The collection blog

Most recent posts

• A place of refuge in the colonies

  

  Published

  26 January 2026

  The National Archives holds powerful material relating to the Holocaust. With over 11 million records on the topic, what stories can we uncover?

• From curiosity to career: my first year in archives

  

  Published

  26 November 2025

  Over the last year, Liv Page has been working at The National Archives as a Level 7 Archivist and Records Manager apprentice.

• Catalogue Week 2025

  

  Published

  24 November 2025

  Archivist Jane Langford introduces our annual celebration of cataloguing projects at The National Archives.

• Cataloguing transatlantic slavery records: an archival history

  

  Published

  21 November 2025

  Cataloguer Adrian Browne traces the custodial history of the Detached Papers, investigating the legacies of Victorian-era recordkeeping.

• Cataloguing West African records

  

  Published

  21 November 2025

  Our volunteers have finished cataloguing Colonial Office correspondence from Cameroons and Togoland, explore these records here.

• Tracing medical records from the First World War

  

  Published

  14 November 2025

  Explore how we are preserving medical records from the First World War and how you can access them.

• The A–Z of the Royal Navy Captains' letters project – 'D' to 'M'

  

  Published

  5 November 2025

  Bruno Pappalardo reveals the latest findings of the volunteer Royal Navy Captains’ letters project.

• Secret diplomatic message deciphered after 350 years

  

  Published

  14 October 2025

  Ruth Selman shares an exciting update to her previous blog post about a 17th-century letter written in cipher.

• 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...