institution altered its name to the Invalid Asylum and Stoke Newington Home Hospital for Women in 1911. By 1916 the establishment was known as the Stoke Newington Home Hospital for Women. It appears that the Invalid Asylum was initially established in Church Street in Stoke Newington. By 1834, the Asylum was housed in a different building to that in which it had begun. This new building was located at 187 High Street, Stoke Newington, and the Asylum remained there until immediately prior to the Second World War. In July and August 1939, the patients were moved to The Firs in Stevenage, the property there having been taken on a lease. In 1944, the Home Hospital bought The Firs, selling their former property in Stoke Newington at the same time.

From its beginning the Invalid Asylum had a physician and surgeon in attendance every working day, and the attendance of a dentist is noted from 1866. In 1826, its first full year, the Asylum treated forty-seven women. By the time of its centenary in 1926, this number had risen to 264. The original purpose had also been extended, with convalescent and maternity cases being admitted. The Invalid Asylum was overseen by a Ladies Committee, and the establishment very quickly gained royal patronage, with Princess Augusta acting as Patroness from 1826 until 1840, when Queen Victoria accepted the role. Queen Victoria served as Patroness of the Invalid Asylum for over 60 years, and the tradition of royal patronage continued right up to the incorporation of the Home into the National Health Service in 1948.

Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie (1783-1862) attended anatomical lectures of John Abernathy at St Bartholomew's Hospital and James Wilson at the Hunterian School of Anatomy, Great Windmill Street, London, 1801-1802; joint secretary of the 'Academical Society'; entered St George's Hospital as a pupil under Sir Everard Home, 1803; appointed House Surgeon, 1805; demonstrator to the School of Anatomy, 1805-1812; assisted Home in his private operations, and in his researches on comparative anatomy; elected Assistant Surgeon to St George's, 1808, and held this appointment for fourteen years; entered upon private practice, Sackville Street, London, 1809; moved practice to Savile Row, 1819; appointed Professor of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology, Royal College of Surgeons, 1819; appointed Sergeant-Surgeon to the King, 1832; acquired premises at Kinnerton Street for the anatomical theatre, museum and lecture rooms for St George's Hospital Medical School; created Baronet, 1834; examiner and member of Council, Royal College of Surgeons; introduced Fellowship examination, 1843; appointed President of the Royal College of Surgeons, 1844; elected President of the Royal Society, 1858; elected first President of the General Medical Council, 1858; resigned Presidency of Royal Society due to failing eyesight, 1861; published 'Psychological Inquiries,', 1854 and 1862.

John Hill Burton was born in Aberdeen in 1809; educated at Aberdeen grammar school from 1819, and went with a bursary to Marischal College, Aberdeen, in 1823. After graduating MA in 1826, he applied himself to the law, reading for the bar in Edinburgh. He was an Adovcate by profession, and as a young man compiled various legal works and was associated with various movements, not only law reform but also political economy and public health. Later his aptitude led him along literary and historical lines. Edinburgh at this period was the centre of intellectual activity and Burton Hill became an intimate friend of many of the notabilities of the day. Burton Hill died of bronchitis at his home, Morton House, in the Pentland Hills on 10 August 1881.

Sir Edwin Chadwick was born at Longsight, near Manchester, on 24 January 1800; educated at a village school in Longsight and then boarded briefly at Dr Wordsworth's school in Stockport and moved to London. Edwin clerked until 1823, when he shifted towards the bar. This acquainted him with the social problems of prisons, hospitals, and slums.

Chadwick was admitted to the Middle Temple in 1823. In 1832 he was appointed Assistant Commissioner to the Poor Law Enquiry and the following year Royal Commissioner to the same Enquiry, and to enquire into the employment of children in factories. In 1834 he was appointed Secretary to the Poor Law Commission, and in 1836 Royal Commissioner to enquire into a rural constabulary. In 1842 Chadwick published the Report on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Population (known as the 'Sanitary Report'). In 1847 he lost his position as Secretary of the Poor Law Commission, but was appointed Royal Commissioner on London sanitation, and Metropolitan Commissioner of Sewers.

In 1848 Chadwick was created CB and was appointed Commissioner to the General Board of Health. He resigned from the Metropolitan Commission of Sewers in 1849 and from the General Board of Health in 1854. In 1857 he became interested in standing for Parliament and in 1859 stood as candidate for Evesham. In 1865 he stood as candidate for London University but withdrew before the poll. In 1868 he stood for Kilmarknock Burghs. He was created KCB in 1889. Chadwick died on 5 July 1890.

Guy Pascoe Crowden was born in 1894 and brought up in Wisbech, where his father was in general practice. Crowden's medical studies at University College London were interrupted by World War One. He served in France with the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, where experience with the Gas Brigade at Ypres, Somme and Passchendale shaped a growing interest in the physiology of work and stress.

