The Local Historian

ISSN 00245585

Published quarterly for the STANDING CONFERENCE FOR LOCAL HISTORY by the NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR VOLUNTARY ORGANISATIONS 26 BEDFORD SQUARE LONDON WC!B 31;1-tl

VOLUME 14 NUMBER 3 AUGUST 1980

CONTENTS DEVELOPMENTS IN LOCAL HISTORY: AN OXFORDSHIRE REPORT Kate Tiller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131

VOW, COVENANT AND PROTESTATION: SOURCES FOR THE HISTORY OF POPULATION AND LITERACY IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY David Cressy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I 34

HISTORICAL PHOTOGRAPHS-3

THE PROBLEMS OF INDEXING A LOCAL NEWSPAPER

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B. J. Elliott . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143

TOWN HOUSES AND SOCIETY IN GEORGIAN COUNTRY TOWNS Part 2: HOUSES AND SOCIETY Adrian Henstock . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

THE MAPPING OF UNCONSIDERED TRIFLES: A YORKSHIRE EXAMPLE Melvy n Jones . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156

GRAVESTONES AND LOCAL HISTORY: PROBLEMS OF INTERPRETATION Christopher Husbands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

FROM READERS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

REVIEWS Philip Bark er P. J. Car.field Christoper Dyer Joe Hillaby Mary Hulton J . D. Marshall Lionel Mumby D. M. Pa//iser Alan Rogers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.... . . .. ..... . ...... . 185

NOTES ON NEWS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

COVER ILLUSTRATION Memorial to the son of Dion Boucicault, killed in the Abbots Ripter railway accident, 21 January 1876. (Photographed 1964)

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The Local Historian

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formerly

The Amateur

Historian

Editor DAVID DYMOND Grundle House , Stanton, Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk

Associate Welsh Editor HYWEL FRANCIS South Wales Miners' Library, University College, Swansea

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Developments in local history: an Oxfordshire report Kate Tiller The pace of local history events in Oxfordshire has quickened markedly this year and has centred on two major happenings, a county Local History Exhibition and Competition and the formation of a new county body, the Oxfordshire Local History Association (OLHA) inaugurated on 19 March 1980. This brief report records the vast amount of enthusiasm and effort put into these ventures, but may also have a wider significance. On the one hand it may suggest ho:w the energy of the increasing armies of local historians can be focused; on the other hand it underlines the need to meet changing circumstances in the organisation of local history at both county and national level.

The idea of a single exhibition and competition to provide a shop window for the work of local history and community groups from all over Oxfordshire was first raised in 1978 and took two years to bring to fruition. For three days, from 18 April to 20 April 1980, Oxford Town Hall and Assembly Room were full of exhibits, and of the members of the twenty-four local groups which had produced them. In addition 2,111 members of the public paid 1 Op each to view the stands , consume the refreshments organised by a local charity, and sample the bookstall. Last but not least, three judges faced the immense task of judging the winners on the basis of their contribution to historical knowledge, accuracy and originality, standard of presentation, quality of catalogue and statement of how any prize money would be spent. Each exhibit was encompassed within a space ten feet by six feet, but there uniformity ended for the variety of shape and presentation was startling. The prizes were well worth striving for, ranging from a first prize of £200, donated by a local brewery, to a sixth prize of £15. The way in which commercial sponsorship may be attracted to local historical events was a striking feature of the enterprise. Overall sponsorship, and advertising, were undertaken by a local newspaper, and other prizes were donated by a bank.

The organisation of the venture rested basically with the Oxfordshire Rural Community Council through its County Local History Committee. For two years its voluntary members tackled an immense range of tasks, formulating competition rules, contacting possible entrants, finding sponsors, booking accommodation, checking the multiplicity of details like fire regulations and insurance, organising refreshments and compiling a printed programme. Was it all worthwhile?

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Certainly the original idea of providing a shop window and a meeting place for local historians was fulfilled and more. The mere fact of seeing work from other communities sparked off ideas and comparisons and explanations, breaking down the barriers of parochialism that so often bedevil local history. The spur of a date, a place and public viewing concentrated people's minds wonderfully, producing some very well-researched and presented local studies indeed. Such an event must have helped to establish and raise the standards of many local organisations . These included not merely formally constituted local societies, but also Women's Institutes, schools and amenity groups. In some cases the need to produce a catalogue has already helped to stimulate the writing-up of projects; in other cases it was agreed that extracts from exhibits shall be included in future issues of local journals, or the opportunity of meeting publishers, librarians and archivists at the exhibition has spurred people to at least consider writing up their work. The catalogues themselves record previously unknown sources and their locations, and the way in which new contacts have been drawn into the enterprise at local level. Last, and not least, the presence of the general public, sponsors and local press and radio brought local history before a much wider audience than is ever the case at more traditional gatherings. This was definitely a worthwhile, if exhausting venture, perhaps to be staged every few years and why not in other counties too?

The Exhibition and Competition represented the last major activity of the Oxfordshire Local History Committee of the county Rural Community Council. After a partnership of thirty-two years the liveliness of the Committee and the Community Council's need to expand its work in other fields brought the relationship to a gentle and amicable end in April 1980. Thus local historians have had to prove themselves capable of standing on their own feet as has happened in other counties, and as is to happen at national level. The challenge has been met by the old County Committee, which had to terminate its own existence and broaden the future base of support. Throughout this transition the Rural Community Council has continued to lend much practical help and professional advice, for example on constitutional matters. What has been the outcome?

The Oxfordshire Local History Association was inaugurated in- March 1980. It is not a federation of local societies but an association of local historians, both society members and individuals. It recognises that the professionals can be of great help in supplying knowledge, advice and organisational support but acknowledges that a voluntary body depends for its success on the multitude of local 'amateur' enthusiasts, whose interest was illustrated by the Exhibition and Competition. Thus whilst representatives of libraries, archives, museums, extra-mural and other educational institutions appear on the new Association's Executive Committee the 'amateurs' will always have an equal, and usually greater representation. The aim of the Association is to continue, and expand, the work of the old County Committee. This will include the organising of regular meetings to review current work in Oxfordshire local history, the publishing of an annual journal and quarterly

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newsletter, acting as a 'clearing house' of information and advice, and perhaps organising a further Exhibition and Competition. Will the Association continue to be the sole formal channel between Oxfordshire local historians and the Standing Conference for Local History or its successor? This pattern has persisted since 1948, based essentially on the link between the National Council for Social Service, the Standing Conference and the Rural Community Councils. It is apparent that this basis will cease, or has ceased, to exist in many areas, not only in Oxfordshire. This change enables us to take stock . It is a nonsense to suppose that the undoubted enthusiasm and enterprise of local historians can only be represented via formally constituted bodies at local society and county level. This neglects so many factors, for example the varying shape of local history in the country at large, and the absence or inactivity of some county bodies. Above all, it neglects the desire of the enthusiastic local historians, whom any national body should want to attract, for direct access to the ideas and encouragement offered by meetings, pamphlets, services such as special bibliographies and lists of work in progress, and not least by receiving a journal such as The Local Historian.

KATE TILLER is a tutor in the Department for External Studies at Oxford, and specialises in local studies. Her main research interest is nineteenth-century working class movements. She is currently vice-chairman and editor of the Oxfordshire Local History Association .

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Vow, Covenant and Protestation: sources for the history of population and literacy in the seventeenth century David Cressy

Among the least exploited sources for the social and demographic history of seventeenth-century communities are the declarations, vows and covenants of the early 1640s. In addition to the Protestation, which is quite well known, there are other lists of names in support of the Vow and Covenant, the Solemn League and Covenant, and a miscellany of partisan petitions. Most of these documents contain information of interest to the local historian, and some of them are key indicators of the size of a local population and its level of literacy.'

From the summer of 1641, when the Protestation first appeared ·outside London , to the end of 1644 when the last subscriptions to the Solemn League and Covenant were being collected in country parishes controlled by parliament, the developing crisis called forth a series of agreements, associations, declarations, remonstrances and oaths to which the ordinary men of a community had to set their names. The petitions, whether royalist, parliamentarian or neutralist, were circulated in a haphazard way without close control, so their value for reconstituting historical communities is limited. But the declarations which were sponsored by parliament itself came with carefully framed instructions and were backed by the local government machinery which lay at Westminster's disposal. Sheriffs and constables, ministers and churchwardens were marshalled to ensure that all the required subscriptions were collected.

The Protestation, a promise to defend 'the true, reformed and protestant religion, expressed in the doctrine of the Church of England, against all popery and popish innovations,' was to be taken by all males aged eighteen and above. Sorrte places took the Protestation of their own accord in 1641, and it was extended to the whole nation in 1642. The Vow and Covenant of 1643, promising assistance to the forces of parliament, was similar in format but was required of males above the age of fifteen. The Solemn League and Covenant, promulgated in 1643 and circulated in parliamentary territory in 1644, was

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supposed to be subscribed by men above the age of eighteen, signifying their acceptance of presbyterianism and the Scottish alliance. 2

Despite the slightly different age requirement the general intent was to secure the loyalty of every man in every parish and bind them by oath to the parliamentary cause. None could avoid the oath simply by staying away, since the local officials were charged with the task of recording the names of absenters and refusers along with the names of subscribers. In some places we hear of special constructions being put on the wording of an oath so that somebody of tender conscience could subscribe, while elsewhere excuses were presented on behalf of men who were away at sea or lying sick in bed. Some of the parishioners at Brantham, Suffolk, annotated their subscriptions to the Vow and Covenant with the cautious reservation, 'so far as lawfully I may.' At Advent in Cornwall John Trefry 'did not sign being feeble in body and past his senses' yet his name still appears under the Protestation. At Minster in Cornwall the list includes 'the names of such seafaring men as are wanting,' while the Protestation of Kelveden Hatch in Essex includes the names of four absent recusants. 3

How confident can we be that the subscription lists to the three parliamentary declarations amount to a faithful enumeration of the adult male population of each parish? The documents often proclaim themselves to be complete, with a preamble to the effect that 'all the men of our parish have Subscribed' or 'not one of the parish aforesaid refused to join in this act', and this can be checked against other sources. Parish registers, ship money assessments, tithe and poor rate lists, hearth tax records and counts of communicants can be used to determine whether the subscribers of the 1640s indeed represented something approaching the entire adult male population, and in most cases the figures will be found to be compatible. Shortfalls and discrepancies can be explained by reference to short-term fluctuations, migration in and out, and the disruptions of civil war.

If we assume that men above the age of eighteen made up some thirty-one per cent of the population, a multiplier of 3.2 can be used to convert the number of subscribers to declarations into an estimate of community size. Since the age-structure of the population varied somewhat from place to place and was subject to change over time our multiplier may have to be modified, but as a rough guide it appears to be satisfactory. At Prittlewell in Essex, for example, the Vow and Covenant was taken by 155 men and the Solemn League and Covenant by 157. The figures suggest a population of just over 500 at the time of the civil war. At East Hanningfield in the same county, where sixty-seven men took the protestation, the population is estimated as 214.4

Another way to gauge the size of population is through the volume of vital events, taking account of estimated birth- and death-rates. As an approximate measure, allowing for under-registration associated with infant mortality, the annual average of baptisms can be multiplied by 33.333 to suggest the size of the population. In the case of Prittlewell, with 16.7 births per year in the mid­seventeenth century, the population was about 557, while East Hanningfield

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had 8.0 baptisms per year in the twenty years before the Protestation, pointing to a population of 267. Both these figures are larger than those derived from the declarations, suggesting some deliberate or accidental evasion of the oath, but they are not incompatible.5

The Hearth Tax records of a later generation throw further light on population history, although they present their own problems of interpretation. The 1671 Hearth Tax assessments for Essex are especially informative since they include exempt and pauper households as well as taxpayers. Assuming the average household size to have been 4.5 we can multiply the seventy-seven entries at Prittlewell to calculate a population of 347 and the fifty households of East Hanningfield to make 225 people.6 Both places appear to have lost people in the later-seventeenth century, but the Hearth Tax estimate for East Hanningfield is not far from the figure obtained through the Protestation.

Besides their importance for community reconstitution and as an alternative source for estimating the overall population, the Long Parliament declarations serve other historical purposes. Most striking is their value for the study of literacy.

