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Kelmscott House Collections

Kelmscott Manor was left to the Society of Antiquaries by William Morris’s daughter May in her will of 1929, naming the Society as her residuary legatee. Her sister Jenny died in 1935, leaving her residuary estate to the Society to form the William and Jane Morris Fund. in 1962, the Society became residuary legatee of the entire Morris estate. The collections consist of about 550 items of furniture, textiles, ceramics and pictures. Some items were in the house when it was leased by Morris in 1871, some were brought to the Manor by May Morris before she died in 1938 and some items were brought to and acquired by the Manor following its restoration in the 1960s. Furniture includes original Morris and Co chairs, Ford Madox Brown green painted bedroom furniture, William Morris’s bed, tables and a settle designed by Philip Webb for Red House. Textiles include 15th and 16th century tapestries, Morris and Co carpets, embroideries by William Morris and the Acanthus and Vine tapestry worked entirely by him, the hangings of his bed and Daisy hangings from Red House. Ceramics include a collection of blue and white china and a William de Morgan lustre plate.

Decorative Art Collection

The William Morris Society has a study collection relating to Morris, his family and associates. The Society particularly seeks material which relates to Morris’s occupancy of Kelmscott House between 1878 and his death in 1896. It has Morris and Co printed and woven textiles, embroideries, Hammersmith rug and wallpaper sample books, designs on paper for wallpapers, textiles, embroideries, murals and stained glass, Morris and Co furniture, Kelmscott Press books, press furniture and blocks and an Albion proofing press used to produce Kelmscott books.

Source: Cornucopia

Date: Not known, but before 2015

Licence: CC BY-NC

The Hawley Collection was formed by Ken Hawley (1927 – 2014) who, having spent a lifetime selling tools in his own shop in Sheffield, had acquired an unrivalled knowledge about the Sheffield tool manufacturing, cutlery and silversmithing industries. The Hawley Collection covers the range of articles described as ‘Light Trades’, as opposed to the ‘Heavy Trades’ of steel making and manipulation. The ‘Light Trades’ include the manufacture of cutting tools, percussion tools, measuring and marking tools, cutlery and flatware, silverware, surgical instruments and related supporting trades. The Hawley Collection includes examples of finished and partfinished tools and cutlery and the tools that made the tools and cutlery, together with associated trade catalogues, ephemera, photographs, audio-visual materials and archives.

The collection was housed with the University of Sheffield from 1995 to 2008, after which it was located in a specially-built extension to Kelham Island Museum, part of Sheffield Industrial Museums Trust. It is operated entirely by volunteers.

Source: Collection development policy

Date: 2014

Licence: CC BY-NC

The collection covers the range of tool manufacturing and the cutlery and silversmithing industries. The focus of the collection is on items from Sheffield and South Yorkshire; however the collection also holds and collects comparative material from elsewhere in the United Kingdom and the rest of the world.

The collection includes finished products, work in progress, raw materials and tools that made tools, together with printed materials such as trade catalogues, price lists, advertisements, archive material such as designs, cost books and correspondence and audio-visual material such as photographs, film, video and audio material.

There are relatively few loans in to the collection, the most notable being the Stanley Millennium Year Knife (an exhibition knife started in 1821 by Joseph Rodgers of Sheffield and now holding over 2000 blades), and the Simon Barley saw collection with over 1270 specimens.

Objects

The object collection contains all classes of tools, particularly edge tools, cutlery, measuring instruments and silversmiths’ tools. This collection comprises over 100,000 items including finished products, work in progress items, raw materials and ‘tools that make tools’ and as such represents a comprehensive record of the processes and people involved in these industries. Most of the material dates from c1800 to the present day and has direct local and regional associations, in the main collected locally or given by local people.

The collection holds some notable groups, for example, the UK’s largest public collection of micrometers, a unique collection of boxwood rules, together with examples of work in progress, trade tools and most importantly standards of foreign measures dating from 1768, early examples of the world’s first steel measuring tape dating to 1845.

