In-depth research guides

These in-depth research guides are intended to provide detailed information on how to find and understand records relating to particular subjects. They cover a wide range of topics, reflecting The National Archives’ extensive collection. If you are just starting your research, you might find it useful to look first at the shorter research signposts.

A

• Admiralty charts (maps)
• Admiralty Index and Digest: ADM 12
• Admiralty, High Court of
• Agricultural statistics
• America and West Indies: Calendar of State Papers Colonial 1574-1739
• American and West Indian colonies before 1782
• American Revolution
• Apprenticeship records
• Archaeology
• Architectural drawings
• Architectural history
• Armed forces: medieval and early modern soldiers 1150-1660
• Armed forces: Militia 1522-1914
• Armed forces
• Art and artists
• Assizes: criminal trials 1559-1971
• Assizes: key to series for English civil trials 1656-1971
• Assizes: key to series for English criminal trials 1559-1971
• Assizes: key to series for Welsh trials 1831-1971

B

• Bankruptcy records after 1869
• Bankrupts and insolvent debtors 1710-1869
• Births, marriages and deaths at sea
• British Army Lists
• British Army: auxiliary forces 1769-1945
• British Army: campaign records up to 1913
• British Army: courts martial and deserters, 17th-20th centuries
• British Army: First World War diaries
• British Army: First World War officers' records
• British Army: First World War soldiers' papers
• British Army: muster rolls, pay lists and description books c.1730-1898
• British Army: officers' commissions
• British Army: officers' records 1660-1913
• British Army: operations after 1945
• British Army: Second World War operations
• British Army: soldiers' discharge papers 1702-1913
• British Army: tracing a regiment or corps
• Business history

C

• Cabinet committees
• Cabinet Office records
• Canals
• Catholics
• Census returns
• Chancel repairs
• Chancery Masters' and other exhibits
• Chancery Masters' reports and certificates
• Chancery proceedings: equity suits before 1558
• Chancery proceedings: equity suits from 1558
• Change of name
• China, records on
• Civil servants' personnel records
• Coal mining records
• Coastguard
• Colonies and dominions, British
• Companies and businesses
• Copyright records: Stationers' Hall
• Court of Requests 1485-1642
• Court of Star Chamber 1485-1642
• Court of Wards and Liveries: land inheritance 1540-1645
• Court, funds in
• Crime and the law in England
• Criminal courts in England and Wales from 1972
• Criminals in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries
• Customs and Excise officials and tax collectors
• Customs' accounts, medieval

D

• Death duty records 1796-1903
• Diplomatic sources before 1509
• Dissolution of the monasteries
• Divorce records after 1858
• Divorce records before 1858
• Domesday Book

E

• Education, history of
• Education: elementary (primary) schools
• Education: Inspectorate and HMI reports
• Education: secondary schools
• Education: Special Services Branch
• Education: teachers
• Education: technical and further education
• Emigration
• Enclosure awards
• Equity proceedings in the Court of Exchequer
• Eyres, general 1194-1348

F

• Film, television and the performing arts
• First World War: conduct of the war 1914-1918
• First World War: conscientious objectors and exemptions from service 1914-1918
• First World War: disability and dependants' pensions 1914-1918
• First World War: women's military services
• Foreign Office and Foreign and Commonwealth Office records from 1782
• Foreign Office: card index 1906-1910
• Foreign Office: card index 1910-1919
• French lands of the English kings

G

• Garden history
• Gay and lesbian history
• German Foreign Ministry and other captured enemy documents from the Second World War

H

• Health between the wars 1919-1939
• Health: 19th century public health and epidemics
• Hearth tax 1662-1689
• Home Office correspondence 1839-1959

I

• Immigration
• Imperial and Commonwealth history
• Indian indentured labour
• Inquisitions post mortem, Henry III-Charles I: landholders and heirs
• Intelligence records
• International boundaries
• International organisations in 20th century Europe
• Internees: First and Second World Wars
• Inventions: patents and specifications
• Ireland: Easter Rising 1916
• Irish genealogy

J

• Jacobite Risings, 1715 and 1745
• Jewish history, Anglo-Jewish history, 18th to 20th centuries

K

• King's Bench (Crown side) 1675-1875
• King's Bench: records of the court c. 1200-1600

L

• Labour history
• Land conveyances: enrolment of deeds and registration of title
• Land conveyances: feet of fines 1182-1833
• Land conveyances: trust deeds (land for charitable uses) 1736-1925
• Land: common lands
• Land: contaminated land
• Land: requisitioned land
• Lands, Crown, church and royalist, 1642-1660
• Lawyers: attorneys and solicitors
• League of Nations