The men who took these oaths were supposed to write their names on the document or, if they were unable to write, they had to make a mark. The parliamentary ordinances which arranged the collection of subscriptions parish by parish took account of the widespread illiteracy of Stuart England. For the Vow and Covenant, 'every man ... shall write his name, or make a mark, whereunto his name shall be written.' The Solemn League and Covenant was to be read 'distinctly and audibly in the pulpit,' then to be taken by all with their right hands uplifted, and the takers were to 'subscribe it severally by writing their names, or their marks to which their names are to be added, in a parchment roll or a book ... and kept as a record in the parish.' 7 By counting the total number of names and the number of marks we can calculate the proportion who were unable to sign their names. This establishes a basic level of illiteracy, since the ability to write a signature was roughly commensurate with the ability to read through a simple passage. There is a growing literature on the subject, some of it controversial, but there is general agreement that the ability or inability to write one's name is a worthwhile indicator ofliteracy. 8

Since they contain large numbers of signatures and marks, collected in named communities under controlled circumstances, the declarations of the 1640s constitute a major source for the level of literacy at a critical moment in English history. Unfortunately, a large number of the surviving lists are fair­copy transcripts rather than holograph documents, and it is not uncommon to discover runs of names written in a common hand. These have to be excluded from a study of literacy, unless the ability of specific individuals rather than the total male community is the focus of attention. Nonetheless, a large number of returns to the Protestation, the Vow and Covenant and the Solemn League and Covenant satisfy the strictest criteria and serve to establish the fact that some seventy per cent of Englishmen were so illiterate that they could not sign their own names at the beginning of the great civil war.9

Where are these documents to be consulted? Most of the Protestation

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returns were gathered up by the sheriffs of individual counties and sent to Westminster, where they remain in the House of Lords Record Office. An early report of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts lists the parishes in each county for which returns survive, and some ·of them have been printed by local historians and genealogists. 10 But dozens more, perhaps hundreds more, never made their way to London and can be found among local records. The names of subscribers, with their marks and signatures, were often entered on a spare page in the parish register, or in a churchwardens' book or in vestry minutes. These local documents supplement the Westminster record, and in some counties provide our only glimpse of literacy in the mid­seventeenth century. The parish registers of Kedleston, Pentrich and South Wingfield in Derbyshire, for example, contain Protestation subscriptions, but no Derbyshire returns are recorded on London.11

All the subscriptions to the Vow and Covenant and to the Solemn League and Covenant are among local records. Only the names of refusers were returned to Parliament. These documents are virtually unknown among social historians, yet the information they contain is similar in type and quality to the material in the Protestations. Among the Essex parochial records are a score or more covenant returns, and eleven of them are complete holograph lists which can be used to reconstruct the level of illiteracy. This is especially significant since only one of the Essex Protestation returns at Westminster, that for Middleton, is acceptable for the study of literacy. Cherry Burton in Yorkshire and Easington and Monk Hesleden in county Durham have covenant subscriptions in parish registers, and no doubt more are lurking and await recognition and exploitation. It is an urgent task to compile a register of Protestation and civil war Covenants among local sources. 12

The fate of some of these documents is as interesting for religious and political history as their content is for the history of population and literacy. We know that some people subscribed reluctantly or under pressure, and the events of the following two decades led some of them to reconsider their position. An unknown poet graced the register at Ashingdon, Essex, with the following verse:

'What more? Vow, Covenant and Protection, All to maintain the church and English nation. A threefold cord sure is not easily broken For so the wise man hath divinely spoken. But all in vain ; men's hearts with guile are fraught, Great ones break through, small fishes they are caught. Three nations thus are twisted all in one; Three nations thus are three times thrice undone.' 13

With the Restoration it was not unnatural for people to wish to dissociate themselves from the revolutionary era. Fortunately they chose to purge their memories rather than purge their neighbours, and they sometimes did this by amending, obliterating or actually removing the Protestations and Covenants to which they or their predecessors had subscribed in the 1640s. The Protestation in the parish register of Hadleigh, Essex, is scratched through,

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while the subscription to the Vow and Covenant in the register of nearby Prittlewell has the remark, 'all Roundhead villains.' 14

The case of the covenant of Swineshead, Huntingdonshire, is perhaps the most curious of all. Swineshead subscribed the Protestation in 1642 and the return was taken to Westminster. On 30 June 1644, the minister, constable, churchwardens and inhabitants of Swineshead took the Solemn League and Covenant and wrote their names on a large sheet of parchment beneath the declaration. Huntingdonshire was a parliamentary stronghold, a bulwark of the Eastern Association , and the Earl of Manchester was patron of the living at Swineshead, so it is not surprising that the rector, Thomas Whitehead, was dutiful in his administration of the declaration . But Whitehead was still rector at the Restoration, and renounced the Covenant and conformed under Charles II. During the early 1660s the large sheet of parchment with the embarassing marks and signatures disappeared. Whitehead effectively surpressed it and it would not be known to history if a Victorian rector of Swineshead had not gone in for do-it-yourself house maintenance. The incomparable description by the Rev. W. Airy will speak for itself.

'In 1846, I found the roof of the Rectory at Swynshed (a house of the early part of the seventeenth ·century) in so dilapidated a state, that it was necessary to remove it entirely. Not to mention other curiosities, such as dried rats, skeletons of cats, and a portion of the original open chimney ... I found in the angle formed by the springing of one of the principal rafters from the wall­plate, a small coil of parchment, one end of which, from the rain having penetrated through the roof, had perished; the rest, which was protected by the rafter, was ... in good preservation and the writing upon it perfectly legible. This was the Solemn Vow and Covenant of the little parish of Swynshed.' Airy restored the document and had it framed in timber from the rectory roof. It eventually found its way to Trinity College, Cambridge, where it used to hang in the Wren library before disappearing uncatalogued into a cupboard. It surfaced again in the summer of 1978 and is being sent to a new and perhaps more appropriate resting place in the Huntingdon Record Office.15

The Swineshead covenant included twenty-eight marks in a total of fifty­one names. The figures indicate a population of 163 and an illiteracy level of fifty-five per cent. This document, so fortuitously brought to light, can now be used by local historians, who should be alerted that others like it survive in more conventional places. The original Protestation of Swineshead, much mutilated with many names removed, survives in the parish register and an official return, lacking autograph signatures and marks, is with the records of Parliament.

The Protestation and Covenants which we have so far considered, emanated from Westminster and circulated in the country. The same political crisis which gave rise to the official declarations led leaders of opinion in the provinces to compose declarations of their own and collect subscriptions in their support. Sotne of these were presented to Parliament as petitions while others have been lost from view. Their purpose was to shape policy rather than

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to endorse it, although most of the petitions which survive offered support to the parliamentary leadership.

Typical of the many petitions received at Westminster in 1642 was 'the humble petition of the knights, gentlemen, ministers and other inhabitants of the county of Essex.' It purports to represent the views of the county and contains the names of over 13,000 people. Some of the sheets in this very confused document have the marks and signatures of the adult males of specified parishes. A similar document is the 'petition of divers baronets, knights, esquires , gentlemen, yeomen and others of the county of Derby.' For the historian who needs the names of particular residents on the eve of the civil war the petitions are a promising source. 16 But they have serious flaws which undermine any value they might have for the history of population and literacy.

Many of the names are written in a common hand and many of the signatures appear to have been written by proxy. And many of the sheets of names can only be linked to particular parishes by knowing from other sources who lived where . This still leaves a few lists where the parish is named and the signatures and marks are authentic. From Ramsey in Essex there were thirty marks among sixty-four named petitioners, while forty-seven of the eighty petitioners from Belper in Derbyshire could not write their names. These figures may represent the true population and the actual level of literacy , but the suspicion is strong that they are incomplete. The main problem is that we do not know how the petitioners ' names were collected. There was none of the supervision that was associated with the Protestation and the Covenant, no certainty that the entire community had the opportunity to subscribe, and even the possibility that some of the signatures were fraudulent. 17 Without close linking with other local records the petitions would best be left alone.

Parliament did not have a monopoly of the Protestation procedure. It was a successful device for spreading propaganda and identifying opposition, and was used by the royalists in the civil war as well as by their enemies. An example is the 'association, agreement and protestation of the counties of Cornwall and Devon' of 1643/4 . Here there was supervision along the lines pioneered by Parliament, with sheriffs, constables of hundreds, petty constables, ministers and churchwardens assigned their part in securing attestations. All men above the age of sixteen were to subscribe their names to this royalist Protestation, 'and such of his parish as shall not be present at the time' should 'take the same within ten days following.' The completed subscriptions were to be returned to the king 's commissioners at Oxford. 18

Whether these instructions were ever carried out, and the fate of the document , if it exists, remain a mystery. A royalist Protestation from the west country would be especially interesting since the Devon and Cornwall returns to the Parliamentary Protestation are among the most complete. Perhaps we should look to our roofs.

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REFERENCES

The Protestations are described in W. B. Stephens, Sources for English local history (Manchester, 1973), p. 38. A checklist of printed Protestations compiled by L. W. Lawson Edwards appears in The Genealogist's Magazine, 19 (1977), pp. 84-5.

2 Journals of the House of Commons, Vol. 2, pp. 132,133,230 , 389, 530; Vol. 3, pp. 11~ 118,119, 14~223,241,254,344,38~

3 Suffolk Record Office, Ipswich, FB 190/Dl/1; House of Lords Record Office, Protestation returns, Cornwall; Kelveden Hatch parish register with incumbent.

4 Evidence for age-structure and advice about appropriate demographic multipliers is drawn from the work of the SSRC/Cambridge Group for the History of Population and Social Structure. I am grateful to Dr R. S. Schofield of the Cambridge Group for allowing me access to this material. The parish registers of Prittlewell and East Hanningfield which contain the declarations are with the incumbents.

5 These calculations assume a birth rate of 30 per 1,000, and are based on the work of the Cambridge Group. A comparison of Protestation returns and parish registers as sources for population totals is in progress. Preliminary results suggest that there was some shortfall in the Protestations and an additional corrective factor may have to be introduced to compensate for the absence of marginal or especially mobile parishioners.

6 Hearth Tax Records in Essex Record Office, Q/RTh/5. The multiplier for household size is based on the work of the Cambridge Group.

7 Journals of the House of Commons, Vol. 3, p. 14 7; C. H. Firth and R. S. Rait, Acts and ordinances of the interregnum, 1642-1660(1911), p. 378.

8 R. S. Schofield,'The measurement of literacy in pre-industrial England,' in Jack Goody (ed), Literacy in traditional societies (Cam bridge, 1968), pp. 3 11-325; Lawrence Stone, 'Literacy and education in England, 1640-1900,' Past and Present, 42 (1969), pp. 69-139; David Cressy, 'Levels of illiteracy in England, 15 30- 1 730,' The Historical Journal, 20 (1977), pp. 1-23; David Cressy ,'Literacy in seventeenth century England: more evidence,' Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 8 (1977), pp. 141-50, and ibid, 8 (1978), pp. 799-801.

9 Cressy,'Literacy in seventeenth century England,' p. 144, and my Literacy and the social order (Cambridge, 1980).

10 Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, Fifth report (1876), pp. 120-134. See note 1 above.

11 Thomas M. Blagg and L. Lloyd Simpson (eds.), Derbyshire parish registers (1914), Vol. 13, pp. 184-5. The 1642 'Petition of divers baronets, knights, esquires, gentlemen, yeomen and others of the county of Derby,' in the House of Lords Record Office, contains several thousand signatures and marks. Most are irregularly arranged, but it is possible to discover that, for example, fifty-nine per cent of the petitioners from Belper and ninety-five per cent from Castleton could not sign their names.

12 Essex Record Office, Catalogue of Essex parish records (1966), passim; Humberside Record Office, PR 1958; Durham County Record Office, parish registers.

13 Harold Smith, The ecclesiastical history of Essex under the Long Parliament and Commonwealth (Colchester, n.d.), p. 97; Essex Record Office, D/P89/ 1/ 1.

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I 4 Hadleigh and Prittlewell registers with incumbents. 15 Airy was a graduate of Trinity and sent two of his sons there. Part of the history of

the Swineshead covenant appears in Alfred Kingston, East Anglia and the great civil war (1897), pp. 365-7. Airy's report, from an undated cutting from the Bedford Times, is attached to the back of the framed document at Trinity College, Cambridge. I wish to thank the librarian and staff for successfully locating the document and allowing me to see it. Cf. F. G. Emmison (ed.), Bedfordshire parish registers, Vol. 7 (Bedford , 1933), sig. F35, and Granville Proby, 'The Protestation returns for Huntingdonshire,' Transactions of the Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire Archaeological Society, 5 (l 937), p. 330.

I 6 House of Lords Record Office, petitions. See not 11 above. Journals of the House of Lords, Vol. 4, pp. 535, 539, 563, 570, etc.

I 7 B. J. Enright, 'Pu blic petitions in the House of Commons,' House of Lords Record Office, typescript (I 960), p. 30.

I 8 The association, agreement and protestation of the counties of Cornwall and Devon (Oxford, 1643), pp. I, 5, 6. A later document extended the royalist protestation to Somerset and Dorset, with hopes of obtaining additional subscriptions from Wiltshire and Bristol, The association ... of Somerset, Dorset, Cornwall and Devon (Oxford, 1644).

DAVID CRESSY taught until recently at Pitzer College at Claremont in California, but has maintained regular contact with England. His research at Cambridge into sixteenth - and seventeenth-century literacy has led to several articles and a book called Literacy and the social order (f 980).

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Historical photographs - 3

THE LINCOLN TYPHOID EPIDEMIC, 1905 A group of Lincoln residents collecting their daily supply of uncontaminated drinking water from a city conduit. The epidemic, caused by neglect of the water supplies to a rapidly expanding population, claimed over a hundred victims in seven months. This picture, which shows the spirit of citizens under stress, comes from a series of post­cards produced at the time.

