Branch records including customer ledgers from 1717 onwards, the main series running to 1896, with a subsequent series between 1927 and 1959. Each ledger includes an index of names of account holders in that volume. Although most accounts are for individuals or family trusts, there are also non-personal accounts such as those of charities (including some schools and hospitals), public subscriptions (including relief of soldiers and of victims of natural disasters), colleges, businesses, and a few public corporations and parishes. A number of interesting entries may be found by browsing the non-personal accounts in the database index e.g. 'Subscription for erecting a pillar at Runny Mead in memory of the Revolution in 1688', commencing in 1788; and 'Jennerian Society for Vaccine Innoculation' in 1803. For examples of notable non-personal accounts see: 'Access Points: Corporate Names' (below).
Some accounts are signed periodically by the customer, as the record of audit. Each account is arranged as credits and debits, with the source of many credits and debits being either named or described e.g. names of payees, stocks and securities purchased.
The ledgers have potential for research in the following fields: biography, family history, local history, estate management, institutional history, trade and business history, the arts, accounting history, investment.
The personal account holders at Goslings comprised a cross-section of moneyed society between the early Georgian and late Victorian periods, including members of the aristocracy, landed gentry, political figures, churchmen, artists and writers. For examples of notable accounts identified so far, see: 'Access Points: Personal Names' and 'Family Names' (below).
The Goslings ledgers constitute one of a handful of more or less complete sets of customer account ledgers to have survived in the United Kingdom, and are thus considered an important source for banking history.
Other material includes customer correspondence; signature books 1806-1896; specimens of early cheques, bills of exchange and pass books; branch premises papers and photographs; staff lists; artefacts including a sword deposited by General Cadogan in 1864 and a post-Great Fire pewter shop sign depicting the Three Squirrels.