Assistant in the University College Physiology Department, 1924; appointed Lecturer in Applied Physiology, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, 1929. His research interests ranged from fatigue and recovery in muscular work to the effects of heat and cold in nutrition. In 1934 he became Reader in Industrial Physiology at the School and finally, after service in the Royal Army Medical Corps during World War Two, he was appointed Professor of Applied Physiology in 1946. He retired in 1952. His connections with firms interested in industrial welfare work were to prove a link to the School's later involvement with occupational health. Crowden died in 1966.

Herbert Edward Durham was born in 1866 and was the son of A E Durham, once senior surgeon to Guy's Hospital and grandson of William Ellis, the economist. Durham was educated at University College School and King's College, Cambridge, and obtained a first class in both parts of the Natural Science Tripos in 1890.

In 1894 Durham passed FRCS and then won a Gull studentship on which he went to Vienna to work in the Grubler's hygiene laboratory. While there, his attention was drawn to the diagnostic value of agglutination in the serum of animals protected by prophylactic inoculations. In 1896, this reaction was applied to typhoid, when at first it was known as the Grubler-Durham reaction, but the title was later changed to that of the Widal reaction. In that year he also became a member of the Royal Society's Committee on disease spread by tsetse flies. In 1897 he produced the universally used and famous Durham tubes to measure the amount of gas produced in culture by bacteria.

In 1900 he led an expedition to Brazil organised by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine to study yellow fever and between 1901 and 1903 he undertook an expedition with Dr P T Manson to Christmas Island, in the Indian Ocean, but this was marred by the tragedy of his young colleague's death.

From Malaya he brought back the roots of Derris elliptica which were found to possess definite insecticidal properties and it seems that Durham was the first to draw attention to this phenomenon. In 1905 he forsook medicine to become supervisor of the laboratories of Messrs H P Bulmer & Co of Hereford who were engaged in brewing cider. Thereafter for thirty years he worked at the problems of fermentation, and was hardly ever seen in medical circles. In 1935 he retired to Cambridge, to his garden where he tended strange plants and herbs, many of when he had originally introduced into this country. Durham died in 1945.

Michael Stewart Rees Hutt, born 1 October 1922; awarded senior lectureship in pathology at St Thomas' Hospital Medical School in London and appointed Professor of Pathology at Makerere University College, Kampala, in Uganda, 1962.

Whilst in Uganda, Hutt organised a country-wide postal pathology system so that remote hospitals received diagnoses in time to be meaningful; enabled one of the few excellent tropical country cancer registries to be set up and stimulated much medical research. Hutt and Dennis Burkitt made a road safari around the mission and government hospitals of Uganda and eastern Zaire, mid-1960s, gathering cancer incidence data. This work on illnesses including Burkitt's lymphoma, oesophageal and liver cancer was important in demonstrating that cancer is a very non-uniform disease. Hutt's work regarding a tumour called Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) showed that on the Uganda/Zaire border it accounted for 10 per cent of all tumours among adults, this occurred prior to the epidemic of HIV and Aids and was a crucial discovery.

Hutt returned to UK in 1970 and became Professor of Geographical Pathology in a unit created for him and Burkitt in St Thomas', developing a system of diagnostic pathology for resource-poor countries. Hutt retired in 1983; continued to press for support of medicine in Africa, especially in Uganda and through the Commonwealth Secretariat organised an umbrella group 'Apecsa, the Association of Pathologists of East, Central and Southern Africa', to reinforce pathology provision and local staff in Africa. Hutt died in Crickhowell, Powys on 29 March 2000.

Publications include: The geography of non-infectious disease (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1986) and Kaposi's sarcoma: 2nd Kaposi's Sarcoma Symposium, Kampala, January 8 to 11, 1980 edited by Hutt and others (Karger, New York, 1981).

Leiper was born in 1881 in Kilmarnock; his father died from tuberculosis when Robert Leiper was 14 which affected him greatly turning him to medical science rather than clinical practice; educated at Warwick School and Mason University College, Birmingham , he proceeded to Glasgow where he held a Carnegie Research Scholarship; graduated MB, Ch.B (Glasgow), 1904, and was employed in studying the helminthic material (relating to the study of parasitic worms) brought back by the Scottish Antarctic Expedition. A year later Patrick Manson recruited him to direct the newly created Department of Helminthology in the new tropical school. In 1907 he proceeded to Cairo to study under Professor Looss, a famous helminthologist in the University of Cairo and took part in the Egyptian Government's helminthological survey in Uganda. There he shot elephants and described several new species of intestinal nematodes from this great pachyderm. In 1909 he served as helminthologist to the Grouse Diseases Enquiry Committee and identified the parasite, Trichostrongylus pergracilis, as the cause of the disease. Leiper became University Professor, 1920 and Courtauld Professor of Helminthology and Director of the Department of Parasitology, London School of Hygiene and tropical Medicine.

