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National Museums and Galleries: Items on Overseas Loan
Lord Freyberg asked Her Majesty's Government:
- Whether they will name all items on overseas loan (not including temporary loans) from government-sponsored museums that have been outside the
- country for more than three years; and in each case whether they will give details of (a) when these items were originally sent on loan; (b) why they were sent on loan; and (c) whether the trustees of the museums concerned were aware that these items were on loan.[HL2849]
Baroness Blackstone: Answers for the museums and galleries sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport are set out in the following table.
Many of the loans listed in the table are duplicate items or are items which would otherwise be held in store. They comprise a tiny fraction of the millions of items held by National Museums and Galleries.
| Government-sponsored Museum and Gallery | Brief description of item(s) on loan | When item(s) was originally loaned | Why the item(s) were sent on loan | Whether the Trustees were aware that item(s) were on loan |
| Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| Horniman Museum | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| Imperial War Museum | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| Wallace Collection | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| Sir John Soane's Museum | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| Tyne & Wear Museums | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| Museum of London | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| National Museums and Galleries on Merseyside | Base for a Delft vase | September 1995 | To the Metropolitan Museum for their Delft vase which needed a base | Yes |
| National Maritime Museum | Three naval uniforms | 1963 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes |
| Ship model Zeven Provencien | 1971 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| Ship model Kaiser Friedrich III | 1977 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| Navigational instrument: Artificial Horizon | 1980 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| Ship model Greenwich | 1998 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| Ship model Raleigh | 1966 | Loaned for exhibition/galley display | Yes | |
| National Portrait Gallery | Portrait Catherine of Braganza | 1971 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British Embassy Lisbon | Yes |
| Portrait Warren Hastings | 1987 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British High Commission, New Delhi | Yes | |
| Portrait 4th Duke of Bedford | 1981 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British Embassy Paris | Yes | |
| Portrait Countess de Grammont | 1973 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British Embassy Paris | Yes | |
| Portrait Lady Masham | 1981 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British Embassy Paris | Yes | |
| Portrait Maria Sobieska | 1980 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| Portrait 1st Earl of Rochester | 1980 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| Tate | Painting Bathing Scene, Bali | October 1994 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to bridge the gap in the borrowing institution's holding of the artists work | Yes |
| Painting The Siege and Relief of Gibraltar | 1968 | Originally loaned to the Governor's residence in Gibraltar, but since 1993 loaned for exhibition/gallery display at the Gibraltar Museum | Yes | |
| Painting Miss Louisa van Diest | 1969 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British Embassy Paris | Yes | |
| Painting Master Frederick van Diest | 1969 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British Embassy Paris | Yes | |
| National Museum of Science and Industry (National Museum of Photography, Film and TV) | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| National Museum of Science and Industry (Science Museum) | Watkin aneroid barometer | 1980 | Loaned for display in Dutch Arctic Expeditions Gallery | See Note 1 |
| Gregorian telescope | 1990 | Study and display | See Note 1 | |
| Iron bitumen telegraph cable | 1994 | Loaned for display in Communications Gallery | See Note 1 | |
| Panel 1 and end plate for the electronic computer Edsac 1 | 1982 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Ferranti pegboard program tray | 1982 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| HMV portable disc recorder and associated items | 1999 | Loaned for display in Operation Epsilon | See Note 1 | |
| Trial model and spare wheel for analytical engine | 1999 | Loaned for display in exhibition "Cyberworlds: computers and connections" | See Note 1 | |
| Model of twin screw steamer Islander and five framed photographs | Pre 1998 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Model of the T.S.Majestic | Pre 1998 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Experimental speculum, illustration of the Great Nebula in Orion, experimental compound speculum mirror, a profile gauge with concave profile, a profile gauge with convex profile, an oval secondary speculum mirror and a "Finder" telescopic eyepiece | 1998 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Symphonion twin-disc musical box and 10 pairs of discs | 1995 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| A Horn compound condensing beam engine and a Whitworth lathe | 1981 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| An Easton Amos & Sons Grasshopper steam engine | 1976 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Three items relating to the Hale war rocket | 1992 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Working scale model of Newcomen atmospheric engine | 1985 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| V1 pulse jet engine and V2 graphite vane | 1997 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| National Museum of Science and Industry (National Railway Museum) | Four Jersey Railways & Tramways nameplates, four Jersey Railway numberplates, a Jersey Railway coat-of-arms, a departure clock and two locomotive worksplates for 2-4-0 tank | 1990 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 |
