The database of the month for May is Confidential Prints: Africa 1834-1966.
What is this database?
Confidential Print: Africa offer full text access to complete volumes of all British Government Confidential Print for Africa, from the Colonial, Dominion, Foreign and War Offices from the National Archives. The series originated out of a need for the Government to preserve all of the most important papers generated by the Foreign and Colonial Offices. Some of these were one-page letters or telegrams; others were large volumes or texts of treaties. All items marked ‘Confidential Print’ were printed and circulated immediately to leading officials in the Foreign Office, to the Cabinet and to heads of British missions abroad.
The introduction to the database provides an overview of the collections covered within the database and also gives some examples of the types of material included. There are telegrams noting the South African government’s support for sanctions against Italy after the Italian conquest of Abyssinia and despatches discussing newly independent Ghana’s slide into authoritarianism.
An example map result of British Somaliland in 1926
The collections include
- Reports
- Dispatches
- Correspondence
- Descriptions of leading personalities
- Political summaries
- Economic analyses
- hundreds of colour maps
How can I access it?
University of Oxford members can access this subscription resource on and off campus via OxLIP+. Remember to sign on to OxLIP+ with your single sign on when accessing the database off-campus.
Other similar databases
- Cabinet Papers 1915-1978, The
- Cold War: Voices of Confrontation and Conciliation
- Confidential Print: Middle East, 1839-1969
- Confidential Print: North America 1824-1961
- Documents on British Policy Overseas
- Empire On-Line (Colonial History)
- Foreign Relations of the United States
- Macmillan Cabinet Papers 1957-63
- Making of the Modern World
- United Nations Treaty Collection
Related Links OxLIP+ | Primary Sources Online Guide for Historians (PDF) | Modern History Sources Guide (PDF) | Guide to using OxLIP+ | Contact the History Librarian | Bodleian Library Official Papers
