Records of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, 1760-2002. The archive is central to the history of the modern Jewish community in Britain. It covers virtually every facet of Jewish life in Britain in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries - assimiliation, education, political emancipation, Shechita, anti-Semitism. The archive is particularly interesting on the conditions of Jewry outside the UK - there is a lot of information, for example, on the rise of fascism in mainland Europe in the 1930s and the Holocaust.

Correspondence of Chief Rabbi Hermann Adler, 1868-1921, relating to diverse subjects including education, legal cases, Jews College, shechita, charity and relief funds, Russo-Jewish Committee, the United Synagogue, administration, provincial congregations and marriages; and relating to foreign places including Australia, China, Japan, Palestine, Jerusalem, Ireland, Romania, South Africa, Russia and New York.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, Office of Chief Rabbi, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Records of Chief Rabbi Lord Immanuel Jakobovits, 1913-1992. The records of Lord Jakobovits are the single largest part of the archive, indicative of the large volume of work undertaken and the relative speed with which the records were passed onto London Metropolitan Archives.

Records relating to the Office of the Chief Rabbi and Chief Rabbi's Cabinet including papers relating to social functions and administration. Correspondence with the Board of Deputies, London Beth Din and United Synagogue. Papers relating to Jewish communal organisations including the Kol Nidre Appeal and the Joint Israel Appeal.

Papers relating to education and Chaplaincy Boards including general correspondence, the Education Reform Act 1988, Jews' College, individual schools, colleges and universities, the University Jewish Chaplaincy Board, and the National Jewish Chaplaincy Board. Papers of the Jewish Educational Development Trust including administration, correspondence, financial records, trustees, donors, applications, fundraising and policies.

Papers relating to Jewish religious organisations including Reform, Liberal and Sephardi congregations and the Spanish and Portuguese Community. Papers relating to congregations and ministers in Great Britain including the registration of synagogues, the National Jewish Chaplaincy Board and provincial congregations.

Halacha [a legal decision regarding a matter or case for which there is no direct enactment in the Mosaic law, deduced by analogy from this law or from the Scriptures] and rulings on religious questions including correspondence, rulings relating to burial practices, the participation of women in communities, blasphemy, medical ethics, circumcision, bar mitzvah, marriage, conversions, get [divorce] legislation, High Holy Days and mikvaot. Papers relating to Shechita [slaughtering practices] and Kashrut [laws relating to food] including correspondence and minutes of the London Board for Shechita and the National Council of Shechita Boards of Great Britain, general correspondence, reports, and defence of shechita practices.

Papers relating to bills in the House of Lords. Correspondence with central Government departments and local authorities, including correspondence with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Correspondence with welfare organisations and papers relating to ageing, child abuse, crime, drugs, homelessness, hospice care, disabled people and individual welfare cases. Correspondence with religious leaders, individuals, and organisations relating to Israel, including the Chief Rabbinate of Israel.

Correspondence with overseas congregations including those in Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Ireland, Russia, South Africa, and the United States of America and correspondence with the Conference of European Rabbis. Papers relating to Soviet Jewry including correspondence, appeals and reports.

Papers relating to interfaith organisations including the Council of Christians and Jews. Papers relating to medical ethics including abortion, sex education, AIDS, organ transplants, Tay-Sachs disease and abortion. Papers relating to social issues including business ethics, disarmament, homosexuality, inner cities, disasters, and race relations. Correspondence relating to the representation of the Chief Rabbi on various public bodies and patronage by the Chief Rabbi.

Copies of sermons, addresses, publications from the office of the Chief Rabbi, press and publicity, broadcasts and messages from the Chief Rabbi. Personal papers including household accounts, letters of thanks and messages of sympathy. Papers relating to the Chief Rabbinate Fund including the distribution of funds to various causes.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, Office of Chief Rabbi, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Records from the Chief Rabbinate of Israel Brodie, 1917-1967, including public messages, circular letters, prayers and appeals issued by the Chief Rabbi; orders of service; correspondence with a variety of individuals and organisations including the Anglo-Jewish Association, Aria College, the London Beth Din, the Board of Deputies, the Central Council of Jewish Religious Education, Jewish Day Schools Council, the Jewish Board of Guardians, Jews' College, the London Jewish Hospital; the Kashrus Commission; the Kosher School Meals Service, the London Board of Jewish Religious Education, London County Council, the Rabbinical Commission, the London Board for Shechita, and the United Synagogue.

