@chuarchives.bsky.social
Where the modern history of Britain is open to all. Home to the personal papers of 600 political, military, and scientific figures. https://archives.chu.cam.ac.uk/
Photo of Nicholas Archer
Photo of Geoffrey Cowling
2 #BDOHP interviews for the price of one! Nicholas Archer, who was wrestling with the Palestinian question 20 years ago, and Geoffrey Cowling, who has some hair-raising tales of dealing with hippie trail overdose cases in Kabul in the 1970s.
buff.ly/u3ET8kf and buff.ly/JeCi2vf
@FCDOHistorians
Sophie Bridges, one of our archivists, will be presenting on ‘Responsibility without authority’: Angela Raspin and Churchill Archives Centre’ at the Women's History Network conference this September.
You can register to attend online at the link below ⬇️
#WomensHistory #Archives
Annie explaining the different spaces available to students in the Churchill College library
Visitors showing each other the library's fruit-themed study buddies
Visitors looking at Margaret Thatcher's handbag
Visitors looking at a reading room exhibition, bringing together rare books and archive material on Balliol College
📚Last week we joined up with Annie, Librarian at Churchill College to host a visit for our friends in the library and archives team at @ballioloxford.bsky.social.
❤️We love it when we get to meet with fellow library and archives professionals and learn from each other about our approaches & work!
Baroness Hilary Armstrong, Baroness Gillian Shephard, Deborah McGurran, Anne Campbell, Dame Athene Donald, Baroness Anne Jenkin, and Boni Sones OBE at Churchill College in 2024.
Deborah McGurran, Allen Packwood, Baroness Spelman and Boni Sones OBE at Churchill College, Cambridge.
🖼️ New Online Exhibition Launch 🖼️
We’re excited to share the launch of 'Groundbreakers: In Their Own Words' — a new online exhibition celebrating the voices and experiences of some of the most influential women in British parliamentary history.
www.chuarchivestories.uk/stories/grou...
Portrait photograph of Lettice Marston in uniform
Montage of souvenirs from the Potsdam Conference
80 years ago today, the Potsdam Conference began.
Lettice Marston (later Churchill's personal secretary 1946-65) went to Berlin as a member of the planning staff making arrangements for the conference on the post-war future of Europe.
Marston's archive is a recent addition to our collections
One of Jean Barker, Baroness Trumpington's scrapbooks before and after conservation treatment. Source: TRUM 1/5
An early page from one of Jean Barker’s scrapbooks, including a photograph of Jean in Paris in 1946. Source: TRUM 1/5
The opening page from a scrapbook covering Jean Barker’s life in the early 2000s, captioned ‘Shades of my Youth’. Source: TRUM 1/43
Jean Barker’s scrapbooks enclosed in a bespoke clamshell box made from archival box-board. Source: TRUM 1/3-4
👋 Hi again, it’s David, one of our Conservation team. We recently conserved the scrapbooks belonging to Jean Barker, Baroness Trumpington. Being poor quality materials they have suffered deterioration. Some were able to be repaired but all albums were re-housed into custom-made ‘clam-shell’ boxes.
11.07.2025 09:15 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Image Reference: COWL G Illustration of the Battle of Britain, with locations labelled in the UK and Europe, with illustrations of planes and soldiers moving across the land
Image reference: WCHL 5/37 One page from a booklet regarding The Battle of Britain printed by HMSO, containing a picture of pilots and a quote: "The gratitude of every home in our Island, in our Empire, and indeed throughout the world, except in the abodes of the guilty, goes out to the British airman, who, undaunted by odds, unwearied in their constant challenge and mortal danger, are turning the tide of world war by their prowess and by their devotion. Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few" - The Prime Minister
On this day in 1940, the Battle of Britain began. It was the first major military campaign fought entirely by air forces. The Battle of Britain marked the first major defeat of Germany's military forces, with air superiority seen as the key to victory.
10.07.2025 11:28 — 👍 4 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
A member of the Archives Centre team sat behind a table hosting research guides and other Archives Centre goodies, including a lightbox spelling @chuarchives.
