Our archive
Photograph collection
The Group has a substantial photograph collection covering all aspects of the NBR’s operations, particularly its stock of locomotives, from its earliest years in the 1840s to the end of the Company’s independent existence. In addition, there are many photographs covering the LNER and British Railways periods. The Group has digitised the majority of these images and a searchable online catalogue with previews of each image is available to members. At present this contains over 42,000 entries, each with a preview photograph, and work is continuing. We hope that this will be a valuable aid to members’ research.
Archive material
The NBRSG has a substantial archive of material relating to the North British Railway and its predecessors and successors. Some of this material is held by the Group, and a proportion of it is available online to members.
Much of the material previously held by the group has been placed in the custody of the National Records of Scotland. In making the transfer the Group provided NRS with a copy of its Archive Catalogue which is being converted by NRS to its own cataloguing system. The Group’s archive has been assigned the NRS Catalogue prefix GD536 and items will appear in the NRS Catalogue as GD536/* where * is the original NBRSG Archive Catalogue number. The NRS has given an undertaking that pending the appearance of the archive in the NRS On-line Catalogue members of NBRSG can request to view any item subject to the usual terms of access to NRS material. These can be found on the NRS website at https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/. An important aspect of access to material is that it must be ordered at least 48 hours before it can be viewed in the Historical Search Room at General Register House.
It should be stressed that potential enquirers should familiarise themselves with the NRS procedures for access to any of its material. Do not turn up at General Register House and expect to view material on demand or you are likely to be disappointed.
Archive and Collections Management Policy
The Group has published a policy document and an Archive Donation Form which are available by following the links below.