The following collections held in Liddell
Hart Centre for Military Archives are of
particular interest for those interested in
the history of science and medicine:
- Barnetson, Maj Gen James Craw (1907-1984)
- Assistant Director of Medical Services,
6th Armoured Div, 1943-1946; Assistant Director of
Medical Services Scottish Command, 1946-1947;
War Office, 1947-1950; 11th Armoured Div, 1951;
Supreme Headquarters, Allied Powers Europe, 1951-1953.
Articles relating to Army medicine, 1945-1960,
including an account of the surrender of German
medical services, Austria 1945, and instructions
for dealing with radiation injury, 1958.
1 file
- Bowlby, Surg Gen Sir Anthony Alfred (1855-1929)
- Service in European War, 1914-1918, with
Royal Army Medical Corps and as Advisory
Consulting Surgeon to British Forces in France.
Report concerning the introduction of steel
helmets in World War One, 1916.
1 file
- Bramwell, Prof Antony (1927-1981)
- Aeronautical Engineer for the Ministry of Defence.
Military specification of piloted V/STOL aircraft, 1970.
1 file
- Davidson, Brig Thomas Walker (1901-1987)
- Royal Army Medical Corps, 1925-1931.
Typescript 'Report on my service in the Sudan 1925-1931',
setting out the medical problems
encountered there during his service.
1 file
- Douglas-Scott-Montagu, Brig Gen John Walter
Edward, 2nd Baron Montagu of Beaulieu (1866-1929)
- Advisor on Mechanical Transport, India 1915-1919;
member of Derby War Air Committee,
1916; representative of India Office to Civil Aerial
Transport Committee, 1917; President of
Air Conference, Guildhall, 1920.
Papers and photographs covering his career, 1915-1922,
including correspondence relating to the
Curzon and Cowdray Air Boards. Montagu played a key
role in promoting the development
of armoured vehicles and this is particularly reflected
in his papers and photographs for the
period, 1914-1922.
5 boxes
- Drake Seager, E R
- Atomic Weapons Establishment
Report on Operation Buffalo, atomic testing at Maralinga,
South Australia, intended to give
British Army Officers experience of an atomic explosion.
Largely written by Drake Seager in
1956 and revised using contemporary documents and
following discussion with veterans in 1994.
1 file
- Foulkes, Maj Gen Charles Howard (1875-1969)
- Service in Sierra Leone, 1898-1899; service in
Boer War, 1899-1900; Assistant Commander, Anglo-French
Boundary Commission, East of Niger, 1902-1904; service in West
Africa (Kano-Sokoto campaign), 1903; General Officer
Commanding Special Brigade and Director of Gas Services,
GHQ, 1914-1918; service in India, 1919-1920; Deputy Chief Engineer,
Southern Command, 1924-1926; Chief Engineer Aldershot,
Command, 1926-1930; ADC to the King, 1928; Col Commandant
Royal Engineers, 1937-1945.
Papers and photographs, 1897-1949, and diaries 1901-1968.
Of particular note are papers and photographs concerning
the development of techniques for photographic surveying
and reconnaissance at the turn of the century, and papers
on the use of gas, its impact and detailed records of
experiments in devising protective measures against it,
1914-1920. Also papers relating to his advisory work
on the protection of buildings in London against blast
immediately prior to World War Two.
42 boxes
- Fuller, Maj Gen John Frederick Charles (1878-1966)
- Service in Boer War, 1899-1902, and in European War,
1914-1918. Military historian and theorist.
Papers covering his career, 1892-1963 most notably relating
to the development of the tank and its deployment during
World War One and the inter war years.
11 boxes
- Glennie, Brig Edward Aubrey (1889-1980)
- Director, Survey of India.
Publications of the Survey of India: Technical and
General Reports, 1947-1955; Geodetic Reports,
1922-1940; History and Professional Papers.
Printed maps of Britain and Europe, World War Two.
9 boxes
- Harrison, Maj Gen Desmond (1896-1984)
- Engineer-in-Chief, South East Asia Command, 1943-1945.
Papers and photographs, mostly concerning South East
Asia Command engineering works, 1941-1946.
½ box
- Lewis, Dr Wilfrid Bennett (1908-1987)
- Lecturer in Physics, Gonville and Caius College,
Cambridge University, 1937; seconded to Air Ministry
as Senior Scientific Officer, 1939; work on radar for
Air Ministry/Ministry of Supply at the Telecommunications
Research Establishment, Great Malvern, 1942-1946.
