Area Secretary's Office

D1920/1 Area Council and Area Executive Committee
D1920/2 Area Circulars
D1920/3 Area Secretary's Office: General Correspondence
D1920/4 Boards, Committees and Councils
D1920/5 Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation (CISWO)
D1920/6 Elections and ballots
D1920/7 The Labour Party
D1920/8 Industrial Action
D1920/9 Branch files
D1920/10 Wage agreements
D1920/11 Pensions
D1920/12 Redundancy and retirement
D1920/13 Education
D1920/14 Conferences
D1920/15 Accident funds
D1920/16 Rules
D1920/17 Disaster funds
D1920/18 Statistics
D1920/19 Historical records
D1920/20 Photographs
D1920/21 The Derbyshire Miners: draft printed history
D1920/22 Visits

The Area Secretary's Office, also referred to as the General Secretary's Office, was responsible for supporting the work of the Area Secretary. This included the arranging of Area Council and Area Executive Committee meetings, preparing reports for the Council, drafting and circulating the minutes from these meetings, and carrying out any duties arising from decisions agreed by the Area Council or Area Executive Committee. It was also responsible for keeping and maintaining the union's records, handling correspondence relating to the many committees served by the union's officials, liaising with branches, organising ballots of members, and property management.

James Haslam, Secretary of the Clay Cross lodge of the South Yorkshire Association and later MP for Chesterfield, became the first General Secretary of the Derbyshire Miners' Association (DMA) in 1880. The role of General Secretary became a full-time one from 1881 and was elected by a majority of the DMA's members. The General Secretary was directed by the Council, also known later (following the DMA's transformation into the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) Derbyshire Area in 1945) as the Area Council, the union's main governing body, and was not allowed to vote at meetings of the Council.

The General Secretary, referred to as the Area Secretary after 1945, sat on the union's Executive Committee. The Area Secretary and his office was responsible for conducting the correspondence of the union and the Area Executive Committee, and keeping records of their proceedings, and for preparing annual returns.