He remained connected to the School until his death in 1969; in the early years at the School he travelled extensively, making essential contributions to the knowledge of a number of helminths and their life-cycles, he founded the Journal of Helminthology in 1923 and began planning the Institute of Agricultural Parasitology at Winches Farm near St Albans. Active long after normal retirement age Leiper was acknowledged by colleagues as the man who put helminthology on the map in the twentieth century.

W H Russell Lumsden was born, 1914; graduated in science and medicine from the University of Glasgow; studied tropical medicine and hygiene at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, and worked as a research fellow in the Department of Parasitology and Entomology. During World War Two he served in malaria field laboratories of the Royal Army Medical Corps and then spent a year with Patrick Buxton becoming Medical Research Council Senior Fellow in Buxton's department, 1946-1947; joined the Yellow Fever Research Institute at Entebbe, Uganda where he remained until he became Director of the East African Trypanosomiasis Research Organisation (EATRO) from 1957 to 1963. Lumsden was Chair of Medical Protozoology 1968-1979.

Born 5 Sep 1874; educated Rugby School and King's College, Cambridge; First Class Mechanical Sciences Tripos, Part I 1896, and Part II (with special distinction), 1898; called to Bar, Inner Temple, 1902; subsequently engaged in scientific research; Fellow of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene; organised in 1920, a scheme for mosquito control of Hayling Island; built and equipped the British Mosquito Control Institute, Hayling Island, 1925; died 5 Dec 1949. Publications: Unofficial Mosquito Control in England (1922); Coastal Mosquitoes and their Control (British Association Address, 1925); Principles and Practice of Mosquito Control (1927); The Organization of Mosquito Control Work (Presidential Address in Zoology Section, South-Eastern Union of Scientific Societies, Portsmouth Congress, 1930); The British Mosquitoes (1938); The Morphology and Biology of Culex molestus (1944).

Born, 1874; educated Mercers' and City of London School and University College London; received his clinical training at St Bartholomew's and St Thomas' Hospitals, qualifying MRCS, LRCP in 1897, after which he held the appointments of house-physician at St Thomas' and resident medical officer at Teignmouth, Dawlish and Newton Abbot Infirmary; after taking the London MB in 1900, he served in the Royal Army Medical Corps with the South African Field Force during the early days of the Boer War, there he isolated the diphtheria bacillus from veld sores and has the claim of being the first to discover this infection of the skin; stayed in South Africa until 1902, gaining the Queen's Medal with five clasps.

He entered the Colonial Service and in 1910 accepted the appointment of Government bacteriologist and pathologist in Jamaica, where he developed an interest in tropical medical problems; while there he discovered that vomiting sickness was due to poisoning by unripe ackee fruit which he found to be highly toxic and described the cysts of Entamoeba histolytica.

He took the DPH of the Irish Royal Colleges, with honours, in 1913; during World War One he served as pathologist at the Cambridge Hospital, Aldershot, in charge of a mobile laboratory, with the rank of honorary captain in the RAMC; after demobilization he became Milner Research Fellow in comparative pathology at the London School of Tropical Medicine and obtained DTM&H (Cambridge); went to Hong Kong as Government bacteriologist and pathologist where he did valuable work on tuberculosis among the poorer class Chinese and gained a great knowledge of morbid anatomy; returned to England in 1922 and became pathologist to the Zoological Society of London, here he compared his 300 post-mortem studies of fatal human cases in Hong Kong with similar studies of animals dying of tuberculosis in the Zoological Gardens; results published by the Medical Research Council in 1929 and threw new light on the pathology of the disease; also a lecturer on tropical diseases at the Westminster Board and Liverpool University; medical secretary to the Colonial Medical Research Committee, 1928-1930; elected a member of the Royal College of Physicians of London in 1916, and a fellow in 1925; elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1917; KCMG in 1941; Fellow of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in 1911, becoming President 1943-1945; appointed assistant director of the Bureau of Hygiene and Tropical Diseases, 1930, becoming director in 1935, holding the appointment until 1942.

In 1937-38 he delivered the FitzPatrick Lectures before the Royal College of Physicians, discussing the conquest of disease in the Tropics, these lectures formed the basis of his best known work: The History of Tropical Medicine, published in two volumes in 1939.

William Whiteman Carlton Topley was born in Lewisham in 1886; graduated BA at St John's College, Cambridge, 1907 and qualified MB B.Ch. from St Thomas's Hospital, 1911. By then he was already an Assistant Director of the Pathology Department at Charing Cross Hospital, London. Always keen on research, war-time experience of a severe epidemic of typhus in Serbia turned his mind to epidemiology, and in 1922 he was appointed Professor of Bacteriology in the University of Manchester.

By 1922, Topley was developing the study of experimental epidemiology, in which he came to rely on the statistical contributions of Major Greenwood. In 1927 both men were appointed to new chairs at the new London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Their collaboration and friendship continued throughout their time at the School, until the threat of war catapulted Topley into organising the Emergency Public Health Laboratory Service (EPHLS). With his younger friend and associate, Graham Wilson, Topley published in 1929 the first of many editions of their classic text, Principles of Bacteriology and Immunity. In 1941 he took over as Secretary to the Agricultural Research Council. War-time stress and a family history of coronary disease caused his sudden death in February 1944, 2 days after his 58th birthday.

