Scope and Content: The Board of Registration of Medicine, established in 1894, was placed within the Division of Registration (Dept. of Civil Service and Registration) in 1919.  It was replaced by the Board of Registration and Discipline in Medicine as of 1976, renamed the Board of Registration in Medicine again in 1979.
Arrangement: Arranged alphabetically by letter, thereunder chronologically by year, and then alphabetically by name
Notes: Cover title: Register, Board of Registration in Medicine, no. 1
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Scope and Content: Per St 1778-79, c 49 (May 1, 1779), the Massachusetts General Court authorized the confiscation and sale of absentee estates for the benefit of the government. Resolves 1778-79, c 312  (Sept. 23, 1779) appointed various county committees to sell at public auction estates confiscated from prominent Loyalists named in the resolve. County committee actions, reflected in resolves passed Oct. 1779-May 1780, included sales, suspended sales, leases, and receipts deposited into the Treasury. Some records for these committees are found in: Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State.  Massachusetts archives collection ((M-Ar)45X), v. 280. –Resolves 1780, Oct Sess, c 95 (Nov. 29, 1780) appointed committees for each county to take charge of absentee real estate and personal effects from the Committee of Sequestration and to sell the same at public auction. Resolves 1783, Jan 1784 Sess,  c 132 (Mar. 16, 1784) suspended sales of absentee estates and directed the committees to settle their accounts by June 10. As the treaty ending the Revolutionary War prohibited further confiscations, St 1783 c 69 (Mar. 24, 1784) specified that any absentee property not already sold or claimed for debt should be returned to its original owner.
Arrangement:  In two subseries: Journal; arranged chronologically, Ledger; arranged by estate, thereunder chronologically
Notes: Title derived from ledger title page; Cover title: Committee for Selling Absentees Estates in the County of Suffolk
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Scope and Content: Middlesex County was incorporated on May 10, 1643 (Mass Recs 2:38), continuing under successive governments of Massachusetts, most recently the Commonwealth (1780), as outlined in MGLA c 34.  Administrative powers and duties previously exercised at various times under the laws of the Commonwealth by the county courts of general sessions of the peace, county courts of common pleas, and circuit courts of common pleas, were assigned to commissioners in Middlesex and other counties, per St 1827, c 77 (1828).  The government of Middlesex County in this and other respects was abolished as of the effective date of St 1997, c 48 (approved July 11, 1997)
Arrangement: Arranged chronologically
Notes: Series incomplete: records after 1914 lacking
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Scope and Content: Assistants, also designated judicially in their own towns as magistrate, with powers of justice of the peace, were chosen annually by the General Court of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay, the colony chartered by the English Crown in 1629.  They met separately from the General Court as a whole (i.e., including its freemen–or, from 1634, their elected deputies), constituting with the governor and deputy governor a Court of Assistants.  In 1634 this body’s legislative powers were ceded to the General Court as a whole (Mass Recs 1: 117).  From 1636 certain members were appointed as members for life of a standing council to the governor (see: Massachusetts. Council. Agency history record). By 1644, while assistants continued to meet separately–now concurrently with a House of Deputies, thus in effect being the upper house of the General Court–the designation of Court of Assistants was reserved for the assistants acting solely in their judicial capacity, this body continuing until the institution of the Dominion of New England in 1686 and then again with the 1689 revival of colonial government until institution of the Province of the Massachusetts Bay in 1692.
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Scope and Content: The Anitoxin and Vaccine Laboratory was established within the Massachusetts State Board of Health in 1904 for the preparation (initially by injecting toxins into or extracting naturally-occurring  toxins from animals), storage, and distribution of diphtheria antitoxin serum and smallpox vaccine.  Other vaccines were added as developed, including those for influenza, meningitis, pneumonia,  and poliomyelitis (derived from polio convalescents, eventually abandoned in the late 1930s as ineffective).  Antitoxin production began in the State House in 1894 but in 1895 was moved to Harvard University’s Bussey Institution, until the establishment of the state laboratory. By 1915 the laboratory functioned as part of the Division of Biologic Laboratories under the state board (renamed Dept. of. Public Health in 1919); by the 1950s the division no longer named or reported  separately on the laboratory.
Arrangement: In seven subseries; Arranged chronologically within each subseries
Restrictions: (Wassermann test results) Personal medical information restricted by statutory provision MGLA c 4, s 7, d 26(c) and c 66A. For conditions of access consult repository
Notes: Transferred to Archives from Center for the History of Medicine, Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard University, Oct. 23, 2013
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Scope and Content: In 1776 the Massachusetts General Court appointed a Committee of Sequestration to inventory, lease, and otherwise manage estates abandoned by Loyalists, primarily in Boston, and to forward their confiscated goods or proceeds from their auctioning to state authorities, until its charge was withdrawn in 1781. Series documents chiefly the first and last of these functions. –Vol. 1, 1776-1778, includes inventories of personal and real estate by absentee, listing items such as furnishings, buildings, slaves, books, by room, store, or other location where found. Sheriff William Greenleaf is noted in some entries as the seller at auction. Absentees include Thomas Hutchinson, Lewis Deblois, Gilbert Deblois, and Edward Lyde. Cover title: Absentees’ estates. –Vol. 2, 1776, lists articles delivered to the commissary by order of the committee, and from whose holdings they were taken (many from the Debloises or Edward Lyde). Items include tools, compasses, locks, lead, files, paper, and pans. Notations indicate that Commissary General Francis Abbott received items as of July 1, 1776 and Commissary General Richard Devens after that date. The volume is signed by Jonathan Browne, committee chair. Another version of this record is found in: Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State. Massachusetts archives collection ((M-Ar)45X), v. 280, p.121 et seq., along with other records of the committee, such as inventories, receipts, vouchers, and accounts. Caption title: Account of sundry articles sold to the commissary.
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Scope and Content: The Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay, chartered by the English Crown in 1629, sat as a General Court, which after the 1630 emigration to America became the government of the Massachusetts Bay colony.  It consisted of freemen (company stockholders), represented from 1634 by elected deputies (as a legislative lower house); and the governor, deputy governor, and assistants chosen by the freemen.  Series consists of public documents created during the period of the colonial charter (1629-1686) and revival of colonial government (1689-1692)–and a few related earlier items–reflecting the legislative, executive, and judicial phases of that government, with the exception of judicial documents specifically pertaining to the activities of the assistants sitting in their judicial capacity as the Court of Assistants.
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Scope and Content: Three successive provincial congresses (1774-1775) served as the government of Massachusetts in opposition to the governor and council appointed by the English Crown.  Series consists of public documents relating to their affairs, as transcribed or referenced in the congresses’ journals ((M-Ar)1704X)
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Scope and Content: The Superior Court of Judicature was created by the Massachusetts General Court in 1692, having cognizance of all pleas involving real or personal property, pleas to which the English Crown was a party, and all matters relating to conservation of the peace and punishment of offenders.  Series consists of public documents created during the provincial and later Revolutionary periods (1692-1774, 1775-1780) that deal with judicial matters (i.e., testimonies, depositions, writs, warrants, and bonds) not already specifically identified with the Council in its judicial capacity or otherwise dealing with divorce petitions or matters of probate and thus identified with the General Court.
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Scope and Content: Rainsford Island in Boston Harbor was the site since 1736 of various hospital and other charitable institutions administered and funded alternately or jointly by Massachusetts and Boston.  In 1854 a hospital for sick state paupers opened there, first under the auspices of the Board of Alien Commissioners and then from 1863 under that of the Board of State Charities; it was also used as a military hospital from 1864 and closed in 1866.
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