36 grants for 2016.
The Museum of English Rural Life at the University of Reading purchase of twenty-two rare agricultural pamphlets from the mid-19th century, which relate to the agricultural innovations and economics of the period, enhancing its existing collection strengths in British agricultural history.…
This collection of over 500 titles represents an outstanding survey of known and lesser known medical authors, practices and treatments from the late 17th century to the early decades of the 20th century – 300 years when the home was the site of most medical treatments and household members the practitioners.…
This important archive of Heston Aerodrome, Middlesex, documents the construction and early operating of Britain’s first private airport. It consists of approximately 160 letters, 20 photographs, 65 drawings, 2 brochures and press cuttings.…
A small but fascinating archive of notes and drawings by the painter Charles Mahoney (1903-1968), mostly relating to the murals in the Lady Chapel of Campion Hall, subsidised by Evelyn Waugh, and painted in 1942-52.…
This archive relating to George Walker of Killingbeck is a good fit with one of the jewels in our archival crown, the famous set of 39 original watercolours by Walker which were published as The Costume of Yorkshire in 1814 (YAS MS1000).…
This autograph letter with envelope from the composer Gustav Holst (1874-1934) is addressed to Mrs Bell, wife of the Bishop of Chichester. The Museum did not previously not have any letters associated with Bishop Bell, who was a great friend of Gustav Holst.…
Written by a single hand in a typically Italian Rotunda script of preternatural regularity, the elegance of which is enhanced by still-wide margins, this late 15th century Book of Hours (Use of Rome) is a handsome and engaging volume.…
The volume contains 20 issues of a rare 19th century periodical, the British Guiana Monthly Messenger, and four equally rare 19th century British Guiana pamphlets.This is an important acquisition for the library of King's College London, complementing and enhancing our already extensive and internationally significant holdings in the field of Briti…
Dickson, Archer & Thorp, solicitors of Alnwick, Northumberland was established in the late 18th century and continued until the death of the last managing partner in 2005.
Formally known as Letters Patent, those signed by the monarch - Royal Letters Patent - are uncommon and this one also has the Great Seal attached to it, reinforcing its importance and legitimacy at a time of upheaval.…
Chawton House Library has English translations of Staël’s best-selling novel Corinne (1807) and Delphine (1807), plus a fourth edition of Delphine (1818), but the first edition of Corinne was a significant omission from the collection.…
Sir Gilbert Clayton was a distinguished soldier and diplomat, serving in North Africa and the Middle East. He excelled as the director of military intelligence in Cairo during the First World War, particularly in managing those military operations in the Hijāz which brought T. E. Lawrence to world attention.…
This large archive of several hundred letters, notecards, etc., circa 1898-1948, largely comprising large bundles of autograph letters to Sydney Cockerell, or Wilfred Scawen Blunt. Their appeal to the Fitzwilliam Museum was obvious.…
A small but significant collection of letters between Shetland antiquary Edwyn Seymour Reid Tait (1885-1960) and Horace Alexander Duncan, always called Barry Duncan (1909-1985), a native of Lerwick who had eventually become an artist and antiquarian bookseller in London.