A @chuarchives lightbox surrounded by Archives Centre pin badges, postcards, pens, leaflets, bookmarks, and research guides.
Archives Centre research guides and games.
🌟It's Open Day time here in Cambridge!🌟
👋If you're around in Cambridge, then do visit our Archives Centre stall in the buttery at Churchill College.
🔎You can explore highlights from our scientific collections with our rummage box and help yourself to our Archives Centre goodies too.
Randolph and Diana Churchill, Clementine and Winston's eldest children, standing next to each other, dressed in tennis whites, holding tennis rackets in their right hands, CSCT 5/5.
🎾As another week of tennis begins at Wimbledon, we had a look in some of Clementine Churchill's photograph albums and found this lovely shot of a young Randolph & Diana Churchill in their tennis whites!
📷 Browse the full album on our Access Portal: buff.ly/UpyCssg
📊 Ever heard of ABC1? It's the most widely understood & quoted of Britain’s social stratification schemes.
But where did it come from and when was it first used?
📖 Find out in our latest blog by Robert Kelsey, one of our researchers here at Churchill College.
Diary entry from Henry Rawlinson's war journal (RWLN 1/5) "The battle has begun well...", Letters written to Gwendoline Churchill (PCHL 5/2) "We have just been in a fearful battle, and no good done..." and Jennie Churchill (CHAR 28/127) "we don't get such severe cases as we did from the front up here..." and snippets from the Autobiography of Major-General Douglas Wimberley (WIMB) "we watched the battle in the distance" "-poor chap, he was killed a few weeks later" "day I shan't forget in a hurry"
On this day in 1916, the Battle of the Somme began. Archives are an invaluable resource when researching events such as this. You can use various diary entries, letters to loved ones and autobiography reminiscences to view the event through numerous points of view. #otd #onthisday
01.07.2025 14:09 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Original packaging – with an apology from the Royal Mail
Carefully unfolding one of the burnt pages
‘Float’ washing a page to remove staining and other adverse chemicals
Completed page dried and trimmed
🔥 Our latest conservation challenge is from the Davidson Nicol collection – a letter partially destroyed by fire during transit in the post.
🏊🏼♀️ David, our Conservator, ‘float’ washed the damaged papers using a silk screen, then lined them with a layer of pre-adhered Japanese paper.
Induction day attendees listening to a talk on digital archives
Induction day attendees in the conservation studio
Induction day attendees identifying material for a display
Induction day attendees preparing a display
On Monday we ran an induction day for people interested in a career in archives, records management or conservation. We loved meeting the attendees and showing them some of the areas we work in. It was a packed schedule!
More about our volunteer programme and induction days here: buff.ly/vxFMH3y
Researchers looking at display in the reading room
Director Allen showing a visitor a Nobel Prize
Researchers looking at display in the reading room
It was great to connect with @teichlab.bsky.social earlier this week. Our volunteers curated an exhibition about scientific breakthroughs, particularly the discovery of DNA, for current researchers based in Cambridge.
A meeting point for modern and historical science!
#archives
🎉 Excited to see this book's publication. Our archives made a small contribution, providing historic photographs of Elizabeth Monroe Boggs that are preserved in the archive of Sir John Lennard-Jones.
Congratulations to the authors!
Photograph of Randolph Churchill and other war correspondents sitting round a table with typewriters, notes and drinks
Front cover of the Daily Telegraph Foreign News Service notes for correspondents abroad (third issue, January 1950)
Press cutting titled "Reported fall of South Korean Capital", 27 June 1950
Press cutting titled "Communist Troops move into S. Korea", 26 June 1950
#onthisday 75 years ago the #KoreanWar started
📷 Randolph Churchill and other war correspondents in Korea, Aug 1950, RDCH 9/3/16
📷 Churchill's copy of the Daily Telegraph Notes for Correspondents Abroad, RDCH 4/20
📷 Press cuttings on the start of the War, June 1950, papers of Noel-Baker, NBKR 4/426
Thank you so much! :)
20.06.2025 09:57 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
🌟 This has made our week!
