British Isles Online Primary Resources: Government Documents

Adam Matthew Archive Explorer is a way to do a general search across many of Adam Matthew digital collections. They are an English company producing digital versions of English records. We own quite a number of their collections and they do have government documents in them.

medieval to modern British History Online is a digital library of core printed British rimary and secondary sources about people, places, and businesses from the medieval through modern periods. It is being created jointly by the Institute of Historical Research and the History of Parliament Trust. Texts from the Centre for Metropolitan History, the Victoria County History Project, Survey of London, and early journals of the Houses of Commons and Lords are also present.

1100-1800 MEMSO is a collection of full text searchable digitized texts of English primary source material produced by the Crown (executive branch of government) from 1100-1800 including English, Irish, Scottish and Colonial governmental, legal, financial, historical, ecclesiastical, and foreign diplomatic material. Rolls Series. Calendars of State Papers Foreign and Domestic. Also includes searchable full texts of the Historical Manuscripts Commission’s materials and records of historical associations devoted to study of significant individuals, events, and places. Use federated search to search for topics across all sources or browse and read individual documents. Download books in html or PDF format.

500-1914 Provides modernized English language texts for major primary sources in English history from 500 to 1914, including American Colonial era documents. Browse by subjects (technology, foreign affairs, etc.), chronological timeline, or by original published volume order. Search by keyword or use advanced search for specific document title, personal name, or place name. Based on the print series (Main DA 26 .E55) edited by David C. Douglas.

1509-1603 Covers State Papers Domestic, and State Papers Foreign, Scotland, Borders, Ireland and Registers of the Privy Council

1574-1739 Colonial State Papers (CO 1) provides access to thousands of papers concerning English activities in the American, Canadian, and West Indian colonies between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. Also included is a digitised version of The Calendar of State Papers, Colonial: North America and the West Indies 1574-1739, which contains bibliographic records and extracts for thousands of additional documents.

MODULE I: EARLY SETTLEMENT, EXPANSION AND RIVALRIES
The first module of Colonial America documents the early history of the colonies, and includes founding charters, material on the effects of 1688’s Glorious Revolution in North America, records of piracy and seaborne rivalry with the French and Spanish, and copious military material from the French and Indian War of 1756-63.

MODULE II: TOWARDS REVOLUTION
This module focuses on the 1760s and 1770s and the social and political protest that led to the Declaration of Independence, including legal materials covering the aftermath of the Boston Tea Party. It is also particularly rich in material relating to military affairs and Native Americans.

MODULE III: THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
This module charts the upheavals of the 1770s and 1780s which saw the throwing off of British rule in the Thirteen Colonies. Contents include volumes of intercepted letters between colonists, the military correspondence of the British commanders in the field and material produced by the Ordnance Office and the office of the Secretary at War, as well as two copies of the ‘Dunlap’ edition of the Declaration of Independence printed on the night of the 4th-5th July 1776.

MODULE IV: LEGISLATION AND POLITICS IN THE COLONIES
The material in this module consists mostly of the text of acts of assembly and the minutes of assembly and council sessions, building up to a comprehensive picture of the colonies’ legislative and political evolution.

MODULE V: GROWTH, TRADE AND DEVELOPMENT
The preponderant part of this module consists of correspondence with the Board of Trade. There are also details of land grants, financial accounts and documents focusing on American Indian relations, as well as George Vancouver’s despatches to London from his 1791 expedition to the Pacific Northwest. The module contains a number of shipping returns, accompanied by a video interview with Hannah Knox Tucker (PhD candidate, University of Virginia), who discusses these documents and their value for researchers in detail.

Includes:

Bills and Acts 1695-2015
Command Papers 1833-2015
House of Commons Papers 1715-2015
House of Lords Papers 1715-1805
Hansard (Debates) 1803-2005
Journals 1688-1834
Debates 1774-1805
Histories and Proceedings 1660-1743

For help to use this material contact Agnes Haigh Widder, widder@msu.edu. Also see http://libguides.lib.msu.edu/c.php?g=96034.

1600-
Module 1: Trade, Governance and Empire, 1600-1947
Module 2: Factory Records for South Asia and South-East Asia
This digital resource allows students and researchers to access a vast and remarkable collection of primary source documents from the India Office Records held by the British Library, the single most important archive for the study of the East India Company.

1898- Upon completion this resource will contain 56,000 U.K. government documents relating to Britain's international relations, including foreign policy instructions, letters and memos, business reports, and more. These primary source materials have been selected by the official historians of Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and, in many cases, have been declassified at their request for inclusion in this series. This resource offers single-point online access from three print series: British Documents on the Origins of War, 1898-1914 (Main stacks D 505 .G68 v. 1-11 contains material on the tensions that led to WWI), Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939 (Main stacks DA 566.7 .A18 Ser 1-3 v. 1-65 interwar period with items on Italo-Ethiopian War and German affairs), and Documents on British Policy Overseas (Main stacks DA 588 .D63 1984 Series 1-4 17 volumes plus cds and microfiche with items on atomic energy, the Korean conflict and the Cold War).

1903-1962 This electronic resource contains a detailed finding aid of all classes of materials at the U.K. National Archives on women along with full texts of documents held there on the suffrage question in Britain, the Empire, and British colonial territories. The full text documents cover the campaign for and granting of suffrage to women from 1903-1928 re Britain itself and 1930-1962 re her colonies. Includes also Home Office files (HO 45), a chronology, Parliamentary debates and committee reports, and information on: individual suffragettes, the ‘Cat and Mouse’ campaign, police surveillance, and prison conditions.

1914-1918 Contains primary sources for the study of the Great War, brought together in four thematic modules. From personal collections and rare printed material to military files, artwork and audio-visual files, content highlights the experiences of soldiers, civilians and governments on both sides of a conflict that shook the world. Allows for study of personal experiences, propaganda and recruitment, visual materials, and WWI as a global conflict.

1947-1980Foreign Office Files for India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, 1947-1980 consists of the complete run of documents in the series DO 133, DO 134 and FCO 37, as well as all documents covering the Indian subcontinent in the FO 371 series. Events covered include independence and partition, the Indian annexation of Hyderabad and Goa, war between India and Pakistan, tensions and war between India and China, the consolidation of power of the Congress Party in India, military rule in Pakistan, the turbulent independence of Bangladesh and the development of nuclear weapons in the region. We also offer other Foreign Office Files. Use the Database A-Z list and search the title Foreign Office Files to find them.

1957-1963 Provides complete coverage of the Cabinet conclusions (minutes) and memoranda of U.K. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan’s government, plus selected minutes and memoranda of policy committees. Cabinet conclusions are taken by the secretary of the Cabinet or one of their assistants and consist of summaries of all discussions in Cabinet, together with a note of decisions reached. Cabinet memoranda consist of all papers circulated to members of the Cabinet and to other ministers for information or as a basis for discussion. These classes provide a distillation of the work of all the other departments of government, ranging in subject matter from agricultural policy and trade to nuclear policy and issues of international diplomacy. This collection also includes 165 files from the Prime Minister's Private Office. These provide an important supplement to the Cabinet records and cover all aspects of policymaking.