Primary sources are materials created at the time of the topic you are researching, or by an eyewitness to the topic. Primary sources enable the researcher to get as close as possible to what actually happened during an historical event or time period. They are not commentary about your topic, but are the topic you are commenting about.
Watch this brief video for help differentiating between primary and secondary sources:
Colonial America (1606-1822) consists of all 1,450 volumes of the CO 5 series of Colonial Office files held at The National Archives in London, plus all extracted documents associated with them. This unique collection of largely manuscript material from the archives of the British government is invaluable for students and researchers of all aspects of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century American history and the early-modern Atlantic world.
"Settlement, Slavery, and Empire, 1624-1832" module stretches from the turbulent years of early British settlement to the rise of the abolition movement, amongst the fierce rivalries with the Spanish, Danish, French and Dutch in the Caribbean region. It makes available materials from 27 Colonial Office file classes from The National Archives UK, and includes administrative documentation, trade and shipping records, minutes of council meetings, details of plantation life, colonial settlement, imperial rivalries across the region, and the growing concern of absentee landlords.