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The Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick

The Modern Records Centre was established at the University of Warwick in 1973 with the principal objectives of locating and preserving primary sources for modern British social, political and economic history, with special concentration on the national history of industrial relations, industrial politics and labour history.

The Modern Records Centre collections extend to over 14kms and their significance has been recognised through the Designation Scheme of the Arts Council - the entire holdings have been designated pre-eminent collections of national and international importance.

The collections include the archives of over 500 trade unions– ranging from the Agricultural and Allied Workers through to the Wolverhampton Operative Tin-Plate Workers' Society. They cover all the major occupations within industry, trade and public service including teachers, nurses, Post Office workers, shoemakers and mechanics.

The MRC also holds outstanding collections for political movements, protest and campaigning organisations and welfare and social work history. These include the archives of the YWCA, the National Union of Students, the National Federation of the Blind, the British Association of Social Workers and the Howard League for Penal Reform.

Trade Union Membership Registers

Explore this immense collection of over three million British trade union records from the Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick. The collection includes digitised images of the original record books from 26 different unions.

Will you discover your ancestor in the thousands of admission books, annual reports and membership lists? These records may be able to reveal whether your relative was married or single at registration, whether he/she applied for funeral benefit for a family member and if your ancestor transferred to a new branch, moving your family to a new town or country. Many trade unions included international branches from Ireland, Australia, Spain and Belgium.

Search Britain, Trade Union Membership Registers

British Rolls Of Honour and Nominal Rolls, First World War

The Modern Records Centre at the University of Warwick have also contributed to our British Rolls of Honour and Nominal Rolls collection from the First World War.

Within this collection, you can search service and casualties records of those recorded as trade union members between 1914-1918.

Search British Rolls Of Honour and Nominal Rolls

Additional information

The collections presented here on Findmypast are the membership records of only nine unions representing railway workers, carpenters and joiners, boilermakers and shipbuilders and a small section of print workers, the lithographers. Between them they cover the period 1870-1930.


Archives of the car, motorcycle and bicycle industries (the National Cycle Archive) are also held at the Centre.

To find out more about the work The Modern Records Centre carries out, visit the website here.