Blog / Archives

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Margaret Duncan’s diary: 2-3 February 1918

by Nicky Sugar, Archivist. In February 1918 Margaret Duncan, a Post Office clerk from Scotland, sailed to East Africa for a new job and new adventures. Her diary and photograph albums are now in the British Empire and Commonwealth Collection at Bris…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Ivan Haslam: An Indian in East Africa

by Pat Ellingham, Archives Volunteer I came across Ivan Haslam in October 2017 when I started to volunteer with the British Empire and Commonwealth Collection at Bristol Archives. My first task was to watch Haslam’s 12 home movies, and write an abs…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Hallo from Germany: an archival exchange

Archivist Graham Tratt has spent the last three weeks representing Bristol Archives in Bristol’s twin city of Hannover, Germany. My visit has been the second half of a professional exchange between Bristol Archives and the Stadtarchiv Hannover. Dr Christ…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Settling in at Bristol Archives

Searchroom Officer Dan Jones joined the team at Bristol Archives in January. Here he talks about his role in running the public searchroom. It’s now been ten months since I started work at Bristol Archives. While I’m very much part of the team by now, I s…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Imaging Imperialism

By Nicky Sugar, Archivist “We are focussing on audio-visual archives because time is running out to save them.” Friday 27 October was World Audio-Visual Heritage Day and the Association of Commonwealth Archivists and Records Managers marked the day with a…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Photography and Empire

by Isaac Blease, photographer and UWE student As part of my MA in Curating at the University of the West of England, I have spent the last nine months on a work placement at Bristol Archives, in the British Empire and Commonwealth Collections (BECC) t…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Empire Explored!

by Nicky Sugar, Archivist In August 2015, Nicky Sugar from Bristol Archives shared her first impressions of the British Empire and Commonwealth Collections. Two years – and tens of thousands of photographs – later, she returns to share how the Exp…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Raising the curtain on the history of the Theatre Royal

By Anne Lovejoy, Bristol Old Vic project archivist As we reported in March, Bristol Archives is part of a project to redevelop the Bristol Old Vic and share the history of this historic theatre, thanks to funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund…