I joined the V&A Wedgwood Collection in November 2021 as an Archives Assistant with the main aim of cataloguing the archive collection and making these records available online. The Archives Assistant role at V&A Wedgwood Collection is generously supported by The Company of Arts Scholars’ Charitable Trust.
The V&A Wedgwood Collection Archive holds approximately 100,000 manuscripts mainly dating from the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries covering a great period of social and industrial change in Britain. The collection has been described by UNESCO as ‘one of the most complete ceramic manufacturing archives in existence’. Some catalogues are available for a significant proportion of the collection but are not stored in formats transferable to an online database and they are difficult to search. The rest of the collection has never been catalogued at all. Therefore, there are two main tasks to accomplish: reformatting and editing old catalogues and cataloguing the previously uncatalogued material onto the V&A’s ‘Search the Archives’ database.
In the past three years, 8,880 records have been added to ‘Search the Archives’ which is growing by the week. This material includes the full catalogue for the Wedgwood Mosley Collection which contains a large amount of Wedgwood family correspondence from the 19th century including letters about Charles Darwin’s voyage on H.M.S. Beagle. The catalogue for one of our largest collections, the Etruria –Liverpool Collection has been partially uploaded. This collection contains some of our most significant material such as letters from Wedgwood’s founder Josiah Wedgwood I (1739 – 95). The catalogue for the Barlaston Collection has also been partially uploaded which contains material from the 20th century after the factory moved from its old site in Etruria to its current location in Barlaston, Stoke-on-Trent.
The most interesting part of my role is cataloguing the material that has never been recorded previously, often acquired as individual items on an ad hoc basis. The varied nature of this uncatalogued material makes it the most fascinating to work with. Since 2022 I’ve catalogued photograph albums, financial, operation and sales ledgers, wage books, sales catalogues, education certificates, minute books, patent records and museum visitor books.
Through cataloguing the photograph albums, I came across an interesting but out of place album that seemed to depict war-time scenes. I then went on to find out that this photography album belonged to Mary Euphrasia Mosley (1880 – 1952), daughter of Wedgwood partner, Godfrey Wedgwood (1833-1905) and direct descendant of company founder, Josiah Wedgwood I (1730-1795). The photographs were taken during the time she served as a Red Cross nurse in Italy during the First World War. Using other material from the collection such as her war-time correspondence and additional photographs, I was able to deliver a short talk on her life at the Wedgwood Symposium, ‘Unpacking the V&A Wedgwood Collection’ which took place in Barlaston in July 2023.
The patent records are particularly fascinating as they contain a variety of extraordinary late 19th century salad bowl designs of various animals and beyond such as lobsters, deer, a wasp and even a griffin!
I have additionally catalogued several small collections relating to key Wedgwood figures and artists such as Harry Barnard (1862 – 1933), Cecil Haven (1893 – 1963), Norman Wilson (1902 – 1985) and Millicent Taplin (1902 – 1980). These small collections go beyond the documentation we expect to see for an artist or employee. For example, Harry Barnard’s Wedgwood Bicentenary Album depicts events held by the company to celebrate the 200th year since Josiah Wedgwood’s birth. The album contains photographs of the participants, and it is presented in a beautiful cloth-bound volume, which includes his descriptions of the event. Further contents of this album include news cuttings and brochures of the events that formed part of the celebration.
Above all, I enjoy cataloguing the material relating to the workers the most as you can use the material to paint a wider picture of factory life and the lives of individual workers. The wage books can be used to identify workers in the factory at a particular time and to connect them with the ware they produced. From the hiring books, you can find the names, jobs and time of employment for individual workers. We also have a collection of education and birth certificates which would have been kept on file to ensure compliance with legislation for the minimum age and education of employees. There are certain photograph albums that can expand this research further such as the ‘Etruscan Breadwinners’ album which was put together at the Etruria Factory and contains many group photographs which are labelled with the names of the workers.
From the available material, you can start to map out the life of some of Wedgwood’s employees, from the start of their role at the factory and throughout their working life. This links in brilliantly with our current People of Wedgwood project which aims to share the stories of the many workers who have helped to shape Wedgwood ceramics. With Art Fund support, we have developed a People of Wedgwood community space in the gallery which includes material from the archive that celebrates individual from each century of Wedgwood. We are adding to this material by carrying out oral histories to capture the voices of current and former Wedgwood employees.
My cataloguing role, generously supported by The Company of Arts Scholars’ Charitable Trust, has allowed us to make a great step forward in ensuring that our material is accessible to the public. Many of our catalogues are now far easier for people to access. This work continues as I am currently sorting through the catalogue for the Barlaston Collection and when complete, the catalogue of most of our 20th century material will be available online. We are learning more about our collection through this cataloguing project which we hope we can pass on and share with our audience.
Selected items from the V&A Wedgwood Collection Archives are available on Search the Archives with material being added regularly.
To enquire about the archive please contact wedgwood@vam.ac.uk