Correspondence with congregations in Great Britain and Ireland, including arrangements for pastoral tours, and correspondence with congregations abroad including in America, Australia, Canada, France, India, Israel, New Zealand, South Africa and the Soviet Union.

Correspondence on subjects including anti-semitism, kosher food, marriage, relief organisations, congregations, education, yeshivot, refugees, Hebrew pronunciation, Israel, liberal Judaism and reform synagogue, Russian Jews, shechita, sopherim training, and teacher training.

Papers relating to the Committee on Calendar Reform including minutes and resolutions of protest. Papers relating to refugees and post-war reconstruction, including report on Belsen Concentration Camp, reports and correspondence of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims against Germany, Commission on the Status of Jewish War Orphans in Europe, Refugee Rabbis Relief Programme and speeches made at the League of Nations.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, Office of Chief Rabbi, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Records of Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, 1988-1999, including correspondence and publications predating Sacks' election as Chief Rabbi; correspondence; administrative files; papers relating to the United Synagogue; papers relating to organisations including the Jewish Memorial Council, the Jewish National Fund, the Joint Israel Appeal, the Zionist Association, the Jewish Marriage Council, and provincial organisations; correspondence relating to the patronage of the Chief Rabbi; papers relating to education including papers of the Jewish Educational Development Trust, correspondence with various schools and universities including the Jews' Free School, Immanuel College, Jews College, Anglo-Jewish Youth, and the Union of Jewish Students; correspondence with welfare organisations including Jewish Care and the Central Council for Jewish Community Services.

Papers relating to political issues including community relations, medical ethics, shechita [slaughtering practices], kosher foods, kashrut [food laws], women in the community, Soviet Jewry, circumcision, Middle East peace talks, anti-Semitism and racism, the Shoah and the Holocaust, business ethics and inner cities; papers relating to overseas congregations including Israel, United States of America, Australia, Canada, South Africa, New Zealand, Europe and Russia; papers relating to the media including correspondence with journalists and broadcasters, copies of articles, interviews, press cuttings, addresses, speeches and lectures, broadcasts, and press statements; papers relating to interfaith organisations including the Council of Christians and Jews, and correspondence with Lambeth Palace, the Islamic community and the Vatican; papers relating to campaigns organised by the Chief Rabbi including the Community Walk for Charity, Jewish Continuity, the Initiative for Developing Education in Adults and the Chief Rabbinate Awards for Excellence; and newsletters from the office of the Chief Rabbi.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, Office of Chief Rabbi, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Records of Chief Rabbi Joseph Hertz, 1899-1946, including correspondence with various individuals and organisations including the Anglo-Jewish Association, Aria College, the London Beth Din, the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Conference of Anglo-Jewish Preachers, the Jewish Association for the Protection of Girls and Women, the Jewish Chronicle, Jews' College, Central Committee for Jewish Education, the Jewish Historical Society, the Jewish Memorial Council, the Council for Christians and Jews, the Jewish Peace Society, London County Council, the Metropolitan Hospital Sunday Fund, the Mizrachi Organisation, the Provincial Ministers Fund, the Spanish and Portuguese Congregation, associate synagogues of the United Synagogue, the War Graves Commission, Zionist groups, the Talmud Torah Trust and the War Victims Fund.

Also correspondence with Jewish congregations throughout the United Kingdom and in countries including Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Egypt, France, Germany, Holland, New Zealand, Palestine, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Switzerland and the United States of America; correspondence relating to matters including shechita, Jews in Ukraine, Germany and Poland, war orphans, rabbinical exams, mikvah, marriages, kabolohs, disarmament, the Coronation of King George VI (1937), and pastoral tours of Wales and Ireland; papers relating to World War One including services for Jewish soldiers, the Kosher Food Fund, correspondence with chaplains, distribution of kosher foods, prisoners of war and Palestine Relief Fund, and copies of publications and sermons.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, Office of Chief Rabbi, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Correspondence of Chief Rabbi Nathan Adler, 1868-1901. A small number of records survive from around 1868 for the Chief Rabbinate of Nathan Adler and more from the late 1870s onwards - around the time Hermann Adler began to undertake many of his father's duties for him. The records consist of bundles of letters to the Chief Rabbi from communal organisations and individuals in Britain and overseas.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, Office of Chief Rabbi, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Records of the Deputy for the Chief Rabbi, 1942-1950, comprising correspondence with various individuals and organisations, including provincial congregations in Wales and England and congregations in Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, Palestine, Russia, South Africa and the United States of America.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, Office of Chief Rabbi, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Correspondence and papers of Dr Moses Gaster, his family, and the family of his wife Lucy (née Friedlander), 1796-1973, dating largely from the 1870s to the 1930s, also including some material on Gaster's life and work which post-dates his death. Many papers relate to Gaster's activities in his official posts, notably as Haham, to his interests in Jewish affairs and Zionism, and as a scholar, but the collection touches upon a wide range of topics in late 19th and early 20th century history, including the history of Rumanian Jewry and Anglo-Jewry. The bulk of the collection comprises Gaster's correspondence, which includes letters from Jewish and Zionist organisations in Britain, Europe and Jerusalem, from newpapers, periodicals and publishers, and from a large number of individuals outside Gaster's family, including eminent British, European and American Jewish scholars, rabbis and public figures, such as members of the Adler, Gollancz, Mocatta, Montefiore and Rothschild families, and with non-Jewish public figures, but it also includes a wide range of other material. The main series mostly cover much or all of Gaster's adult life. Some material of the same type or on the same subject is separated between different sections of this large collection.

