Forthcoming attractions

January 1st in the archives is a time not only for new resolutions and new projects, but for new raw material: at the start of each year, a batch of material that has been closed for Data Protection reasons is opened for readers to work upon. The precise contents of this year's batch, of course, are still secret for a little over a week. We can, however, give at least the bare-bones information from the archive catalogue about these forthcoming attractions. They include:

More material from the papers of Lord Moran, Churchill's physician (PP/CMW), to join that released on 1st January 2011.

Two items from the Queen's Nursing Institute (SA/QNI): a volume of the Queen's Roll, on which inspections of nurses were recorded, covering 1926-1927; and - from the card index that replaced the original bound Roll - a microfilm of nurses' records on cards from 1907 to 1927.

A file from the Brain Research Association (SA/BRA) explaining the Association's position regarding the 1979 Protection of Animals (Scientific Purposes) Bill and the 1979 Laboratory Animals Protection Bill.

Files from the Beit Memorial Fellowship (SA/BMF) on various candidates for a fellowship, discussed in 1927.

A file from the papers of the psychiatrist Donald Winnicott (PP/DWW) relating to a few adult patients whose papers found in a small file of predominantly child patient notes from the 1920s.

The full list is as follows. Only a little while to go....

MS.8155; Christo P. Popoff; 1957; letter to Dr. C. Allen of the Seamen's Hospital, Greenwich, London. Popoff writes about a case of schizophrenia and enquires about the effectiveness of Largactil in stabilising patients suffering from this condition.
PP/CMW/D.9/1; Moran's Notes; 1950-1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/2; 1951 Recommendations; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/2/1; London Teaching Hospitals and Regions 'For meetings, 7/2/52 & 6/3/52'; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/2/2; Index to 1951 recommendations; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/3; 'Notes 1951'; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/3/1; Birmingham I, Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/3/2; Wales, Leeds, Sheffield; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/3/3; North East, North West Metropolitan Region; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/3/4; South East, South West Metropolitan Region; 1951.
PP/CMW/D.13/3/5; Specialities, London Regions and Teaching Hospitals; 1951.
PP/DWW/F/1; Adult Clinical material; 1920s; A few cases of adult patients found in a small concertina file of predominantly child patient notes from the 1920s (now in PP/DWW/E.2/1) and separated out here.
PP/HUN/C/1/23; Cysticercosis; 1932-1943.
SA/BMF/A.2/109; Hacker, Henry Pollard; 1927.
SA/BMF/A.2/110; Winton, Frank Robert; 1927.
SA/BMF/A.2/111; Wooldridge, Walter Reginald; 1927.
SA/BMF/A.2/112; Morgan, Walter Thomas James; 1927.
SA/BMF/A.2/113; Eggleton, Philip; 1927.
SA/BMF/A.2/114; Marrian, Guy Frederick; 1927.
SA/BMF/A.2/115; Fee, Archibald Roderick; 1927.
SA/BRA/C.1/3/2; Brain Research Association response to the 1979 Protection of Animals (Scientific Purposes) Bill and the 1979 Laboratory Animals Protection Bill (Includes papers from the Committee for the Reform of Animal Experimentation, The Physiological Society, the Research Defence Society, The Royal Society, and the Universities Federation for Animal Welfare); 1980-1981.
SA/QNI/J.3/35; The Queen's Roll: 8301-8550; Oct 1926-Jul 1927.
SA/QNI/J.4/1; The Queen's Roll on cards; 1907-1927; 3055-8499.


Image: 19th century wood engraving from the Wellcome Library's Iconographic Collections.

Wellcome Library loans swastikas and squiggles to the Science Museum

Submarines, tanks, swastikas and squiggles are probably not the first things that come to mind when envisaging the material held in the Wellcome Library, but that’s exactly what is contained within the Melanie Klein and Donald Winncott archives that are deposited here. Now, a number of these items have gone on loan to the Science Museum’s new exhibition, ‘Psychoanalysis: The Unconscious in Everyday Life’.

Melanie Klein was an Austrian-born British psychoanalyst who had a significant impact on child psychology and contemporary psychoanalysis. The material on loan to the Science Museum consists of a series of drawings by 'Richard', a boy of eight who had many sessions with Klein and is one of her most famous case studies.

Dating from the early years of World War II, the drawings depict Nazi submarines surrounded by schools of large yellow fish, tanks, numerous explosions, and dogfights between British and German planes.

Even for the untrained eye, it is easy to deduce that this young boy was deeply affected by the events occurring on the world stage at that time. Indeed, on reading more on the subject, one is told that 'Richard's psychopathology centred on the Oedipus complex and projected the figure of Adolf Hitler onto his father'.

The naivety of the drawings - some in grey pencil, others more vividly coloured in - coupled with their small size (similar to a postcard) and the flimsy paper they are drawn on contributes to the feelings of poignancy and fragility surrounding them.

Donald Winnicott was another British psychoanalyst who worked extensively with troubled young people. He believed in using the idea of play during his consultations with patients; his 'Squiggle drawings' are an example of this. He would draw a shape and ask the child to add to it and make something out of it. Two of these 'squiggles', along with two other drawings by Winnicott called 'Stella' and 'Tak', have also been lent to the exhibition.

‘Psychoanalysis: The Unconscious in Everyday Life’ runs from 13 October 2010 to 2 April 2011 at the Science Museum, London.

Author: Rowan de Saulles

Donald Winnicott papers - expanded catalogue now online

Early in February a substantial additional tranche of papers of Donald Winnicott was received from the Winnicott Trust to add to the significant transfer they made last summer of the papers of this important figure in child psychiatry and the British school of psychoanalysis. The new material has just been added to the online catalogue.

Besides vastly expanding the number of Winnicott's unpublished papers in the collection, this new accession includes his appointment diaries, additional case-material (most of which is, however, currently closed for reasons of Data Protection), files on his interaction with child psychiatrists and the psychoanalytic community in Finland, and an assortment of documentation relating to his work with the Oxfordshire Evacuee Hostels Scheme during World War II. It was in connection with this scheme, which dealt with evacuees who were too disturbed to be billetted in ordinary households, that Winnicott met Clare Britton, who became his second wife, in her capacity as the project psychiatric social worker.

The catalogue can be viewed online by putting PP/DWW into the reference field of the search interface for the Archives and Manuscripts online catalogue. Clicking on the blue numerals in the lefthand column of the resulting hitlist will provide access to detailed descriptions, and the 'See in Context' link for a hierarchical 'tree' view of the catalogue.

Readers requiring access to the collection must obtain prior permission from the Winnicott Trust: further information available from Archives and Manuscripts