We have put together a list of replies to often asked queries about the Business Archives Council. The list has been separated into categories. If you should find that your question has not been answered here, please contact us.
- Do you have any records relating to a specific company?
- I am just starting out researching a company's history. I have never done any of this type of research before. Could you make any suggestions as to where I should start?
- What other places do you recommend I contact in relation to a business records enquiry?
- Do you have any information on specific industries? I am trying to locate the records of a brewery.
- I am trying to trace information about my grandfather, do you have any information about the company he owned?
- Where is the BAC Business History Library?
Do you have any records relating to a specific company?
No. The BAC is not a physical repository and it holds no archive records at all. It is a registered charity established in 1934 for the promotion and preservation of business history - not a repository for business records.
I am just starting out researching a company's history. I have never done any of this type of research before. Could you make any suggestions as to where I should start?
There are several sources worth consulting during the initial stages of your research which could provide you with some leads:
- A Guide to Tracing the History of a Business by Dr John Orbell. This lists sources and ideas which you may well find helpful. You will find a copy in a good reference library and we hope to have a new edition out next year.
- Kellys Trade Directories. These are similar to telephone directories, grouping together businesses according to trade for yearly periods. If you have a name of a business in a particular area or an idea where a business was located over a given time period, for example Jones’ Blacksmith's in London in 1899-1913, you can use these directories to the confirm its existence at that location at that time, to follow the physical relocation of that business and trace how long it was at various premises. Researchers should be advised that these businesses may not appear in directories consistently year after year.
What other places do you recommend I contact in relation to a business records enquiry?
It is recommended that you contact:
- The National Register of Archives (NRA), at Quality House, Quality Court, Chancery Lane, London WC2A 1HP (Tel: 0171 242 1198). They maintain a list of the location of archives throughout the UK, which is indexed by both business and personal names: these indexes are available in their searchroom and on the Internet at http://www.hmc.gov.uk
- The local record office where the firm was located. If it was based in London then contact London Metropolitan Archives, 40 Northampton Road, London EC1R 0HB, (Tel: 020 7332 3820; E-mail: LMA@ms.corpoflondon.gov.uk). For the area of Westminster contact City of Westminster Archives Centre, 10 St. Ann’s Street, London SW1P 2DE, (Tel: 020 7641 5180; URL: http://www.westminster.gov.uk/libraries/archives/index.cfm), and for the City “Square Mile” of London try the Guildhall Library Manuscripts Section, Aldermanbury, London EC2P 2EJ, (Tel: 020 7332 1862; URL: http://ihr.sas.ac.uk/gh/.
- Companies House provides details such as the registered address of a company, directors names, some account details, memorandum and articles of association and annual returns. It has microfiche records for dissolved companies dating back to 1976. The records of “live” (i.e. currently existing companies) exist on microfilm if they are recent but the more historical records are in hardcopy only dating as far back as when those companies were founded. Contact the Archives Section of Companies House, Crown Way, Maindy, Cardiff, CF4 3UZ, (Tel: 01222 388588; URL: http://www.companieshouse.gov.uk). Certain basic details are provided free of charge but there is a fee for the reproduction of most pieces of information.
- The files kept by the Registrar of Companies on each registered company are held by the Companies Registration Office in England and Wales (see above) for 20 years after the company's dissolution, and then either destroyed or transferred to the The National Archives: Historical Manuscripts Commission, Kew, Richmond, Surrey TW9 4DU, (Tel: 020 8876 3444; URL: http://www.pro.gov.uk). The files of returns made to the Registrar by all companies registered under the 1844 Joint Stock Companies Act and those registered under the 1856 Companies Act which were dissolved prior to 1860 are to be found at the PRO in class BT 41. The files for companies dissolved after 1860 and registered in England and Wales under the 1856 Act and all subsequent Acts are held in class BT 31.
Do you have any information on specific industries? I am trying to locate the records of a brewery.
The Council’s range of publications based on surveys it has undertaken includes guides to the historical records of Brewing, Shipping, Chartered Accountants and British Banking. In addition to that there is a database of the records of the pharmaceutical industry publicly accessible at the Wellcome Institute Library, London and the University of East Anglia.
I am trying to trace information about my grandfather, do you have any information about the company he owned?
Contact the Family Records Centre, 1 Myddelton Street, London EC1R 1UW, (Tel: 020 8392 5300; Website: http://www.pro.gov.uk/about/frc/). You should consider whether you are more concerned to establish details about your grandfather or whether you wish to find out about his business. If the enquiry is of a personal/family history nature, for example searching for the details of your grandfather who worked for X mining company in Yorkshire or who owned his own toy making factory in Shropshire, then it is often better to establish as much about your family member as you can first through other means rather than taking the business as your starting point.
Knowledge of a relation’s connection with a business may help to locate them at a certain place at a certain time but will not necessarily provide more family background. Records for small independent companies owned by a family member rarely survive. If they are not passed down through the family they are most likely to have been destroyed rather than given to a public repository. Staff records which may document the employment of a family member within another business are not always deemed the most important historical items to keep and so they too have not always survived even where other records have.
If you are more interested in the business itself then treat it as a normal business enquiry and approach all the usual places as listed above.
Where is the BAC Business History Library?
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