| Description | Minutes of meetings of special committees, appointed respectively by the Court of Governors in 1915 to make recommendations for the election of a Chancellor of the University following the death of Joseph Chamberlain, and by University Council in 1919 to discuss the return of the buildings on the Edbgaston site to use by the University after the War Office and First Southern General Hospital had finished work there
Minutes of the Chancellorship committee contain lists of current Chancellors of universities in England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, and of the names of individuals which the university was considering for the vacant position. Membership of the committee consisted of twelve members of the Court of Governors, including the Vice-Chancellor, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Principal, Professors Tilden, Saundby and Sonnenschein, the Treasurer, the Lord Mayor, George Kenrick, Neville Chamberlain, G. S. Albright, and William Cadbury. The minutes include a lettter from Professor William Tilden discussing possible names and recommending the Marquis of Crewe for the position, and record that the committee recommended that Prince Arthur of Connaught should be approached. Loose inserts in the volume include a copy of a letter from the Vice-Chancellor to members of the committee informing them that Prince Arthur had declined the position and suggesting that the matter should not be discussed again until after the end of the First World War
Minutes of the Edgbaston Reconstruction committee contain references to a Senate report concerning the return of the University to the 'Bournbrook site' and to suggestions about the use of space in the buildings by the academic departments already based there, and the possible accommodation of the whole of the Geology department and the transfer of the Faculty of Commerce to Edgbaston from Edmund Street. The volume records minutes of only one meeting of this committee, and there is no evidence of further meetings |