Catalogue description Foreign Office: Chief Clerk's Department and Passport Office: Collection of Passports

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Details of FO 655
Reference: FO 655
Title: Foreign Office: Chief Clerk's Department and Passport Office: Collection of Passports
Description:

This series contains a collection illustrating the many different types of passport issued. It includes some passports issued in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries by Foreign Missions in this country to British subjects wishing to travel abroad. Up to 1898 the passports are in the form of single sheets folded in four: thereafter (until 1923, when the modern book form was introduced) in eight-page folded books.

The search register of passport applications for 1851-1856, 1858-1862 and 1874-1903 has been digitised by an external company unassociated with The National Archives and are searchable through their website.

Date: 1802-1961
Held by: The National Archives, Kew
Legal status: Public Record(s)
Language: English
Creator:

Foreign Office, Chief Clerks Department, 1782-1900

Foreign Office, Passport Office, 1855-1968

Physical description: 2097 papers and volumes
Access conditions: Subject to 30 year closure
Administrative / biographical background:

The practice of foreign countries issuing passports to the nationals of other countries ceased in 1858.

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