World War One
Finding primary source material in Special
Collections
Specific material of
interest
Material relating to 6th Battalion Cameron Highlanders
Including diaries, reminiscences and letters from the front:
MS Gen 1376 &
MS Gen 532:
MS Gen 1376/1-2: retrospective notes and reminiscences of Robert McOwan who
joined the battalion as one of a draft of 250 just after the battle of Loos
in 1915; includes accounts of the Somme and the Marne.
MS Gen 1376/4: diary of John Kenneth Bulfin-Crawford from 4 July to 17
November 1915.
MS Gen 1376/6: diary of James Campbell from 8th July 1915 to 16th March
1918.
MS Gen 1376/7: souvenir booklet of the Sixth Cameron Highlanders, 1916.
MS Gen 1376/8-10; 12-16: reunion club material, minute books and press
cuttings.
MS Gen 1376/11: photographs.
MS Gen 532: some seventy letters from Captain F. J. MacCunn to his family
recounting his experiences as a soldier, from a telegram saying goodbye in
September 1914 to correspondence concerning his death in 1915.
Papers of Alec Lawrence Macfie
MS Gen 1517/1: correspondence from 1917-18, to his mother, describing
military training in Cambridge and elsewhere and war service in France;
comprises of 76 letters, 10 postcards, & 1 letter journal.
MS Gen 1643/580-642: material from his brother, John Mandeville Macfie,
relating to the Salonika campaign; includes maps, postcards and photographs.
MacCallum Scott papers
Alexander MacCallum Scott (1874-1928) was Secretary of the League of
Liberals against Aggression and Militarism, and Secretary of the New Reform
Club before becoming Liberal M.P. for the Bridgeton constituency of Glasgow
in 1910. During the First World War he was Parliamentary Private Secretary
to Winston Churchill. The papers include correspondence with constituents
and contemporaries, drafts of speeches, and political diaries:
MS Gen 1465 (items 5-9 particularly relevant, being his political
diaries from 1914 to 1919).
Protective coloration of ships
MS Gen 1302: collection of typescript documents relating to the
protective coloration of ships etc. in the Great War, compiled by Sir John
Graham Kerr.
How to find more
As well as those collections mentioned above, war touches on and is
mentioned in the letters and papers of most of those people alive during the
period. For example, a series of letters from the composer Gustav Holst (MS
Gen 1350) includes some from his time in Salonika in 1918, while those
letters written 1914-18 in a collection of correspondence from the Edinburgh
schoolteacher Christina Hunter Lawson (MS
Gen 525) provide a civilian's viewpoint of the war experience. There is
therefore much more material of relevance than it is possible to list here.
Since most Glasgow University Library stock is available via on-line
catalogues, this material is easy to trace independently:
Manuscripts catalogue
Unpublished material (including photographs, typescripts etc) is indexed
on the Special Collections
manuscripts
catalogue.
The catalogue may be searched via
name,
document or
collection: for more guidance see the
help page.
Some search strategies: -
- to find any items relating to Winston Churchill, use the
Name
Search option, typing 'Churchill' in the top name box and 'w'
in the forenames box
- to find any items produced in 1914, use the
Document Search option, typing '1914' in the year box
- to find any items relating to conscription use the
Document Search option, typing 'conscription' in the word (or phrase) in
description box
NB: Use the Word (or Phrase) in Description box for
keyword-type searches; note, however, that the manuscripts catalogue is
not subject indexed, and successful searches therefore rely upon
matching words that have been used in the descriptions section of the
record (tip: be prepared to try different keywords and synonyms).
Printed Books
Records for all the printed material held in the library are indexed on
the main library
catalogue, with the usual fields to search (author, title, keyword etc);
this catalogue includes printed books in Special Collections and material
held in the library's remote store (housing lesser used material, including
many books of relevance published at the beginning of the twentieth
century).
Use the Advanced Keyword
Search option to limit searches to material held in Special Collections
and/or by date:
- to find any books relating to war published between 1914
and 1918, use the Advanced
Keyword Search option, typing 'war' in the main search box
and '1913' in the Year: After box in the Optional Limits section;
try the same search using 'western front', 'conflict', etc as
keywords.
Further help
I am always happy to try and help locate relevant material and advise on
best use of the collections:
Julie Gardham: j.gardham@lib.gla.ac.uk; 330
3791 (office); 330 6767 (Special Collections reading room).
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