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The Rev. George Armstrong was initially an Anglican clergyman who became an influential Unitarian minister and this collection of his letters is largely unpublished. This makes them valuable for scholars, and, as such, a very exciting acquisition for us. The College archive reflects the history of the College, which was a Unitarian foundation, and also the history of Unitarianism and the influential people who were, and are, Unitarians, not only in the UK, but worldwide. We add to the archive as much as we can, generally through the donation of papers, and we are very grateful for this opportunity to purchase such a valuable collection.

A sequence of early nineteenth-century London Almanacks, which were essentially ephemeral and are consequently very rare indeed. The Almanacks are of importance to any major collection relating to London history, principally because the standard format includes multi-paged, and sometimes folding, engraved plates of various London landmarks, as well as a listing of the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs of that year. They are also significant examples of decorative bindings and of a tradition of printing ‘miniature books’.

Robert, the son of Ralph de Alderstead of Merstham in Surrey, probably assumed the surname Pashley only on his marriage to Sarah, the heiress of an estate centred on Pashley in Ticehurst, in about 1265. His son Sir Edmund Pashley pursued a career in the common law. Among the haul is a charter of free warren on all his demesne lands in Sussex and Kent, granted to Sir Edmund in 1317; it is the earliest and most spectacular element of the collection. During the 1450s, by a process not yet fully understood but which may be illuminated by these documents, the manor passed into the hands of the Boleyn family of Hever Castle in Kent. As well as a charter of feoffment of 1455, the collection includes court rolls compiled on behalf of its lords between 1455 and 1458. In 1540 the manor was sold to the May family of Combwell in Kent, in whose hands it descended until 1733.

The National Library of Scotland has worked since the 1950s to build an unrivalled collection of modern Scottish Literary papers. This collection of almost 100 letters from Mackay Brown to Kenna Crawford, as well as 26 manuscript poems. The letters enrich the Library’s existing George Mackay Brown collection, which includes significant literary papers and much of his extensive correspondence with a wide circle of friends, some famous and some unknown.

In 1903 Anna Muthesius published the influential Das Eigenkleid der Frau, regarded as a seminal text in the development of early twentieth-century dress, and particularly associated with the Artistic Dress movement. Artistic Dress describes clothing that was produced for everyday use, designed in accordance with contemporary art principles, intended to challenge fashion and considered a work of art in itself.

One of the very first decisions made by the Mitchell Library trustees in 1874 was that the Library should seek to acquire all that it could about Glasgow, and about Robert Burns. The Robert Burns Collection is, therefore, fundamental to the Mitchell Library, and remains at the core of our current collecting policy. The acquisition of Ye Banks and Braes o' Bonnie Doon adds considerable strength to the Mitchell Library’s existing holdings.

This first edition of The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne is very finely bound by Robert Riviere with a fore-edge painting of The Plestor, the village square in Selborne, reproduced from one of the original illustrations for the first edition of The Natural History. The original illustrations were commissioned by Gilbert White himself from the Swiss painter Samuel Hieronymus Grimm. Fore-edge paintings are very rare and this edition will make a very valuable exhibition item. Robert Riviere was an English bookbinder of French descent, he was an accomplished craftsman and his styles and techniques have not often been surpassed.

In the 18th century genteel behaviour was a crucial concern of London’s middling sorts, whose homes and domestic lives the Geffrye Museum represents. Nivelon wrote to advise those 'who had rather be, and appear, easy, amiable, genteel and free in their person, mein, Air and motions, than stiff, awkward, deform’d, and, consequently, disagreeable’.

This copy of the The Compleat Gardener’s Practice, a 17th-century gardening book, was acquired from the library of the garden designer Rosemary Verey, and includes the yellow sticker she used to mark the knot design which inspired her own renowned garden at her home, Barnsley House. Stephen Blake’s The Compleat Gardener’s Practice is an important addition for the Garden Museum collection, because it illustrates the change in use and design of the garden during the seventeenth century. It is also invaluable to the study of twentieth- century garden design.

A splendid map of the environs of Newhaven, drawn by William Figg in 1824 measuring over 6 by 8 feet. The Figgs were the foremost Lewes surveyors of the day, and the office holds many of their maps and drawings, both worked-up products from the records of their clients, and the substantive business archive of the firm itself. This map, drawn at a scale of 100 feet to an inch, is a detailed survey of an extensive area from the mouth of the river Ouse upstream to the town.