The Clendon papers include personal, business and official correspondence and papers, letterbooks, registers, journals, memoir, ephemera, photographs and inscribed books. Some material is in te reo Māori, including letters, land leases and a manuscript copy of the Treaty of Waitangi in Māori. The role of women represented in the papers is important.

From the 1830s to the 1850s they show the importance of family and financial links with England, Australia, and the United States for the early traders. The development of government in New Zealand is seen through James Reddy Clendon’s sale of land at Okiato, his part in the Northern War and his lifelong administrative roles.

Thereafter the papers reflect the changing bi-lingual, bi-racial society of the Hokianga through the Clendon family’s correspondence, business and leisure affairs and their administrative roles in government.