M

• Manor and other local court rolls, 13th century to 1922
• Manorial Documents Register and manorial lordships
• Manorial records
• Maps and plans: overseas relations
• Maps for research
• Maps, plans and architectural drawings
• Maps: military maps of the First World War
• Maps: military maps of the Second World War
• Maritime history
• Markets and fairs
• Medals, British armed services: campaign medals and other service medals
• Medals, British armed services: gallantry medals, further information
• Medals, British armed services: gallantry medals
• Medals: civilian gallantry
• Medieval and early modern sources for family history
• Mental health patients and institutions
• Merchant seamen: abbreviations found in RGSS registers
• Merchant seamen: interpreting voyage details in registers of officers' services
• Merchant seamen: interpreting voyage details in registers of seamen series II
• Merchant seamen: interpreting voyage details in registers of seamen's tickets and alphabetical registers of masters
• Merchant seamen: log books, agreements and crew lists after 1861
• Merchant seamen: medals and honours
• Merchant seamen: officers' service records 1845-1965
• Merchant seamen: registers of service 1835-1857
• Merchant seamen: sea service records 1913-1972
• Merchant shipping: crew lists and agreements 1747-1860
• Merchant shipping: registration of ships 1786-1994
• Mines and quarries
• Ministry of Labour records

N

• National Farm Surveys of England and Wales 1940-1943
• Naturalisation and citizenship: grants of British nationality
• Newspapers and the press
• Nonconformists
• Nurses and nursing services: British Army
• Nurses and nursing services: civilian
• Nurses and nursing services: Royal Air Force
• Nurses and nursing services: Royal Navy

O

• Oath rolls and sacrament certificates after 1660
• Old Bailey and the Central Criminal Court: criminal trials
• Ordnance Survey records
• Ordnance: records of the Board of Ordnance
• Outlawry in medieval and early modern England

P

• Parliamentary records after 1500
• Passenger lists
• Photographic series in The National Archives
• Photographs for research
• Pipe rolls 1130-c.1300
• Police: London Metropolitan Police records of service
• Police: transport police
• Poor and the Poor Laws
• Poor Law records 1834-1871
• Port books 1565-1799
• Prime Minister's Office
• Prisoners of War in British hands 1698-1949 (ex-PoWs and displaced persons 1945 onwards)
• Prisoners of War, British, 1939-1953
• Prisoners of War, British, c.1760-1919
• Privy Council correspondence from c.1481
• Privy Council proclamations, Orders in Council, and statutory instruments
• Privy Council registers from 1540
• Propaganda

R

• Railways: overview
• Railways: staff records
• Refugees and minorities
• Registered designs and trade marks
• Registered designs: diamond marks
• Religious houses and their lands c. 1000-1530
• Rights of way, public
• Royal Air Force service records: Second World War 1939-1945
• Royal Air Force, RFC and RNAS service records from 1914 onwards
• Royal Air Force: operational records
• Royal Air Force: research and development records
• Royal grants: letters patent and charters from 1199
• Royal household and wardrobe
• Royal Irish Constabulary
• Royal Marines: further areas of research
• Royal Marines: how to find a division
• Royal Marines: officers' service records
• Royal Marines: other ranks' service records
• Royal Naval dockyards
• Royal Naval research and development
• Royal Naval Reserve
• Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve
• Royal Navy: log books and reports of proceedings
• Royal Navy: officers' service records, First World War 1914-1918, and confidential reports 1893-1943
• Royal Navy: officers' service records
• Royal Navy: officers’ pension records
• Royal Navy: operational records 1660-1914
• Royal Navy: operational records, First World War 1914-1918
• Royal Navy: operational records, Second World War 1939-1945
• Royal Navy: operations and policy after 1945
• Royal Navy: ratings' pension records
• Royal Navy: ratings

S

• Seals
• Second World War: Bomb Census Survey 1940-1945
• Second World War: Home Front 1939-1945
• Second World War: War Cabinet 1939-1945
• Second World War: war crimes 1939-1945
• Ships wrecked or sunk
• Slavery: British transatlantic slave trade
• State papers domestic: Charles II-Anne 1660-1714
• State papers domestic: Commonwealth 1642-1660
• State papers domestic: Edward VI-Charles I 1547-1649
• State papers domestic: George I-George III 1714-1782
• State papers domestic: miscellaneous series
• State Papers foreign 1509-1782
• State Papers Ireland 1509-1782
• State Papers: Letters and Papers of Henry VIII
• Supreme Court: appeal cases after 1875
• Supreme Court: Chancery Division cases after 1875

T

• Taxation records before 1689
• Tithe records
• Transportation of convicts
• Treasury Board: letters and papers 1557-1920
• Treasury Solicitor

V

• Valuation Office survey

W

• Wills and probate records