Henry Cobb – or as he was known throughout his career, Harry Cobb – who died on 27 June 2016 was a leading member of a generation of post-war archivists who contributed to the development of the archival profession.
Harry was born on 17 November 1926 in Wallasey on the Wirral. The son of a chartered accountant, he attended Birkenhead School. He left at the age of 17 in order to be articled to his father but seems to have decided at a fairly early stage that he did not wish to follow in his footsteps and he instead went to work in Wallasey Library. In 1946, he moved south having gained a post in the library at the London School of Economics. This carried with it the opportunity to study and he was awarded a BA (Hons) in history in 1950. His interest in medieval economic history, which was to last all his life, began at the LSE under the guidance of Professor Eleanora Carus-Wilson and continued when he returned to Liverpool to study for a diploma in archive administration at the university, having abandoned all thoughts of becoming a librarian. There it was Professor Geoffrey Barraclough, the founder of the archive course, who encouraged Harry’s research. In due course, this resulted in editions of the local port book of Southampton 1439–40 (Southampton Record Society, 1962) and the Exchequer customs accounts 1480–81 (London Record Society, 1990). A further similar project was incomplete upon his death. These editions were accompanied by several articles on the subject of trade, including ‘Cloth exports from London and Southampton in the later fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries: a revision’, which was published in the Economic History Review in 1978.
In 1951, Harry became the first archivist to be appointed by the Church Missionary Society in London following a grant from the Pilgrim Trust. The Society, which had been founded in 1799, possessed a large collection of records relating to its activities at home and overseas which needed organizing. This was a two-year post and Harry later described the archives and his work, which was carried on by subsequent CMS archivists, in ‘The Archives of the Church Missionary Society’ (Archives, Vol. II, no. 14). A report he prepared for the Society’s Executive Committee in 1952 is preserved amongst the organization’s records in the Cadbury Research Library at the University of Birmingham (CMS/G/C1/107).
The experience Harry gained from his work at the Church Missionary Society proved invaluable when in 1953 he was appointed, with the help of Barraclough, to the post of Assistant Archivist at the House of Lords Record Office (now the Parliamentary Archives), initially for five years. It was an appointment that was to shape the rest of his career. The office, which had been established in 1946, was presided over by Maurice Bond, who was in the process of creating an environment for the storage of Parliament’s records which met professional standards. In addition to Bond, Harry found himself working alongside Elizabeth Poyser, who had been appointed to the post of Assistant Clerk of the Records in 1950. There was much work to be done. The Victoria Tower, which had been designed by Sir Charles Barry as a records repository for parliamentary records following the disastrous fire of 1834, had been completed in 1860. It now required significant work. The discovery of mould on some of the collections had convinced the authorities that the installation of air conditioning was a necessity and there was also a need for a lift. Of even greater concern was the realization that extensive building work was required in order to guarantee the stability of the tower itself. This eventually resulted in a plan to remove the internal structure from half of the tower, to transfer the weight of the roof to the external walls and to construct seven new floors. The lower five floors were completely refurbished. It was Harry’s job to supervise this enormous project and in particular to oversee the migration of records from floor to floor as the work progressed. Years later in an interview he recalled the state of the tower at that time which featured blown out windows and no lighting. The lack of a lift meant he had to ‘clamber up’ the central Victorian spiral staircase. One result of his involvement in this work was the acquisition of extensive knowledge of the records kept in the tower which manifested itself in his first Record Office publication, The Journals, Minutes and Committee Books of the House of Lords (1955). Indeed, it was Bond himself who wrote in the preface to the Guide to the Records of Parliament, which was published in 1971, that Harry’s ‘comprehensive knowledge of the records and their historical background’ had contributed ‘richly’ to that publication. By the time that the Victoria Tower repository was opened in July 1963, Harry held the permanent post of Assistant Clerk of the Records. He became deputy to Maurice Bond in 1973 and Clerk of the Records in 1981, an appointment which meant a great deal to him.
Bond was a hard act to follow, and in addition a period of retrenchment brought Harry a range of different problems. In meeting these challenges, he was committed to applying his professional skills as an archivist in order to ensure that the office continued along the path that Bond had firmly established. A highlight of his Clerkship was without doubt his involvement with David Johnson, his deputy, in the research and planning of the exhibition held in the Banqueting House in Whitehall in 1988 to mark the tercentenary of the Glorious Revolution. The exhibition, which was visited by HM Queen and other members of the Royal family, was an ambitious project, not least because of its scale, the number of exhibits which included iconic parliamentary records and a diverse range of external loans, and the various stakeholders. In the face of indifferent and even hostile media attention, the exhibition was a success and was accompanied by a small touring display.
During his career, Harry produced a formidable number of publications which deployed his scholarship in order to further public understanding of the collections in his care and of parliamentary history. A steady stream of catalogues and articles was produced, some adding to the Office’s publications list, but it is also evident that his interest in economic history could not always be divorced from the parliamentary dimension. Contributions to Archives, Parliamentary History and the Journal of the Society of Archivists all reflected his increasing stature within both the academic and archival spheres and were often reflective in nature, for example ‘Politicians and Archives’ and ‘Archivists and History’ (Journal of the Society of Archivists, vols XV, 1994, and XVI, 1995). Harry also made contributions to various organizations and professional bodies, serving on the Council of the British Records Association between 1978 and 1981, and being Chairman of the Society of Archivists 1982–1984 (later President 1992–1996) and Chairman of the London Record Society 1984–2005. Between 1973 and 1977 he lectured in palaeography at the School of Librarianship at the North London Polytechnic.
Retirement in 1991 brought with it the award of the CBE but also the opportunity to devote more time to research interests. In particular, Harry’s visits to the Parliamentary Archives on Monday afternoons, which became something of a tradition, preceded as they were by an increasingly late lunch, meant that he was able to compile A Handlist of the Braye Manuscripts (1993). His role as Honorary Archivist to Hampstead Garden Suburb between 1992 and 2010 resulted in the production in 2001 of a handlist to the collection, edited with Ann Saunders. He also had more time to enjoy music, an interest he shared with his devoted wife Eileen, who survives him.
With Harry’s death the Parliamentary Archives lost, in its 70th anniversary year, the last link with those who worked in the 1950s and early 1960s to establish a professional archive service to care for Parliament’s records and to make them publicly accessible. He is remembered by those who worked with him for his humour and his laugh, but also for a steely determination in the face of injustice and a desire that junior staff should be encouraged in the development of their careers. As news of his death broke the tributes came in. He was recalled with ‘great respect’, as a ‘very kind and patient teacher’ and ‘ever friendly and helpful.’
Parliamentary Archives
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