(Supplied by Miss J. Tasker; from the Lincolnshire Local Studies Collection by courtesy of Lincolnshire Library Service)

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The problems of indexing a local newspaper B. J. Elliott Most historians of modern British history will have had cause at some stage in their researches to bless the indexers of the Times newspaper, whose annual and eventually quarterly index volumes have opened up a major source of contemporary news and opinion. Similarly most local historians working on a substantial theme will probably have faced the daunting tas~ of seeking information from the volumes of one or more local newspaper s.Local papers may have a continuous run of between 100 and 200 years and following the easing of certain fiscal burdens around 1860 may have become daily papers, particularly those in large cities. It is not impossible that this could amount to up to 500 volumes, many of which may have been transferred on to micro-film with all the technical problems that this implies for the researcher.

Furthermore these papers tended to grow in size up to 1900 or even 1939, and for much of the nineteenth century used a painfully small typeface. Most discouragingly they have no index. Unless the local historian has considerable energy and time available, usually between one and six hours per volume depending on the extent of his research, he must acquire closer chronological references from such general sources as books and pamphlets, or even grave­and foundation -stones . To save laborious searches it is necessary to know at least the year if one is searching a 'weekly' , or the month if the paper is a 'daily'. Generally speaking, the sheer mass of local newspapers is a deterrent to all but the most assiduous researchers.

Partly as a result of my personal encounters with these problems, and being susceptible to Professor W. G. Hoskin 's ' Special Tasks' in Local History in England (195 9), chapter XI, I looked often and longingly at the 151 bound volumes (1820-1970) of the Stirling Journal and Advertiser which had been rescued from pulping and placed in the University of Stirling Library by the penultimate (1925-68) owner, Mr Andrew B. Learmonth. It appeared to me that the compilation of a comprehensive index would be beyond the task of one person or even a team of part -time volunteers .

I took no action therefore until my return from a year in Canada in 1976, by which time the government 's Job Creation Programme had been instituted. As is well known this programme was designed to alleviate unemployment amongst young people by providing work on socially or environmentally useful projects , on a non-profit-making basis, which, through lack of finance, would otherwise never be carried out.

All applications for Job Creation financing had to be submitted to the Manpower Services Commission with deta iled costing and a statement of intent for scrutiny and approval by an Action Committee. The principal

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l

unknown factors were the most appropriate size of the indexing team, the length of time required and the most suitable systems to use. Initially we requested well-educated adults, ideally with degrees in History or Geography, for a period of six months. The MSC rejected the request for adults and offered financing only if school-leavers were employed. It proved impossible to persuade the MSC that such a task would probably call for a higher degree of local knowledge and skills than one could hope to find amongst average shool­leavers. The one concession offered was that, in addition to the four school­leavers, an unemployed graduate history teacher could be hired to act as supervisor of the project.

Whilst negotiations were in progress with the MSC a group of interested persons representing the Education and Planning Departments of the Central Region Council, the Museums' Association and the University of Stirling met to consider the establishment of a common indexing system for a proposed regional information bank. After several meetings this was achieved, though all concerned had to make compromises. One result was that some categories such as 'personal possessions' could reasonably be expected to contain few entries from newspapers. For several of the categories second- and even third­tier headings were constructed. Others such as Fishing, People and Religion were listed directly by names of waters and families and of Churches respectively. For Industries the Registrar General's Standard Industrial Classification was used. The twenty-six main headings chosen are listed below with 'Buildings' as an example of further sub-categorisation. The headings are more generalised than those suggested by Professor Hoskins, but should be of greater value to the local historians working upon a theme than an index of merely specific headings of the type found in the Times index or in the Glasgow Herald index, 1906-1968.

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Main headings

AGRICULTURE ASSOCIATIONS BUILDINGS COMMUNICATIONS CULTURE DOMESTIC MATTERS EDUCATION EVENTS FISHING FORESTRY HEALTH AND WELFARE INDUSTRIES LAW AND ORDER

LEISURE LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAPS AND PLANS MILITARY NATIONAL GOVERNMENT NATURAL HISTORY PEOPLE PERSONAL POSSESSIONS POLITICS POPULATION STATISTICS RELIGIONS TOPOGRAPHY TRANSPORT

An example of second- and third-tier headings from

BUILDINGS

AGRICULTURAL COMMERCIAL HOUSES

MILITARY

PUBLIC

RELIGIOUS

by farms. banks, hotels, offices, shops, warehouses . country houses, homesteads, hut circles, local authority, mansion houses, pre-historic ,settlement sites, tenemental houses, tied houses (by industry), town houses airfields, Antonine Wall, barracks, broch, castles, crannog, depots, defended homesteads, dockyards, dun, gun sites, hill forts, moated homesteads, mottes, Roman forts, tower houses. administration, bus stations, colleges, coµrts, fire stations, halls, hospitals, libraries, monuments, museums, police stations , post offices, prisons, railways stations, warehouses . burial places, cathedrals, churches, monasteries, nunneries, priories, standing stones.

Four school leavers and a graduate supervisor were recruited in February 1977 and were given a brief (too brief as it turned out) training by a University sub-librarian who specialises in indexing systems and myself. Each indexer was given a volume of newspapers and a pile of slips (10cm. x 7cm.) which were produced by cutting reams of plain A4 paper into eight on an electric guillotine. He was instructed to look carefully over each issue of the newspaper, select items of local importance and index under the systems shown above, adding the date of issue with the page and column number (for example, 1825 4/8 3c).

For the first few days the supervisor and I checked each issue of the Stirling Journal as it was indexed, but this could not be continued without slowing down the work drastically; four indexers could work collectively through the volumes at a much greater pace than we could check them. When indexers resigned, the training problem eased considerably because the supervisor could devote most of his time to single new appointees during their first two weeks or so, to ensure they learnt the job thoroughly. In the early stages the supervisor was also learning; random checks revealed some large omissions. After several weeks a further retraining programme was initiated, and the supervisor personally checked many volumes to ensure that all relevant entries had been filed.

For anyone attempting a similar exercise, the lesson from our experience is that, until those in charge are convinced beyond any doubt that indexers thoroughly understand what constitutes a relevant entry for a local index, the principal effort should go into training and the checking of all work, with no regard to the speed at which volumes are completed. Even at the later stages accuracy both in compiling index slips and in selecting relevant material must

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be repeatedly stressed. As a rule of thumb, we gave instructions that if an indexer was in doubt he should fill in a slip. An irrelevant slip can be destroyed, but entries, once missed, cannot be retrieved without many hours of extra work. However, the value and comprehensiveness of an index rests finally on the energy and integrity of the individual indexer. It is always possible to make random checks on his work, but it is impossible to check all his work without, in effect, indexing volumes twice. ·

This need for accuracy also means that prospective editors and supervisors should not put pressure upon indexers to reach certain target dates for completion of volumes, since it raises the possibility that these will be met simply by omitting entries. Additionally, the small nineteenth-century typeface imposes a strain upon the eyes. particularly towards the end of a day. Furthermore it was no surprise to find that as time went by the size of each issue, and therefore the volume of local news, increased. However , as the indexers became more skilful, volumes took no longer to complete. We found that, working thirty-five hours per week, a skilled indexer could complete a one-year volume in ten to twelve days, which suggests that indexing the 151 years of the Stirling Journal absorbed about 18,000 man-hours. Filing, checking and typing add many thousands more.

To assist the indexers in selecting relevant entries, certain broad guidelines were laid down. It was decided at an early stage, perhaps controversially, to ignore all advertisements, letters and, because the complexity of their arguments frequently masks the content, leader articles. Foreign and UK news, unless it involved local people, was also omitted on the grounds that this paper would not be considered a primary or even major secondary source for such themes by an historian.

The geographical definition of 'a local index' was established within a flexible radius of twenty-five to thirty miles from Stirling, which included Perth and South-west Perthshire, Kinross, Dunfermline and West Fife and the counties of Stirling and Clackmannan, but not Edinburgh or Glasgow . Such definitions will depend on local circumstances, and the more urbanised the district the smaller would probably be the area covered. However, in our case, the plethora of obscure place-names, particularly of estates, required frequent recourse to gazetteers and Ordnance Survey maps to make sure whether or not they fell within our boundaries.

Some newspaper articles covered more than one possible category . For example, the outbreak of an epidemic in a school could be placed under 'Health and Welfare' or 'Education' . Generally we asked the question 'what prompted this news item?'. Clearly the epidemic did, but if the event had serious repercussions upon the school it should be entered under Education also. Another example is whether one should place the Educational Institute of Scotland, the largest Teachers' Union, under 'Associations' or 'Education'. The former was chosen but a single cross-reference also appeared in the latter. A more frequent problem was the inadequacy of even a triple-heading system to provide sufficient information to a potential researcher. A good example is provided by the Sheriff's Courts which are a third-tier entry under 'Law and

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Order': 'Courts'. No room is available to itemise cases, unless it was a spectacular trial such as that involving State Prisoners for Treason in the early 1820s, nor has every reported petty theft or assault been included. As certain categories filled up and became more sophisticated, so they had to be further subdivided. Again 'Health and Welfare' provides a good example because the major developments in this field during the last 150 years are well known to historians. As a result new sub-categories have had to be created to cope.

The nature of this work demanded that we appoint young people with above-average qualifications, and over the first twelve months (the project was refunded in November 1977 for a further year) we tended to secure the services of young people waiting to go to University or further education. Within five months the first two supervisors had also left, but in each case a successor was appointed before he left. Since Job Creation made no provision for holiday or sick pay and because of the early departure of some indexers to their courses etc., the project began underspending considerably on wages. It therefore became possible to increase the size of the team to a maximum of nine at one stage. New regulations introduced in 1978 made it compulsory for sponsors to hire persons aged nineteen or over, but the original funding had been based on the wage-rates of sixteen - and seventeen-year olds. Thus by the late summer of 1978 the team was divided equally between 'older' and 'younger' groups , when the pay anomaly could be eased slightly with a ten per cent rise. The actual work of indexing and filing the 150 years was completed in the early autumn of 1979, approximately two and a half years after starting . The team was then reduced to one typist who began the long task of typing some 200 pages of entries for volume III.

During the indexing of volume I ( 1820-1869) two or three persons worked on the volumes compiling slips and another person filed the slips. For this purpose several steel filing boxes were acquired. Thus by the time 1869 had been reached it was necessary only to check and 'tidy up' the files before they were typed . Although it was originally intended to publish the index, the cost made it impossible to consider approaching a commercial printer. The index was therefore typed out on an IBM electric composer belonging to the University. Unfortunately it was an old machine which broke down frequently and considerably delayed the publication of volume I. With the prospect of even longer indexes to come, a request was sent to the Manpower Servies Commission for funds to hire our own composer at £168 per month! This was duly granted as there are provisions in Job Creation for the supply of materials not exceeding ten per cent of the total wages bill. In preparation for the typing we had hired replacement indexers with qualifications in Secretarial Studies as early as July 1977 and ensured that these girls were replaced when they resigned . When typed, each volume was duplicated in the University's own print room and bound in the bindery with a loan of£ 110 per volume from the publications fund. 150 copies of volume I were printed which, allowing for review and complimentary copies, were sold at £1.50 each. A reprint of 100 copies was soon necessary. Volume II which was twice the length of volume I was published in 1979, price £2.00. At present (April 1980) volume III (1920-

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1970) is about two-thirds typed. It is anticipated that this work will be completed and the volume published in autumn 1980.

All the work described has been carried out on the fourth floor of the University library. The Librarian cordoned off a corner although this did not stop some students' complaints about noise. Additionally two cubicles were provided for general storage and typing. Employees of the project became temporary members of the University's non-academic staff and are paid by the University which reclaims monies spent.

B. J. ELLI01T lectures in education at the University of Stirling, and has taught in Canada. Being also interested in local studies, he is editor of the Stirling Journal index and on the editorial board of the Forth naturalist and historian.

STOKE FERRY The Story of a Norfolk Village

by DORIS E. COATES

A fascinating account of the development of a West Norfolk Village from the time Neolithic Man camped on the edge of the fens to the 1920's.

This book tells of the roads, river and railway, the church and the inns, the markets and the fairs, the merchants and the farmers.

Above all, it captures the spirit of the community with stories of its inhabitants rich and poor over the generations.

160pp. inc. 28pp. half-tone illustrations and many line drawings, maps and inserts.

£4.95 + 45p postage and packing direct from the publishers.

THE HARPSDEN PRESS, Guyda Cottage, Harpsden Village, Henley­on-Thames, Oxfordshire. Tel. Henley (04912) 77263

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Town houses and society in Georgian country towns Part 2: Houses and society Adrian Henstock One important aspect of investigating the history of a Georgian town is to discover who built, owned and lived in the various private houses. In many cases it should be possible to compile a complete tenurial history of individual buildings throughout the late Georgian period, and sometimes earlier. The problems lie in the quality of available sources and the difficulty of linking people with properties, especially as house numbers and names were usually non-existent at that period. Using land tax assessments however, which usually survive in county record offices for smaller towns at least, it should be possible to 'repopulate' the houses with . the families who lived in them for a fifty-year period from 1780 onwards. This technique has been developed for use with nineteenth-century censuses, and was originally applied to land tax records by David Iredale in his work on a Cheshire village.' To the present author's knowledge, the Ashbourne project is the first to apply the extended method to an eighteenth-centur y urban community . The basic sources for such a project are as follows:

(a) the annual land tax assessments for the township or parish, which name the owners and occupiers of each property and the assessment. They should survive from 1780 to 1832 but occasionally may exist both earlier and later. They are normally arranged in topographical order street-by-street (although the street names are often omitted) but may change part-way through the series to an alphabetical arrangement by property owners. They rarely include descriptions of the property.

