| Description | Notes and Abstracts, in six bound volumes, relating mainly to Bradfield, but including also material relating to Sheffield and neighbourhood. The abstracts (including some full transcripts) were made from the Wilson MSS., the Hunter and Mitchell MSS. in the British Museum, the Norfolk Estate Office records, and other miscellaneous sources. The Wilson MSS. (of which there is a synopsis in two volumes, in addition to the abstracts) were collected by the antiquary, John Wilson of Broomhead (d. 1783), and the collection was sold in 1843, most of it going to the Phillipps Collection. When the latter was broken up, a portion of the Wilson MSS. was repurchased by the Wilson family, by whom the documents were again sold in 1953. The original collection was studied by Joseph Hunter about 1806-1808, and the Ronksley abstracts may be partly from his notes. They are mainly, however, of those manuscripts which were in the possession of the Wilsons at Waldershelf in Ronksley's time. There are elaborate indexes (in boxes) to the abstracts. |