The first Chairman of the Friends of the British Library was Christopher Henry Beaumont Pease, 2nd Baron Wardington.

Officers and members of the council are elected as required by the Constitution of the membership at each year's Annual General Meeting.

It depicts 324 coats of arms which are approximately a quarter of the entire English baronage during the reign of Edward I.

It is currently on public display on the first floor, at the head of the stairs at the main British Library facility in St.

[11] The single largest contribution that the Friends have made towards the British Library was the grant of £130,000 towards a new conservation room as part of a bequest from Mary Welsh.

[14] The archive itself dates from between 1940 and Peake's death in 1968 and includes unpublished material such as correspondence with writers Laurie Lee, Walter de la Mare and C. S. Lewis.

It also included the unpublished draft of the sequel to the Gormenghast trilogy, Titus Awakes which was published in 2011 by Vintage Classics to celebrate the centenary of Peake's birth.