Collection KAP - PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE: King's College London administrative records

Key Information

Reference code

KAP

Title

PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE: King's College London administrative records

Date(s)

  • 1863-1997 (Creation)

Level of description

Collection

Extent

105 boxes

Scope and content

The records of the Principal's Office, King's College London, comprise minutes, correspondence and memoranda, 1863-1997. These notably include minutes of the Delegacy of King's College School of Medicine and Dentistry, 1989-1990, and various committee minutes including those of the Health and Welfare Committee, Joint Medical Advisory Committee and the Committee for the London Institutes for Advanced Study, 1974-1990; a run of general correspondence relating to College business including staff salaries, property, events, scholarships and relations with other universities, 1944-1979; but also more specifically, personal correspondence with Principal Richard William Jelf, 1863-1864; correspondence and papers on quinquennia and outlining the strategic direction of the College and constituent academic departments, including merger negotiations and the College Charter, 1933-1992; Principal's files relating to named departments, faculties and schools, including the United Medical and Dental Schools Merger, 1988-1997; correspondence on students including named individuals, the Student's Union and some pass lists, 1946-1979; correspondence concerning staff appointments, including professorial and other senior vacancies such as Secretaryship and Principalship, individual Chairs, salary scales, sabbaticals and staff-student relations, 1920-1997, correspondence concerning scholarships and awards, 1988-1997; papers relating to College property including proposals for the redevelopment of the College in Bloomsbury, expansion into Somerset House, Strand, and student residences, 1920-1985; minutes and correspondence concerning College libraries including the Ronald Burrows Memorial Library, 1931- 1977; correspondence and papers on the management of the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, including with donors, 1977-1994; correspondence concerning hospitality and entertainment including Fellows' dinners and graduations, public and inaugural lectures, orations, royal visits and student events, 1946-1997; correspondence and papers charting the relationship of King's with the federal University of London, including Heads of Schools and reports on teaching, post-war reconstruction and the future of Goldsmith's College, 1943-1987; assorted memoranda, 1896-1978.

Appraisal, destruction and scheduling

The papers will be weeded in due course to reduce duplication.

System of arrangement

Arranged according to year of accession.

General Information

Name of creator

(1831)

Biographical history

The Principal is the chief academic and administrative officer of the College, responsible to the College Council. There have been eighteen Principals since the appointment of William Otter in 1831.

Custodial history

Principal's Office, King's College London, 1982-2000.

Conditions governing access

Administrative records are generally closed for 20 years except for published material and some committee and other minutes.

Files containing personal data are closed for 80 years and sensitive personal data for 100 years from the date of the most recent document in the file.

Where open, access is subject to signature of Reader's undertaking form, and appropriate provision of two forms of identification, to include one photographic ID.

Conditions governing reproduction

Copies, subject to the condition of the original, may be supplied from open material for research purposes only.

Requests to publish original material should be submitted to the Archives.

Language of material

  • English

Script of material

Finding aids

Some more detailed lists are available in hard copy in the College Archives reading room.

Existence and location of originals

Off-campus collection

Please note: We require 7 days notice to retrieve this collection as part, or all of it, is held off-campus. Read more ›

Related materials

King's College London Archives: Records of Ronald Montagu Burrows, Principal of King's College, (Ref: KCLCA KAP/BUR), and Burrows' private papers (Ref: KCLCA K/PP 47); papers of Sir William Reginald Halliday, Principal of King's (Ref: KCLCA Halliday); papers of the Very Reverend Henry Wace, Principal of King's (Ref: KCLCA K/PP 21); Secretary's in-correspondence (Ref: KCLCA KA/IC); Secretary's out-letter books (Ref: KA/OLB). The Secretary's extensive governance, administrative and academic files series contains material that resembles closely records created by the Principal's Office (Ref: KCLCA KAS/AC, KAS/AD, KAS/GC); Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King's College London: papers of General Sir John Winthrop Hackett (Ref: KCLMA Hackett).

Related descriptions

Alternative identifier(s)

Genre access points

Rules and/or conventions used

Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000.

Script(s)

Archivist's note

Entry compiled by Geoff Browell

Accession area