Over the next few weeks we’ll be posting a few more articles than usual, all tied to our exhibition Leodis: 400 Years of Leeds in the Leeds Libraries Collections. The exhibition can be seen in our City Library until November 11. This week, our focus is on ‘Collections.’

In Leeds City Library we have of course, a vast number of defined ‘collections’ which could be a couple of books, a bequest of items or a lifetime of work. All are important, and most significantly when they are deposited with the library service they become accessible to anyone who would like to visit and view them.

For the Leeds 400 exhibition we have items from a number of our collections throughout, however this post will focus on three of our notable collections in Leeds City Library.

The Gascoigne Collection

Comprising over 3,000 books, pamphlets and periodicals, the Gascoigne Collection mainly covers military and naval history. The collection was donated in 1968 by Sir Alvary Gascoigne, in memory of his father, Colonel F.R.T. Gascoigne of Lotherton Hall.
The collection includes army and navy lists fromthe early 19th century, regimental histories and biographies.

The Gott Bequest

The Gott Bequest is a collection of 600 early English gardening books and periodicals, including works published in the 16th-18th centuries. All belonged to Alderman Beryl Gott of the local textile manufacturing family.

The collection includes fine examples of hand-coloured botanical illustrations, Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, and a first-edition of Flora Londinensis – of which only 300 were produced.

The Mary Gawthorpe Papers

A teacher, suffragette, organiser and public speaker for the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), Mary Gawthorpe was born in Woodhouse, Leeds in 1881.  Leeds City Library holds Gawthorpe’s personal papers, including newscuttings, photographs, postcards and diaries, spread over 17 reels of microfilm.  

We also hold Gawthorpe’s autobiography Up Hill to Holloway (1962), covering her childhood and early campaigning.