Organisation charts, staff rolls, photographs and
scientific papers covering his service at the
Telecommunications Research Establishment;
correspondence with R van de Hulst concerning a
thesis on radar history.
2 boxes
- Marnham, Brig Sir Ralph (1901-1984)
- Officer Commanding Surgical Division of Nos 62
and 6 General Hospitals and Consultant Surgeon to
9th Army, East Africa, and Southern Command, 1939-1945.
Papers concerning surgical innovations in battle
conditions and No 62 General Hospital, Tobruk, 1940-1942.
Sir Ralph was responsible for the 'Tobruk plaster',
a rapid method of supporting broken bones credited
with significantly improved healing.
1 file
- Mills, Maj John W
- In charge of testing a prototype heavy tank for
Experimental Wing of Tank Design Department, Farnborough, 1941.
Letter, 1978, concerning tests.
1 file
- Parkes, Col Thomas
- Service in World War One with Chemists Corps,
Special Coy, Royal Engineers.
Diary, 1916.
1 vol
- Ridley, Gp Capt Leslie (1907-1982)
- Worked on the development of radar; in technical
control of all radar stations during Battle of
Britain, 1940-1941.
'The History of 72 Wing, May 1944-September 1945'
1 file
- Scott-Taggart, Wg Cdr John (1897-1979)
- Service with RAF in France, 1939-1940;
Staff Officer Air Ministry responsible for radar
training in RAF, 1940-1941; Senior Technical Officer,
No 73 Wing, responsible for radar stations in most
of England and Wales, 1943-1945.
Papers concerning his career, 1940-1950.
1 box
- Stern, Lt Col Sir Albert Gerald (1878-1966)
- Secretary Landship Committee, Admiralty, 1915;
Chairman Tank Committee, 1916; Director, Tank Supply
Department and Director, General Mechanical Warfare,
Ministry of Munitions, 1916; Commissioner, Mechanical
Warfare Overseas and Allies Department, 1917;
Inter-Allied Tank Bureau, 1917; Tank Board, 1918;
Chairman, Special Vehicle Development Committee,
Ministry of Supply, 1939-1943.
Papers relating to the development of the armoured
fighting vehicle during World War One and World War Two,
1915-1946.
17 boxes
- Swinton, Maj Gen Sir Ernest Dunlop (1868-1951)
- Service in European War, 1914-1918; Assistant
Secretary of the Committee of Imperial Defence and
War Cabinet; Chichele Professor of Military History
Oxford, 1925-1939; Col Commandant Royal Tank Corps, 1934-1938.
Papers and scrapbooks concerning his career and especially
the origins of the tank, c1911.
3 boxes
- Trewby, V Adm Sir (George Francis) Allan (b 1917)
- Marine engineer; winner of Ackroyd Stuart Award
of the Institute of Marine Engineering, 1954-1955;
Chief of Fleet Support and member of Board of Admiralty,
1971-1974.
Lecture notes and articles concerning the development
of marine gas turbines 1954-1963.
3 files
- Tudor, Adm Sir Frederick Charles Tudor (1863-1946)
Third Sea Lord, 1914-1917.
- Papers relating to the development of the tank, 1916.
1 file
- Webster, Lt Col Derek (1898-1983)
- Service with Royal Artillery, British Expeditionary Force,
1939-1940, on staff, South East Command, 1942-1943,
and HQ 21st Army Group, 1943-1945.
Papers, 1938-1979, concerning the use of the hollerith
(prototype computer) and the Army Stats Club.
Photograph include the hollerith used by the 21st
Army Group during the liberation of North West Europe.
1 box
- Wilson, Walter G
- Collaborated with Sir Albert Stern on the design
of the tank during World War One.
Copies of annotated pages from Sir Albert's Tanks,
1914-1918: The Logbook of a Pioneer.
1 file
- Woods, Maj Gen Thomas Frederic Mackie (1904-1982)
- Service with Royal Army Medical Corps in India,
Malta and UK, 1927-1940; service in UK, Madagascar,
India, Middle East, Burma and Malaya, 1940-1946;
seconded to Ministry of Food as Chief Medical Officer,
East African Groundnut Scheme, 1946-1948; Col Commandant
Royal Army Medical Corps, 1965-1969.
Papers, 1932-1970, including MD thesis relating to the
prevention of malaria in Northern India.
1 box
- Misc 41: War Neuroses in North Africa:
The Tunisian Campaign, Jan-May 1943, by Lt Col
R R Grinker and Capt J P Spiegal (1942).
