Chartwell Manuscripts

The Chartwell Manuscripts collection consists of manuscripts and printed ephemera related to Sir Winston Churchill, which have come from the National Trust property at Chartwell in Kent, which was Churchill's home from 1922 until the end of his life, in 1965.

The collection also includes material from Grace Hamblin. Hamblin was secretary to Churchill from 1932-38, secretary to Clementine Churchill from 1939 to 1966, was also in charge of secretarial and financial affairs at Chartwell from 1945 to 1965 and then finally became Administrator at Chartwell for the National Trust from 1965 until 1973.

The collection consists mainly of material either sent to Churchill during his lifetime or sent as a tribute to him after his death, and is extremely varied. It includes artefacts such as certificates of Churchill's membership of various societies, historically important items such as the degrees Churchill was awarded in Zurich [Switzerland] in 1946 after his "United Europe" speech or a tribute signed by members of the French Resistance. There are also some facsimiles of important documents, such as a memo on the piers to be used in the Normandy landings [France] and correspondence between Churchill and the American President Franklin Roosevelt.

There is also a small administrative archive of Chartwell material compiled by Grace Hamblin, which mainly includes notes and correspondence concerning the running of the house and gardens, as well as material on Churchill's paintings and various cards and invitations.

The National Trust deposited this collection as a permanent loan at Churchill Archives Centre in September 2000.

This catalogue is a copy of the National Trust's card index to the collection, combining lists of the manuscripts (MSB) and printed ephemera (PE) which were kept in the Chartwell Muniment Room and Silver Safe, and also a list for Grace Hamblin's papers. As not everything from Chartwell has been deposited here, the catalogue references do not keep to an unbroken numerical order, but have large gaps between some numbers (and actually start at MSB/6). In addition to this, in a few cases reference numbers are listed slightly out of sequence; where this happens, notes have been added to the catalogue to indicate where the next reference has been inserted.

When ordering items from the catalogue, please include the main parts of the reference codes, which have been highlighted in yellow: ie. MSB/6, or PE/4 (or in the Grace Hamblin list, 1/1), and also the box number marked beside the reference code.

The papers are on permanent loan.

The collection is open for consultation by researchers using Churchill Archives Centre, Churchill College, Cambridge. Churchill Archives Centre is open from Monday to Friday, 9am-5pm. A prior appointment and two forms of identification are required.

Researchers wishing to publish excerpts from the papers must obtain prior permission from the copyright holders and should seek advice from Archives Centre staff.

Please cite as Churchill Archives Centre, Chartwell Manuscripts, CHWL

Please see also the Churchill Papers (http://www.chu.cam.ac.uk/churchill_papers/), Churchill Additional Collection (WCHL), other Churchill related collections at Churchill Archives Centre, and also the Hamblin Papers (HAMB). See the National Trust (http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/) for details on Chartwell.

A copy of this finding aid is available for consultation at Churchill Archives Centre, Cambridge, the National Register of Archives, London and on the Janus website, http://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/. A more detailed version can be consulted at Churchill Archives Centre.

This collection (fonds) level description was prepared by Katharine Thomson of Churchill Archives Centre in April 2004 and the full catalogue was converted in 2011.