Born 1896, graduated Manchester University; served in World War One in Egypt and the Palestine Campaign 1915-19 (wounded at Gaza 1917); Graduating MB Ch.B in 1924; joined the East African Medical Service in 1927; became Tuberculosis Research Officer in Tanganyika in 1930; at the Bureau of Hygiene and Tropical Diseases (he took the DTM&H in 1941) from 1938; Director of the Bureau, 1942 to 1961; also consultant to Counties Public Health Laboratories, London, 1962-76.

Prior to the introduction of the GPO's mail coach service in 1784, the mail was conveyed by horse riders or mail cart on the longer routes out of London and on foot on some country services. The service was slow and vulnerable to attacks by armed robbers. In 1782 John Palmer of Bath put forward his scheme for conveying the mail by stage coach. Rejected in 1783 by the Postmasters General, a trial was finally approved in June 1784, with the support of William Pitt, Chancellor of the Exchequer. The experiment on the Bristol-Bath-London road in August 1784 was a success and Palmer began to organise further mail coach services in 1785. He was appointed Surveyor and Comptroller General of the Post Office in 1786 and presided over the expansion of the service throughout England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. By 1790 all the most important routes had been covered and many towns had a daily delivery and collection of mail by coach. The full scheme involved 42 mail coach routes.

The mail coach service was almost immediately affected by the arrival of the railways in the 1830s. The GPO quickly took advantage of this new and faster method of transport to replace the mail coaches. The last of the London based coaches ceased in 1846, although this method of conveyance continued for cross post services between some provincial towns until the 1850s. The last coach in the Midlands ran out of Manchester in 1858. Mail coaches lasted longest in those area which railways were slow to reach, such as Cornwall, Mid Wales, the Peak District and far North of Scotland. One of the last mail routes to be used, to Thurso in northern Scotland, ceased after the opening of the Highland Railway in 1874. In some remote parts of Scotland railways were never built and horse drawn carriage continued into the twentieth century, until replaced by motor vehicles.

Post Office experiments with motor transport began in the 1890s. Until the end of the First World War services were provided mainly by private contractors. In 1919 the Post Office introduced its own fleet of motor vehicles.

Much of the artwork in the series was commissioned by the Public Relations Department, which was first created in 1934, under the first Post Office Public Relations Officer, Stephen Tallents.

Right from the conception of the department, it assumed responsibility for commissioning designs for posters, which it considered to be a vital part of Post Office publicity, it did this initially in consultation with a 'Poster Advisory Group' but, from 1937, it operated in its own right. The department approached leading artists for the production of posters of two kinds, known respectively as 'Prestige' and 'Selling'. 'Prestige' posters fell into two categories: those specially prepared for distribution to schools and those for display in the public offices of Crown Post Offices and non-public offices in Post Office buildings, they were intended to be more formal in style, eye catching rather than persuasive. 'Selling' posters had a direct 'selling' appeal and were intended to persuade the beholder to use a particular service or buy a particular product.

The Post Office Greetings Telegram Service was introduced in July 1935 as a means of revitalising the telegraph service and the Public Relations Department was involved from the outset, involving itself both in publicising the new service and in commissioning artists to produce designs for the forms themselves. Greetings telegrams were to be associated with special occasions and as such, designs had to be particularly attractive, with an element of luxury, this was encapsulated in the golden envelope designed to accompany the form.

The Public Relations Department underwent several changes in structure throughout the decades following the 1930s, but the production of good publicity literature, both written and visual, continued to be a very important part of its remit. Post Corporation, commissioned artists tended to be less well known and the focus of the posters turned increasingly towards the promotion of special stamp issues and philatelic products.

In the 1990s, the Public Relations Department was renamed as Communication Services and was positioned as part of Royal Mail Group Centre. This signified a change in outlook, with an emphasis on 'hard sell' and the commissioning of advertising agencies to work on individual campaigns for special services and products.

The first ever main line railway opened in 1825 and ran between Stockton and Darlington. In 1827 the use of that railway, and future lines, for carriage of mails was suggested to Secretary Francis Freeling by Thomas Richardson (see POST 11/51). The first conveyance of mail by this method actually occurred on 11 November 1830 on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, less than two months after this second main line had opened (see POST 11/52). The Post Office was quick to take advantage of the new form of transport and in July 1837 mails were conveyed by train from Birmingham to Liverpool on the inaugural service of the Grand Junction Railway (see POST 11/57 and 58). In January 1838 the idea of having special mail carriages was experimented with; a horse box suitably fitted up started running between Birmingham and Liverpool on the Grand Junction in 1838. Proving a success, the first official 'travelling post office' set off from London to Preston on 1 October 1838.

