The Collection highlights focus on the museum's archives and objects. At the moment it is the drawings that are in the limelight.

The museum archive has around 22,000 drawings: everything from hand-coloured sketches to computer assisted drawings. The exhibition shows the sheer breadth of the drawings that exist, including those of cannon and ships.

Many of the drawings are signed; certain artists recur often, clearly known in the larger world. Some of these are seen in the exhibition.

The drawings have been donated to us from the naval base and some from people's wills, but we also buy drawings for the collection. The War Archive is the archiving authority for the navy, and for that reason it is the largest part of our collection.