Printed Material

The collection also holds a range of printed material relating to the manufacture of tools, cutlery and silverware. There are over 5,000 catalogues for British and foreign hand tools, machine tools, cutlery, steel and surgical instruments. There are also firms histories and trade literature and ephemera such as newspaper cuttings, notes, pamphlets, price lists and records of some unions and employers’ organisations.

The Hawley Collection holds probably the most comprehensive run of the Sheffield Illustrated Lists, (second edition onwards), which details the diverse range of material manufactures in Sheffield. The catalogue collection also includes some notable 19th century illustrated examples typical of the period.

Graphics

The collection also contains artwork for promotions and trade catalogues, commissioned designs for silverware, production drawings and plans. Examples from the collection include the drawings of Wallace Smythe, a noted in-house designer in the 1920s for Mappin & Webb of Sheffield.

Archives

The collection contains archive material, for example letters, day books, order books, production records, patents and outworker records relating to tool manufacture, cutlery and the silversmithing industries. The archive material has mostly been acquired at the same time as object collections to complement the contextual knowledge and understanding of the trades.

Audio-Visual Material

The collection contains over 3000 photographs and a range of 35mm slides, videos, 8mm and 16mm film which record the people, places and processes involved in the tool manufacture, cutlery and silversmithing industries. The collection also contains over 100 recorded interviews with workers and craftsmen covering the manufacturing processes and histories of trades.

Source: Collection development policy

Date: 2014

Licence: CC BY-NC

Social History Collection

Local history of Kendal and the former county of Westmoreland including personal, domestic, working, civic and community life.

Subjects

Social History

Biology Collection

Local and non-local natural history including the Dr Parker collection of birds and birds eggs and the hunting trophies of Colonel Edgar Harrison and Major Cooper, acquired whilst they were serving abroad as military officers. Animal heads donated by Col. Harrison in the 1930s include Antelope, Bison, Gazelle, Pumas, Rhinos and a Tiger. The collection also features African animals such as a lion, aardvark, springbok and a great flamingo donated in 1860 and one of the oldest specimens in the collection. The Arctic specimens include a Musk Ox, Snowy Owls and a fully-grown adult polar bear formerly part of the Earl of Lonsdale’s collection at Lowther Castle. From South America there is a three-toed sloth, an armadillo and several exotic birds including Toucans and a Quetzal. Australian mammals are represented by marsupials such as a Red Kangaroo, Spiny Anteater and a Duckbilled Platypus. There is also a rare specimen of a Thylacine, a large carnivorous marsupial also known as a Tasmanian Wolf or Tasmanian Tiger and thought to have been extinct since the 1930s. This specimen was donated in 1939 by a Dr Parker, and was cased by H. Murray of Carnforth. Asian wildlife covers the wide range of habitats with species such as the Orang-utan of the rainforests and lowland species such as the Peacock. Europe specimens include a Great Bustard (extinct in England since the early 19th Century), an Otter, Badger, Waxwing and Spoonbill.

Subjects

Biology

Geology Collection

Geological collections include fossils, local shales, flags, grits and slates, and also local minerals and rock types.

Subjects

Geology

Personalia Collection

Alfred Wainwright was involved with the museum for many years and amongst the collections are some of his personal items such as his walking jacket, spectacles, rucksack, heavily darned socks and pipe. There are also many of his original pen and ink drawings including original pages for his famous ‘Pictorial Guides’, maps drawn when he was a child, his original map of Westmorland, hand-written accounts, and drawings of items from the Museum of Lakeland Life, Kendal.