In August 1838 an Act to provide for the conveyance of the mails by railways was passed by Parliament. This enabled the Postmaster General to compel railway companies to carry mails by ordinary or special trains, at such hours as the Postmaster General might direct, together with mail guards and other officers of the Post Office. Companies could also be required to provide carriages fitted up for sorting letters en route. In return, railway companies would receive a payment to be fixed, by arbitration if necessary, for any services and accommodation supplied. This Act provided the foundation for all future arrangements for carrying mails by rail.

Between 1838 and 1848 railways expanded rapidly in Britain and mails were quickly diverted to them from the roads. The London and Birmingham Railway, opened in September 1838, was the first important line to be completed in England and marked the end of the 'Golden Age' of coaching. From 1844, the year of 'railway mania', to 1848, 637 separate lines received their charters from Parliament. Mail coach contractors unable to get passengers essential to their operations where the railway ran a parallel route began giving notice to quit (see POST 11/60 and 61). The south western coaches ceased their runs when the Great Western Railway was completed to Bristol in June 1841. The last horse drawn mail from London, to Norwich via Newmarket, was withdrawn in January 1846. By this time the railway network was becoming moderately complete. However, up to the 1870s railway services in the provinces often operated in connection with mail coaches.

By the 1850s the railway posts were generally known as Travelling Post Offices or Sorting Carriages and a number of trains almost wholly devoted to carrying mail were in operation. (See also POST 18). Over the next seventy years railways contributed significantly to the vast improvement in quality, increase of volume and speed of postal communications within Britain. Serious competition was absent until the widespread use of motor vehicles from the second quarter of the twentieth century.

Not applicable.

Since the mid-nineteenth century, staff associations and unions have come into existence, acting on behalf of their members primarily on issues of pay and working conditions. In addition, clubs and societies have been formed, providing social and leisure opportunities. By 1890, the British workforce had been organised into workers unions and associations to a far greater degree than it had previously and the Post Office, which had grown in numbers as well as in the variety of its services (and therefore in the variety of occupations falling under its employment), was very much a part of this development. There were over 40 distinct grades of employment in the organisation and each had its own staff association. In 1919 these were amalgamated into the Union of Post Office Workers (UPW), although secessionist groups continued to break away from the UPW, which consequently struggled to remain united (which is perhaps explained by the diverse range of working conditions and pay that its members experienced). From the large-scale public enquiries at the beginning of the century, to the wholesale workers' strike of 1971, to the 1995 amalgamation into the Communications Workers' Union (CWU), staff associations, unions, clubs and societies have been an integral component, as collective organisations, to the history and development of the Post Office and its workforce. See POST 65 (Post Office Staff Associations) for relevant records and a more detailed account of this subject.

The majority of these associations and unions produced some form of literature, many publishing an association or union magazine or periodical. It is a wide range of this kind of material that is present in POST 115, which consists of in excess of 1,000 volumes. The class has been divided into eight Sub-Series, which cover the main types of publications that can be found. These are: Civil Service Associations Journals; Post Office Clerks Associations Journals; Postmen's Associations Journals; Postmasters' Associations Journals; Supervisory Grades Associations Journals; Post Office Engineering Union and Association Journals; Post Office Electrical Engineers' Journal; and The Rowland Hill Benevolent Fund. It is important to note that the official Post Office Magazine (entitled 'St Martin's le Grand' until its name changed to 'The Post Office Magazine' in 1934) is not an association, society or club publication and can consequently be found in POST 92.

The largest association in the history of Post Office staff associations is the UPW, which was formed in 1919 from the numerous, disparate and less formal associations that preceded this. In 1920, the UPW launched its official journal called 'The Post, the Organ of the Union of Post Office Workers' (Commonly referred to simply as 'The Post'). The first issue sold almost 90,000 copies and in another early issue, the editorial noted that 'Standing on the threshold of the New Year [1920] we are, as postal workers, confronted with one outstanding fact - amalgamation has occurred' (POST 115/437, p.27; p.32). This periodical is likewise a useful source of information (albeit from a UPW perspective) for subsequent events of importance to the Post Office through the twentieth century. Indeed, Martin Daunton and Alan Clinton (the two most prominent historians of the modern Post Office) have both made heavy use of 'The Post' in their work. Its name changed to 'The Post, the Journal of the Communication Union Workers' in 1980 and continued to be published until 1993. It should also be noted that 'The Post' is distinct from 'The Post of UPW House' which was a UPW newspaper that was filled with similar, but more informal content.

