Subject Guide: Politics: Subject Databases

State Papers Online offers original historical materials from high level international politics and diplomacy to the charges against a steward for poisoning a dozen or more people. The correspondence, reports, memoranda, and parliamentary drafts from ambassadors, civil servants and provincial administrators present a full picture of Britain from the period of Henry VIII to the reign of George III.

With the dissolution of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) in 1991, the decision was taken to deposit the archives alongside those of the Labour Party in Manchester's People's History Museum. Catalogued in 1993-1994, these turned out to be one of the outstanding national collections for the political history of the British left and have since aroused considerable scholarly interest. For the period from the 1940s, records of the party's central leading bodies have been meticulously preserved and include notes taken at meetings by leading party officials. In addition there are extensive records of central departments like the industrial department, which dealt with the trade union activities which were the most visible and controversial sign of the party's influence, and the international department, which maintained links with communist parties overseas. Contains Central Party records, Local Party records, Miscellaneous non-Party organisations, Individual deposits and CPGB history materials.