A STUDY OF THE THEORY OF APPRAISAL FOR SELECTION By ...

of the Rolls has been required 'from time to time' to order that
Departmental records be delivered in his 'custody'; in fact he
has never done so, and the practice remains as it was settled in
1845-6."8
The need to appraise the value of records was identified in
an 1836 report to the Record Commission. The criterion used to
identify value was "usefulness". The report stated that in
almost every office "there are large masses of documents utterly
useless to anybody for any purpose. . The keeping of these
takes up valuable room, and imposes useless trouble. Under
proper precautions, the Record Commission would do great service
by destroying them."9 In spite of questions regarding the
legality of the practice, an informal routine emerged in which
the Treasury began to destroy records after seeking the advice of
the Master of the Rolls regarding what records were not worth
retaining.10 The practice continued for many years, as did the
concern of the Master of the Rolls that the destruction of legal
records was contrary to law.
In 1875, the Deputy Keeper published a parliamentary paper
in which he reiterated the earlier call for destruction of
useless records:
There are extant in the Public Record
Department large masses of legal and
Government documents which are wholly useless
8 Ibid, 15, paragraph 19.
9 Ibid, paragraph 20.
10 Ibid, 15-16, paragraph 21.
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