History of the Falkland Islands Archives

By Jane Cameron, Archivist
November 2003

Early Documents

The earliest document in the Government Archives is dated 1831. It is a letter from Louis Vernet appointing Captain Smyley as the official pilot for shipping in Port Louis, Port William and other East Falkland waters. Other notable items include a manuscript of Thomas Helsby's account of the Port Louis murders and the census document for 1851. The earliest Letter Patent from the British Crown, typically elaborate parchment documents with heavy wax seals, providing for the Government of the Falkland Islands and Dependencies is dated 1843.

Only intermittent records from the 1830s have survived and consistent records do not begin until the arrival of Governor Moody in 1842. Although systematic records were kept after this date, their survival was a matter of chance. Storage was often a haphazard business and many losses occurred over the years as a result of poor binding, careless handling and fires in government buildings.

From the 1830s until around the time of the First World War, Government records were kept in large copybooks. Any loose materials, such as incoming letters, were also bound up into volumes. The Archives hold incomplete sets of approximately 150 volumes of Inward Despatch and Letter Books from 1832 to 1947, and 180 volumes of Outward Despatch and Letter Books from 1841 to 1965. Copies of letters out from about 1900 onwards are typed carbon copies. After World War 1 the quantity of paperwork led to a gradual change over into individual subject files, the form in which Government records are still kept today.

Legislative Council Minute Books

The Archives holds a complete set of eight volumes of Legislative Council Minute Books covering the period 1845 to 1972. From 1891 onwards Legislative Council minutes were published in the Government Gazettes. There are also eight volumes of Executive Council Minute Books from 1845 to 1958. The first volume of Executive Council minutes is missing and the explanation can be found at the beginning of the second volume where a note reads "Volume 1 of the minutes of the Executive Council was lost in the wreck of the Levenside at the entrance of Port William."

The Levenside was a British barque that had been collecting guano from New Island. She was returning to Stanley to land Governor Rennie, who had taken the opportunity to visit West Falkland (and was carrying official papers, clearly hoping to do some office work on the voyage). On the night of the 26th of January 1852 the Levenside struck on the Billy Rock and foundered in Port William. Everyone on board was saved but the ship was a total loss, as was the Executive Council Minute Book.

Gazette Notices

Handwritten Gazette notices were pinned up on the Government Notice Board in Stanley for public information before printed Gazettes began to be regularly issued from 1st January 1891. Three volumes of these notices survive. Before 1891 only occasional sheets were issued in printed form. The first notice in Gazette No.1 Volume 1 of 1891 reads "In consequence of the destruction of the Government Official Gazette Board on which it has been customary to publish both official and private Notices, His Excellency the Governor has been pleased to authorise the issue of a Government Gazette by authority."

Statistical records

The Blue Books were produced annually and contain statistical records for the Falkland Islands. They were called Blue Books simply because the forms to be filled in were printed on blue paper. They listed names, salaries and dates of appointment of everyone working for government and information on trade, shipping, land use, schools and local organisations. Thought to be issued for the Falkland Islands from 1846 to 1944 there should be ninety-nine volumes in total, but the current Archive collection is incomplete, having about thirty volumes missing, mainly from the 19th century. There is thought to be a complete set in the Public Records Office in London.

The Blue Books formed the basis for the Colonial Annual Reports, a printed booklet produced by the British Government for each of their overseas possessions. They contained summaries of statistics and activities for the Colony and Dependencies over the relevant period. Production of the reports was suspended for the years 1939 to 1945 during the Second World War. The reports commenced in 1846 and the last annual report was produced in 1949; thereafter until their demise in 1975 they were biennial reports.

Miscellaneous official documents

A fascinating volume covering the period 1848 to 1855 contains a detailed description of all Government buildings and structures including turf walls and stone corrals, both in Stanley and Camp. Six volumes from 1886 to 1985 recorded oaths of office taken by individuals such as members of Legislative and Executive Councils, Governors, Colonials Secretaries, judges and other senior civil servants. They contain specimen signatures of many prominent local people.

There are also volumes recording details of Falkland Islands registered vessels and the movements of shipping in and out of the Falkland Islands (and, in later years, South Georgia) over a 150 year period, together with manuscript and typescript burial records for Stanley Cemetery from the 1840s to the 1970s.

