Catalogue description Ministry of Housing and Local Government and Department of the Environment: Historic Buildings and Ancient Monuments, Registered Files (HB Series)

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Details of HLG 126
Reference: HLG 126
Title: Ministry of Housing and Local Government and Department of the Environment: Historic Buildings and Ancient Monuments, Registered Files (HB Series)
Description:

Files of the Ministry of Works, Ancient Monuments Branch, re-registered in the HB series of the Ministry of Housing and Local Government in 1966 and inherited by the Department of the Environment in 1970 relating to the maintenance and preservation of buildings of outstanding historic and architectural interest. They include general policy papers and case files, as well as minutes and reports of the Historic Buildings Council for England.

Files of the Ancient Monuments Branch not re-registered in the HB series are in WORK 14

Date: 1920-1997
Related material:

See also the Records created or inherited by the Department of the Environment, and of related bodies, Division within AT

For later Welsh files see BD 34

See also HLG 103

For records relating to successor, Historic Building Division, see PF 297

Held by: The National Archives, Kew
Former reference in its original department: HB and HSD file series
Legal status: Public Record(s)
Language: English
Creator:

Department of the Environment, 1970-1997

Ministry of Housing and Local Government, 1951-1970

Ministry of Works, 1943-1962

Ministry of Works and Buildings, 1940-1942

Ministry of Works and Planning, 1942-1943

Office of Works, 1851-1940

Physical description: 2297 file(s)
Access conditions: Open unless otherwise stated
Immediate source of acquisition:

From 2023 Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport

From 1981 Department of the Environment

Accruals: Series is accruing
Unpublished finding aids:

Subject index with series list

Administrative / biographical background:

Ancient Monuments Boards and Historic Buildings Councils The Ancient Monuments Act 1913 provided for the appointment by the commissioners of works of Ancient Monuments Boards for England, Scotland and Wales consisting of archaeologists, historians and representatives of learned societies and interested public bodies to advise them on the making of preservation orders concerning monuments in danger of destruction or damage. The boards had power to inspect any monument in such danger even against the wishes of the occupier. The Historic Buildings and Ancient Monuments Act 1953 obliged them to report annually to the minister of works.

The same act empowered the minister to appoint Historic Buildings Councils for England, Wales and Scotland to advise him on the exercise of his powers to make grants and loans towards the repair and maintenance of historic buildings, to acquire such buildings or to assist organisations like the National Trust to acquire them. The councils were also given more general responsibities in relation to historic buildings.

In 1966 control over them was transferred to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government and thence to the Department of the Environment in 1970 except for Welsh monuments which became the responsibility of the Welsh Office (404) and, from April 1991, of Cadw, the Welsh Historic Monuments Executive Agency.

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