Correspondence series include letters from organisations and individuals outside Gaster's family, one sequence sorted alphabetically by correspondent; one sequence sorted chronologically, 1874-1939, with a few other items, the earliest dating from 1854; a sequence of undated letters, sorted alphabetically; letters received by Gaster on the emigration of Rumanian Jewry, including to England, 1900; Gaster's out-letters and copies of letters written by him, 1887-1939; copies of letters from Gaster to the Zionist Chaim Weizmann dating from the 1900s and 1910s; letters not written by or addressed to Gaster, 1870-1939 and undated.

A series of bound volumes contains press cuttings and other items, largely printed, including circulars and pamphlets, with some letters received and written by Gaster, and relates to various subjects, although much of the material was apparently bound haphazardly; the contents, overall dating largely from 1879-1939 but with items of 1796, 1838-1849, and 1867, include persecution of Jews in Rumania and elsewhere; emigration; Anglo-Jewish matters and the Anglo-Jewish Association; hospitals and schools; lectures, weddings, and other functions; the Board of Deputies of British Jews; Shechita; the Slaughter Bill, 1911; the Spanish-Portuguese congregation, including Bevis Marks Synagogue and Gaster's 25th anniversary as Haham, 1912; Independent Order of B'nai B'rith; letters congratulating Gaster on his engagement, marriage and birth of his children, and on the 'Gaster Anniversary Volume' ; Zionism, including the Jewish Colonial Trust, and Zionist Congresses in 1905, 1907 and 1913; Palestine; the Royal Asiatic Society; the Folklore Society.

Printed ephemera, dating from the 1870s to the 1930s, includes invitations to lectures, weddings and other events; visiting and greeting cards and condolences.

Papers, 1890-1896, on the Ramsgate affair relate to Gaster's association with the College there, the controversy over his management, and events leading up to his departure in 1896.

Papers relating to Zionism include copies of letters between Gaster and Theodor Herzl at the turn of the 20th century and other Zionist correspondence and papers up to the Balfour Declaration of 1917; file of letters and telegrams, some copies, from Winston (Leonard Spencer) Churchill, 1906-1908; volume of minutes of Council meetings of the London Zionist League, 1904-1910; microfilms of Zionist sources, among them Herzl letters held elsewhere.

Pamphlets, 1944-1950, relate to the Anglo-Jewish Association, a London conference of Jewish organisations, Palestine, the Jews in Britain, and Jewish Relief Units in Germany.

Working papers include notebooks, many undated, relating to Gaster's studies (from the 1870s) and later research; typescript and some manuscript reviews, sermons, letters to the press, obituary articles or notices, speeches and articles by Gaster; loose press cuttings of Gaster's reviews and articles, and cuttings on Gaster himself and his areas of interest; reproductions of texts and manuscripts and working notes by Gaster on his scholarly research.

Papers on Gaster's life, work and estate include a photostat manuscript catalogue of Gaster's Hebrew, Samaritan and other manuscripts and printed books, with annotations postdating Gaster's death in 1939; papers relating to Gaster's manuscripts which passed to the British Library, John Rylands Library and Rumanian Academy, including manuscript and typescript descriptions of manuscripts, and correspondence, 1925-1926, 1941, 1961-1962, on their disposal; papers dating from the 1940s to the 1960s on the estate of Gaster's wife (d 1940) and disposal of her books and on Gaster's will, estate and the disposal of his books and manuscripts including his Judaica, the sale of his Rumanian library to the School of Slavonic Studies, the disposal of Samaritan and Hebrew manuscripts to the John Rylands Library, his papers at University College London; material, including press cuttings and papers to 1971, on Gaster's publications, including a copy of his 'History of the Ancient Synagogue ... in Bevis Marks ... 1701-190' (published in 1901); papers to 1961 on the 'Gaster Centenary Publication' (first published in 1936), the centenary of Gaster's birth in 1956, and his publications; papers on Gaster's life and work following his death in 1939, including a file of Vivian Gaster's correspondence on his father to 1973.