(b) the tithe apportionment, usually of the 1830s or '40s, which names the owners and occupiers of each unit of property in the town, identified on the accompanying large-scale plan. Unfortunately not all towns will have tithe awards, and not all of them will contain sufficient detail.

(c) any surveys, valuations or rate books listing all properties in the town compiled for parish or estate administration in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth centuries. For Ashbourne a valuation for church rates exists for 1825 (unfortunately lacking its map), naming the

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owner and occupier of each property together with a brief description of the premises and details of its rateable value (which helps to provide an idea of the size or 'quality' of the property), arranged in topographical order street-by-street. A series of lease registers of large private or corporate landowners, or of manorial court-rolls of copyhold estates, may also be of value.

Using the techniques of 'house repopulation' it is possible to trace the names of the owners and occupiers of each property through the annual tax assessments from 17 80 to 183 2, and then to identify some of them on the later tithe apportionment and plan, which will fix the location of the property. The problem of pridging the gap from 1832 to the date of the tithe records can be met by using any other sources which may exist, or the occasional land tax returns which survive after 183 2.

In Ashbourne the results of 'repopulation' were reasonably successful. Positive identifications of the larger houses along the main streets were achieved in nearly all cases, but problems arose with the smaller properties in yards and alleys in and around the Market Place. Because the assessments changed to alphabetical order in 1815 it was more difficult to trace changes after that date, but this was achieved by using the constant factor of the assessment and working by a process of elimination if necessary. Every year's assessment was consulted as it was important to know the exact year at which changes took place . Two problems of using the assessments were (a) that the rate of assessment changed in 1799 and in 1806, although the properties were still assessed in the same proportion to each other, and (b) that after 1798 some owners compounded for their future tax by paying a lump sum, and thereafter the assessments are divided into two columns for those 'exonerated' and 'not exonerated'. Fortunately the names of those exonerated are still recorded, although elsewhere it is known for them to disappear from the records altogether. The details of each property on the assessments are best copied onto separate record-sheets, which need to be large enough to accommodate each annual entry.

Other sources are useful both in helping to identify properties and in providing supplementary information:

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(a) Title deeds dating back to the eighteenth century may survive for many properties, but apart from a few in local record repositories the majority will be in private hands, often deposited in banks or building societies. For obvious reasons these are not easily available, but where they can be found they may supply essential details of changes in ownership and also shed light on family relationships, mortgages and financial settlements. They also provided descriptions of properties, although these are often very summary and imprecise, and occasionally evidence of rebuilding. The two following sources partially compensate for the absence of deeds.

(b) Wills and inventories Copies of wills are often found amongst documents of title but the m_ain series of probate records for the

period will be at the appropriate record office. For example, for Ashbourne there are some 200 wills between 17 50 and 1815 at the Lichfield Diocesan Record Office. As they provide details of the disposal of property at death they cover one of the two principal reasons for change of ownership. Probate inventories listing rooms and contents are of major importance but unfortunately they rarely survive for the period after c 1750 and it is thus difficult to link them with actual properties.

(c) Newspaper advertisements The volumes of major eighteenth ­century county newspapers, such as the Derby Mercury which exists from 1732 onwards, provide a probably comprehensive coverage of all property sales in local towns; used together with wills these should cover most changes of property ownership. The advertisements usually include reasonably informative descriptions of the property, recording its function and sometimes referring to rebuilding. Some provide details of the numbers of rooms on each floor, and, exceptionally, even the dimensions of rooms. The chief problem is that the locations are often vague and the owner's name rarely given, but used in conjunction with the land tax and related records it is often possible to fix the locations precisely.

(d) Topographical views These are found as printed engravings in contemporary topographical works, or as original sketches and paintings in museums and private hands. There exist in the Nottingham Castle Museum, for example, two general views of the town executed by Thomas Sandby in 1742, with the buildings shown in faithf~I detail and a key naming the owners of prominent town houses. For Ashbourne two engravings were included in printed works dated 1793 and 1817 respectively; both are again distant general views, but they depict some of the larger residences in recognisable detail. A useful general guide to possible sources is published by the Council for British Archaeology. 2 Victorian and Edwardian photographs can also help to show the former appearance of houses before the insertion of shop-fronts or other modern alterations.

When repopulation has been completed, a variety of general conclusions can be drawn about both the buildings and the local society which inhabited them. In Ashbourne it appears that most of the town houses were built by wealthy professional people and tradesmen such as attornies, mercers, cheesefactors, ironmongers, tanners and maltsters, as well as by some of the gentry and clergy. Despite the elegance of the town houses it was usual for tradesmen to have their workshops or warehouses behind or adjacent to their residences, including even malthouses and tanneries . It is often said that, because of the difficulties of travel to London, members of the Georgian provincial gentry maintained town houses in their local country towns as homes for the local 'season'. However, in the east midlands this does not seem

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to have been the case. Certainly some of the smaller gentry and the rising tradesmen owned both country and town houses, but the country houses were often small and old-fashioned, and the town house was the main residence. Also many town houses were occupied by the daughters or younger sons of such families. The Dukes of Newcastle and of Devonshire may have each kept up a house in the county towns of Nottingham and Derby respectively, but when the other local aristocracy and major gentry visited the towns from their country seats they seem to have stayed with friends or relations. Whether this situation also applied to other parts of the country , especially the regions remote from London, is a matter which local historians could well investigate. One common characteristic of many town houses, however, appears to have been that their tenants were frequently changing. Owners frequently vacated them for various reasons and they were let for short periods to respectable families from elsewhere, who stayed for a few years and then departed .

• • • The study of buildings provides an excellent basis for more generally

investigating the life and society of a Georgian town. For this a variety of sources can be used, some more obvious then others:

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(a) Newspaper reports and advertisements Although local reporting in eighteenth-century newspapers is minimal, reports and advertisements over a long period can convey an idea of the flavour and attitudes of Georgian life which can be gleaned from few other records. A lively picture may emerge of the social calendar with its assemblies and plays, of commercial life with details of partnership, bankruptcies, and turnpike trust meetings, and of many other aspects such as crimes and punishments, private schools, pubs, sports and amusements, public celebrations and so on.

(b) Directories These are rare for the eighteenth century but notable exceptions include the Universal British Directory of 1792-5 which is an invaluable list of the gentry, clergy, professional and tradespeople in many towns.

(c) Registers of duty paid on hair powder, 1796-8 Under an Act of 1795 all persons using hair powder (that is, wearing wigs) were required to purchase a permit or certificate, and county-wide registers of such certificates for 1 796-8 exist in many county record offices. They provide a useful directory of the persons of 'quality' (including women) in the towns, and usually record their street of residence. Where applicable the names of butlers and other upper servants are also given.

(d) Literary sources These are rarely-used sources of local historical information, which might be totally non-existent for some towns but fairly rich for others. The Ashbourne district, for example, was fortunately popular amongst the local intelligentsia and dilettante

gentry in the late-eighteenth century, and attracted such figures as Samuel Johnson, Erasmus Darwin, David Garrick, Tom Moore and J. J . Rousseau as visitors or short-term residents. The area therefore features briefly in the diaries and letters of these figures, now mostly published. Of exceptional importance is the journal of Johnson's companion James Boswell, which contains a substantial section on Ashbourne in the 1 770s, including invaluable character studies of some of the leading citizens. The town also features in such diverse publications as the satirical novel about an itinerant nonconformist preacher entitled The Spiritual Quixote (1773) by Richard Graves, the poetry of Sir Brooke Boothby, and Erasmus Darwin's Planfor the Conduct of Female Education of 1797. The development of the Peak District as a fashionable tourist resort also produced a spate of guide books at this period, many of which mention Ashbourne. John Aikin's Description of the country 50 miles around Manchester (1795), for example, includes both an account and an engraved view of Ashbourne.

Diaries of other visitors include the Torrington Diaries recording in often amusing detail visits to the town by the Hon. John Byng. For example one night in 1789 he found the yard of his inn, the Blackmoor's Head, 'crowded with chaises full of company, going to a grand dinner in this town', and observed cynically 'there to be overwhelmed by dress, compliments, hams and fowls, ducks, custards and trifles, losing their time, their peace and not improving their politeness.' Another writer similarly remarked about Ashbourne society at this period that 'card playing and squabbles about precedency occupied most of the time of the great and little gentry.' A Victorian lady's reminiscences about her youth spent in Ashbourne in cl 815 include the information that 'Ashbourne was .. . a small town inhabited by a society of very social habits and mostly small means ... There were constant ... dances by night, some in rooms so small that none but willing feet could have stood up at all . . . the same the next week, each house in its turn where possible.' 3

This type of general information is perhaps best organised by a card-index of persons and subjects, containing in each case a brief summary of the source with date and reference. Suggested subjects are Buildings, Trade and Industry, Transport , Church and Chapel, Social Life, Sports and Pastimes, Law and Order, Friendly Societies and Poor Law, Public Houses, Agriculture and Markets , Education and Charities, Public Affairs, Health and Medicine, and, inevitably, Miscellaneous. It may be possible, from press announcements, to identify the fashionable period of a town's history by counting the number of annual assemblies over the years, or the main period of commercial prosperity by quantifying the annual income from toll-gates on the turnpike roads through the town. It should be possible to plot the beginnings of industrial expansion, which at Ashbourne for example took the form of small brass and iron foundries, clockmaking workshops and three neighbouring water-powered

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cotton-spinning mills emulating Arkwright's pioneering venture at nearby Cromford. The residence survives in Ashbourne of Anthony Bradley, a wealthy mercer who was the principal financial partner in one of these cotton mills, but the long saga of his subsequent bankruptcy is well charted in the pages of the press. Another fine Ashbourne town house was the residence of Francis Beresford, member of a local landowning family who practised as an attorney, was clerk to most of the turnpike trusts, and who used his fortune to help launch the famous Butterley ironworks some twenty miles away on

. Derbyshire's eastern coalfield. In this manner it is possible to see the 'industrial revolution' at grass-roots level and to see how some of the elegant Georgian town houses were built with industrial wealth. 4

/ .l ,,,I J

- I

If

Plate I:' A Promenade to a Rout on a Fair Evening' One of a series of caricatures of Nottingham society by George Woodward published in his Eccentric Excursions ... of 1797 (engraved by Cruikshank the elder). Routs were parties held in private town houses.

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REFERENCES

For the techniques of house repopulation in relation to mid 19th-centur y censuses, see A. Hens tock , ' House Repopulation from the Census Returns of I 841 and 185.1 ' , L ocal Population Studi es, IO (1973) and D. R. Mills, 'The Technique of House Repopulation: experience from a Cambridgeshire Village, 1841', The Local Historian , 13/ 2 (1978) . For the technique in relation to the land tax, see D . Iredale, Discovering Your Old House, ( 1977), a revision of the same author's This Old House (I 968).

2 M . W . Barley , Guide to British Topographical Collections (1974) . 3 C. M. Andrews , ed., The Torrington Diaries (1936) ; dairy of Mark Noble quoted in

A. Henstock, Ashbourne: the Historical Setting (I 971); E. Mosley , 'A part of my life for those who care to read it' (1879), unpublished ms.; another diary which conveys a good picture of the social round in a larger Georgian town is A. Henstock, ed., The Diary of Abigail Gawthern of Nottingham, 1751-1810, Thornton Society Record Series, 3 3 (1980).

4 For the role of local families in providing capital for East Midland industries, see J. D. Chambers , The Vale of Trent, 1670-1800, Economic History Review Supplement No. 3 (n.d.) and S. D. Chapman, The Early Factory Masters (1967).

NOTE: The study of Georgian Ashbourne is being undertaken by the following members of the Ashbourne Local History Group: Mr and Mrs R. Bartlett , Mr and Mrs J. Brooks , Mr K. Dadge, Mr and Mrs P. Fletcher, Miss F. Gadsby, Mr H. Inch, Mrs J. Lane, Mr J. Mogg, Mr J. Parker, Mrs M . Winstone , Mrs D. Wheatcroft, Mr and Mrs A. Yarker.

ADRIA N HENSTOCK is the county archivist of Nottinghamshire . He has been tutor to a long-established adult class at Ashbourne in Derbyshire, where he developed the technique of 'house repopulation '.

COPIES OF THE JOURNAL AVAILABLE FROM

A. M . Berrett, 71 Trafalgar Road, Moseley, Birmingham BJJ BBL: Vol. 1, Nos. 1 to 12 (except No. 3); Vol. 2, Nos . 1 to 11 (except No. 5); Vol. 3, Nos. 2, 3 and 4.

G. T. Jones, 6 Ponc-Y-Fron, Llangefni, Anglesey , Gwynedd: Vol. 6, Nos. 2 to 7 (inc.); Vol. 7, Nos. 1 to 5 (inc.), 7 and 8; Vol. 8, Nos. 1, 2, 3, 5, 7 and 8; Vol. 9, Nos . 1 to 8 (inc.); Vol. 10, Nos. 1 to 8 (inc.); Vol. 11, Nos. 1 to 8 (inc.); Vol. 12, Nos . 1, 2 and 3/ 4 (combined). All in very good

condition ; 50p each , plus 15p post and package, or £ 15 plus post and package for all issues (including Indices to Vol. 4, 6 and 8 to 11 inc.).

