LibGuides: British and UK History: Overview

Introduction

This guide is intended for research about the history of the Great Britain and the United Kingdom (England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland).

Below are some databases that are frequently used to start with, but you can find more resources through the left-side tabs. For resources focused on another area of the world, please see the list of related guides.

For assistance with finding resources, please ask a librarian in the chat box in the right-hand column. For more in-depth help, contact the History Liaison Librarian and Archivist, Colleen Marquis.

Frequently Used Databases

Historical Abstracts with Full Text
Covers the history of the world (excluding the United States and Canada, which is covered by America: History and Life with Full Text) from 1450 forward.

Includes world history, military history, women's history, history of education, and much more. Provides indexing of historical articles from more than 1,800 journals in over 40 languages back to 1955.
JSTOR
Provides full-text access to the archives of core scholarly journals in the arts, humanities, social sciences, and sciences. Also include full text ebooks and open access content.
Some journals in JSTOR are available for U-M Flint until June 30, 2022, after which they are expected to become unavailable. Many other journals will remain accessible. Click "more..." for additional information.

Mostly 3-5 years & older full text. African American studies, anthropology, botany, business, ecology, economics, education, general science, geography, history, language & literature, mathematics, philosophy, political science, sociology, statistics.

Dates of coverage vary by journal title. All go back to the very first issue published, but most have a "moving wall" embargo that excludes issues from the most recent X years (where X can be anywhere from 0 up to 10 years, depending on the particular journal; most are in the 3 to 5 year embargo range).

Hint: Use documents to find useful keywords and concepts, and retrieve matching JSTOR content, via JSTOR Text Analyzer

As a public service during the COVID-19 pandemic, JSTOR provided subscribing libraries access to journals free of charge. This expanded access is expected to expire on June 30, 2022, but the Thompson Library will continue to have permanent access to hundreds of journals through JSTOR. Please contact the Thompson Library if you have any questions.
Gale Historical Newspapers (Gale Primary Sources)
Provides cross-searching of 18 different British and American historical newspapers and periodical archive collections, ranging from the 18th century until a few years ago.
Includes these newspapers and collections of newspapers, which can also be searched separately:
- 17th and 18th Century Burney Collection Newspapers
- 19th Century UK Periodicals Digital Archive
- British Library Newspapers, 1732-1950
- Daily Mail Historical Archive
- Economist Historical Archive, 1843-2013
- Financial Times Historical Archive, 1888-2010
- Illustrated London News Historical Archive (1842-2003)
- Independent Historical Archive, 1986-2016
- International Herald Tribune Historical Archive 1887-2013
- Liberty Magazine Historical Archive, 1924-1950
- Listener Historical Archive 1929-1991
- Nineteenth Century U.S. Newspapers
- Picture Post Historical Archive, 1938-1957
- Punch Historical Archive, 1841-1992
- Sunday Times Digital Archive, 1822-2006
- Telegraph Historical Archive, 1855-2016
- Times Digital Archive, 1785-2012
- Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive