Catalogue description Secretaries of State: State Papers Foreign, German States

Mainly in-letters mostly to the Secretary of State from the English (later British) ambassadors, ministers and envoys to the states comprising Germany: Ansbach, 1748-1753, Bavaria 1748-1780; Brunswick 1748-1770; Cassel, 1716-1731; Cologne, 1743-1780; Hanover, 1689-1714; and Hesse-Cassel, 1737-1777. Subjects also include: General, 1577-1696, and the Imperial Diet at Ratisbon,1689-1763. Prussia, and Hamburg and the Hanse Towns are excluded, however, and Saxony after 1696.

The series includes compensation claims arising out of The War of Austrian Succession and The Seven Years War (Commissioners for German Demands) and negotiations for the election of Archduke Joseph as the Holy Roman Emperor, 1752-1754. It also contains correspondence concerning the recruitment of German troops for garrison duty in Gibraltar and Minorca and for military service in the American War of Independence, 1775-1784.

Many draft replies by the Secretary of State are also in the series, though they are less frequently found in the earlier volumes, and a number of petitions and royal letters.

Selected documents dated before August 1589 are described in the Calendar of State Papers Foreign Series of the Reign of Elizabeth I ed A J Butler S C Lomas and R B Wernham (London 1901-1950). For references to the more important papers for the period August 1589 to December 1595 see the List and Analysis of State Papers Foreign Series Elizabeth I I-VI ed by Richard Bruce Wernham (London 1964-1993). Please speak to staff at the Map and Large Document Room enquiry desk for the precise location.