Theresa, Lady Londonderry Papers

Identity Statement

Content & Structure

• Scope & Content: Stewart, Theresa Susey Helen Chetwynd, 1856-1919, Marchioness of Londonderry Vane-Tempest-Stewart, Charles, 1852-1915, 6th Marquess of Londonderry Vane-Tempest-Stewart family, Marquesses of Londonderry ↴

  The Theresa, Lady Londonderry Papers comprise c.4,600 papers and 15 volumes of diaries, scrapbooks, etc, 1858-1919, mainly of Theresa, Marchioness of Londonderry (1856-1919), wife/widow of the 6th Marquess, but including some papers of the 6th Marquess himself, of and about his mother, Mary Cornelia, widow of the 5th Marquess, and of his brothers Lords Henry and Herbert Vane-Tempest.
  The D2846/1 section of the archive begins with 158 letters to Theresa, Lady Londonderry from Sir Edward Carson, afterwards Lord Carson, 1903-1919, many of them about the opposition to the Third Home Rule Bill.
  There follows: 36 miscellaneous Unionist papers of Theresa, Lady Londonderry, 1910-1935. There follows a quantity of letters to Theresa, Lady Londonderry from Ulster and Irish Unionists. The first category comprises 55 letters from various Irish Unionists, 1912-1919, arranged alphabetically, there are also numerous letters from various women Unionists, 1912-1919, arranged alphabetically
  D3846/2 Are box-files of correspondence numbered, 1-36 in Lady Londonderry’s original filing-system. (1874-1919) (c.2400 items)
  The final section of the collection, D2846/3, consists of letters and papers of the 5th Marquess of Londonderry and his wife and leading political figures and also other members of the Londonderry family. The collection also contains letters and papers of and about the 6th Marquess of Londonderry, Theresa, Lady Londonderry’s husband including a volume containing bound-in and indexed telegrams, May 1878, concerning the stormy election of Viscount Castlereagh, later the 6th Marquess, for Co. Down, vice William Sharman Crawford and in opposition to William Drennan Andrews; a volume containing newspaper cuttings on the same subject, May-July 1878; letters, 1886-1912, to the 6th Marquess from Queen Victoria, the Prince of Wales, A.J. Balfour, Joseph Chamberlain, the Marquesses of Salisbury, Lansdowne, Ripon and Crewe, the Duke of Devonshire, J.S. Sandars and others, about the Viceroyalty of Ireland and the other major political offices held by the 6th Marquess, Tory party politics, Home Rule, tactics in the House of Lords, etc; papers about the 6th Marquess’s will, 1881-1921; 3 envelopes of newspaper cuttings and other printed matter, February 1915, about the death of the 6th Marquess; and a volume containing newspaper obituaries of the 6th Marquess, February 1915.

• Appraisal Destruction ↴

  Permanent Retention

• Accruals ↴

  No further accruals expected.

• Arrangement ↴

  D2846/1 has been arranged into coherent groups according to either writer or subject matter. Those items which constitute D2846/2 were already arranged according to a scheme of Theresa, Lady Londonderry’s devising. This arrangement has been preserved. However, there is so much overlap between the two that, if a correspondent or topic occurs in either D2846/1 or /2, it is next-to-certain that he, she or it will also occur in the other.
  The contents of D2846/3, although papers not of Theresa, Lady Londonderry, but of other members of the Londonderry family, were part of the second deposit. The arrangement is as follows:

  D2846/1 Letters to Theresa, Lady Londonderry from names or classified correspondents. (1874-1940)(c.600 items)
  D2846/2 Box-files of correspondence numbered, 1-36 in Lady Londonderry’s original filing-system. (1874-1919)(c.2400 items)
  D2846/3 Letters and papers of members of the Londonderry family other than Theresa, Lady Londonderry. (1772-1920)(822 items)

Conditions of Access & Use

Allied Materials

Descriptive Control Area