Catalogue description Lord Steward's Department: Examinations of Bills

This series contains Lord Steward's Department examinations of tradesmen's bills from 1825 to 1849. They are quarterly examinations, and basically form a summary of bills followed by sundries, digested under heads, with totals of bills and a marginal note of rates paid for various commodities. Totals are given for sections of the examinations, and for the entire quarter's account. These are not signed as examined at all, but many of the items are ticked, presumably denoting a form of checking off.

The entries are numbered, and organised by palace or residence. The name of the person is given; the commodity for which payment is required; the date; and the amount. The information contained about the commodities is quite detailed - eg bread is divided into types; fruit, vegetables, meat and fish are specified. Under sundries may be included costs of newspapers, candles, postage, cleaning, repairing and filling ice wells, chimney sweeping, travelling expenses, post horse provision, Board of Green Cloth expenses, etc, and also boardwages. These latter were payments in lieu of food and drink allowances, whilst in attendance on household duties.

The numbers of the items in this series correspond to those of the creditors in the following series, to which this one makes a "contents table" for the years in which they overlap. Tradesmen's bills and the sundries covered by this series fall into the category of bills known as extraordinary, that is, not regular and predictable; accounts rendered for extraordinary expenses were known as creditors, and it is these that are detailed in LS 8