Colonial Office 391 consists of the Kraus Reprint (1969-1970) edition of the "Journals of the Commissioners for Trade and Plantations", an exact reproduction of the fourteen volumes originally published in 1920-1938 by HMSO on behalf of the Public Record Office. This printed text contains not only the minutes as recorded in the Journals now designated CO 391/17 to CO 391/89, but also all marginal annotations, with full correlation to the volume and folio numbers of the original.
The minutes record the deliberations of the Board of Trade, entered in formal Journals (now CO 391/9 to CO 391/89). Some drafts or duplicates of the minutes and the journals of the Board (now CO 391/90 to CO 391/120) have been preserved. Included with these are some journals and minutes of predecessor agencies, 1675-1696 (now CO 391/1 to CO 391/8). The minutes for 1696 to March 1704 were described in the "Calendar of State Papers, Colonial", while those for April 1704-May 1782 were printed in full as the "Journal of the Commissioners for Trade and Plantations" (in 14 volumes, each with an index).
The tables in C.M. Andrews' "Guide to the Materials for American History, to 1783, in the Public Record Office of Great Britain", vol. 1, Appendix B identify the modern locations. Despatches from Nova Scotia are now in CO 217/1-29 while texts of outgoing documents were recorded in entrybooks now found as CO 218/1-10; the equivalents for Quebec are CO 42/1-10 and CO 43/1-3; those for Newfoundland are CO 194/1-21 and CO 195/1-11; and those for Prince Edward Island are CO 226/1-2 and CO 227/1. Categorized as Plantations General were matters not specific to one colony, and the affairs of territories for which British government was being established (notably Quebec, 1759-1764); the records are now in CO 323/1-29 and CO 324/6-19. Alpha-numeric references endorsed on the despatches and their enclosures reflect the sequence in which they were presented to the Board. A single letter sequence A-T was used in the period 1712-1782; usage of a letter was not co-terminous with specific journal volumes. The exact nature of the numbering scheme as a means of relating minutes and submissions awaits study and explanation. Researchers will find the numbering a useful reminder that documents written over an extensive period might be tabled at a single Board meeting, and that the order of consideration may reflect the Board's assessment of significance for each item.