😊 Thank you to our lovely researchers for their kind words about our work here at the Archives Centre.
Congratulations Matthew! 🎉
You can find out more about Matthew's research and work at the Archives Centre in this brilliant blog he wrote for us last year⬇️
www.chu.cam.ac.uk/news-and-eve...
Congratulations Matthew! It's been brilliant to work with you on your research. What a milestone.
17.06.2025 11:22 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Valentine Lawford working on a charcoal portrait, inspired by Horst P. Horst's photograph of the poet and critic Edith Sitwell, 1955, LWFD 6/1
Lawford on the terrace at Oyster Bay, 1957, LWFD 6/2
Lawford at Shangri La, the home of socialite Doris Duke in Hawaii, 1966, LWFD 6/2
🌈 Happy Pride Month!
🖼️ Today we share our new exhibition 'An Englishman in New York' on Valentine Lawford.
🎨 In 1948, Lawford swapped diplomacy for art, reinventing himself as an artist & writer. He settled in the US with his partner, the celebrated photographer Horst P. Horst.
buff.ly/suQDZ5q
A highlight of Lise's archive is her slide rule, a crucial instrument for the 20th century physicist.
Showing signs of frequent use, the slide rule was treated in our conservation studio: archives.chu.cam.ac.uk/news/lise-me...
Who knows how many calculations Lise might have used it for?
Great to hear more recognition for Lise Meitner, whose contributions to nuclear physics were essential yet often overlooked.
We preserve Lise's personal archive here in Cambridge, and researchers are welcome to access it: archivesearch.lib.cam.ac.uk/repositories...
How fascinating. 💾
You might find this blog by our digital archivist of interest: archives.chu.cam.ac.uk/news/ongoing...
Let us know how you get on!
Series of code in batches of 5 letters, written on an RAF message form
Can you crack the code? ⏳
This fully-encoded message was discovered while cataloguing the papers of Terence Sanders. We believe it's from his time as an army officer engaged in countering the V2 threat.
🔗 If you've not come across it before, then our Access Portal shares some of our unique collections online. You can access it from anywhere at anytime. It's free, open to all, and we're continually adding new material.
🔗 Just visit: oa.churchillarchives.libnova.com
Clementine Churchill sorting letters, c.1940s CSCT 5/4/99
Mary Churchill holding her poodle Sukie, 1941, CSCT 5/4/20
IVF pioneer Robert Edwards, sitting at a microscope, in Bourn Hall, c.1980s, EDWS 18/5/18
📦Happy #InternationalArchivesDay!
🌍 The theme of this year's #InternationalArchivesWeek is #ArchivesAreAccessible.
📸To celebrate, we’re sharing a few photos available on our Access Portal from the papers of Clementine Churchill & Robert Edwards.
A selection of literature arguing for and against Britain remaining in the European Community from the papers of Julian Amery (AMEJ 1/3/38) and Michael Stewart (STWT 12/2/4).
🗳️ 50 years ago, UK voters headed to the polls to vote in a referendum on whether the UK should stay in the European Community (the Common Market).
✅ 67% voted in favour of continued membership.
📄 Here’s a flavour of some of the material we hold on this historic referendum.
Photo of Archive Assistant Cherish showing students a scrapbook in the reading room
Photo of students looking at archive material
Photo of students listening to a lecture about the archives
Photo of students looking at archive material
Last week, we hosted students from @syracuseu.bsky.social who have been considering interactions between global politics and local enterprise.
We introduced the students to archives: what they are, how to access them, and how evidence of politics & science survives through time.
Volunteer with a scrapbook on a book rest
"I would strongly recommend this placement to anyone seeking to gain their first experience in the archival sector...No other institution provides such a well-structured and organised programme" - Sully, Archives and Records Management Volunteer 2025
#NationalVolunteeringWeek
➡️ buff.ly/fcP4Ywo
