The Charterhouse School Archive (in Godalming) is located in the cloisters adjacent to Scholars’ Court and contains the records of the School's activities and administration since 1872. Some registers and printed annual form lists for earlier years in the nineteenth century were transferred when the school moved from London, and a few papers, letters and albums relating to the period before the move have been given by former masters and pupils. Otherwise all earlier records of Thomas Sutton's 1611 foundation, including scholars, are held in the London Metropolitan Archive.
The ‘Charterhouse Registers’, which give biographical details of scholars (boys on the foundation) from 1614 and of all known pupils from 1769 to 1975 have been published, although not all are still in print. There is a useful bibliography in the most recent history of the School: Charterhouse, A History of the School, by Anthony Quick, 1990. This can be purchased from the School Shop.
The Charterhouse Archive contains the official records of the school, but also a wide range of information and photographs covering every aspect of Carthusian life, and collections relating to the lives of Old Carthusians as diverse as Thackeray, Baden Powell, Beerbohm, Vaughan Williams and Ronald Millar. The archive is available to the school community as an educational and administrative resource, and we also welcome research enquiries from the general public.
For further information or to arrange a visit, please contact The Archivist, Catherine Smith, +44 (0) 1483 291604, archive@charterhouse.org.uk.