- The Nuclear Age
- A series of twelve programmes on the history of
nuclear weaponary and strategy made jointly by
Central Independent Television PLC and WGBH Boston in 1989.
In addition to videos of programmes broadcast, the
Centre holds scripts for the series and full uncut
transcripts of interviews conducted in research for
the series. Many scientists, as well as politicians
and diplomats, were interviewed. These include
Hans Bethe, German educated physicist and
Director of the Theoretical Physics Division of Los Alamos
Laboratories, 1943-1946;
Bertram Goldschmidt, assistant in the Curie
Laboratories in Paris, 1935-1940, section leader
of the Anglo-Canadian Atomic Project, 1942-1945 and
Chemical Commisariat a l'Energie Atomique, 1949-1959;
Petr Leonodovich Kapista who worked under
Rutherford in 1921, Deputy Head of the Cavendish Magnetic
Research Laboratory, 1924-1934, latterly heading own
research institute in Moscow;
George Keyworth, Los Alamos Laboratories, 1968-1981,
Scientific Advisor to the President, 1981-1983 including
working with Reagan on the Strategic Defense Initiative, 1983;
Ronald Mason, Chief Scientific Advisor to Ministry
of Defence, 1977-1983 and Chairman of the Council for
Arms Control, 1986-1990;
Yuval Neeman, Director of Centre for Particle
Theory, Texas, USA, Scientific Director Atomic Energy
Commission Laboratories, Israel, 1961-1963;
Sergei Mikhailovich Polikanov, nuclear physicist
who worked at the Moscow Nuclear Power Research Institute,
1950-1957;
Dr Ramanna Raja, Chairman of the Atomic Energy
Commission and Secretary, Department of Atomic Energy,
Government of India, 1983 (Raja led the group that built
the Indian bomb);
Edward Teller, Hungarian Physicist, Manhattan Project,
Los Alamos, 1942-1946, Lawrence Livermore Laboratories,
1954-1975, member of the Science Advisory Board of the
United States Air Force;
Victor Weisskopf, Manhattan Project, Los Alamos,
1943-1946, Professor of Physics, Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, 1946-1960, Director General of European
Organisation for Nuclear Research, Geneva, Chairman of
High Energy Physics Advisory Panel of the Atomic Energy
Commission, 1967-1973;
Herbert York, Director, Lawrence Radiation Laboratory,
Livermore, California, 1952-1958 and member of the General Advisory
Committee of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, 1962-1969
and Defence Science Board, from 1977;
Lord Zuckerman, Chief Scientific Adviser to UK Government,
1964-1971.
- US Army Chemical and Biological Testing Programme
- Copies of documents from official American records
relating to US Army tests conducted at Aberdeen Proving
Ground, Edgewood, Maryland, USA, 1955-1975. Compiled
as research for Yorkshire TV documentary, Bad Trip to Edgewood,
transmitted 2 March 1993 as part of the First Tuesday series.
6 boxes
- Other
- Other papers within the Liddell Hart Centre for
Military Archives collection include
scattered items of interest to scientists.
The files of Captain Sir Basil Liddell Hart, for example,
include correspondence with Prof J D Bernal,
1938-1940, and Lord Zuckerman, 1957-1966, and those of
General Sir Ian Hamilton include an album of photographs
of the Tirah Campaign, North West Frontier, 1897-1898 including a
photograph of Surgeon Major Beevor operating under canvas
captioned 'by the aid of X-ray apparatus'. The papers of
Sir Arthur Bryant include a file of correspondence with
Sir Barnes Wallis, 1956-1979.
King's College London Archives
- Among the private papers deposited within King's
College London's institutional archives
are two collections compiled by individuals who served
as Surgeon Rear Admirals in the Royal Navy:
- Cheyne, Surgeon Rear Admiral Sir William Watson (1852-1932)
KH/PP3
- House surgeon in 1877, promoted through to Professor
of Clinical Surgery in 1902.
Notes on lectures on clinical surgery delivered by Sir
Joseph Lister and taken by Cheyne in 1872-1873.
Lister (1827-1912) was Professor of Clinical Surgery
in the Hospital between 1877-1893.
- Edmunds, Surgeon Rear Admiral Professor Arthur (1874-1945)
KH/PP4
- Educated King's College. Assistant Demonstrator,
1902, through to Surgeon at King's College Hospital
in 1919. Consulting Surgeon to the Royal Navy.
Papers including correspondence, case notes and
photographs relating to hermaphroditism and hypospadias.
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