| Arrangement | The papers were marked on arrival with the date of receipt and sometimes a date of answer and/or date on which the committee dealt with them. From 1820 to May 1824, from May 1825 to April 1843 and again from the autumn of 1861 to 1880 the papers were also numbered in red ink, in the order in which they arrived at headquarters. Some of them were initialled by the Secretary who read or dealt with them. The majority of the papers were then copied in full into the mission books [q.v.].
The papers appear to have been kept in wooden boxes, about ten years or so for each box. There were bundles of papers of various kinds such as correspondence with bishops, education papers, minutes of local CMS conferences etc., as well as letters and papers from individuals. These bundles have very largely been kept together by subject, but amalgamated by years. The main bulk of the papers, however, have been sorted according to the various individuals who wrote them, and are arranged alphabetically. |