In line with the City of London’s
Community Strategy themes of ‘A vibrant and culturally rich
city’, ‘An inclusive and outward looking City’ and ‘A skilled
and learning City’ the City’s Libraries, Archives and
Guildhall Art Gallery Department wishes to set up a
contractual relationship with an external service provider to
provide a digitisation service for major genealogical archive
and printed sources held by the department.
The Heritage Services Division of
the Libraries, Archives and Guildhall Art Gallery Department
manages London Metropolitan Archives (LMA), which is the
second largest archive service in the UK and Guildhall
Library, the major historical reference library for London,
which holds printed books, archive and maps and prints
collections. Also in the division are
Guildhall Art Gallery and
Keats House. The department also includes three lending
libraries and the City Business Library. From 1 January 2007
Heritage Services has been managed by the Assistant Director
(Heritage), Dr Deborah Jenkins.
The collections at LMA and
Guildhall Library have received designation from the
Museums,
Libraries and Archives Council as being of national and
international significance as the History of London
Collection. The collections tell the story of London and
Londoners from 1067 to 2006 and comprises material filling
some 101km of shelving over the two sites. Amongst
these are substantial and highly significant collections of
archives and related material which are key sources for
genealogists across the world. For example:
- Over 10,000 parish registers of baptisms, marriages and burials
dating from the 1530s to the twentieth century for over 1000 Church
of England parishes in Greater London
- Approximately 80,000 wills from Church of England dioceses
dating from the medieval period
- Over 9,000 records (which relate directly to named individuals)
from Boards of Guardians from the nineteenth to early twentieth
centuries
- Approximately 7,000 poll books and electoral registers for
Greater London in the modern period (one of the most complete set
in existence)
- Approximately 2,000 admission and discharge registers for
London schools in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries
These collections, and other key
genealogical sources, are currently available on site at LMA
and Guildhall Library. The Libraries, Archives and
Guildhall Art Gallery Department now wishes to make them
available online via a chargeable web based service which is
setup, hosted and maintained by an external service provider
with demonstrable experience in this field. A royalty
will be paid back to the City for reinvestment in the care and
preservation of the collections. This new service would
sit alongside existing on-site services which the City will
continue to provide.
The City of London is currently working on a digitisation tender
with those companies who have expressed an interest in this
project. Please
email ask.lma@cityoflondon.gov.uk
if you have any questions.