The archive project combing through 900 years of history
Behind the unprepossessing red brick walls of the London Metropolitan Archives, a project is underway that will bring all of City Bridge Foundation’s archives together in one place for the first time.
- Published: 4 April 2024
The charity is funding an 18-month scheme which will see several thousand items catalogued, packaged and preserved for posterity at the City of London Corporation-run archive in Clerkenwell – no small job according to senior archivist Amy Proctor.
She says: “The biggest challenge is the size of it, and having to try and quickly get a grasp of the history of an organisation which goes back over so many years.
“Until very recently the foundation’s work was covered by a lot of different City of London Corporation departments, so it can be a challenge to understand how and why decisions were made.”
The archive includes over 1,000 plans of Tower Bridge alone, some of which are still used today by those entrusted with the maintenance and running of the bridge – which can take its toll on paperwork over 100 years old.
“The state the items are in varies enormously,” says Amy. “A lot of the plans were, and some still are, working documents, so are quite well worn.
“We’re not trying to make them perfect, just to get them to the point where they can be used and handled. That can involve cleaning off surface dirt, repairing tears or even just putting an item in the right packaging.”
Among the curiosities the project has unearthed is a build-it-yourself version of Tower Bridge, described by its late-Victorian manufacturer as ’an amusing model for self-construction, made in cardboard’.
Perhaps the jewel in the crown, though, is the charity’s very first Royal Charter, signed on vellum (animal skin) on May 24, 1282 by King Edward I.
In it, he confers on the City of London various properties and rents deriving from them ‘to them and their heirs for ever, for the support of the… Bridge’. All the foundation’s work to date flows from this unremarkable looking artefact.
When complete, every single item in the archive – including those already held at the LMA and many in the process of being moved there from their current home at Tower Bridge – will be catalogued online, making it more easily accessible.
“The collection is so rich in information about all aspects of the work of the foundation over the years but it’s currently an under-used resource,” says Amy. “Hopefully it will increase the profile of the organisation and open up the catalogue to more researchers.”
The archive, like all those held at the LMA, will be freely accessible to all, while selected Tower Bridge artefacts will go on public display later this year at Guildhall Art Gallery, in an exhibition marking the 130th anniversary of the bridge opening.
“I really enjoy digging around in the archives and finding the who, the what and the where of an organisation with a really long history like City Bridge Foundation,” says Amy.
“But the most satisfying thing will be when all the material is catalogued and we start to see people using it.”
London Metropolitan Archives hold all the City of London Corporation archives as well as those of the Metropolitan Board of Works, London County Council and the Greater London Council – all predecessors to today’s Greater London Authority.
More information is available here.