This is a beautiful humanist edition of Boccaccio’s most famous work and one of the earliest with illustrations; the 101 woodcuts are copies from the 1492 incunable edition.…
Sylvia Lynd played an important role in 20th-century literary culture as a judge for the Book Society (the British equivalent of the American Book-of-the-Month Club) and the Femina Vie Heureuse Prize.…
In September 2016, the Norfolk Record Office purchased a wide range of documents sold at auction in the Morningthorpe Manor Country House Sale. A keen local collector had accumulated this eclectic array of documents over a number of decades.…
Heywood’s drama is a significant addition to the Guildhall Library's collection of ‘Citizen’ dramas and is the only copy of this early edition in a public library. The play itself was performed at the Red Bull playhouse which is just a mile from Guildhall Library.…
An important letter from poet and artist David Jones (1895-1974), author of In Parenthesis, to novelist Anthony Powell. The letter was bought for the National Library of Wales with the aid of a grant of £650 from the Friends of the National Libraries.…
A letter written to the Marquess of Buckingham by Sir George Calvert in November 1622, when Calvert was one of the two principal Secretaries of State to James I, with responsibility for external affairs. George Calvert was born on the Kiplin estate in 1579 and built Kiplin Hall in the early 1620s.…
The 38 letters of Robert Louis Stevenson to Anne Jenkin are published in the comprehensive Yale edition of his letters, but of the 15 which Fanny sent to Anne, only the heart-rending letter written the day after Stevenson’s death is known to be published. It is therefore in Fanny’s letters that the research value of the collection probably lies.…
The parish library at Lund was established by the gift of Sir Thomas Remington (c.1612‒81), possibly in or shortly before 1676, when this catalogue was made.…
This is a hard-backed, handwritten notebook, filled in by a group of men who gathered regularly in a London pub to debate local, national and international current events, trade in banter and discuss literature and cultural matters.…
The book was written by Virginia Woolf for her lover Vita Sackville-West (1892–1962), who was born and brought up at Knole. It tells the story of the house through the life of Orlando, a character whose life spans the 400–year history of Knole and who mysteriously changes sex half way through.…
In 1886, the artist Norman Garstin (1847-1926) and his wife Louisa joined the blossoming artistic community in Newlyn and Penzance and it became home for them and their three children.…
One of the most important art collections in Britain of the 17th century was that of Thomas Howard, 8th Earl of Pembroke (1656-1733) (of Pope’s ‘statues, dirty gods, and coins’ fame). He had a particularly strong collection of coins, and his is the best documented of any early British coin collection.…
The records are a crucial part of Warwick's economic and industrial heritage and a testament to the entrepreneurial and engineering expertise of the local area. The company played a ground-breaking role in British motor design and sporting success.…
The Marchmont Manuscript of the key Scottish legal text Regiam Majestatem is written in Lowland Scots.…
A manuscript memorandum book made for Archbishop Thomas Bourchier (c.1411-1486). Bourchier was Archbishop of Canterbury for 32 years, during the tumultuous period of the Wars of the Roses: he crowned Edward IV, Richard III and Henry VII. His activities within the diocese of Canterbury, however, are less well documented.…
This map depicts the manor of Trotton and Cumbers Farm, owned by Laurence [Lawrence] Alcock, lord of the manor of Trotton. It records a wealth of information including the names of the individual fields which made up the manor and farm, their acreage, and the names of the surrounding landowners.…
The Monson Papers, an ‘indispensable record of British national life’, has been purchased and incorporated into the collections of Lincolnshire Archives. This extensive archive contains artworks, letters and travel papers spanning around 700 years.…
In 2016, a collection of the papers of James Watt was donated by the Watt family to the Royal Library, Windsor Castle. The donation was made through Friends of the National Libraries.
Watt was a master at the Royal Naval College at Osborne, and tutored the two eldest sons of George V and Queen Mary, both future Kings.…
Laurens van der Post was one of the most important and influential literary figures of the 20th century. The collection is perhaps unique, in that van der Post was directly or indirectly involved in many of the key literary and political developments of the period. The papers reflect his long, extraordinary and occasionally controversial life.…
The Red Book, a record of the work undertaken by Baron Ferdinand Rothschild (1839-1898) at Waddesdon Manor, his neo-Renaissance mansion near Aylesbury. Copies of this private publication are extremely rare—this is only the sixth recorded.…
A two volume copy of The Remains of Henry Kirke White, Of Nottingham, Late of St. John’s College, Cambridge with an account of his life (1810) by Robert Southey.…
The application process to apply for funding from the Friends of National Libraries was very straightforward and the decision made within an exceptionally short timeframe.