Download this summary catalogue (PDF) ›MORRISON, George Ernest (1862-1920)

Identity statement

Reference code(s)

GB0100 KCLCA Morrison

Title

MORRISON, George Ernest (1862-1920)

Date(s)

1668-1685

Level of description

Collection (fonds)

Extent and medium of the unit of description (quantity, bulk, or size)

½ box.

Context

Name of creator(s)

Morrison, George Ernest, 1862-1920, foreign correspondent of The Times

Administrative / Biographical history

Born in Geelong, Australia, 1862; began to travel while a student in Australia, 1882-1883; pursued a career in journalism, travelling from Port Mackay to the South Sea Islands to study the traffic in Kanaka islanders; graduated Doctor of Medicine, Master in Surgery, Edinburgh University, 1887; travelled in the USA and West Indies before returning to Australia; went to Hong Kong, 1893; travelled from Shanghai to Rangoon, 1894; in London, offered work by The Times as a secret correspondent to Siam (Thailand), 1895; also continued travelling in China; appointed resident correspondent of The Times in Peking, 1897; left The Times to become political adviser to Yuan Shih-K'ai, president of the new Chinese republic, 1912; died in England, 1920. Published An Australian in China (1895).

Archival history

The papers came from the collection of George Ernest Morrison. His son Alastair believed that Morrison purchased them c1917, and that they were consequently not included when he disposed of his library at that date.

Immediate source of acquisition or transfer

The papers were presented by Alastair Morrison (Secretary to the Government at Kuching, Sarawak) to the Prestage Library, King's College London, in 1958 through Professor C R Boxer. They were subsequently housed in King's College Archives.

Content & structure

Scope and content

Papers, 1668-1685, from George Ernest Morrison's collection relating to the activities of Jesuit missionaries, principally in the Far East, including a legal document on Roman Catholic martyrs in Flanders, Japan, England and elsewhere, signed by the notary Hermanus Bex and others and with the great seal of the City of Liege, 1668, and correspondence and other documents concerning missions including transcripts of petitions protesting against the activities of the Vicars Apostolic, and in favour of the Jesuits, of Christians in Cochin China (Annam) and Indochina, 1681-1682.

Conditions of access & use

Conditions governing access

Open, subject to signature of Reader's undertaking form, and appropriate provision of two forms of identification, to include one photographic ID.

Conditions governing reproduction

Copies, subject to the condition of the original, may be supplied for research use only. Requests to publish original material should be submitted to the Director of Archive Services, King's College London.

Language/scripts of material

Latin, French, Portuguese

Finding aids

Typescript list available in reading room at King's College London Archives.

Allied materials

Existence and location of originals

King's College London College Archives

Related units of description

State Library of New South Wales, Mitchell Library, holds correspondence and papers of Morrison, 1850-1934 (Ref: ML MSS 312). News International Record Office holds papers of Morrison, 1895-1912. British Library, Oriental and India Office Collections, holds correspondence between Morrison and Frederick Bailey, 1911 (Ref: MSS Eur F 157). Newcastle upon Tyne University, Robinson Library, holds letters from Morrison to Gertrude Bell, 1903-1919. Cf. The correspondence of G.E. Morrison, ed. Lo Hui-min (2 volumes, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1976). Morrison sold his library to the Japanese in 1917 and it was housed in Tokyo; cf Catalogue of the Asiatic Library of Dr G E Morrison (2 volumes, Tokyo, 1924).

Description control

Archivist's Note

Compiled by Rachel Kemsley as part of the RSLP AIM25 project. Sources: brief description in King's College London Manuscripts and Private Papers: A Select Guide (1982); Dictionary of National Biography; King's College London Archives, KAL/AD6/F56 (recording the acquisition of the papers by King's College); National Register of Archives; British Library OPAC.

Rules or conventions

Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

This catalogue is made available under the Open Data Commons Attribution License. This catalogue may be updated from time to time in order to reflect additional material and/or new understandings of the material.

Date(s) of descriptions

Jan 2001