Beyond the 3,700+ issues of 'The Post', there remains over 45 distinct association and union publications that are available to view in POST 115. From 1890, the publications that predate the 1919 amalgamation include: 'The Postman's Gazette', 'The Post (the Organ of the Fawcett Association)', 'The Central London Review and The Postal and Telegraph Record', amongst others. There are journals representing women only such as 'Opportunity, The Organ of the Federation of Women Civil Servants' and many publications that relate to a particular issue of concern such as 'The Whitley Bulletin, The Official Publication of the National Whitley Council for the Civil Service'. Other major publications representing particular grades and types of employment include: 'The Controlling Officers' Journal'; 'The Sub-Postmaster, The Official Organ of the National Federation of Sub-Postmasters'; 'The Journal, The Official Journal of the Post Office Engineering Union'; and 'The Post Office Electrical Engineers' Journal'.

Other publications range from the specific, such as 'The Rowland Hill Fund Handbook', to the broader ranging, such as the numerous Civil Service newspapers and journals. These ran from 1890 to 1977 (although most stop at 1969, the year the Post Office ceased to be a Government Department) and include titles such as 'Red Tape' and 'The Quill'. Considering the following Civil Service journal should help the prospective reader avoid possible confusion: POST 115/1-38 is 'The Civilian', a Civil Service newspaper that ran from 1894-1928, which changed its name to 'The New Civilian' in 1926. There are a number of publications in this class where a slight name change has occurred. In each instance, the individual catalogue description alerts the reader to this. Additionally, the series description for 'The Civilian/The New Civilian' (immediately preceding POST 115/1 in the catalogue) states that volumes 51-113 are held in the archive. Beneath this, [in square brackets] it states that there are 38 volumes. The volume number in square brackets always refers to the number of bound volumes of material in the archive, the description 'Vols 51-113' above this refers to the original, contemporary volume numbers that this publication was serialised under.

The system of 'minuting' papers submitted to the Postmaster General by the Secretary to the Post Office for a decision (i.e. numbering the papers, and separately copying a note of the paper as a 'minute' into volumes indexed by subject) was introduced in 1793. It remained in use by the Post Office Headquarters registry until 1973.

Until 1921, several different major minute series were in use: that concerned with the Packet Service (POST 29), and those concerned with England and Wales (POST 30), Ireland (POST 31) and Scotland (POST 32). From 1790 until 1841, parallel 'Report' series were in use by the Secretary (POST 39 and POST 40)

In 1921, the several different minute series were replaced by a single all-embracing series (POST 33). This was suspended in 1941 as a wartime measure when a Decimal Filing system came into use (POST 102), but was resurrected in 1949. In 1955 the registration of Headquarters files began to be decentralised under several local registries serving particular departments, although the 'minuting' of cases considered worthy of preservation, and the assimilation of later cases with earlier existing minuted bundles, continued until 1973.

Please contact the Archive for further information.

History of Postal Drafts

With the passing of the National Insurance Act 1911, Approved Societies acting as agents of the Ministry of Health for the paying of National Insurance benefits approached the Post Office for a means of sending small remittances through the post, postal and money orders being unsuitable. An Interdepartmental Committee, including representatives of the Post Office and the National Health Insurance Joint Committee, was appointed by the Treasury in June 1913 to consider the matter and the postal draft was the outcome of the Committee's recommendations. The service was introduced at the end of 1914 with the approval of the Treasury and without specific statutory authority. Very few Approved Societies in fact made use of the system, preferring to pay benefits in person.

During the First World War the use of postal drafts was extended, by Treasury authority, to various Government departments and some quasi-Government departments, including departments established in the United Kingdom by Colonial Governments. The War Office and Admiralty were amongst the first departments granted permission to use the system for the payment of pensions and reserve pay. Postal drafts were a more economical method of sending remittances through the post and Government departments were encouraged to use them in place of money orders.

In 1934 a Postal Draft Committee report recommended extension of the system, by statute, to Friendly Societies, Trades Unions, Local Authorities, Public Utility Corporations, charitable organisations of a permanent character and other similar bodies. Nothing emerged from those recommendations and the majority of non-Governmental applicants were denied access to the system by the Post Office, which cited practical difficulties and lack of statutory authority. No definite policy for granting or refusing permission to utilise the system was ever established.

The system of postal drafts ceased in 1969 with the introduction of Girobank services.

The postal draft system

The postal draft was a form of cheque for small sums drawn on the Postmaster General. It provided for the payment of money which had to be remitted by post. Printed forms of drafts were supplied by the Post Office to issuing authorities - Approved Societies or Government

departments - which entered amounts and transmitted them to payees. Most forms were printed on watermarked paper and further protected by a colour band. The maximum amount payable was printed on the draft. Drafts could be cashed at any Post Office in Great Britain, Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic or at a specified post office. For the payment of sums over £10 evidence of identity was normally required from the payee. Paid drafts were returned to the issuing authority by the GPO and the account rendered. Advances to cover estimated payments were sent by issuing authorities to GPO Headquarters.

The Receiver General was an independent appointment, designed to remove all responsibilities for cash from the hands of the Postmaster General. There was, however, another major financial position in the Post Office, the Accountant General, who was appointed by the Postmaster General to keep an account of all revenue. This produced duplication of records. The Receiver General took receipt of all money paid into the Department, and paid costs directly from these funds.

