The Ipswich Record Office – with its archive of documents going back to the 12th century - is one of the busiest in the country outside London.
Run by Suffolk County Council, every year over 30,000 people use the archives to research the people and properties of Suffolk and many different aspects of the county’s history. Now the record office is becoming even busier as its House History and Family History workshops put more and more Suffolk residents in touch with their past. We sent our reporter Kerry Burn to meet the staff and find out more about their work.
The Ipswich Record Office is one of three in Suffolk – the other two are in Bury and Lowestoft – which are run by Suffolk County Council’s Libraries and Heritage Directorate. The Ipswich office is housed in the refurbished Bramford Road School – originally built in 1870 and opened as the Record Office in 1990 by Diana, Princess of Wales.

Pauline Taylor, the Public Service Manager showed me round the office.
“About two thirds of people come to research their family or their house” she explained “with the others from academic research or school backgrounds.” 
“People can walk in but it’s far better to telephone in advance as you will receive advice and help from our specialist staff before you arrive” she explained. “The public are encouraged to ask staff for help as they can advise which records, microfilms or books to search next.  The amount of material available can sometimes be overwhelming for first time customers”. 
Pauline showed us the card indexes that contain details of all items in the archive. Visitors can ask for items to be brought from the strong room to the main public area – the search room. There is also a microfilm room – many paper records are microfilmed for safety and ease of use – and a map room. The strongroom upstairs has four miles of shelves holding archive boxes containing the bulk of the collection. The strongroom is temperature and humidity controlled and linked electronically to Suffolk Police and Fire Brigade. “You need to register to use the archive” Pauline went on “It’s free and lasts for four years. It also entitles you to use many more county record offices in the country.  All you need to bring with you is a proof of identity with your address on.”
“Visitors come from as far as Australia and the US to research family history” explained Pauline“ but for those who aren’t able to come here in person we offer a post research service. For £22.50 per hour our full-time researcher will work on your family or property history and post the results back to you.”
I then met the Archivist, Bridget Hanley in her office, surrounded by display materials for exhibitions and neat piles of items being catalogued. She showed me the display boards she was preparing for the new St Nicholas Centre in Cutler Street. I was impressed by her obvious enthusiasm for her work. I couldn’t resist asking her if she had a favourite item in the archive.

Grisly archives“I have many favourites, there are so many different types of records I couldn’t choose just one.” said Bridget. “I really enjoy my job cataloguing them and looking after this part of the County’s heritage!”

So I had another try and pushed her to name the most unusual piece in the archive.  After a second Bridget told me about the spine from a Chinese man that came with an archive deposited by Ransome and Rapier. This famous Ipswich company were building a railway in China where a train ran down a local man. The legal documents from the resulting court case came with his bones attached!

Suffolk's record offices - your questions answered

How do I find the records office?
Gatacre Road , Ipswich IP1 2LQ, Tel 01473 584541
The office is open 9 to 5, six days a week.
email ipswich.ro@libher.suffolkcc.gov.uk
website www.suffolkcc.gov.uk/sro/

Where are the other two offices?
77 Raingate Street, Bury St Edmunds IP33 2AR, Tel 01284 352352 
Central Library, Clapham Road, Lowestoft NR32 1DR, Tel 01502 405357  

How do the House history courses in Ipswich work?
These are held monthly, last two hours and cost £10.00. For that you get a selection of documents that relate to your parish area to study and individual help to get going on your own research. These are very popular so book early!

How do the Family History Workshops in Ipswich, Bury and Lowestoft work?
These are held on the last Wednesday of every month but you need to book well in advance – these courses are extremely popular. There are 12 people on each course, and it costs £10.00.


No birth records here - try the Registrars instead
People often come to the record office looking for birth records. In fact these are kept by the Registrars’ or Registry Office in Grimwade Street Ipswich.


Do you have materials that the records office might be interested in?
If anyone has any records they think might be of interest that they should contact Bridget Hanley on 01473 584541.


The archive held by the records office includes:

• a library of local studies books about Suffolk
• parish records from 1538 onwards covering baptisim, marriages and burials 
• maps including 25 inch to the mile maps from 1884 to the present 
• deeds
• about 50,000 photos (dating back as far as the middle of the 19th century) divided into parishes and subjects.  Volunteers are indexing and scanning some of these photographs to add to the Suffolk Sense of Place website http://www.senseofplacesuffolk.co.uk
• court records