This is the main series of Home Office papers. The subject matter of the files reflects the diversity of domestic matters dealt with by the Home Office. These have included aliens, betting and gaming, borstals, building societies, burials and cremations, bye-laws, changes of name, the Channel Islands, charities, children, civil juries, drugs, ecclesiastical matters, elections, explosives, extradition, factories, fire services, firearms, honours, Ireland and subsequently Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, magistrates, markets and fairs, Lords Lieutenant, mental patients and criminal lunatics, naturalization, pardons, petitions of right, poisons, police, prisons, prostitution, public order, use of royal title by institutions and companies, universities, vivisection, wartime measures, warrants and wild birds.

For naturalization papers: information regarding the place of residence (usually town) only appears from 1878 onwards.