MT 39/511

POST-WAR DEVELOPMENT, 1914-1918, 1939-1945: Roads Improvement Association: Mr. Rees Jeffreys

Date range	1942-1946
Location	National Archives (see all files stored here)
Catalogue	See entry
File base	Series MT, subseries MT 39

This file is truly delightful. It is likely to bring a smile to your face, probably because it contains the sort of thing that makes trawling through dusty archive documents worthwhile. The thing in this file that makes your day might actually have nothing to do with its subject matter.

Context

William Rees Jeffreys was considered one of the leading experts on roads in the early 20th century, but this file dates from the later years of his life. By the 1940s he was no longer working for government organisations, but as this shows, he was still very much in touch with them. There is lots of correspondence here from Rees Jeffreys to the Ministry, and their replies to him. His tone is always very familiar.

For the most part, this set of correspondence is about Rees Jeffreys' insistence that facilities built for the war could be designed in such a way that they would be useful road schemes in peacetime. The Ministry were not quite so sure about this as he was. There is a rather lovely memo that he would not have seen, which asks how he could possibly have learned some of the things he mentioned in his letter about what were supposed to be secret military installations.

Contents of note

• Full list of London arterial road works undertaken before the war, with intended further works for peacetime, dated April 1945.
• A letter dated 7 January 1943 indicating that plans to extend the East Lancs Road to Yorkshire had been put on hold during the war and it was intended to return to them in peacetime.
• Two large plans of proposed improvements to the national road network.

People with camera copies

Chris Marshall has a partial copy.