Today's Hertford College is the successor of two medieval halls of the University of Oxford. The site has been the home of Hart Hall, Magdalen Hall (not to be confused with the separate institution of Magdalen College) and a previous ‘Hertford College’ which existed from 1740-1818. Hart Hall was originally established around the 1280s as an academic hall for students studying at the University. It carried on in this form until 1740 when Dr Richard Newton re-formed Hart Hall as an independent College. Although Dr Newton eventually won the battle for incorporation and tried impose his vision of a model academic life, he never obtained enough endowments to sustain this incarnation of  Hertford College. After his death in 1753 the College declined, the number of Fellows and tutors was reduced and by 1810 there were virtually no matriculations. Eventually the underfunding and inability to attract Fellows and even a Principal led to the de facto collapse of the College. The Fellows of Magdalen College, who had long been looking for a means of taking back the site occupied by Magdalen Hall, saw their opportunity and on 4 May 1816 a University Inquisition dissolved Hertford College. The College and its assets were transferred to the Crown, and the last remaining Fellow was pensioned off. In due course an Act of Parliament granted the property to the University in trust for Magdalen Hall, which moved to the Catte Street site after a fire destroyed its own buildings next to Magdalen College in 1820. Magdalen Hall continued until its incorporation as a full college in 1874 when it once again took the name of Hertford College. 

The complicated history of the various halls and colleges means that it can be difficult to disentangle the archival collections of these institutions. Note that Magdalen Hall is a distinct institution from Magdalen College and that the Hertford College Archive does not hold records relating to Magdalen College - for information about Magdalen College go to https://www.magd.ox.ac.uk/libraries-and-archives/archives/.

In his introduction to the catalogue of Hertford’s archives compiled in 1985, archivist Aidan Hyland Lawes (also archivist at Pembroke College Oxford) wrote:

‘At the dissolution of the original Hertford College in 1818, its records, together with any that might have survived from its predecessor, Hart Hall, were either probably destroyed, or, if they concerned property rights, transferred to the University Archives. The University Archives contain the original Charter of Foundation of 1740 [University Archives N.W.7.1]; correspondence relating to its dissolution [University Archives N.W.74] and papers dealing with the admission of Principals of Hart Hall [University Archives N.W.P. Pyx B.6b]. They also contain some documents relating to properties held in trust by the University for Magdalen Hall – cross references to these will be found with the catalogue entries dealing [with] those particular estates.

The surviving archives of Magdalen Hall consist mainly of Battels Books, which survive from 1661. As with Hart Hall, records were regarded as the personal possessions of the Principal and may never have been very elaborate. In 1873, Principal Michell explained to the University Commission that he could furnish no accounts for his predecessor’s tenure of office as ‘the papers found at his decease were most meagre, both in number and contents’ [HC Archives X-HC/GOV/1/1/57].

There have been few attempts to set the College archives in order. As a small and poor College, with relatively few estates and properties, the College never needed the kind of elaborate filing systems and storage equipment that can be found at New College and Magdalen College. One Principal, N.R. Murphy (1939-1959), is held to have dealt with his correspondence by placing it under the carpet and his obituary notice in The Times recorded that – ‘undeterred by modern secretarial methods, he continued to treat much of the college correspondence with a fine old-fashioned detachment from files, duplicate copies and prompt answers’. It should be noted that, in this, he appears to have merely maintained the methods of his predecessors and the College tradition, surviving from the medieval hall, that records were the personal property of the Principals. After 1960, modern records of filing were more widely adopted.’

Aidan Lawes catalogued the college archives in 1985 and this catalogue was added to the list maintained by the Historic Manuscripts Commission [NRA 27928]. The NRA catalogue arranged the records of Hart Hall/Old Hertford College, Magdalen Hall & Hertford College as a single collection. This typescript catalogue is still available but has been superseded by our online catalogue at https://archive-cat.hertford.ox.ac.uk/. In the online catalogue the records of Hart Hall, Magdalen Hall and Hertford College have been treated as separate collections. Within these collections the arrangement followed in the NRA catalogue has been preserved; apart from some files which have been put into the Personal Papers series [HC-PER]. Records of benefactions, estates & advowsons belonging to Magdalen Hall have been included in the catalogue relating to that institution.

The few surviving records in the Hart Hall/old Hertford College collection [X-HH] cover the years 1716 to 1820 and relate mainly to the period of its incarnation as Hertford College after 1740. The collection is arranged as follows:

• Governance
• General Correspondence
• Chapel
• Library

The records in the Magdalen Hall collection date from the period when Magdalen Hall was still located next to Magdalen College and were brought to current site when the Hall moved in 1820. It is presumed that many of Magdalen Hall’s records were lost, either during the fire at the old site by Magdalen College in 1820 or during the move to Catte Street. The Magdalen Hall collection [X-MH] covers the years 1656-1972 and is arranged as follows:

• Administration
• Advowsons
• Benefactions & Trusts
• Estates & Properties
• Governance
• Library

The Hertford College collection [X-HC] contains the college’s administrative records from the years from 1874 to the present day and is arranged as follows:

• Academic Administration
• Access & Outreach
• Advowsons
• College Archives
• Benefactions & Trusts
• Bursar
• Development & Alumni Relations
• College Buildings & Site
• College Chapel
• Domestic Administration
• Estates & Properties
• Events
• Finance
• Governing Body
• Foundation & Governance
• Junior Members
• College Library
• Principal
• Publications
• Senior Common Room
• College Clubs & Societies
• College Staff & Servants
• Works of Art & College Pictures

Further information about the halls & colleges which have existed on our site, with biographies of some of our alumni, can be found on the history pages of the College website: https://www.hertford.ox.ac.uk/and-more/college-history.