The papers from the career of Commander Murray Thomas Parks include official service documents 1843 to 1870, but are made up mainly of papers relating to the HMS ENTERPRISE and the Arctic expedition of 1851. There are also some letters received by his wife Mary Parks née Dodds, between 1862 and 1881.

Administrative / biographical background
Murray Thomas Parks was one of the sons of Abraham Parks and his wife Sarah Parks née Smith. He was born at Shoeburyness, Essex, in 1827 and entered the Navy in 1842. He first went to sea as a volunteer on the survey vessel HMS COLUMBIA, employed for five years in North America. He later served on the brig HMS PANTALOON on the coast of Africa. In 1850 he was appointed mate on HMS ENTERPRISE, under the command of Captain Richard Collinson, on a Franklin search expedition. He obtained his commission as a lieutenant on the same vessel in the following year. He returned to England in 1855 and was then employed as a marine surveyor at Liverpool. In 1867 he became an agent for transports for the British expedition to Abyssinia. Parks then went on half pay due to ill health, was promoted to the rank of retired commander in 1870, and died at Southsea in 1877.