Letter from M Swainson regarding the collection of fish purchased from the Zoological Society of London from the museum of Mr Guilding

Letter from Felix Anton Dohrn to Philip Lutley Sclater regarding an enquiry by Gegenbaur and publications of the Zoological Society of London

Letters from Friedrich Finsch, Curator of the Museum of Natural History in Bremen to Philip Lutley Sclater

Letters from Carl Jacob Sundevall, Director of the Royal Museum Stockholm, to Philip Lutley Sclater regarding specimens found in the Museum such as Galapagos birds

Letter from Michael Rogers Oldfield Thomas of the British Museum (Natural History) to Philip Lutley Sclater regarding the skin of a giraffe

Correspondence between the British Museum (Natural History) and Sheffield Airey Neave regarding delegates to the Conference on Nature Preservation in Post-War Reconstruction, and a meeting of the Council

Correspondence between United States Lines and Geoffrey Marr Vevers regarding the transport of animals and museum specimens to Philadelphia on the Russell R. Jones

Letter regarding notes on various lizards and a West African Echis

Lists specimens sent to the Natural History Museum

It was proposed in the setting up of ZSL that there would be a museum for zoological specimens, and items began being collected c.1827 including a collection of Sumatran specimens donated by Lady Sophia Raffles, widow of ZSL founder Sir Stamford Raffles. The museum was housed firstly within our office building at 33 Bruton Street in central London, and charged entry for people to visit. Many specimens were donated by fellows, John Gould donated his collection of Himalayan birds in 1831 to the museum, for example. The museum proved very popular, and grew at such a rate that it was one of the reasons for moving office to Leicester square. It was decided that the Society either needed to purchase a dedicated building for it - or to disperse the collection. ZSL Council chose the latter, and by 1855 the collection had been dispersed to various other collections including the British Museum (Natural History) and Norwich Museum.