The sources of income are mainly payments received from inland letters; window money (postage due on letters handed in by the public to the clerk behind the window of a post office); postmasters; letter receivers; returned letters; charges levied on incoming foreign letters. Expenditure includes payments for salaries of postmasters, letter carriers, sorters, window men, clerks of the roads and of the inland and foreign offices, inspectors, watchmen and other employees; ship letters; returned letters; accommodation, furnishings and equipment; travelling expenses; allowances and pensions; local taxes; contractors and tradesmen; building, hire, wear and tear of packet ships; captains fees. The balance of cash was transferred to the Exchequer.

Officials of The Post Office acted as the first newsagents in this country after the establishment of the public postal service. Six postal officials entitled 'Clerks of the Road' were privileged to frank gazettes at 2d, a reduced charge from letter post. Under the terms of the Franking Act 1764, newspapers bearing the signature of a Member of Parliament or sent to a member at any place which he advised were to go free. The Newspaper Office was established at the General Post Office in 1782 by John Palmer, following criticisms relating to the treatment of newspapers. With the coming of the French Revolution, the Clerks in the Foreign Office established a large foreign news agency. The Ship Letter Act of 1815 contained an important provision in favour of newspapers, providing the first enactment that allowed newspapers to go out of the United Kingdom at a cheaper rate than letters.

The act of 1764 also authorised Members of Parliament to frank newspapers. Many extended the provisions of the act by allowing free postage to booksellers and newsagents who rapidly took over a considerable part of the distribution of newspapers from the Clerks of the Road. An Act of 1825 legalised the free transmission of newspapers by post. In 1830 news vendors presented a petition to Parliament protesting against Post Office servants being allowed to compete with private dealers, and on 5 April 1834, The Post Office ceased to have a privileged interest in the franking of newspapers.

An act of 1855 abolished the compulsory payment of stamp duty on newspapers. Newspaper proprietors were allowed the option of printing on paper stamped to denote payment of stamp duty and thereby qualifying for free transmission by post or using unstamped paper and paying normal rates of postage, until 1870.

The Post Office Act of 1870 provided that newspapers fulfilling the conditions specified in the act were, after registration by The Post Office, entitled to transmission within the United Kingdom at a rate of ½d irrespective of weight. In 1897 weight restrictions were introduced. A grant of preferential tariff to the press was declared by a Treasury Committee in 1875, enabling The Post Office to transmit press releases and news messages to newspapers and other news institutions at the press tariff rate. By The Post Office (Newspapers Published in British Possessions) Act of 1913, copies of newspapers printed and published in any British possession or protectorate were admitted to the benefit of the inland newspaper rate. The Canadian Magazine Post introduced in 1907

allowed for the transmission of all newspapers registered at the Inland Newspaper rate and in addition publications issued at intervals of not more than 31 days, subject to certain conditions.

Until the late nineteenth century the carriage of parcels was in the hands of 'carters' or carriers, operating on a local basis. With the improvement of the roads in the eighteenth century and the inception of the railway services in the late 1820s, the volume of parcels conveyed by coach and railway increased. By the 1850s railway companies had cornered the bulk of this business. In 1842 Rowland Hill suggested that a parcel service should be operated by the Post Office. However, the government was content to let this business remain in the private sector, for the time being. By the 1860s the population explosion and dramatic expansion of British commerce and industry gradually forced the Post Office to give some thought to parcel post. A plan for the introduction of a parcels post was suggested in the 1860s by Rowland Hill and Frederick Hill, (Rowlands' brother and Assistant in the Postmaster General's Office).

The establishment of the General Postal Union in 1874, (now known as the Universal Postal Union) led to further discussions. In 1880 the union promulgated a convention for the exchange of postal parcels between Germany, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark, Egypt, Spain, France, Great Britain and Ireland, British India, Italy and Luxembourg. This envisaged the transmission of parcels up to 3 kilograms in weight. A convention was signed at Paris on 3 November 1880, due to come into operation on 1 October 1881. A protocol attached to this convention took note that Great Britain, Ireland and British India were not in a position to sign the convention as they did not have an inland parcels service at that time, and they were accordingly given until 1 April 1882 to bring the convention into effect.

On 11 February 1882, Henry Fawcett, Postmaster General, assisted by Frederick E Baines, Inspector General of mails, and Sir Arthur Blackwood, Secretary to the Post Office, submitted a memorandum analysing the various problems preventing the introduction of an inland Parcel Post service and suggesting ways of overcoming them.

An Act to amend the Post Office Acts with respect to the Conveyance of Parcels (45 and 46 Vict. Ch. 74), was passed by Parliament on 18 August 1882. Twelve of its seventeen sections dealt with matters arising from the negotiations between the Post Office and the railway companies; their remuneration and the services to be rendered by them.

