Life

He was the eldest son of John Caley, a grocer in Bishopsgate Street, London. Acquaintance with Thomas Astle

Thomas Astle

Thomas Astle was an English antiquary and palaeographer.-Life:Astle was born on 22 December 1735 at Yoxall on the borders of Needwood Forest in Staffordshire, the son of Daniel Astle, keeper of the forest...

 led to a place in the Record Office in the Tower of London

Tower of London

Her Majesty's Royal Palace and Fortress, more commonly known as the Tower of London, is a historic castle on the north bank of the River Thames in central London, England. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the eastern edge of the City of London by the open space...

. In 1787 he received from Lord William Bentinck, as clerk of the pipe, the keepership of the records in the Augmentation office, in place of H. Brooker; and in 1818, on the death of the Right Hon. George Rose, he was appointed keeper of the records in the ancient treasury at Westminster. Meanwhile he had entered Gray's Inn

Gray's Inn

The Honourable Society of Gray's Inn, commonly known as Gray's Inn, is one of the four Inns of Court in London. To be called to the Bar and practise as a barrister in England and Wales, an individual must belong to one of these Inns...

, on 11 January 1786, but never proceeded to the bar.

When the first Record Commission was nominated in 1801, Caley was appointed secretary, an office which he continued to hold until the dissolution of the commission in March 1831. A special office, that of sub-commissioner, to superintend the arranging, repairing, and binding of records, was created for him, with a salary of £500 a year, besides retaining his two keeperships.

Caley died at his house in Exmouth Street, Spa Fields, on 28 April 1834, aged 71. His library, rich in topography and collections of reports and searches made by him as a legal antiquary during a period of fifty years, was sold by Evans in the following July. Several of his manuscripts were acquired by the British Museum

British Museum

The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

.

Works

As a sub-commissioner Caley became a joint-editor in 14 of the works undertaken by the commission. He also printed, at the request of Thomas Burgess, a few copies of the ‘Ecclesiastical Survey of the Possessions, &c., of the Bishop of St. David's,’ privately printed, 1812.

In 1813, he engaged, in conjunction with Bulkeley Bandinel

Bulkeley Bandinel

Rev. Dr. Bulkeley Bandinel was a British scholar, ecclesiastic and librarian.He was born in the parish of St Peter-in-the-East, Oxford, firstborn son of Rev. Dr. James Bandinel of Netherbury by his wife, Margaret . Educated at Reading under Richard Valpy and then at Winchester College, Bandinel...

 and Sir Henry Ellis, to prepare a new edition of William Dugdale

William Dugdale

Sir William Dugdale was an English antiquary and herald. As a scholar he was influential in the development of medieval history as an academic subject.-Life:...

's Monasticon, which extended to six volumes, the first of which appeared in 1817, the last in 1830. He mainly furnished documents. Caley was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in March 1786, and to the eighth volume of the ‘Archæologia’ (pp. 389–405) he contributed a memoir ‘On the Origin of the Jews in England.’ His other contributions were: in 1789 an extract from a manuscript in the Augmentation Office relative to a wardrobe account of Henry VIII (ix. 243–52); in 1790 a valuation (temp. Henry VIII) of the shrine called Corpus Christi Shrine at York (x. 469–71); and in 1791 the ‘Survey of the Manor of Wymbledon, alias Wimbleton,’ taken by the parliamentary commissioners in November 1649 (x. 399–448). He was also a Fellow of the Royal Society

Royal Society

The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

 and Linnean Society, and a member of the Society of Arts.

Reputation

To Caley's influence were attributed many of the scandals of the Record Commission. He had critics in the arranging and binding of the records; and he also removed the seals from documents. Applicants for historical documents had to apply at Caley's private house, a costly and unreliable process. The only indexes were in Caley's possession at his house.