Personal papers include Gaster's appointment diaries; congratulations on Gaster's engagement (1889); various rolled or printed addresses to Gaster as Haham, from Jewish communities; certificates, including one for Gaster's election as Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, 1930; letters of congratulation and cuttings on Gaster's 80th birthday (1936); typescript autobiographical notes and reminiscences by Gaster; papers on Gaster's death, 1939, including a scrapbook of cuttings.

Family papers include a genealogical roll of the Gaster family; two photograph albums, largely undated but apparently dating from the latter 19th century, many items unlabelled but some taken in Bucharest, Breslau and London and some identified as members of the Friedlander and Gaster families; correspondence, comprising letters from Gaster's family in Rumania, 1873-1939 and undated; Gaster's original letters to his family in Rumania, from 1874; letters from Gaster to his wife and children, 1885-1939 and undated, and a diary of Gaster on a journey to Palestine, 1907; letters to Moses Gaster from his wife Lucy, between Moses and Lucy and their children, and from the Friedlander family to Moses and Lucy Gaster, 1888-1939; letters from Lucy to her parents, Michael and Bertha Friedlander, before and after her marriage, 1880-1922; Friedlander family correspondence including letters from Michael Friedlander to his wife Bertha, from 1866, and to the Friedlanders from the Gasters; other letters received by the Friedlanders from their family and others, largely 1870-1927 and undated. Other Friedlander papers comprise papers of Michael Friedlander, including notes, and working papers and correspondence relating to Jews' College, including its administration and courses; and the diary of Bertha Friedlander (wife of Michael Friedlander and mother of Lucy Gaster, née Friedlander), 1893-1898.

Papers, 1950s-1986, of Marguerite Jellicoe, relating to her work in the Singida District of Tanzania, including research material forming the basis for her book The Long Path. The notes and transcripts of tapes give an insight into the Rimi/Nyaturu tribe before it became integrated into mainstream life. Topics such as spiritual life, diet, medical knowledge, customs and beliefs are covered.

Records of the Kashrut Division of the London Beth Din, 1951-1983. The collection consists mainly of financial records together with some material on koshering work at private functions and newscuttings scrapbooks.

PLEASE NOTE: Written permission from the depositors is required to access this collection. Contact the Chief Executive, United Synagogue, 735 High Road, North Finchley, London NW12 OUS.

Records of the Court of the Chief Rabbi, London Beth Din, 1904-1988. The bulk of the archive transferred to London Metropolitan Archives are the administrative papers and general correspondence of the Court, and in particular that of the Clerks and Registrar. There are also files concerning consultations the Beth Din undertook with the Government on the Matrimonial and Family Proceedings Bill in the 1980s. Some correspondence and rough notes of the individual Dayanim and records relating to work done with refugees in the Second World War have also been deposited.

Records of the Rabbinical Commission for the Licensing of Shochetim, including Commission minutes; general correspondence and correspondence with Shechita Boards.

Records of the United Synagogue's Head Office, including minutes, agendas, presented papers, printed annual reports and accounts, byelaws and standing orders, papers relating to property, letter books and correspondence, financial accounts, insurance papers, membership papers, records relating to staff, administrative records, photographs, press cuttings, orders of service, Aubrey Newman's files, and papers relating to Soviet Jewry. This material has been catalogued in 20 sub-fonds (ACC/2712/01 to ACC/2712/20).

Also included in this collection are records of the individual member synagogues; these comprise mainly membership records, but there are also administrative and financial records for some synagogues. Records of bodies connected with the United Synagogue to a greater or lesser extent are also included in this collection, such as the Office of the Chief Rabbi, London Beth Din and Beth Hamedrash, the Kashrut Commission and various Jewish friendly societies and charities. The United Synagogue's close links with Anglo-Jewish education are also represented in the collection, including records of individual schools such as the Jews' Free School. These records have been catalogued in 47 separate sub-fonds (ACC/2712/AJE to ACC/2712/WWS). Please see individual sub-fonds for further information.

PLEASE NOTE: Records can only be accessed with the written permission of the depositor. Contact the Chief Executive, United Synagogue.