Mrs H. Panter, 8 Lady Jane Court, Cavendish A venue, Cambridge CBI 4 UW: Vol. 1 complete ; Vol. 2, missing No . 8; Vol. 3 complete; Vol. 4 missing No. 5; Vols. 5, 6 and 7 complete; Vol. 8, Nos. 1 to 6 (inc.). Duplicate s, Vol. 4, Nos. 6, 7, 8; Vol. 5, No . l ; Vol. 6, No. 3.

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The mapping of unconsidered trifles: a Yorkshire example Melvyn Jones

" .. . there are no sources for a systematic study of transport and communications in the local community before the nineteenth century. Rather it is a piecing together of scattered fragments and drawing deductions from casual references."

Alan Rogers (1977) 1

For the local historian the practical difficulty of assembling reliable data is a serious one, and he must often rely on scraps of evidence preserved by chance. This article is concerned with the cartographic analysis of two interesting fragments of business history - list of accumulated debts for the sale of coal from two South Yorkshire collieries during a twenty-six year period in the second half of the eighteenth century . The two collieries, though lying close to each other and under the same ownership, did not enjoy the same access to navigable water, and so the debt lists can help us to reconstruct where each colliery sold its coal in the period immediately prior to the widespread construction of canals. In addition , they suggest a close trading relationship between a South Yorkshire estate and its source of agricultural lime.

A secondary aim is to show the usefulness of mapping with quantitative symbols in local historical analysis . Specifically three claims are made for maps of this kind: they add precision to verbal description, they facilitate the making of comparisons between distributions, and they draw attention to characteristics less likely to be noticed by merely scrutinising and summarising lists of data. A large body of local historical work is concerned with what are essentially spatial problems, for example patterns of land ownership, field patterns, land use and social structure, in which cartographic analysis and display may at least draw attention to relationships, even if they do not necessarily explain them.

Much has already been written about the Rockingham/Fitzwilliam estate in South Yorkshire in which the two collieries were located .2 This article is not only derived from a study of the workings of that estate, but from an investigation of transport development in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in a number of coal mining communities in South Yorkshire. The case for local historians to work in the area where local history and transport history meet was convincingly put in the pages of this journal as long ago as 1966.3

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The two collieries Elsecar colliery was located just inside the limits of Hoyland township;

Low Wood colliery was just outside the Hoyland boundary in Wentworth and Brampton Bierlow townships, midway between Barnsley and Rotherham. Both collieries worked the Barnsley seam, which was almost three metres thick in this area, near its outcrop. The first documentary evidence of Low Wood is dated 1723; Elsecar was first mentioned in 1750.4 Both collieries were the property of the 2nd Marquis of Rockingham for all but the last six years of the period under investigation (1762-88); in 1782 on the death of the Marquis, his nephew, the 4th Earl Fitzwilliam inherited them. Prior to 1752 both collieries were leased from the Marquis, but in that year Elsecar colliery came under the Marquis' direct control and in 1763, on the death of the lessee, the Marquis took control of the working of Low Wood. 5

z 5 -150----......_

--.!i- 2 -• 6 X

3 ([[[JJJ]lb 7 y .• .. . . . .. ... , . ...

4 .. . ..... 8 .. ... . . .. .. . .. .

Fig. 1 The locations of Elsecar and Low Wood collieries. I - contours at 25 feet intervals. 2 - outcrop of Barnsley seam. 3 - Basset level of Elsecar col­liery, 1757. 4 - deep level of Elsecar colliery, 1757. 5 - deep level of Low Wood colliery, cl 790. 6 - generalised land routes for coal. 7 - settlements. 8- Wentworth Woodhouse and its park (the

country house of the 2nd Marquis of Rockingham).

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A local surveyor's map of 17576 shows that Elsecar colliery consisted of two underground roadways (called levels) roughly paralleling the outcrop of the Barnsley seam; one roadway (called the Basset level)7 followed a zig-zag path, because of minor faulting, about 100 metres north of the outcrop, and the other one lay at a greater depth about 150-200 metres further north , down the dip of the seam (Fig. I). Along the line of the Basset level in 1757 were eight pits - three air pits, two open pits, a closed pit, a working pit and a sinking pit. The pits were no more than fifteen metres deep. 8 Low Wood colliery was designed to work the Barnsley seam in a similar way on the other side of the Harley Dike valley. A field-map of 17909 shows a deep roadway running from the valley floor in a south-easterly direction, parallel to the coal outcrop (Fig . I).

Compared with some other collieries in West and South Yorkshire with the advantages of adjacent navigable water or nearby urban markets, production at Elsecar and Low Wood was small. In 1769 near the beginning of the period under discussion, the production at Low Wood was 5,301 'dozens' and three 'pulls' . In the same year the production at Elsecar was 1,683 'dozens'. A dozen was the volume of coal obtained by multiplying one square yard of coal by the height of the seam. In the Barnsley seam at Elsecar and Low Wood a dozen would be 3 feet by 3 feet by 9 feet = 81 cubic feet. It has been calculated that a dozen was the equivalent of about 42-45 cwt. 10 There were 12 pulls to a dozen. Production at the two collieries was uneven. In 1769 Elsecar produced almost double its figure for 1770. At Low Wood production in 1768 was more than 1000 dozens lower than the 1769 output. The variations in output seem, at least in part, to be related to the amount of stockpiling. There was a lay-off of eight weeks at Elsecar in 1753 because the pithead was overstacked with coal, 11 and another of twenty weeks in 1770.12

The surviving fortnightly accounts of the two collieries give details of employment. 13 In the fortnight from 1-15 July 1769, nine men were employed at Elsecar. Five men worked below ground - three men getting coal, one filling and one harrowing - and four men worked on the surface, one landing coal, one working the gin, one stacking and one selling coal. Ten years later employment at Elsecar was much the same - four colliers below ground and four labourers on the surface. At Low Wood in January, 1772, seven miners and two gin boys were employed. The debt lists and the areas covered by coal sales

The coal from the two collieries was used on the Rockingham/Fitzwilliam estate and in the surrounding area. The Elsecar yearly summary for 1771, for example, shows that most of the production was 'sold to the country', the remainder going to Wentworth House and Gardens (the country house of the Rockingham/Fitzwilliams), to a lime kiln and to the malthouse.

Detailed, regular records of coal sales, naming the customer and his town, parish or village do not exist, but an indiction of the extent of the market area for the Elsecar and Low Wood coals is given in two lists which show outstanding debts for coal during the period 1763-1788 (Elsecar) and 1762-1788 (Low Wood). 14 Thirty -two places are mentioned in the Elsecar list out of

158

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t t

t

t

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t

/·· ..

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,.··· t .:::::::::.•

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\ . ( ... ~ ........ .....

>·····<'.NCOLNSHIRE

( ... ··· ....... .:-······

........ ···::_:

t

t

( .... ,.. \ t / t ~laces ment.ioned :. :_ 1n the debt r,sts Low

: •.. ... · Elsecar 0,.-Wood . .. NOTTINGHAM SHIRE coals coals

... ·.;° ~~~e 10 times

1 --- 5 N ()

t 6-10 2• 2 D 6 tim es

~ 3 ........ 7 () 3.-5 ti mes

..--4 0 5 () 1-2 ~_rn t imes

,.

Fig. 2 Places mentioned in the two debt lists, );:lsecar 1763-88, Low Wood 1762-88.

I - Elsecar colliery. 2 - Low Wood colliery. 3 - outcrop of magnesian limestone (beginning of concealed coalfield). 4 - navigable River Don (Dun Nav igation) . 5 - generalised land routes for coal. 6 - towns. 7 - Country boundarie s.

137 individual entries . The total debts over the twenty year period were £88-5-8, and ranged from £4-19-9 to 1/-. Twenty of the debtors were dead. Sixty-one places are mentioned in the Low Wood list out of 116 individual entries. The total debts amounted to £100-6-4½ and ranged from £8-5-0 to 7½d. Fifty of the debts were for 5/- or less. Fifteen of the debtors were dead.

All the places mentioned in the debt lists have been mapped using quantitative symbols (Fig. 2). Each symbol indicates the whereabouts of a debtor and the size of the symbol indicates the number of times the place is mentioned in the lists. By using a divided circle symbol, with the left-hand side showing Elsecar debts and the right-hand side Low Wood debts, the sale debts for both collieries are shown on one map.

There were no debts for Elsecar or Low Wood to the north , west or south of the Rockingham/Fitzwilliam estate in the Tankersley-Hoyland-Wentworth area . To the north and south were other collieries working the seams of the Middle Coal Measures at their outcrop. To the north they were meeting local demands in the Barnsley area, and to the south meeting the demands of industrial and domestic users in the Sheffield-Rotherham district. To the west the Silkstone seam and some of the Lower Coal Measure seams were exploited on a small scale over a wide area, including pits leased by the Marquis of Rockingham at Westwood in Tankersley parish, five kilometres south-west of Elsecar colliery. There were, therefore, no open markets to the north,west or south.

The open markets lay north-eastwards: in the far eastern part of the exposed coalfield which, with one or two notable exceptions, would not see mining for almost a century; on the magnesian limestone plateau and claylands of the concealed coalfield which would not see mining for more than 125 years; and in the marshy, only partially reclaimed areas along the lower Don and Trent. Here the markets were non-industrial and all the local suppliers shared the same disadvantage - distance. The 2nd Marquis of Rockingham and later the 4th Earl Fitzwilliam had another reason, besides coal sales, for establishing links with the areas to the east and north-east of their South Yorkshire estate -the need to obtain a regular supply of limestone. The limestone was burnt in lime kilns15 and the burnt lime was used extensively on agricultural land within the estate. It counteracted the acidity of the coal measure soils and allowed manure to have a full effect, although it is probable that early irnprovers such as the 2nd Marquis of Rockingham viewed burnt lime as a plant food in itself. 16

If we look more closely at the destinations of the coals from the two collieries as shown in the debt lists (Fig. 2) it is clear that Elsecar coal found a much more local sale - of the 137 individual debts, 66 were in Hoyland township and 28 in the neighbouring township of Wentworth - all within a few kilometres of the colliery stack. Low Wood coal, on the other hand, was sold predominantly in the rural areas to the east reached in part by navigable waterways. The importance of limestone is reflected by the fact that, apart from the immediate locality of the two collieries, it was only along the limestone escarpment, according to the debt lists, that the two market areas overlapped to a noticeable extent.

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Coal for more distant markets was moved from the two collieries along two distinct routes. One route lay north-eastwards in the direction of the Dearne valley and beyond towards the magnesian limestone escarpment. The River Dearne was crossed at what was known in the eighteenth century as Marl Bridge17 (Marie's Bridge today) about five kilometres to the north-east of the two collieries. The generalised route is shown in Figs. 1 and 2. A second route, and one predominantly used for moving Low Wood coal, lay to the east. This consisted of a cart road eight kilometres long to the Marquis' wharf at Kilnhurst on the Dun Navigation. 18 From Kilnhurst the canalised river gave access southwards to the industrial markets of Rotherham and Sheffield where there was fierce competition, and northwards to the low-lying areas along the lower Don and Trent. Overland carting from riverside wharves to outlying villages must have followed. The debt lists show that Low Wood coals were sold thirty-two kilometres away in the lower Don in South Yorkshire, thirty­two kilometres away in North Nottinghamshire and forty kilometres away in the Isle of Axholme in North Lincolnshire (Fig. 2).

The coal trade with the rural lowlands of the east and north-east, although in existence earlier, seems to have come into its own in the 1 770s. On 9 July 1771, William Martin, an estate steward, wrote to the 2nd Marquis of Rockingham:

"The Law Wood yet seems to be the favourite Colliery with the Low Country people. The Principle (sic) part of the sale this year having come that way, and not over Marl Bridge as for some time - I have taken of (sic) the colliers from Elsecar and put them into Law Wood in order to raise as much coals there as possible and keep the sale while the season lasts which may be also an inducement to them to come another year."19

It is clear from this letter that one reason for the large sale of Low Wood coal, as opposed to Elsecar coal, in the 'low country' was the stated preference of customers. Two other contributory factors were distance from the canal and the state of local roads. The Elsecar workings were gradually moving westwards away from the Dun Navigation; the Low Wood workings, on the other hand, were moving eastwards towards the waterway. Besides this the carters moving Elsecar coals to the canal had to contend with a short but steep slope out of the Harley valley (see Fig. 1) which must have been a hard pull in dry weather and hazardous when wet. In May 1753, Thomas Smith, one of the tenants at Elsecar had written to the Marquis on this very point:

" ... we Expect no Extraordinary Sale till most of the Law Wood Coals be gone for they are very Busy Every day and their Roads both Level and Better repaired than some of our Roads are."20 ·

Summary and conclusions The debt lists upon which this analysis is based contain only a sample of

the markets reached, and they may constitute a biased sample at that. Bowever, there is no reason to believe that folk living in certain parts of South Yorkshire, North Nottinghamshire and North Lincolnshire in the second half of the eighteenth century were more likely to incur bad debts than people living in other areas; to that extent the sample may be fairly representative. The lists

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also cover long periods. The fact that the volume of sales for both collieries, as reflected in the debt lists, falls off with distance is also reassuring.

