Historical Manuscripts Commission

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Tuesday 29th May 2012 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Sandwich]

My Lords, I am impressed that in the list of the political interests of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, he has arts and heritage ahead of defence and NATO. Of course, he chaired and helped to found the original Arts and Heritage All-Party Group more than 20 years ago, but I did not know that he had served for so long on the RCHM and the HMC. He has indefatigably defended our national heritage, notably in another place in his debate in 2006 in which he pleaded for more support for museums.

I am not sure of my own qualifications for this debate. I was an historian at Trinity Cambridge under some parental duress. My mother's influence led me to a modern language degree, but I had studied a fair amount of English history. In the 1960s, I gradually became the self-trained curator of our family archive which, in spite of the depletions of a fire in 1830, includes papers dating back to the civil war. Therefore, as a private source of manuscripts and a trustee of our excellent history centre in Dorchester, I thank the NRA, the RCHM, the HMC and now the National Archives for the work that they have done to make historic family papers more accessible over the decades since the last war.

I am not saying that the job is done; in fact every time I look online I wonder whether too many links and references bewilder students. The NR website is refreshingly honest about not always getting it right but access has been greatly improved. When I think of the number of unsorted papers and photographs surviving centuries of neglect in attics in country houses, I know that we have come a long way towards meeting the needs of scholars, writers and researchers.

I well remember the arrival of Sir Edward Warner back in the 1970s, when he came to list the voluminous papers of the 4th Earl of Sandwich. Without him I would never have appreciated the rows between admirals and politicians in the 1770s which thwarted so many naval victories, and Dr Nicholas Rodger would never have been able to complete his superb biography 20 years ago. The study of manuscripts always produces surprises. Noble Lords may know of Edward Gibbon's original record of the 4th Earl's famous invention in 1762 in a chocolate house in St James's. But I have also discovered a reference to early chocolate recipes in the 1st Earl's journal when he was ambassador in Madrid. We are awaiting further results, for apparently he may even have invented the chocolate ice bar.

In political terms, perhaps the most exciting recent discovery was in the same journal during the research carried out by Dr Charles Littleton and others for the history of the House of Lords. It turns out that the 1st Earl, who was made a Peer by Cromwell as well as by Charles II, occasionally kept minutes of council meetings and, in one or two cases, these have proved to be the only record of such meetings.

Next year sees the publication of the very first biographical and institutional volumes of this history, and it will prove to be a most exciting occasion for Parliament. In due course, digitisation and online publication will lead to the first electronic history of the Lords. But new technology does not always work. Only last week an historian asked whether she could consult me on intimate details of the 4th Earl's private life because the name of a courtesan had not appeared on a microfilm. I was relieved to be able to report that there was no such reference in the original either.

During a recession, private owners suffer like everyone else and, from time to time, we have to subsidise the considerable cost of maintaining historic properties and collections through painful personal sales. In these difficult times, we continue to look to the Government not to make our lives more difficult than they are already, and to look kindly on exemption rules and in-lieu arrangements, as I know they have. So I look forward to the Minister's confirmation to the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, that historical manuscripts in public hands will continue to be cherished and will not be the target of cuts while he is around.