There is a further update on our opening hours and service provision. See Update on Caird Library opening hours from 2 January 2009 for more details.

Renee (Digital Resources Librarian)

A few weeks ago I visited The National Archives for their Cataloguing Awareness Day. I was really impressed with the variety of projects underway, from the records of Victorian women prisoners, to ‘Bread or Blood’, describing political agitation for electoral reform in the early 1830s. I thought I’d mention the most relevant connected with maritime research.

Bruno Pappalardo, from the Advice and Records Knowledge team, gave an interesting overview of a project to catalogue and digitise a series of Royal Navy Medical Officers journals, from 1793-1880, though the series itself runs up to approximately 1960. The project is being funded by the Wellcome Trust and aims to catalogue over a thousand medical officer’s journals. The series includes convict and emigrant ships as well as the ships of the Royal Navy.

Bruno showed how these journals provide a wealth of information for medical historians, as they include detailed information on diseases and injuries, treatments and living conditions at sea. Surgeons were often fascinated with the natural world and frequently recorded their impressions with far more detail than the terse entries in the Captain’s log, leaving a series of records replete with watercolour illustrations, hand-drawn maps, and pictures of local flora, fauna, people and animals.

We have one or two examples in our manuscript collections, including the medical journal of La Seine kept by Surgeon John Martin off the coast of Africa and West Indies between 1799-1800 (ref: MLN/12) and the papers of Surgeon Vice Admiral Sir James Porter, (1851-1935) who amongst other things was principal medical officer to the Naval brigades during the Boer War (collection ref: PTR).

We also have a few examples of the standard surgeon’s reference books, such as Buchan’s Domestic medicine of 1779 and William Turnbull’s The Naval Surgeon of 1806. The ship’s copy of Buchan’s book was taken by the mutineers from HMS Bounty in 1787, showing just how important the information these books contained was.

So whilst these journals could be invaluable for comparing how the treatment of wounds and diseases, fevers and injuries changed over time, they are also of great potential value to family historians and other researchers. Of real value to family history research, it was pointed out, the medical journals go back further than the records of individual naval ratings (which don’t start until 1853). In other words it’s a way of finding information about ratings, of which there are virtually no record beyond a mention in a ship’s crew list. And the best news is that the new catalogue entries will be fully searchable by name; a wonderful tool for tracing naval ancestors.

Now that I’ve sung the project’s praises, you can have a look for yourself at:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/partnerprojects/officer-journal.htm

Or you can search the TNA catalogue for details of these records at:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue

Martin (Manuscripts Cataloguer)

Update on the Caird Library opening hours

In August 2008 the National Maritime Museum announced the planned temporary closure of the Caird Library due to the move of the archive and library collections as part of a forthcoming £35 million redevelopment of the Museum’s South West Wing.

This capital project involves the complete refurbishment of the current South West Wing, upgrading its conservation, storage and library services. Over the longer term the new wing, which will include a new research and reading room, will offer a significantly improved customer service to its users.

Before construction work begins on the new wing, we need to move many of our collections to offsite storage. This involves packing, documenting and relocating over 3,000 linear metres of archive and library material – over 300,000 items – a considerable task. The work requires the specialist skills of archive and library staff, as well as our collections staff, and is a major undertaking for the Museum.

Over the past few weeks, the South West Wing Project’s anticipated work programme has been firmed up and this has given us some extra flexibility in regard to the Caird Library decant. The revised Library service provision will be as follows:
 
20 December 2008 – 4 January 2009
The Caird Library reading room will be open over the Christmas period on Saturday 20 December, Tuesday 30 December, Wednesday 31 December, Friday 2 January and Saturday 3 January 2009 10.00-16.45, with full access to all the Archive and Library’s collections.

On Saturdays 20 December and 3 January, material will be available by prior arrangement only and closed for an hour 13.00-14.00. Please request material via the request function on the Archive online catalogue or the Library online catalogue, or contact the E-Library during Library opening hours on (0)20 8312 6516 to make an appointment for either of these Saturdays, so material can be retrieved for you in advance of your visit.

5 January – 1 June 2009
From the week beginning Monday 5 January 2009 until the completion of
the move, by 1 June 2009 at the latest, the Caird Library reading room
will be open on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, 10.00-16.45. Collections
available for consultation will be those held in the reading room,
namely printed books, journals and microfilm holdings. Rare books are
also available for consultation and should be ordered three days in
advance (please order via the Library’s online catalogue.

Direct research access to the manuscripts collections will not be possible during this period as they will be packed up and in transit to offsite storage. Nevertheless, the Library will continue to provide a copying service (digital scans) for master’s certificates and crew lists during this period. In accordance with the Museum’s obligation as a Place of Deposit for Public Records, access to information contained within the public records in our care will be maintained as required.

Access to online catalogues and electronic resources such as Ancestry Library will still be available from the E-Library, telephone (0)20 8312 6516. Throughout the period the Library will maintain its current enquiry service. Please contact library@nmm.ac.uk or manuscripts@nmm.ac.uk.

1 June 2009 – opening of Sammy Ofer Wing in 2012
From 1 June 2009 until the new Research Centre’s anticipated opening in early  2012, the Library will be open on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, and on the first Saturday of the month, for the consultation of all material in the archive and library collections. For readers requiring access to material held temporarily off site  (as will be indicated by the online catalogues), the Library will operate a booking and appointments system to allow necessary time to retrieve such materials. Details on how to make an appointment and order material in advance will be communicated via our website as soon as possible.

Details on how to make an appointment post 1 June 2009 and order material in advance will be publicised in late January 2009. The appointment system is necessary to allow us time to retrieve the material for you from the offsite storage, and because of limited available seats in the reading room.

View the full Caird Library opening hours.

Eleanor (Head of Archive and Library)

About a month ago we launched a new copying policy and digital scanning service for the Archive and Library. This is something that we’ve been planning for while, so it was great to get it up and running and to start using our shiny new digital scanner.

So what’s changed? Well we knew that our copying policy was confusing to most, especially with regards to what could and couldn’t be photographed, so we tried to keep rules consistent across types of material. There are still some items that can’t be copied by any means, such as manuscript collections on loan to the Museum, or scrapbooks and ephemera that face copyright restrictions. The key changes are as follows:

Photography
Readers can use their own cameras to photograph any item from the collection, including modern printed books and journals. Photography is still subject to copyright restrictions and a self-photography form and copyright declaration must be completed and returned to staff at the desk. A camera stand is available to help keep cameras steady in low light.

Photocopying
We no longer allow any photocopying of items from our manuscript or rare book collections. This is to avoid unecessary exposure to the heat and light of the copier, which is damaging to paper. The only items that can now be photocopied are modern printed books and journals from the library collection.

Digital scans
Instead of photocopies we can provide a digital scan of items from our manuscript or rare book collections. Digital copies have to be ordered – we aim to have the CD or paper print-outs posted within 10 days. Pricing is banded, with up to five copies being provided free of charge. The full price list is available on our website (newly adjusted for the VAT reduction).

Here’s an example of a scanned Mates Certificate of Service – click on the image to see the full size.

We hope this new policy will make it easier for people researching our collections. If you have any questions please leave a comment and I’ll do my best to answer them.

Renee
(Digital Resources Librarian)