The information mapped in Fig. 2 fills in one piece of a jigsaw but the full picture may never emerge. The map at least draws attention to the effect of variable transport, over a relatively short distance , on coal sales, and to the importance of considering trade links between districts. The trade with the villages of the magnesian limestone escarpment appears to have been as much to do with the carrying of limestone as with the carrying of coal.

Finally, a surviving record from the period under discussion, not in the debt lists, shows a market for Low Wood coal which was a forerunner of the long-distance markets secured for South Yorkshire coals in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In October, 1765, William Martin wrote to the Marquis:

" I have engaged a Sloop to take in about 40 Dozn. of Low Wood Coals for your Lordships use in Town - The Vessel is now lying at Thorne and the Coals are getting down to Kilnhurst ... "21

The Marquis' town house in London was in Grosvenor Square. This unusual commission was due tci the shortage of coal in London because of a strike in the North-east coalfield in August and September of that year.

REFERENCES

1 Alan Rogers , Approaches to local history (2nd edition), Longman, 1977, pp. 117-118.

2 See for example A. K. Clayton, The story of the Elsecar and Milton ironworks from their opening to the year 1848, 1955 (typescript in Sheffield City Libraries); A. K. Clayton, The Elsecar collieries under Joshua and Ben Biram, 1964 (typescript in Sheffield City Libraries); Graham Mee, Aristocratic enterprise, Blackie, 1975; Paul Nunn, 'Aristocratic estates and employment in South Yorkshire , 1700-1800' in Essays in the economic and social history of South Yorkshire, South Yorkshire County Council , 1976; Sidney Pollard, The genesis of modern management, Harmondsworth, 1968.

3 B. F. Duckham , 'Transport and the local historian: some suggestions for further work ', The Amateur Historian, Vol. 7, No. 3, 1966, pp. 84-87.

4 A. K. Clayton, 'Coal mining at Hoyland' Trans. Hunter Arch. Soc., Vol. 9 pt.2, 1966, pp. 77 and 82.

5 G . G. Hopkinson, 'The development of the South Yorkshire and North Derbyshire coalfield, 1500-1775', Trans. Hunter Arch. Soc., Vol. 7, 1951-7, p. 312.

6 Field map by William Fairbank, Fairbank Collection (FB)l2, pp. 58-63 . 7 Basset is an old mining term for outcrop. 8 A new pit sunk at Elsecar in December 1752 was 15 yards deep. Wentworth

Woodhouse Muniments (WWM) F95. 9 FB, 68.

10 A. K. Clayton, A study of parliamentary enclosure in Hoyland, (typescript, Sheffield City Libraries), p. 171.

11 WWM, F95. 12 WWM , F99(a). 13 WWM, F98, F99.

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14 'An Account of the Arrears on the Outstanding Debs [sic] of the Elsecar Colliery for 25 years commencing 1763 and ending 1788 after every Endeavour that can be made to get them in.' And a similar list for Low Wood Colliery 1762-1788 . WWM, FlOO.

15 There were four lime kilns within the Rockingham /Fitzwilliam estate in the second half of the eighteenth century.

16 A contemporary account of the husbandry of the 2nd Marquis of Rockingham and his tenants is given in Arthur Young's, A six months ' tour through the North of England, Vol. 1, Letter V, pp. 278-353 .

17 Marie's Bridge was first recorded as Marlebrygge in 1516 according to A.H . Smith in The place-names of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Pt. 1, p. 104, CUP, 196 I. The name suggests that even in the early sixteenth century it was on an established limestone carrying route.

18 The Marquis' wharf is shown on a field map in FB, 12, pp. 56-57. The Dun (Don) Navigation was improved as far as Tinsley near Sheffield in 1751.

19 WWM, R188 . 20 WWM, F95 . 21 WWM, Rl86.

Acknowledgements are due to Earl Fitzwilliam, Earl Fitzwilliam's Wentworth Estates Company and the City Librarian, Sheffield City Libraries for permission to use and quote from the Wentworth Woodhouse Muniments.

MELVYN JONES teaches geography and environmental studies at Sheffield City Polytechnic. His main research interest is the structure of industrialising communities in south Yorkshire. He has recently published (with W. F. Hornby) An introduction to population geography (CUP).

163

Gravestones and local history: problems of interpretation Christopher Husbands

Fran Stewart's report on her graveyard survey in Middleton Stoney 1 is to be welcomed: too often, the local historian is apt to forget the valuable contribution which a study of grave memorials might make to the subject. Furthermore, at a time when energetic clergymen are attempting to 'tidy' their graveyards by removing some of the older, untended grave memorials, such surveys should be actively encouraged, before we lose an important record of social history. However, graveyard surveys pose certain difficulties, and Mrs Stewart goes too far in many of her conclusions. Whilst her article includes some interesting ideas, the evidence she adduces will often not bear the interpretation she puts upon it.

Basic to Mrs Stewart's conclusions is the unspoken assumption that a study of gravestones can tell us something about the community as a whole, with regard to life expectancy, the distribution of names and the stability of the community. However, as she herself almost comes to admit, this is manifestly not the case. The chief difficulty, for Middleton Stoney as for many other graveyards, is the paucity of evidence . When one looks beyond Mrs Stewart's results, one finds that they are based on a study of 272 memorials covering a period of 279 years; that is, on average, something less than one memorial per year. Yet the population of Middleton Stoney in 180 I was 309, and, although it fell in the mid-nineteenth century, it was 324 in 1901, and by 1951 had reached 477.2 Thus, in purely numerical terms, the gravestones can represent only a small proportion of those who died in the village in the years between 1690 and 1969. The omissions may be significant.

From the assumption that the gravestones are numerically sufficient to use as a guide to the inhabitants of Middleton Stoney, flows the connected assumption that they are sociologically representative. Mrs Stewart observes that:

'A fairly high proportion of the professional classes, forty--0ne per cent, and the tradesmen , forty-one per cent, were commemorated in this way, but, as might be expected, only a small percentage (twelve per cent) of the servants or labourers.' 3

It might be noted in passing that this result is based on the 1851 census returns. Only eighteen memorials survive from the decade 1850-1859, which rather detrac'ts from the percentage figures. However, having noted the predominance of the middle-classes amongst those commemorated, Mrs Stewart does not

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consider the ramifications of this for her 'average ages at death'. The middle­classes predominate because they could afford grave memorials. In the same way, they would have had access to medical facilities and to hygiene denied to their social subordinates. This would imply that the life expectancy suggested by Mrs Stewart is too high if applied to the community at large. Certainly, an 'average age at death' of fifty or sixty for the mid-nineteenth century, even excluding child mortality, seems much too high.4

Mrs Stewart's statement about using the gravestones in conjunction with parish registers is also misleading, as it neglects severe handicaps in both sources. Parish registers are not faultless: gaps, errors and so on indicate that they are of very variable quality, and have to be used with caution. Furthermore, neither grave memorials nor parish registers record deaths; rather they are records of burials, and the distinction is significant. In this sense, parish registers are likely to be better records than gravestones since they include paupers . Even so, registers and gravestones will only include the burials of Anglican members of the community. Nonconformists, both dissenters and Catholics, will not be mentioned. The consequences of this exclusion cannot be assessed until the extent of religious dissent in an area has been investigated, and, without a guide to its prevalence in Middleton Stoney, Mrs Stewart's work cannot be judged. However, the extent of nonconformity might affect her lists of the ten 'most popular Christian names'. Whilst it might be defensible to assume that Christian names cross socio-economic boundaries, there might be important variations amongst different religious denominations. Furthermore, it may be that there was a correlation between social class and religion. These interesting questions cannot be answered by graveyard surveys alone, but the fact that they occur at all throws doubt on the conclusions reached by Mrs Stewart on the related questions of social class and age expectancy .

The consequences of the assumption that a graveyard survey presents a representative cross-section of a community run through other of Mrs Stewart's conclusions. She is, for example, apt to generalize about the incidence of death. Thus, she suggests that 'there were, consistently, more deaths in the winter half-year than in the summer half-year'. 5 This statement raises many problems. First of all, there are just not enough examples to talk about a 'consistent' pattern. Secondly, the term 'winter half-year' is not defined, and it is probably too general to be analytically useful. Whilst it might be true that mortality was higher in the winter months, this is not a legitimate inference when, for the first hundred years for which there are extant memorials, we have a total of only forty-four stones, and never more than eight in any one decade! The term 'winter half-year' conceals more significant patterns. In pre-industrial society, mortality tended to be highest in the spring, when the previous year's harvest was almost exhausted. Again, it is unlikely that gravestones can give information about those social groups which would have suffered most from spring famines, after having been weakened by winter weather. These seasonal variations are probably more useful than long-term averages for life­expectancy though, on such a small sample, Mrs Stewart was wise not to look

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for seasonal differences. At the same time, the presence of variables like harvest fluctuations and social differences render statements about .' an improvement in the general health of the inhabitants' 6 meaningless. It is back to the old problem of a small, unrepresentative sample.

There is one other major methodological difficulty in Mrs Stewart's article. This arises from her suggestion that the earliest and latest gravestones for a particular family give us the beginning and end of the family's residence in the village. Such a suggestion may well be true in some cases, but it ignores too many other factors . There is, for example, the problem of short-term migration, often local, which was extremely common in pre-industrial England. 7 It assumes, furthermore, that the dates on the gravestones are accurate; it assumes that all members of a family are commemorated. This is dubious. A socially rising family might suddenly discover that it could erect a memorial to a relation who died one, two or ten years earlier. In this case, the date on the grave might not be precise, and members of the family who died before the family became affluent would not be commemorated . Conversely, a socially declining family might decide that it cannot afford to continue to commemorate the dead, while still remaining in the village. Whatever is the case, we cannot assume that the gravestones are a conclusive piece of evidence.

Mrs Stewart's article has served as a starting point for a general discussion of the problems facing those who seek to apply the evidence of grave inscriptions to local communities. Certain severe handicaps in interpreting gravestones cannot be ignored:

(1) English villages were never tightly-knit, homogeneous social units. For social and religious reasons, only a small minority of the total number of deaths in the community were marked by grave memorials. It should be possible, for some villages, to work out the approximate proportion of those so commemorated, with the help of poor law records, parish registers, census returns, family records - and so on through the whole gamut of sources available to the local historian.

(2) Rarely, if ever, will the researcher find in a graveyard a sufficient number of memorials for him to be able to generalize about long­term trends in life expectancy, or to make detailed statements about seasonal variations in death rates.

(3) Gravestones are not to be taken as the definitive record of a local community. This ignores very important patterns of geographical and social mobility.

In spite of what has been said so far, however, grave memorials do constitute a rich source for the local historian. The researcher must bear in mind that , like so many other sources he uses, they are only supplementary, to be used in conjunction with more traditional types of evidence. They can still play a part in building up a picture of the local community. Thus, for example, they can hint at local employment patterns. More widely, they can be, with great caution, used to assess the varying importance of a community in its

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economic setting. Very often stones record the birthplace of those commemorated. In such cases, these are hints of a growing and prosperous community. There are also cases where travellers, who died while breaking their journey in a particular settlement, were buried where they died. In major route-centres, such cases might be of especial value. One significant aspect which few local historians seem to note is that gravestones might give us a guide to the relative importance of different local monumental masons: by building up surveys of several graveyards different 'areas of influence' can be discerned. I was attracted by Mrs Stewart's suggestion that something might be learned from the wording of epitaphs, though this lies outside the sphere of the local historian.

Grave memorials give us a record of the middle class, and not of the whole community. This does not minimize their significance, but it does modify it quite considerably, since it alters the nature of the questions we can ask. They will not tell us about the community at large; they will tell us very little about the subordinate classes. And they are not numerous enough for a long­run analysis of any value. Within these limits, and using them in conjunction with other documents, the local historian can turn the graveyard into a fertile source of evidence.

REFERENCES 1 F. V. Stewart, "Life and Death in an Oxfordshire Churchyard" The Local

Historian, Vol. XIII, No. 3, 1978 pp. 149-158. 2 VCH: Oxfordshire, Vol. V. 3 F. V. Stewart: op.cit., p. 157. 4 A. Rogers, Approaches to Local History (2nd ed. 1977), Ch. 3, for example. 5 F. V. Stewart, op.cit., p. 157. 6 F. V. Stewart , op.cit., p. 155. 7 For rural mobility, and its problems for the researcher, see, for example, W. G.

Hoskins, Local History in England (2nd ed. 1972), Ch. 9.

CHRISTOPHER HUSBANDS has just graduated in history at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He is about to embark on research into agricultural change in the Mid lands, applying computer analysis to probate inventories.

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FROM READERS DID ANNE HUGHES EXIST?

May I take up the challenge which you made in the editorial of Vol. 14, No. 1? I ought to make clear from the outset that I am by no means an 'expert' on diaries or diarists, although I have a very great interest in the genre and have accumulated a reasonable collection of British diaries.

I have made no specific study of Anne Hughes' diary, nor made any attempt to research the background -although I think that such a task would not be impossibly difficult. Nevertheless, I have formed an opinion as to its authenticity, based,. in the main, upon an intuitive 'feel' for the material and after having read so many diarists and studies of their art.

