The collection blog

Most recent posts

• Cataloguing Women’s Auxiliary Territorial Service records from the Second World War

  

  Published

  6 October 2025

  In February 2023, the Ministry of Defence began the monumental task of transferring ten million personal records to The National Archives. What do they contain?

• Think your ancestor might have worked in intelligence? Where to start your research

  

  Published

  29 September 2025

  If you have a family legend that a relative worked in intelligence, here are our top tips to get started with your research.

• Using The National Farm Survey as a gateway for research

  

  Published

  24 September 2025

  Discover how one farm in East Sussex can lead us on a journey through stage and screen, motorsport successes, and celebrity connections during the 20th century.

• Hidden in plain sight: an undeciphered letter from Louis XIV’s France

  

  Published

  4 August 2025

  This letter – sent from the court of King Louis XIV in Paris – contains coded text that historians have been unable to decipher...

• How to search for security and intelligence records: where to start

  

  Published

  1 July 2025

  Inspired to discover tales of espionage and intrigue? Find out how to start researching the records of MI5 and British intelligence services we hold.

• Researching hospital-related records

  

  Published

  27 June 2025

  Tracing hundreds of years, PhD student Jessica Gregory outlines some of the best ways to research hospital-related records at The National Archives.

• A summer (spy) reading list

  

  Published

  18 June 2025

  Inspired by our current exhibition, MI5: Official Secrets, we've drawn up a summer reading list offering both spy fiction and fact.

• Norfolk Island: the ultra-penal colony

  

  Published

  13 June 2025

  Volunteer Dr Brenda Mortimer examines how Australia's Norfolk Island became ‘a place of the extremest punishment’ for colonial convicts in the 1820s.

• Five reasons to visit MI5: Official Secrets

  

  Published

  12 May 2025

  From secret codes to never-before seen devices, here’s five reasons to visit our current MI5: Official Secrets exhibition.

• The Long March to Freedom 1944–1945

  

  Published

  1 April 2025

  Eighty years ago a series of forced prisoner of war marches took place. We trace some of the incredible stories from these marches through our records.

• Working while pursuing my passion: Becoming an archivist apprentice

  

  Published

  11 February 2025

  For National Apprenticeships Week, Level 7 Archivist and Records Manager apprentice Liv Page reflects on her first two months here at The National Archives.

• Confessions from the Cambridge Five: a file release from MI5

  

  Published

  14 January 2025

  Over 100 Security Service (MI5) files are being released today covering a wide range of subjects and individuals. Most notably, the Cambridge Five spy ring.