Documents representing the payment of monies for surety of perfrmance of obligations. These bonds fall roughly into four categories: 1) for city officials or employees - harbor master, city collector, assayer of silver, superintendent of chimney sweeps, collector of refuse materials, city librarian, lamplighters, gauger of casks, school board principals, and firemen 2) for licenses - auctioneer, pawn broker, and operators of billiard, cramboli, and bagatelle tables 3) for provision of goods and services - paving, supplying oil or stationery to the city government, and construction of wharves 4) for financial transactions - city loans to railroad companies, sale of property, executors of estates, payment of park taxes.

Only a few bonds appear in most years but 1848-51, 1858, 1863, and 1903 have fairly extensive and representative quantities of these documents. Two non-indexed bonds have been included at the end of this series.

A complete item inventory is available in the Baltimore City Archives.