To me the Hughes diary is patently a work of fiction of the style of the 'Diary of a Young Lady of Fashion' and similar works. It has all the hallmarks I associate with such fictional accounts: a completeness and chronological sequence of events leading to neat and tidy conclusions. There is little of the repetitive trivia which characterizes most of the genuine. The whole book is, in my view, a fully conceived entity, formed by the author before pen was put to paper.

A cursory reading reveals much that is worth questioning. Although the preface mentions 'phonetic and erratic spelling' I find it, frankly, quite unbelievable. Consider the multiplicity of double vowels and consonants as in 'hee', 'eers', 'thees', 'tenn', 'putt', 'reddie' and 'didd'. The aditional final 'e' on so many words, such as 'nowe', 'owne', 'jumpe', 'ande' , etc. seem to me, as do the double letters, a deliberate attempt at quaintness and quite unlike the genuine journals of the period such as

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Woodforde or, more significantly, Mary Hardy, a woman of the same class and environment as 'Anne Hughes' . Certain words and phrases are quite out of character, 'cracke up', meaning to praise, 'tumbel toe' , to discover, 'shulde nowe better' and 'a flightie bitte', meaning a girl of gay demeanour. Is this colloquial 18th century? A search to establish early usage might be of value. Throughout the diary, the syntax is patently laboured and artificial. Another area which gives rise to doubt is simply the length of entry on certain days. Given the imagined circumstances · of the book, the long working day described, the stated secrecy of the undertaking, the physical conditions surrounding such writing, is it conceivable that entries could run to many hundreds of words, well over 1,000 on a number of occasions? In spite of the evidence of Miss W eeton, the thing does not ring true in this case. Consider too the young parson who figures prominently , 20 years old, the son of a blacksmith , settled in a comfortable living. Not, I think, characteristic of the age. There are other inconsistencies; no doubt many will suggest themselves to you.

To sum up: the book seems to me to be a patent fiction with recognizable fragments of original journals included. Compare it with Mary Hardy, already mentioned, with Elizabeth Raper, with Nancy Woodforde; compare it even with 'Cleone Knox'. You will appreciate that the foregoing is merely an untutored opinion; I should hear with great pleasure opposing views but I must say that I should require a deal of convincing.

G. H. Bunting, 54 Old Fold View, Barnet, Hertfordshire

[A new edition of Anne Hughes' diary has just been published by Allen Lane, under the title of The Diary of a farmer 's wife, 1796-97.

Mr Bunting is chairman of the Parson Woodforde Society, and has a collection of over 900 published British diaries. - Ed.}

Since editors, like public servants, tend to hear from their public only if there is a complaint, I feel I should write a line of praise and appreciation to you on the latest issues of the Local Historian (Vol. 13, No. 8 and Vol. 14, No. 1).

I think these have been excellent, directed very much as they are towards assisting local historians to develop in a variety of fields, showing them how research has been tackled and can be tackled . This is in my view where the emphasis should lie. I hope you continue to be supported by contributors who make this emphasis possible.

William Serjeant, Suffolk Record Office, County Hall, Ipswich IP4 2JS.

I read with interest Mr. Priestley's letter in Vol. 14, No. 1. I believe the idea of an information exchange to be very useful. May I therefore through your letter-page place a request to readers?

I seek information on military history (personal) and would welcome any details of personal documents, pay accounts , awards and citations, casualty lists, etc., or inscribed items such as medals and swords. Any reader with access to early newspapers, will no doubt come across casualty lists, awards, postings etc., and I would welcome copies.

In exchange I can offer various information on Cambridgeshire, Sudbury and Long Melford. John F. Tinworth, 1 Swan.field, Long

Melford, Sudbury, Suffolk

Hector (L.C.) The Handwriting of English Documents

Facsimile reprint 1980 £7 .50 Hector's classic THE HANDWRITING OF ENGLISH DOCUMENTS, with its 56 illustrations of English handwriting, is available again. The chief object of this book is to moderate as far as possible the difficulties of reading presented by the hands written in England for administrative, legal or business purposes during the past eight or nine centuries. 'This is a book which no one working in English history can afford to neglect; but merely reading it will not do-it must be bought and cherished. '.' (G. R. Elton in the Cambridge Review). " .. . Hector's masterpiece remains unrivalled in its special category as the student's vade-mecum." (J. B. Post in Archives). Available through book­sellers or direct from the Publishers at £8 .10 (inc. post).

KOHLER & COOMBES LTD. Local History Publishers 12 Horsham Road, Dorking, Surrey, RH4 2JL

169

REVIEWS THE EARLY CHARTERS OF THE THAMES VALLEY by Margaret Gelling (Leicester University Press, 208pp., 1979), £14 PROCEEDINGS OF THE BATTLE CONFERENCE ON ANGLO­NORMAN STUDIES, I, 1978 edited by R. Allen Brown (The Boydell Press, XII+ 247pp., illus., 1979), £12

Twenty-seven years ago the University of Leicester Press published the late H. P. R. Finberg's Early Charters of Devon and Cornwall. This was the first in its series of hand-lists of Anglo-Saxon charters. It was followed by companion volumes by Finberg on the West Midlands (1961), with a second edition nine years later, and Wessex (1964) and by Dr Cyril Hart's Eastern England (1966), Essex (1971) and Northern England and the North Midlands (1975). Margaret Gelling's volume on The Early Charters of the Thames Valley now deals with the counties of Bedford, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertford, Middlesex, Oxford and Surrey. It completes the series and almost completes Finberg 's original aim: comprehensive coverage of the whole country. Only Kent and Sussex have been left out. For those two counties no hand-list has been published, nor is one planned.

The seven volumes of the series catalogue all the known pre-Conquest documents relating to land ownership for their respective areas. The contents of each charter are summarised. The degree of authenticity is assessed on a four-point scale ranging from 'authenticity not in doubt' to 'thought to be a complete fabrication' . The critical notes include some discussion of the identity of persons and place-names referred to in the text. In addition to the references to the main printed edition of each text found in the preceding volumes, Mrs Gelling gives some indication of their whereabouts. At least one source is noted for each document and, where appropriate, reference is made to the fact that that text is one of a number available.

For the local historian the principal interest of these charters lies in the light which they throw on early parish and estate boundaries. In many of the tenth-century charters the perambulations are surprisingly detailed. For those of an earlier date the perambulations are much briefer and simpler and, consequently, vague. Michael Reed makes a detailed examination, with maps, of the six surviving Buckinghamshire pre-Conquest charters in an appendix. This illustrates clearly the possibilities, and difficulties, of topographical reconstruction.

Even with such expert guidance the way remains difficult.Mrs Gelling suggests that for the foreseeable future students must continue to grope their way through the jungle for it has become increasingly clear since the series was commenced that 'An glo-Saxon charter studies are in their infancy and that there can be no question at this stage of definitive reference books'.

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Nevertheless, this series, taken together with P. H. Sawyer's Annotated List and Bibliography of Anglo-Saxon Charters (1968), is one of the essential starting points for the study of any locality, even if many of us are unfortunate and draw a blank.

The first annual Conference on Anglo-Norman Studies was held in Sussex, at Battle itself, in 1978. In a famous passage in the Gesta Regum William of Malmesbury described the Normans as 'a race inured to war, and can hardly live without it; fierce in rushing against the enemy; and where strength fails of success, ready to use strategem, or to corrupt by bribery'. Clearly warfare looms large in the collection of papers delivered and now published by the Boydell Press, under the editorship of R. Allen Brown, as the Proceedings of the Battle Coriference on Anglo-Norman Studies, I, 1978. They include contributions on Saxon warfare by Nicholas Hooper and John Godfrey, on the Norman military revolution in England by David R. Cook and Crusading warfare by Rosalind Hill. In 'The Norman Conquest , 1066, 1106, 1154 ?' John Le Patourel discusses the old question of the effects of the Conquest in the wider context of the Norman and Angevin Empires and, in another paper, Marjorie Chibnall looks at the many-coloured picture of Norman feudal society presented by Orderic Vitalis in his Ecclesiastical History .

For the local historian, however, especially those without benefit of Anglo-Saxon charters, H. R. Loyn's paper on Domesday Book will be of prime interest. Much work ·has been carried out on the great survey in the last two decades by such authorities as V. H. Galbraith, P. H. Sawyer and Miss Sally Harvey as well as H. C. Darby's Domesday Geographies and the books and articles of R. Welldon Finn, in particular the Introduction to Domesday Book ( 1963). As Loyn says 'during the last generation Domesday Book has proved a lively, vital, active source of historical investigation'. His paper, together with Edmund King's review article on 'Domesday Studies' in History for October 1973, provides a valuable survey of the material produced. No longer can it be suggested, as did David Knowles eighteen years ago, albeit with tongue in cheek, that Domesday studies have the likeness of 'one of the more abstruse branches of nuclear physics'.

JOEHILLABY

THE LORDS OF HOLDERNESS, 1086-1260. A study in feudal society by Barbara English (Oxford University Press for the University of Hull, 1979, 275pp., 14 plates, 2 maps), £14

Holderness is the low-lying district of east Yorkshire occupying the land between the Humber estuary and the North Sea. The district has attracted historians in the past because the late thirteenth century documents compiled for Isabella de Fortibus reveal the workings of a great liberty and show large­scale demesne sheep farming on the Holderness pastures. Now Dr English has

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studied the district in the two centuries before the time of Isabella, when successive counts of Aumale made out ofit a strong and compact lordship. She traces the political fortunes of each count , showing how they advanced, and sometimes retreated, in their acquisition of power and land, changes which she sees as closely related to the amount of control exercised by the crown. The administrative structure of courts and officials is described, and also the courts' organisation of military tenures. Finally there is an account of the social and economic history of the district, with special emphasis on its villages, fieids, and boroughs. Dr English handles a wide variety of sources with skill, and is able to give indications of the character of individual counts, in spite of the scattered and fragmentary nature of the evidence. A useful description is given of the work of the sheriffs of Holderness, and the development of the liberty is traced through a shadowy period. We are given a clear exposition of the transition of feudal military arrangements from the flexibility of the late eleventh century to a well-organised system by 1200, based on a remarkably large knight's fee of 48 carucates. However, the reader will have to make his own connections between the comments made about the Holderness milites and the current debate about the status of knights and their reception into the ranks of the nobility. This is typical of the approach adopted in the whole book, which eschews broad interpretations and discussion of wider historical problems. Readers interested in such subjects as the internal colonisation, the seigneurial role in urban growth, or the dynamics of feudal lordship will find much valuable information, but little explicit discussion of these concepts . The introduction contains a summary of the contents rather than a statement of any general themes to be explored, and there is no conclusion at all. The subtitle recalls the breadth of Marc Bloch's Feudal Society, but this book is a product of traditional English concerns with feudal institutions rather than feudal society.

CHRISTOPHER DYER

MEDIEVAL ENGLAND An Aerial Survey by M. W. Beresford and J. K. S. St. Joseph (Cambridge University Press, xvii+ 286pp., illus. second edition, 1979), £10

The first edition of this book, published in 1958, rapidly became a classic demonstration of the value of aerial photography in the study of landscapes and settlements. This new edition is beautifully printed so that the photographs (on which everything rests) have a clarity too often lacking in these days of over-inked offset litho. By an always happy selection of Professor St. Joseph's photographs from his vast collection at Cambridge, coupled with a commentary from one of the most discerning of our landscape historians, the reader is led, by means of viewpoints unimagined by their inhabitants, to looking with a fresh eye at towns, villages, castles, earthworks and fields. Every example is chosen to illustrate a theme - the siting of a village or the plan of a newly-planted town; the relationship between a village and its fields; or the

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varieties of what Beresford calls 'the dissolution of the medieval landscape' -by retreat; by attack; by agreement or by Act of Parliament. Every photograph has a short, highly concentrated and authoritative commentary, scholarship at its best.

The comparisons between recent photographs of villages and fields and maps of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries are most illuminating and demonstrate how much of our ancient landscapes remain to be seen and walked over, even though deep ploughing is drastically reducing the acreage year by year. Some of the illustrations are particularly telling. The photographs of deserted villages taken when the sun was low so that the earthworks are revealed in detail enable us to grasp the plan of the settlement in a way quite impossible from the ground. Plate 53, for example, of now enclosed open fields at Brassington in Derbyshire is a startling reminder of how much of the medieval landscape was under the plough, and at what cost of time and labour. Photographs of towns, such as Royston, at the crossing of the Ermine Street and Ickneild Way, or of Lydford, lying within its Saxon ramparts, or of the street grid of Flint, laid out in 1277 but now lined with terrace houses , enable us to understand at a glance patterns which would otherwise take an hour's walk.

Perhaps inevitably the distribution of sites illustrated is heavily weighted towards the Midlands and East Anglia. The west of England, with the exception of Devon and Cornwall, is neglected , though it is equally rich in the sort of sites here chosen. Curiously (and perhaps provocatively to those west of the Dyke) four sites from Wales are included in this book called Medieval England .

There is also a noticeable lack of crop-mark sites. The great revolution in our understanding of the complexity and density of past settlement, which has come about in the last twenty years (between the two editions of this book), has derived mainly from the vast increase in known crop-marks. Is it simply that comparatively few medieval sites are under the plough, or that it is not easy to date crop-marks by inspection and that some of the sites which we cannot date are in fact medieval? Plates 44, 68 and 115 are good examples of crop-marks known to be medieval, and plates 5 lA and 5 lB form a sad example of how fine earthworks become crop-marks.