The Inland Parcel Post came into operation on 1 August 1883 and 'letter-carriers' were entitled 'postmen' as a result. From 12 August 1884 the service was known as the Parcels Post. Parcels sent by the Post were limited to 7lbs in weight and the rates of postage ranged from 3d for 1lb to 1s for 7lbs.

The Accountant General was appointed by the Postmaster General to keep an account of all revenue in the Post Office. There was another major financial position, that of the Receiver General, who was appointed independently to remove all responsibilities for cash from the hands of the Postmaster General, taking receipt of all money paid into the department, and paid cash directly from these funds. These two positions overlapped, and there is much duplication of work, and records, and they were finally amalgamated in 1854.

A number of major changes took place during the period covered by this series. From 1 April 1922, Post Office services in Southern Ireland were transferred to the control of the provisional Irish Government. The growth in administration meant that aspects of work relating only to matters of local interest were devolved from central headquarters to district surveyors. In 1934 as part of a general reorganisation of the Post Office, a Director General was appointed to replace the office of Secretary to The Post Office. At the same time a Post Office Board was created under the chairmanship of the Post Master General. Further changes in 1934 led to the replacement of district surveyors by regional directors, who were given full powers of day-to-day control of local postal and telecommunications affairs in their regions. This reorganisation was complete by the mid-nineteen forties, with an increasing amount of work concerning local affairs being devolved from Headquarters, leaving it to deal only with matters of general policy and those outside the scope of regional authority.

British postal agencies, (also known as British Post Offices) were established in countries throughout the world to manage and monitor the arrangements and regulations for the conveyance of mail to and from Britain and to carry out these arrangements. Agents were appointed to conduct local affairs on behalf of the Postmaster General. Their duties included the receipt and despatch of mails, the collection of postage, maintenance of accounts and reporting to the Secretary in London any matters of concern.

In 1873, British Consuls were appointed as agents with the titles of British Post Office Agent.

In 1880 a Postal Conference was held at Paris with the view to creating an International Parcel Post. At that conference the British Post Office was represented, although having no Inland Parcel Post it was unable to enter into any international agreement.

The Inland Parcel Post came into operation on 1 August 1883, and from the outset it was intended to link this service with the International Parcel Post as soon as possible.

Early in 1883 the proposals to be submitted to the forthcoming Postal Congress were being circulated and it was apparent that there would be an attempt to introduce into the Parcel Post Convention modifications which the Post Office would find very difficult to accept while its parcel post was yet in its infancy. A circular letter

was sent to all the signatories of the convention asking whether they were willing to concede to Great Britain the special terms agreed to at the Paris Conference of 1880. The replies to the circular were generally favourable but the Treasury at this time declined to allow the Post Office to proceed with negotiations until the Inland Parcel Post was more firmly established. It was not until November 1884 that authority for the establishment of a Foreign and Colonial Parcel Post was at length obtained, and the service established.

An overseas mail service has been in operation since 1580, before the establishment of the public postal service. A staff of ten Royal Couriers carried letters on affairs of State, or on the business of 'particular merchants' to Dover. In 1619 the office of Postmaster General for foreign parts was created. His couriers, who wore distinctive badges, carried letters between London and the Continent. A public office was maintained near the Exchange, where writing desks for public use were provided and where details of the Posts were displayed. Mails were despatched twice a week. By 1700 the Dover packet boats provided services to France and Flanders, and additional Packet Stations had been established. That at Harwich (established in 1660) provided a service to the Netherlands and that at Falmouth (established in 1689) provided services to Spain and Portugal. During the next century the Falmouth Station grew in importance, providing new services to the West Indies and serving British fleets in the Mediterranean. 'Packet ships/boats' is a generic term for vessels carrying mails. The contracts use the term 'packet ships' and/or vessels.

The incentive to change from sail to steam power on packets carrying the Irish mail was the need to recapture passenger income. This vital supplement to the packet captains' income from their mail carrying contracts with the Post Office was rapidly being lost to other competing Government-operated vessels and to the new fast privately-operated steamship services coming into use across the Irish Sea during 1818-1819. The Post Office's first experiments with steam power took place early in 1819, with trials of the privately owned steamers Talbot and Ivanhoe. By June 1821 - the journey time halved - the Post Office had built its own steam driven packet boats for the Holyhead station: the Meteor and the Lightening. By the end of the year steam packets were also serving the Dover Station and a revolutionary change in postal communication by sea had begun. Thus after this time the contracts often refer to 'steam vessels' rather than packet boats.

In 1823, following arguments that there would be less smuggling should the packets be under naval control, a measure that would also ensure an effective armed force in and around Channel waters, the Admiralty took control of the Falmouth Station. Management of the packet stations had become so much criticised that the remainder of the packet station were turned over to the Admiralty in 1837, where they remained until 1860 when they were transferred back to the Post Office. Thus between 1837 and 1860 the contracts were between the Admiralty and shipping companies.