Meet me and my microbes

Wednesday 10th April is when I will be giving my final talk dedicated to the fine collection, the Medical History of British India. Exploring the more gruesome aspect of life in British India, the talk explores the diseases the British attempted to combat and how their medicine moved into the lives of the indigenous population. Come along to the National Library of Scotland on George IV Bridge at 6pm and meet me and my microbes! Book online here. It is a free event.

Shot in the arm for Medical History website

A new collection of medical documents from the British Raj is now available to browse and search on the Medical History of British India website. 'Medicine - Vaccination' shows British efforts to vaccinate the Indian population against smallpox using the latest 19th and 20th century western scientific techniques. Over 60 reports reveal the complex nature and the scale of ambition of the vaccination programme in India as well as the conflict between western colonial medicine and indigenous society, culture and systems. The project was generously funded by a grant from the Wellcome Trust.

Who lets the dogs out!

As supposedly a nation of dog lovers, with over 8 million dogs kept as pets, it is worrying to read that over 100,000 strays are found each year, plus a rising number of incidences of cruelty and neglect, with many dogs out of control.


In a year there are about 210,000 people attacked by dogs in England, this includes 6,000 postal workers. The cost to the NHS of treating severe injuries caused by dogs is over £3 million and since 2007 seven people including five children have been killed by dogs in home.

These facts come from the House of Commons paper “dog control and welfare” the seventh report of session 2012-13 by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

This publication highlights many problems, from dog attacks on private property, which means the person attacked has no recourse to the criminal law provisions which apply to attacks on public property. There are also the problems of attacks on assistance dogs such as guide dogs, which impacts on the disabled person. There is also a problem with dogs that attack livestock, the legislation needs to be updated to include livestock such as llamas and other camelids. There is also a major concern about so-called “puppy farmers”

This parliamentary paper is well worth a read.

Farewell to India

After five and a half years I’m hanging up my Digitisation Manager’s hat and saying goodbye to the Medical History of British India.

I’ve had a brilliant time and have been privileged to work with such amazing material and a group of very talented colleagues across the National Library. Special thanks must go to the procurement staff and the Digital Team, plus to Jan Usher who was one of the co-founders of the project.

I’ve been to some great places to talk about the project, including the Wellcome Collection in London and Brisbane, Australia, and have met some wonderful researchers along the way.

Most of all, I have been immersed in a world long gone but preserved in our reports, British India. I have met doctors and patients, pioneers of medicine, witnessed the horror of death and disease and the role of medicine in colonial power. From prostitutes who lived in rum barrels, to bowel gangs and rabid badgers, medical students, veterinarians and lunatics, it has been a colourful experience!

These reports are all still available for free on the website and on April 10th I will be giving a talk called Painful Tales from the Raj at the National Library’s George IV Bridge Building at 6pm.

 

I’m doing another podcast on the asylums and mental hospitals and will be promoting the vaccination reports which are due online next month.

I have a new post as Digital Projects Officer, still in the NLS, working to bring more of the Library’s collections online.

The Library is applying for more funding to add further reports to the website so this may not be the end of the journey….

Don't doodle on books!

I was checking the consolidated list of Government Publications for 1930 and when looking through the index I came across this drawing. These publications are kept within the Official Publications Unit and therefore it must have been a member of the OPU staff that actually drew on a book!

I wonder which member of staff did it and who were they portraying in the doodle?

It looks like it is a woman, middle aged and with bags under her eyes. Now, I have been in OPU for 25 years and I don’t recognise her. Is it a self-portrait or were they sketching someone in the office...?

I wonder why they drew this picture - were they looking for inspiration to find an answer to an enquiry perhaps?

Stop for horses: horse meat scandal

The Food Standards Agency has information on the horse meat scandal, including a timeline of events and a list of answers to "your horse meat questions".

Palace of Westminster

The lavishly illustrated “Palace of Westminster Official Guide” by the Houses of Parliament arrived on my desk this week. It is a very informative book on the Palace, full of interesting facts and illustrations.


The history of Parliament is a fascinating one and I liked the quote on the back cover

“We may be proud that England is the ancient country of Parliaments. With scarcely any intervening period, Parliaments have met constantly for 600 years, and there was something of a Parliament before the Conquest. England is the mother of Parliaments.” John Bright, British politician and orator, 1865.

The book describes many interesting historical facts about Parliament, from the beginning of parliament, when Hansard was formally established, to what is Hansard, to the Suffragette/suffragists period, gunpowder plot and much, much more.

One particular fact jumped out at me, it was the assignation of Spencer Perceval. I didn’t realise that at 5.15 pm on 11th May 1812 the Prime Minister Spencer Perceval was fatally shot as he entered the House of Commons Lobby.

The assassin was John Bellingham, who was a merchant and felt he was entitled to compensation by the British Government for being wrongly imprisoned in Russia. He was hanged for murder the following week.

There is a very interesting timeline at the back of the book, which compares the Palace of Westminster to British parliamentary and constitutional history to major events.  I noticed that in the timeline the trial of Warren Hastings in 1788 is mentioned. The trial started the year before the start of the French Revolution.
It’s a fascinating book full of information and gorgeous illustrations.

The Medical History of British India Project

Suffragettes - the official view from Parliament

Day 4 of the OPU display

Today's choice is from Carol Campbell...


My first choice is not a major publication it’s a colouring book - ABC pictures to colour and I came across it when I was working on an enquiry a few years ago. It instantly reminded me of my childhood visits to the National Museum of Scotland, I think I insisted on being bought a new one each time I went!

My next item is another smaller ephemeral item, Be the voice that counts, is careers information leaflet for recruiting female Post Office telephonists published in the early 1970s. I chose this leaflet because it is very much of its era. Looking at it forty years after publication the contents could be viewed as quite sexist – reflecting the attitudes of a pre-equality legislation society. I am really interested the more ephemeral government publications like pamphlets and posters. These are often published in quick response to an emergency like Bird flu or in this case as temporary publication, easy to update as situations change, and were seen as items to be discarded after they stopped being useful. They provide an interesting snapshot of a moment in time, and we are fortunate that the National Library of Scotland retains these items in the collection.

Native American Photography at the Smithsonian is my last selection. The official publications collection includes a very interesting selection of United States material, including Congressional publications on print and microfiche. This item is a republication of the catalogue of the first photography exhibition held at the Smithsonian, but is more than that. This book gives an insight into attitudes of the time – the Native Americans appear to be treated as specimens rather than people and they are often wrongly identified, something that has been rectified where possible in this republication.

Quirky, moi?

Today's choice is from Diane Milligan, she has chosen items of a more quirky nature. Look out in particular for the 1947 vintage style 3-D glasses!

I guess I've made a pretty eclectic selection of material, but there is one overarching theme - the sheer breadth of the official publications collections.

One of the reasons why I chose "Food from the garden" is that it makes me think of my Granddad. When I was little my Mum told me about how he planted vegetables around their Anderson shelter during the Second World War. I also think it’s amazing that we have publications like this which come from that actual era, not to mention other items from the 19th century and earlier; it’s like holding a piece of history in your hands.

I really liked the way that "Air survey for development" takes a quite narrow subject area and makes it accessible, with the various applications of aerial mapping and photography clearly listed and with plenty of illustrations, some of them in 3-D (which explains the accompanying stereoscopic glasses!)

When I came across "Art collector", the Tate Gallery’s twist on the game of Happy Families, I was immediately struck by how it was such a good way to get kids interested in art and artists. We receive many beautiful books from the Tate and other galleries, and I did think that maybe I should have chosen one of those, but in the end this item’s quirkiness and innovation won out.

And last but not least, I was keen to include an electronic item. "Looking for Vikings" is an interactive resource, informing through words, pictures, and occasionally song! It was the result of a collaboration between the National Museums of Scotland, the National Museum of Ireland, and the National Museum of Denmark.

Curator's choice

Francine Millard an OPU curator tells me about her choice.

“I chose ‘Farm fires’ because it represents many Official Publications which have colourful illustrated covers. MAFF (Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food) was dissolved in 2002 when its responsibilities became part of the Department of Food, Agriculture and Rural Affairs (Defra). Having grown up in rural Lancashire among a menagerie of chickens, goats, ponies, cats and dogs, I have a particularly like publications on farm and animal management.

‘Make your own Egyptian mummy case’ is a British Museum item which I liked not just because of its subject, but because it was an interesting item to catalogue. Its format is ‘visual material.’ It is never to be made, so it is preserved exactly as it was when it arrived in the Library. It is similar to the real British Museum sarcophagi as it will be kept safe for future generations.

Finally, I chose ‘Pandemic flu: important information for you and your family’ because in 2005 governments were considering the danger H5N1 avian influenza (bird flu) if it evolved the ability to spread from human to human. The Welsh Assembly Government, who produced this leaflet in Welsh and English, issued many such publications. These will be important to future epidemiologists and history of medicine scholars who will be able to construct early 21st century reactions to infectious disease.”

PICK AND MIX (2)

OPU Curators’ choice (part 2)



So why did I choose the other 2 books for the display? There are many fascinating items in the Official Publications collection and I wish I could display all the ones that have caught my eye over the last 25 years. This display just touches the tip of an iceberg of the wealth of material in the collection.

The 2 books that I chose to be displayed are books about my interests – gardening and history.

“Artists Kew” is a delightful book on paintings around Kew Gardens which I love as I am an avid gardener. I came across the book “Nelson” when answering an enquiry. At that time I had just finished reading a book about Lady Emma Hamilton and I started to become fascinated by Lord Nelson turbulent lifestyle.

Part 3 of the OPU Curators choice will appear on Tuesday.

PICK AND MIX

OPU Curator’s choice (part 1)


My name is Elaine Simpson and I have worked in this unit for 25 years.  In that time I have seen many unique, important and quirky items pass across my desk and I try to blog about the more unusual ones that catch my eye.
The OPU curators were asked to submit 3 items from the collection for the display.  It was quite a challenge to choose what I thought would be good to view, out of the approximately 2 million items the Official Publications hold. In fact I cheated I just had to have 4 items on display.
My first had to be a parliamentary paper, they might look boring on the outside but inside a wealth of interesting facts appear, from when the first motorway was created to the European Union thoughts on eggs and information on disinewed meat. I have learnt a lot from House of Commons papers. The one I eventually decided to choose was based on the fact it is very new and quite topical “The referendum on separation for Scotland: terminating Trident – days or decades.”
I also chose a Scottish parliamentary paper for the same reason, it is the Public Audit Committee’s fourth report “The Gathering 2009.”

Tomorrow I will blog about my other 2 choices.  In the next few weeks all the curators involved will be explaining why they chose their items. There are quite a few quirky items on display it will be quite interesting to see why they decided on these items.

The display is in the cabinets at the top of the stairs in the George IV Bridge Library.

Coming soon...

The countdown is on....only 5 days to go...not to the next James Bond movie but to the Official Publications Curators' Choice display.  This display of items is showcasing material from the Official Publications collection.  The reason for choosing these books will become more evident from future blogging. 
The display cases are outside the reference services area in the National Library of Scotland.

Summer weather

Protecting the Arctic
I have been concerned about climate change for a long time, and remember going to a conference many, many years ago about this subject, where government scientists did mention there was a need to be aware of this problem.

I was leafing through the recently published report on Protecting the Arctic. In the summary it mentioned the damaging effects of climate change in the Arctic. It is warming twice as fast as anywhere else on the planet, the speed of the ice cap retreating has increased and the previously held view that the ice-cap is not at risk of a summer collapse in the next few years need to be re-examined.

After our summer weather I was dismayed to read in the introduction “ As a result of climate change, a number of “tipping points” that would hasten further global climate change could be approaching, with serious ramifications for the UK’s weather and climate.”

Could we stand more miserable summers? More rain and cold is something we could get used to. However, what about the 4 million people that live there and the species that are unique to that area, if this continues what will happen to them?

This is a very informative parliamentary paper that does make you think about our fragile earth.

The title and shelfmark of the report is –Protecting the Arctic : second report of session 2012-13 by the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee.

P.P. 2012-13 HC 171.

Mental Health reports added to Medical History of British India website

Those of you who regularly read this blog will know that I have been working on the digitisation of lunatic asylum reports from British India for some while.

I am delighted to announce that they have been added to the Medical History of British India website as the 'Medicine - Mental health' collection.

The 20,000 pages cover the period of 1867 - 1948 and describe the patients, staff and conditions of asylums throughout colonial India. This free to access material provides extensive research on responses to mental illness when the asylum's role was changing. Detailed reports show how 'moral management' was used by British colonists to treat native and European patients. This material will be particularly valuable to genealogists and those interested in the history of psychiatry, Indian and colonial history.

Please do have a browse and remember that the reports are searchable; just click on 'include book content' when you search.

The material, from the National Library's India Papers collection, was microfilmed and digitised using a grant from the Wellcome Trust.

(Picture shows Block plan of Rangoon Lunatic Asylum from 1893, image number: http://digital.nls.uk/83977693)

A long political life

Simon Walker, our latest intern from Strathclyde University, started work with us a few weeks ago. He will be researching vaccinations for smallpox in India using secondary and primary sources to write web text for the Medical History of British India Project website using NLS web writing guidelines.

It turns out that Simon’s grandfather was Harold Walker (Baron Walker of Doncaster), which of course was of great interest to us here in the Official Publications Unit.
Harold Walker was an Amalgamated Engineering and Electrical Workers’ Union (AUEW)-sponsored Labour Member of Parliament for Doncaster from 1964, holding the seat for 33 years. His political career progressed through junior whip in Harold Wilson’s government, under-Secretary for Employment, Privy Counsellor and Deputy Speaker. His union links were compromised by his involvement in Barbara Castle’s incomes policy initiative, the controversial “In place of strife”*, but he saw more progress with his work on equal pay, though Hansard shows that he still got a rough ride, despite his best intentions.

According to his obituary in the Telegraph, “One of Walker's most celebrated rulings was to order (with a barely-controlled straight face) the Labour maverick Tam Dalyell from the Chamber in 1986 for calling Mrs Thatcher "a bounder, a liar, a deceiver, a cheat and a crook", thereby uttering the five most un-Parliamentary expressions in a single sentence. Walker also expelled the future Scottish [First Minister] Alex Salmond for interrupting Nigel Lawson's 1988 Budget speech”.

He was knighted and served in the Lords on his retirement in 1997.

*You can access this report at the Library, shelfmark: P.P. 1969-1969 Cmnd 3888, or see the electronic version online, if you are a registered reader, in our licensed digital resources.

Simon was kind enough to bring in various documents, diaries and photographs, including this one of a (much younger!) Simon, with his distinguished granddad receiving his KBE, and Harold's second wife.

Great British bed bugs

In the build-up to the London Olympics, with the invasion of Union Jacks, adverts for sport gear and energy drinks, have you considered another invasion - of bed bugs?

The Australian bed bug epidemic was most likely to have been caused by the mass influx of visitors to the Sydney Olympics in 2000. Now London is bracing itself not only for a year's worth of tourists in 3 weeks but a surge in the bed bug population.

Bed bugs are wingless insects which are transferred from place to place by crawling into clothes and luggage. They can hide in mattresses, bed frames and even clock radios. They thrive in densely packed cities and feed on human blood. Infestations can be dealt with by pest control experts who deploy steam and chemicals against the unwanted insects.

Buyers of secondhand furniture are advised to check all items for bugs very carefully and travellers asked to check hotel beds and headboards while keeping luggage off the floor.

In British India it was suspected that the bed bug caused leishmaniasis, such as in Preliminary report on the development of the Leishman-Donovan body in the bed bug, 1907.

Medical personnel deliberately placed bed bugs on patients who were lying prostrate with malaria as part of their experiments.

In nineteenth century Bengal, bed bugs were a threat to army health as well as causing uncomfortable nights' sleep for the soldiers as they were feared to carry disease-causing parasites.

Europeans were advised to copy the Mahomedans, who shook the bugs out of their beds just outside the house or the Hindus who placed wooden bug traps in their beds.

Dalai Lama visit to National Library of Scotland

On Friday 22nd June, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet visited the National Library of Scotland here in Edinburgh.
He had requested a private viewing of some material, which included some Medical History of British India items.
On this page from His Holiness’s website Jan Usher, Head of Official Publications and one of the founders of the project, shows His Holiness a photograph from 1894 of Indian mendicants in the Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission.

To flog or not!

It never ceases to amaze me what Parliament discusses. I came across volume 156 of  Hansard for the year 1860, and read the discussion about flogging in the Army and Navy.


Mr W. Williams started the debate stating that he can’t understand why flogging was allowed as it would prevent respectable men from joining the Army or Navy.

The argument for flogging was that it had to be maintained as otherwise there would be “total subversion of discipline.”

He goes on to state that for trivial offences the soldiers and sailors would receive worse treatment than convicted criminals and felons!

Apparently the maximum of lashes for the army was one thousand, but this number was reduced to three hundred after a soldier died from flogging, and reduced again by the Duke of Wellington to fifty lashes.

The descriptions of flogging a soldier would appear in newspapers. One such incident concerned a young soldier named Davis, “his back was covered with a mass of large, red, inflamed boils, which bled profusely at every stroke, and reddened the ground under his feet, upon which the cat was ordered to be withheld for a few moments.” Even after pleading for mercy and escaping the confines the punishment still continued.

An interesting note is that the cat used in the Navy was heavier than the Army and was wielded in a different fashion which meant that 50 lashes in the Navy was equivalent to 150 in the Army.

In seconding the motion Mr Bristow when asking a French officer if there is any flogging in the French Army, received the reply “Neither the French men nor the French soldiers are brutes.”

However, later on the debate it is mentioned how the French treated crimes in the Army. “Do not talk about our treating men as brutes, when the French shot where we flogged. In Berlin solders were punished by being placed in a room six feet by four, with a series of re-entering angles, so that it was impossible for him to stand.”

It is a fascinating but horrific debate and an insight into what Parliament discussed in the Victorian era.

Perfect bodies

The British Museum have just published Perfect bodies: sports, medicine and immortality, edited by Vivienne Lo. Based on an interdisciplinary conference and other academic events and exhibitions which began in 2007, this book explores ideas and training and preserving the perfect body. The chapters in the book reveal the changing ideas about how exercise contributes to health and the history of sport and body cultivation. In the run-up to the 2012 London Olympics, this book explores the diverse traditions of perfecting body and soul including early Chinese kickball games, Andreas Vesalius's De humani corporis fabrica of 1543 and twentieth century Chinese exercises to do while brushing teeth. Illustrated throughout, this book is at NLS shelfmark OP6.212.44/2.