| Model of East India Railway 3rd class bogie carriage. Madras and Southern Mahratta Railway model of a 4-6-0 locomotive and tender; and a model of a Grand Indian Peninsular Railway tourist carriage | 1978 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Model of Jenny Lind type locomotive and tender | 1956 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 1 | |
| Natural History Museum | No items are on long-term loan to overseas organisations | — | — | — |
| Victoria and Albert Museum | Nine Chinese/Japanese vases | November 1994 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 2 |
| 36 objects including dishes, plates and medals etc | July 1963 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 2 | |
| 26 electrotypes and two silver plates | October 1976 | Loaned to British Embassy Rome | See Note 2 | |
| Breastplates and gauntlets | November 1947 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | See Note 2 | |
| Royal Armouries | 177 pieces of 17th century munition armour, 316 19th century military pistols, 225 19th century bayonets and 245 19th century swords | 1920 | Loaned to the Dominion Archivist, Canada; the Australian War Museum, Australia; Ministry of the Interior, New Zealand; the Natal Museum and Port Elizabeth Museum, Pretoria | See Note 3 |
| Six 19th century firearms, four bayonets, 12 19th century military swords and 10 items of 17th century munition armour | 1922 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Museo de Armas de la Nacion, Argentina | See Note 3 | |
| Five items of 17th century munition armour; nine 19th century military firearms and seven 19th century edged weapons | 1938 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Royal Ontario Museum, Canada | See Note 3 | |
| Six items of 17th century munition armour, 10 19th century military firearms and 11 19th century edged weapons | 1938 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Army Museum, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada | See Note 3 | |
| Three 19th century edged weapons and five 19th century firearms | 1938 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Musee de la Civilisation, Quebec, Canada | See Note 3 | |
| Six items of 17th century munition armour, 6 19th century military firearms and 11 edged weapons | 1938 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Royal Military College, Duntroon, Canada and Zimbabwe Military Museum, Zimbabwe | See Note 3 | |
| Six 18th century carbines and four cannon | 1949 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Colonial Williamsburg, USA | See Note 3 | |
| One drum, five firearms and 12 edged weapons | 1963 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Newfoundland Museum, USA | See Note 3 | |
| Seven 19th century edged weapons, five 19th century firearms and a 19th century cannon | 1965 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Waterloo Museum, Belgium | See Note 3 | |
| Three items of 16th century munition armour, four 19th century military firearms and seven 19th century edged weapons | 1965 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Mutare Museum (Umtali), Zimbabwe | See Note 3 | |
| Six bayonets and seven 19th and 20th century firearms | 1969 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Jersey Museum Services | See Note 3 | |
| A 17th century matchlock musket | 1971 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the National Museum of Ireland | See Note 3 | |
| A 16th century Shaffron | 1985 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, USA | See Note 3 | |
| Four items of 17th century munition armour, one bandoleer and a crossbow bolt | 1989 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to Jamestown Yorktown Foundation, USA | See Note 3 | |
| A 18pdr QF MKII | 1987 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Regiment of Artillery Association, India | See Note 3 | |
| Three 16th century armours and three items of 16th/17th century armour | 1998 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display to the Cleveland Museum of Art, USA | See Note 3 | |
| National Gallery | Painting Prince Rupert | 1986 | Loaned to Government Art Collection, British Embassy Prague | Yes |
| Landscape Painting Hawking Party | 1996 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| Painting The Swearing of the Oath of Ratification of the Treaty of Munster | 1999 | Loaned for exhibition/gallery display | Yes | |
| British Museum | A fragment of a sarcophagus | 1939 | Loaned for study purposes | Yes |
| Four sculptures | 1970 | Loaned for study purposes | Yes | |
| Pottery vessels and fragments of vessels | 1964, 1968 and 1984 | Loaned for study purposes | Yes |
Note 1:
The Board of Trustees of the National Museum of Science and Industry have delegated the decision to approve loan requests to the approvals team at the Science Museum and the loans are vetted by the museum's security adviser.
Note 2:
The Board of Trustees of the Victoria and Albert Museum delegate responsibility for the loan of objects individually valued at under £500,000 to the director. All objects currently on long-term overseas loan are valued at under £500,000. All objects on loan are listed in the museum's annual report.
Note 3:
The Royal Armouries became a trustee body in 1984. Decisions on overseas loans continued to be taken by museum officers. In 1989 the trustees reviewed a full report of all existing loans and approved the continuation of the procedure of overseas loans being approved by officers. In 2001, a new procedure was adopted and all overseas loans are now approved by the Board of Trustees.
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