Subjects

Personalia

Archaeology Collection

The archaeology collections range from Prehistoric to Post-Medieval. The majority of material relates to excavations from the same horizons including a large collection of Neolithic axe heads and stone tools from the “factory” at Great Langdale, Cumbria and Mesolithic tools from Westmoreland Uplands. Roman finds from Watercrook Fort, Kendal includes domestic and military items, coins, jewellery, shoes, altars, funerary stone and a sculpture of the classical god Bacchus. Other local Roman sites at Ambleside and Tebay are also represented. A 10th Century Hiberno-Norse Cross and a pattern welded sword found near Kendal in 1898 are included in the Viking collection, whilst various Medieval items include a coin hoard from Grasmere dating from the reigns of Edward I to Henry VII. The museum also has an original key from Kendal Castle, built in the mid-13th Century and home to the family of Katherine Parr, together with other items such as leather drinking jugs, a silver coin hoard, weaponry including cannonballs and chain mail. The Egyptian collections include funerary objects, scarab seals, shawabti figures, and numerous necklace beads, some acquired from excavations in the early 1900s. There is also a selection of foreign Roman finds and some 5th century BC Greek pottery.

Subjects

Archaeology

Ancient Egyptian Collection

The museum holds 250 ancient Egyptian objects which are part of the Archaeology collection. Classes of objects represented in the collection include: coffins; coins; faience figures; furniture; jewellery; metal figures; animal remains (mummies); human remains (mummies); offering tables; papyri; pottery; ‘Ptah-Sokar-Osiris’ figures; scarabs; shabtis; stone figures; stone vessels; textiles; toilet articles; tomb models; wooden figures. Objects are known to have come from the following locations in Egypt (with the name of the excavator/sponsor and year of excavation given where possible): Abydos (Garstang; there is no further information in the records but this may be Garstang excavating the El Arabeh area of Abydos with the Egyptian Research Account, 1900); Beni Hasan (Garstang with Liverpool University, 1902-1904); Esna (Garstang and Jones with Liverpool University, 1905-1906).

Subjects

Antiquities; Ancient civilizations; Antiquity; Archaeological sites; Archaeological objects; Egyptology; Archaeological excavations

Source: Cornucopia

Date: Not known, but before 2015

Licence: CC BY-NC

Arms and Armour

The collections of the Kent and Sharpshooters Yeomanry Museum comprise uniforms, weapons and equipment, guidons and flags, silver, pictures, photographs, documents, medals and personal relics and mementoes of officers and men who served with the regiment from the formation of the Kent Yeomanry in 1794 to the present day. This includes the Royal East Kent Mounted Rifles, Queen’s Own West Kent Yeomanry, Kent Yeomanry, 3rd County of London Yeomanry (Sharpshooters), 23rd London Armoured Car Company (Sharpshooters), 4th County of London Yeomanry (Sharpshooters), 3rd/4th County of London Yeomanry (Sharpshooters), Kent and County of London Yeomanry (Sharpshooters), Kent and Sharpshooters Yeomanry.

Source: Cornucopia

Date: Not known, but before 2015

Licence: CC BY-NC

Subject Areas: Our collections focus on reflecting the diversity and history of Freemasonry.

Formats: The collections include various formats such as artifacts, artworks, documents, photographs, and digital media.

Geographic Focus: While maintaining a global perspective, the primary geographic focus is the County of Kent.

Source: Collection development policy

Date: 2024

Licence: CC BY-NC

The collection at Keswick Museum and Art Gallery was founded by the local Literary and Scientific Society in 1873, with a particular focus on Natural Sciences. The collection of random, chance finds of local, natural and antiquarian interest was quickly focused under several local naturalists and geologists, including James Clifton Ward, to active systematic collecting. A number of pieces were bought including Flintoft’s model of the Lake District, while the bequest of James Edmonson’s butterfly collection forms a focus of the entomological collections today. The important literary collections were begun when Canon H D Rawnsley, one of the founders of the National Trust, became a Fitz Park Trustee in the early part of the twentieth century. His fame brought donations and bequest from many quarters including members of the Southey family. The collection is largely provenanced to Keswick and the North Lakes.

The Museum was governed by the Fitz Park Trust until it ran into financial difficulties in 1994, at which time the Keswick Museum and Art Gallery Trust was formed, with Allerdale Borough Council as Trustee. In 2003 the Museums collections were formally acknowledged as existing and the collection was transferred to the trust.

In 2007 the management of the Museum was delegated to Keswick Museum and Art Gallery Management Limited from Allerdale Borough Council.

A major building refurbishment was completed in 2014, allowing more space for exhibitions as well as being able to develop more commercial activity to support the sustainability of the museum.

Source: Collection development policy

Date: 2022

Licence: CC BY-NC

Archaeology

The small collection comprises mainly Cumbrian artefacts, deriving from a number of sources including bequests, excavations and casual finds. This material can be placed in three categories: Pre-history, Roman, and Medieval.

Pre-history

There is a significant collection of worked Neolithic axes from the Langdale axe making sites including rough outs and finished axes, all found within the North Lakes area. Additionally there are several bronzes weapons and two Iron Age bangles from the west of Thirlmere.

Roman

The Roman collection is a small number of ceramic sherds from Samian to lower wares, including some from different local sites, and a few unprovenanced coins.

Medieval

The collection is a small number of ceramic sherds from key local sites such as Lords Island, seat of the Earls of Derwentwater, and a recently acquired lead seal and crucifix mould. Tullie House Museum in Carlisle holds the premier collection of archaeological material from Allerdale, ranging from excavation archives through to specific pieces such as the Cockermouth gold neck ring.

Social History

Costume & Textiles

The collection includes little costume material except for the Flather costume collection, comprising non-local 1920s and 30s daily wear and accessories. Also John Ruskin’s court suit; Robert Southey’s shoes; wedding and may queen outfits.

Domestic: leisure/pastimes

This collection includes pastimes, sport and music, especially the famous Musical Stones. The Museum has three sets of stones and a significant archive of associated material.

Work: industrial, commercial, maritime, agriculture

This area of the collection concentrates on pencil and bobbin manufacture; Cockermouth, Keswick & Penrith Railway; Keswick Gas, Light & Coke Company; tourism & hospitality; shops; quarrying & mining (very little material).

Community: schools, religion, political/military

The collection includes local primary and secondary schools; churches; Keswick Convention; festivals; celebrities such as Sir J G Woodford. The collection features a significant model – Flintoft’s relief map of Cumbria, made in 1834 and material relating to the Keswick Convention.

Natural Sciences

Vertebrate Zoology

The collection includes the display collection of mounted British birds and mammals, some not found in Cumbria today, some osteological material, and several hundred clutches of birds eggs and nests. This collection at Keswick Museum and Art Gallery formed the original basis of the Museum and most specimens date from the nineteenth and twentieth century. Most is of local and regional significance with some specimens of national interest, such as the Vendace, a local relict of the ice age, together with published examples of taxidermy, for example, Greenwell Blackett’s Buzzard. Most have close associations with notable local naturalists such as Joseph Flintoft, and Linneas Eden Hope who helped develop the collections.

Invertebrate Zoology

Keswick Museum houses a large entomological collection of mainly British Lepidoptera and Micro-Lepidoptera, and a comprehensive collection of local Coleoptera. The collection includes fish, reptiles, and amphibians, preserved wet, dried and mounted, with a significant collection of freshwater and marine shells from Britain and the world.

Botany

The herbarium at Keswick Museum and Art Gallery includes over 1000 sheets of pressed material.

