A collection of mostly deeds and court papers from Durham in particular, but with material also from various other parts of England, and beyond, probably gathered together by Cuthbert Mills Carlton (1832-1892). He was a Durham journalist, antiquarian and author of History of the Charities in Durham, (Durham 1872) and The Monumental Inscriptions of Durham, (Durham 1880). The Durham material features documents from the chancery court. This includes a file of documents for a case between Nicholas Hodgson and Thomas King in 1616 and papers for a variety of cases in 1643, along with files and particular cases from the later eighteenth and earlier nineteenth centuries. The deeds include groups for "Hunters" tenement in Fleshergate in Durham and a dyehouse in Watergatestreet, property in Ryhope and South Shields, and Bradley Hall and manor from the later seventeenth and earlier eighteenth centuries. Outside Co Durham, there is a collection of deeds concerning Elizabeth Williams, widow of Thomas Williams of Gloucester, who remarried John Essington in 1671, and the consequent settlements of property, covering Gloucester and Breconshire, along with isolated items for London and Greenwich, Kent, and a quantity of material for Cranfield, Bedfordshire. Arguably the collection's most significant group of material is from the diocese of Durham, including part of a probate act book for 1588, three precedent books from the sixteenth and seventeeth centuries, a quantity of bishop's transcripts for Co Durham parishes, and a 1716 terrier for Northallerton vicarage. There is also material from the city of Durham, featuring lists of jurymen, alehouse owners, members of the saddlers' and curriers' companies, and an extensive set of bills for the 1807 election. In addition, there are some transcripts of early 19th century parish registers from Montreal (Canada).
Carlton also made extensive extracts from records himself, and the collection includes a number of indexes to wills and marriage licences, and extracts from other Durham records, some acquired from the London record agents Drury and Page. Carlton's own writings are few, but there are some papers on various topics and chapters for possible histories of Durham.
All this came to Howe from Carlton, and Howe was also given by Canon Greenwell, James Raine's Testamenta indexes of marriage bonds, administrations and wills compiled in 1826, with an index to that volume, compiled by R.W.