Collections

The ERO archives are full of fascinating stories of people and places.

Established in 1938, the Essex Record Office cares for documents, maps, images and sound and video recordings that together tell the stories of over 1,000 years of Essex history.

Our holdings, which include parish registers, diaries, letters, court records, wartime records, manorial records and school records, take up nearly 8 miles of shelving, making us one of the largest county archives in England.

We are also home to the Essex Sound and Video Archive, which includes over 30,000 recordings.

This wealth of material is available for researchers to use and enjoy, whether you are tracing your family history, house history, local history, or another area of interest.

Accessing our collections

Essex Archives Online includes details of the hundreds of thousands of records that we hold. Some of our records have been digitised, including all of our parish registers and all of our original wills, which can be viewed on this site if you have a subscription.

You can search the site from home before your visit to identify documents that you wish to view in our Searchroom, or documents that you would like us to copy or search for you.

You might be interested in...

Bastardy bond, 1773

The favourite document of Hannah Salisbury, Audience Development Officer

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