Geology (rocks, minerals and fossils)

Keswick Museum and Art Gallery contains an important collection of rocks, minerals and fossils including the collection assembled by James Clifton Ward who surveyed the geology of Keswick for the British Geological Survey. The size and information associated with elements of this collection makes it of regional significance. The geology collection contains a good balance of rocks, minerals & fossils, mostly from local sites and well representing the complex local geology, industrial activity and the work of important nineteenth century collectors. A large proportion of the mineral and rocks are from named collections, including those of Ward, Robert Harkness, John Postlethwaite and Jonathan Otley, all early geology pioneers. The Museum also holds a small collection of minerals collected by John Ruskin, the great Victorian author, artist and social reformer and has specimens donated by twentieth century geologists such as Edgar Shackleton. Cumbria has the greatest number of mineral species in the country and the minerals of the Caldbeck Fells, an internationally important mineralogical area, now collecting restricted, are well represented, including many irreplaceable specimens. Local commercial exploitation and use of stone is also documented in the collections. Graptolites and other marine fauna of the Skiddaw Slates are well represented in the fossil collection, with some type and figured material of national importance. Plant fossils of the Coal Measures are also well represented and the Museum has one specimen of reptile footprints in Eden Valley Sandstone.

Fine and Decorative Art

Fine Art (Oils, Prints, Watercolours)

A collection of prints, watercolours, oils and drawings covering the period c.1700 to the present day, with the majority of the works dating from the nineteenth century. The collection is primarily of works on paper, of regional significance. The exceptions are nationally important works by Nash and Westall, primarily of nineteenth century Southey family portraits and contemporary views, and a significant collection of watercolours and etchings by Brangwyn. Other notable artists include Sir Charles Holmes, Collingwood and Longmire. The easel paintings are again mainly nineteenth century in date and of regional importance, though the collection does include a number of works by James Durden; a portrait of Robert Southey by Opie; a Redpath oil; a large oil of Waterfall at Keswick by Joseph Farington.

Metal and Glass

The collection mainly consists of Arts & Craft metal work from the Keswick School of Industrial Arts (KSIA), founded by Canon H D and Edith Rawnsley in 1884. The collection includes some early pieces of repousse and chased copper articles, by named artists including W H Mawson and a portrait of Rawnsley in bronze relief by Edith Maryon, and various sporting trophies and shields, some silver, but the bulk is later stainless steel commemorative ware. There are also some KSIA fixtures and fittings in the building itself. The Goldscope Cup is a fine piece of silversmithing, but its main importance lies in the locally sourced silver. There is a nationally important bust of Hugh Walpole by Epstein.

Ceramics

The collection holds a very small collection of ceramics: Robert Southey’s tea service; a cup & saucer from Peter Crosthwaite’s museum reputedly made for Napoleon.

Furniture

A small eclectic collection includes a large parish trunk; John Peel’s chair; Southey’s chair and writing desk; Wonderful Walker bobbin chair; Radcliffe arms chair.

Archive Material

The core of the archive is the literary collection of manuscripts; letters, poems and prose and associated material of the Lake Poets and writers, especially Robert Southey who lived in Keswick for 40 years, and, to a lesser degree his contemporaries; William Wordsworth, De Quincey, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Later authors Hugh Walpole, Canon H D Rawnsley and John Ruskin are also well represented. The Southey collection has been built up over several decades primarily from donations and bequests made by members of the Southey family, including a recent bequest of many unpublished letters and early manuscripts of published poems. It is an internationally important archive, in the top 10 repositories of Southey material in the Country. The Museum also holds a quantity of correspondence and manuscript material from Peter Crosthwaite. The Museum has an important collection of geological maps associated with James Clifton Ward, who surveyed the area for the British Geological Survey, and other locally significant archives, including that of the Fitz Park Trust who used to own and manage the Museum. The strengths of the library lie in the areas of early tourism and nineteenth century guidebooks, and geology, and the Museum holds a run of the weekly newspaper, the English Lakes Visitor & Keswick Guardian, from the 1870s to 1910. The photographic archive details the work of important local photographers; the Abrahams, Maysons and Pettitts. The Abrahams firm in particular holds national significance as photographers of pioneering mountaineering climbs locally and elsewhere.

Source: Collection development policy

Date: 2022

Licence: CC BY-NC