Hi,
My dad's been helping clear a family friend's home and found an old suitcase full of the most beautifully drawn designs of eg. lancasters and airships, with endless detail, as well as investigations into german aircraft including the then 'experimental' Messerschmitt, and V1s, with hundreds of unbelievably high quality photos and exploded diagrams of their engines, flight patterns, individual components, performance at various mach speeds etc.
There are A1 handdrawn schematics and newspaper pages from as early as 1917.
We are not interested in making money from this find we just want to ensure it goes to someone who can appreciate, extrapolate and publicise the information responsibly, ethically and professionally. Which British museum would you suggest we approach, and given the ongoing ww1 centenary events, is it worth contacting the bbc, antiques roadshow etc.? The documents do seem very unique - most are hand drawn and addressed to various committees and institutions - and continually underpinned with a RESTRICTED notice.
All stored in a brilliant old laundry box with a 12 shilling fine if not returned.
Thanks very much.
Holy hell what a treasure trove. At a guess I'd imagine that the imperial war museum would be the first port of call given the era we are talking about. Please give an update as you hear more, I'm truly excited to hear what happens.
Defo the Imperial War Museum. Or try the RAF musuem in Hendon.
As a note, please be very careful with (for example) scanning any of this information and making it available online or emailing it to people outside of the UK.
Technical information on military items even from the WW2 period is still considered 'Military Technology' and may require an export licence to be shared outside of the United Kingdom. There are various exemptions and more generous licences available for pre-1946 technology but you do need to register for and be aware of them.
You can find very top level information here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/export-control-organisation
This is a very real consideration - I encountered a situation professionally where somebody unknowingly exported drawings for a Spitfire engine and it required a voluntary disclosure to HMRC.
As above/below the Imperial War Museum would love to see that I'm sure.
RAF Cosford also holds the RAF Museum, they would love to see it aswel I'm sure
Any update on all this?
I was going through my saved posts and remembered how excited I was to see the outcome of all this.