Although a few Government records continued to be maintained in ledgers until the 1990s, after the Second World War files of loose papers, normally typewritten and held together in subject folders, became the most common form of record keeping. The introduction of computers to Government Departments in the 1980s and 90s has not so far had an impact on archiving.

Some of the more fascinating of the later Government records include photographs and personal details of all those who applied for passports during the period 1919 to 1988; Minute Books and other documents relating to Stanley Town Council which was formed in 1947 and disbanded in 1973; and news transcripts from the Falkland Islands Broadcasting Station of items of local interest from 1960 onwards. No transcripts are known to have survived prior to 1960. There are also some court records from the 1950s to 1980s but nearly all the early court records are thought to have been destroyed in the Town Hall fire.

The West Falkland Magistrate's Office was established at Fox Bay in 1895, the Post Office in 1899 and the Wireless Station in 1918. The Archives hold some of the records including general letter books, registers of births, marriages and deaths and shipping registers. There are also Post Office registers including money orders and cash books, and Wireless Station log books.

Falkland Islands' Dependencies

From 1980 until 1962 the Falkland Islands' Dependencies comprised South Georgia, the South Sandwich Islands, South Orkney Islands, South Shetland Islands and Graham Land. On 3 March 1962 the latter three became part of the newly defined British Antarctic Territory and on 3 October 1985 South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands were also grouped separately from the Falkland Islands. The Archives hold records from the civil administration established at King Edward Point in 1912 consisting of a magistrate, customs office, radio station, Met Office and Post Office to supervise activities at the various whaling stations around South Georgia.

The history of the Archives

For many years the Archives were kept in a room in the Secretariat. In 1977 a records specialist from the Public Records Office in the United Kingdom was commissioned to report on the Falkland Islands Archives and make recommendations for their future protection and use. At about the same time a conservator arrived on a three-month contract to repair some of the most fragile and severely damaged early material.

At this time the Archives were moved from the Secretariat and allocated the top floor of what is now the Visitors Centre and at the time housed the FIGAS offices and the Met Office. Sydney Miller agreed to take on the post of Honorary Archivist and to supervise access to the Archives.

During the conflict of 1982 the Archives were broken into by Argentine troops, but miraculously the room was simply used as shelter and little damage appeared to have resulted to the records. The most obvious signs of occupancy apart from plates of food were the trampled maps which had apparently been pulled off the shelves to serve as bedding.

In 1989 Jane Cameron started to carry out preservation work on some of the badly damaged material in the Registrar General's Office, and in 1990 began working full-time as the first Government Archivist. An archives workshop was established in an ex-military Portakabin, temporarily sited in what is now the Gilbert House carpark. When this Portakabin was removed the Archives Office was transferred to Gilbert House. However, the Archives themselves remained in the building by the Public Jetty, a matter of serious concern due to the high fire risk. Various options for their storage were investigated, including use of the old Smithy in the Dockyard, but no satisfactory solution was found.

In 1996 funding was allocated for a new archives building and in 1997/8 this was constructed next to the Museum on Jeremy Moore Avenue. It was specially designed to provide proper storage facilities, together with a conservation workshop, reading room and office. The documents were transferred from the old building in June 1998.

Once the material had been safely housed the priorities were to build up the collections and to catalogue and index them. This work is in progress today and will be ongoing. The Archives staff doubled in 2001 with the recruitment of Tansy Newman to work on the cataloguing.

The future of the Archives

The collections are being expanded to cover not only the government records preserved in the past but also the wider social history of the Islands. To this end, a whole range of non-governmental material is actively being collected, from farm diaries and private photographs to periodicals and sports programmes.

Although the potential for space saving and rapid data access now exist, it is thought that as far as archives are concerned, digitisation is likely to remain an accessory rather than a primary tool for the foreseeable future at least. This is partly because computer discs in their present form are too easily corruptible to ensure the safety of information contained on them. In addition, the hardware necessary to read them is changing so fast that there is no guarantee the appropriate machinery would be available to a future researcher needing to consult a disc. For the present, paper remains the most reliable, time-tested medium and one which can be read with no auxiliary equipment.

Source: The Falkland Islands Archives Outline Guide to Holdings, published by the Falkland Islands Government, November 2003

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