This is a splendid book, which marries aerial photography, local history and field-work in a compelling and imaginative way. It will bear repeated study, like a work of art. At the same time, given to a young field-worker, it might well inspire a second Beresford to look at the landscape with fresh eyes.

PHILIP BARKER

DESOLATION OF A CITY - Coventry and the Urban Crisis of the Late Middle Ages by Charles Phythian-Adams (Cambridge University Press xx + 350pp., illus.), £16.50

The purpose of this book, as its title exactly indicates , is to explain and demonstrate what its author believes to have been the sensational collapse of the once-proud medieval textile centre and cathedral city of the English

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·Midlands, during the second quarter of the sixteenth century. In order to do this Mr Phythian-Adams has been able to draw on particularly rich late medieval (early modern?) materials, which survive in its record office and elsewhere.

The general possibility of sixteenth century urban decay has, of recent years, become the subject of sustained debate, notably in the columns of Urban History Yearbook, and has provoked fervent disagreement. This book, although one might not discern the fact from its text, is also a major contribution to that wider discussion. Advance echoes of its contents have already produced some reservations, in otherwise sceptical opinions, that Coventry might have been affected by 'special factors' during the period. So how typical of its age, or otherwise, may the dilemmas of the city appear to be in the light of the completed work? Was it truly the victim of a unique or of a widespread urban crisis?

Four possible approaches offer themselves: namely by the consideration of institutional decline, of demographic structure, of national changes or of religious and ideological change. Obviously none of these will be thought of as mutually exclusive, but it is also to be expected that a work of this type will, in fact, concentrate on the first two. The main body of the text gives full value to both, and very extensive appendices are offered in support. Non­demographically inclined readers are likely to find the sections on institutional change somewhat easier to absorb than the mass of statistics, which (with many necessary reservations), inevitably accompany the account of population change. It should be said, though, that when describing the background of. the daily working life of the city, the writing is graphic and memorable: as readers of Ceremony and the Citizen might well expect.

Perhaps, then, it can be regretted that the closing pages which deal absorbingly with fundamental changes of belief towards the end of the period, were not more fully worked out than they are. (Surely the Cambridge University Press could have afforded it? A text of just under 300 pages with two illustrations, even allowing for the appendices, is hardly cheap at this price). There was already, after all, an established tradition of dissent and communal disorder in the city, which can be traced in the Leet Book, through the career of such a man as Lawrence Saunders, or in the evidence of Lollardy which occurred from time to time. Mr Phythian-Adams alludes briefly to the latter, under the heading 'Social Structure' and comes to the conclusion that it 'hardly posed a threat to the social order', although, at the same time, he places great emphasis on the social disorders of the 1520s, because 'only a confusion of the situation with other issues could seriously endanger the social order' (my italics). In other words, the demographic evidence will help to predetermine the significance of matters of conviction and belief: a determinist view-point which may not be endorsed by all readers.

Nevertheless population changes are obviously a key factor, and the full analysis of many sources, which is provided here, does establish that the city was experiencing troubled times in the 1520s. But as with the previous topic, it is harder to be certain that this is entirely unprecedented. Even where changes

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(of the numbers of those who practised particular crafts, for instance) appear reasonably clear -cut, can we be certain that they are demonstrating anything more than a change in record-keeping? Coventry may or may not have been subject, at that period, to disasters of a unique frightfulness, and which are the key to its eventual decline; but there is no doubt that it was subject to an almost unique urge to record the state of things as they were (which two circumstances may, or may not, be connected). It must also be remembered that these records, themselves, have shown a very unusual ability to survive . There will be much interest for the reader, then, not least in being able to come to his own conclusion about the central issue of the book.

Whatever conclusion is reached, this is still an important work on a central topic. It will become part of every urban historian's apprehension of the period, both in the Midlands and elsewhere.

MARY HULTON

ELIZABETHAN MANCHESTER - Chetham Society Remains, Historical and Literary, iii series, Vol. XXVII by T. S. Willan (Manchester University Press for the Chetham Society, 163pp, 2 maps, 1980), £10 .50

Urban histories, like towns themselves, come in all shapes and sizes. Professor Willan's study in the Chetham Society series is deliberately low-key in its approach. He provides a laconic survey of Manchester's urbanising economy and society; and specifically excludes many aspects of its history, including its political, administrative, and religious experiences, that have been covered by other studies. He also enjoys reminding readers of the paucity of evidence relating to early modern urban societies and economics, and of the imperfect information that the scanty surviving sources will yield. The text therefore (minus Appendices) runs to a modest 129 pages.

This approach enables him to extract the maximum information from fragmentary local sources, without claiming too much for them. Manorial records and rentals, including a very detailed one for 15 99-1600 (in full in Appendix I), are surveyed to yield evidence in unparalleled detail about forms of tenure, patterns of ownership and tenancy, land values and rent levels, in a developing township. Similarly, court leet records and local probate inventories are analysed to suggest the range of economic activities in an expanding settlement, which had perhaps 2,000 inhabitants in the later sixteenth century. The growing importance of its commercial life, as a market and as a specialist finishing centre for the Lancashire textile industry, is noted, as is the relative infrequency of purely agricultural occupations. And, lastly, fifty-seven probate inventories covering the years 15 70 to 1602 (listed in Appendix II), are scrutinised, in conjunction with wills and other data, to illuminate the social structure of Manchester, and of standards of housing and domestic furnishings there.

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The tone of the discussion throughout is thoughtful and probing; and the range of information will prove of great interest to all social and economic historians. In particular, those who are currently studying probate inventories will find much instructive comparative material here. (Devotees of time warp will also enjoy the quarrel between Adam Smith and Oswald Mosley over disputed property rights). Those who are interested primarily in towns may, however, find themselves slightly disappointed. In many ways, the focus of the study falls upon the sources and the information they will yield, rather than upon an urban economy and society as such. There is very little sense of Manchester as a developing urban community - if, indeed, that is what it was. Certainly, comparative references to the experiences of other towns are perfunctory. The brief concluding chapter raises a number of interesting general points, but only very briefly. Of course, it may well be that the questions raised hitherto by historians of the early modern town are not the best questions to ask, or are not the best questions to ask about Manchester. It is indeed refreshing to find a survey of Tudor life that does not even contemplate the word 'crisis'. But it is hard to believe that no general issues are raised by the urban growth of sixteenth-century Manchester, or that no general interest derives from the experience of one of the most rapidly-expanding of the so-called 'new towns'. The appetite is therefore whetted for more, even while enjoying the unusual repast of choice information about a non-corporate town.

P. J. CORFIELD

FAMINE , DISEASE AND POPULATION FAMINE IN TUDOR AND STUART ENGLAND by Andrew B. Appleby (Liverpool University Press, 250pp., 1978), £10 .75 PLAGUE, POPULATION AND THE ENGLISH ECONOMY 1348-1530 by John Hatcher (Macmillan Studies in Economic and Social History, 95pp., 1977), £1.75 THE PLAGUE RECONSIDERED: a new look at its origins and effects in 16th and 17th century England (Local Population Studies Supplement, 145pp., 1977), £3.65 THE CONQUEST OF SMALLPOX: the impact of inoculation on smallpox mortality in eighteenth century Britain by Peter Razzell (Caliban Book, X + 190pp., 1977), £8

Malthus pointed out nearly two centuries ago that populations tend to increase faster than food resources. He did not say that this would necessarily happen (like many great thinkers he is often misquoted), but that such crises had to be prevented by 'preventive checks' (by which he seemed to mean chiefly restraints on marriage), or nature would impose its own grim alternative in the form of 'positive checks' - war, famine and disease. These are the so-called Malthusian checks or Malthusian crises which figure prominently in works on population history.

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Unfortunately for the local historian , keen perhaps to study a local crisis with the aid of expert advice, life has been difficult. The only epidemic disease to have received much scholarly attention - before the age of cholera - has been bubonic plague, and both historical and medieval specialists have differed sharply in their accounts of it. Creighton's great History of Epidemics in Britain (1891-4) was medically out-of-date on plague even when it appeared , while even the recent massive History of Bubonic Plague in the British Isles by Professor Shrewsbury (1970) has been heavily criticised. For famine , on the other hand, the problem has been a lack of any general framework. Much work has been done on 'subsistence crises' in France, but until recently almost the only readable general treatment of such crises in England was a stimulating chapter of Peter Laslett's The World We Have Lost. Fortunately, much valuable work on English population is now being published, and the works under review, among others, should make the patterns much clearer.

Pride of place should perhaps go to Dr Appleby's excellent pioneer work on English famines. It is largely a regional study, concentrating on Cumberland and Westmorland in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. First, the subject of famine is carefully defined; then a picture is built up of the rural economy of the two counties. Three central chapters then demonstrate the existence of three severe famines in the north west (1587, 1597, 1623) and place them in wider English and European framework; and finally, reasons for the gradual disappearance of famine after 1623 are suggested. It is these wider considerations that justify the general title; for Dr Appleby's is a model regional study, based on a thorough familiarity with the area and a careful analysis of parish registers and other sources, but never losing sight of the broader national and international framework. He has some especially stimulating and controversial views on the links - or rather the lack of links -between famine and disease, which he has developed further in an important article in the Journal of Interdisciplinary History for 197 5.

The existence of severe famines in medieval England has long been known, especially the 'great European famine' of 1315-17, but it was possible in 1965 when Laslett wrote 'Did the peasants really starve?' to doubt whether they still occurred in early modern England. Now we know for certain that they did, although Appleby also shows that English famines, if terrible enough, did become localised and then disappeared earlier than in other countries. The famines of the 1580s and the 1590s seem to have been more severe in the north than in the south, while that of 1623 was almost entirely confined to the north. In contrast, the famine of the 1550s - which is not fully reflected in the parish registers and not dealt with here - was apparently nationwide; and by the 1690s, when many Scots and Frenchmen starved to death, England was almost immune. Gradually, it seems, Tudor and Stuart England was removing the spectre of starvation. Much more work needs doing on agriculture at the regional level before the process is fully understood; but there are many invaluable suggestions here of how Cumbria solved its problems, and broader hints about the response in other regions. Meanwhile , Dr Victor Skipp has tried to analyse elsewhere how the Arden district of north Warwickshire came to

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terms with the same problems at the same period ( Crisis and Development, CUP, 1978).

Perhaps the most essential of the books under review is The Plague Reconsidered, a joint publication by Local Population Studies and the Cambridge Group for the History of Population. It is really the first satisfactory manual for the non-specialist on bubonic plague in early modern England, crisp, clear, concise and gratifyingly readable . Paul Slack contributes a useful introduction and a case-study of Bristol plagues, while other contributions by Leslie Bradley, J. - N. Biraben, Roger Schofield and Derek Turner are all helpful, and Christopher Morris' important review of Shrewsbury's book is thrown in for good measure. Many myths about this disease are exposed, Bradley's demolition of the traditional account of the plague at Eyam being particularly enjoyable. This slim but important book is especially welcome because there is still no really reliable account of plague in Tudor and Stuart England, although Slack has a book on the subject nearly completed. In the meantime, readers who want to take further some of the themes of The Plague Reconsidered should turn to Slack's article, 'Mortality crises and epidemic disease in England 1485-1610', in Health, Medicine and Mortality in the Sixteenth Century, ed. C. Webster (CUP, 1979). For some new and stimulating thoughts on the vexed question of how and why plague disappeared, one should turn to an article by Appleby in the latest (May 1980) issue of the Economic History Review.

Bubonic plague was present in England from 1348 to about 1670. Naturally the second half of that period is better recorded because of parish registers and the increasing volume of documentation generally. The first and most terrible outbreak in 1348-50 is of course a familiar subject, and can be conveniently studied in Philip Ziegler's The Black Death (Pelican, 1970), a popular account which is also thoroughly scholarly. But the history of plague between 1350 and the start of parish registers in 1538 has remained very murky and treacherous ground; the most recent attempt to explain it, by R. S. Gottfried (Epidemic Disease in Fifteenth Century England, Leicester UP, 1978), is ingenious but suspect. All the more reason, then, to give a warm welcome to John Hatcher's book on Plague, Population and the English Economy, which summarises carefully and readably the likely effects of plague between 1348 and 1530 and is rounded off by a full bibliography.

The same unqualified welcome cannot, unfortunately, be given to the last book under review. Peter Razzell's book, which is poorly produced for the price, is also a more controversial guide than the others. The author has been arguing in print since 1965 that much if not all of the decline in mortality in eighteenth-century England can be attributed to the success of inoculation against smallpox, a technique which long preceded vaccination and was, he asserts, widespread, safe and effective. His stoutest opponent has been Professor McKeown, who has long had doubts about the argument and has most recently summarised his own position in The Modern Rise of Population (Edward Arnold, 1976). Razzell is surely correct that inoculation was an important and neglected phase in the conquest of disease, but the book is more

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a one-sided argument than a balanced picture. The argument over the decline of smallpox remains unresolved, and the best short guide to the controversy is still the judicious study by M. W. Flinn, British Population Growth 1700-1850, in the same excellent series as John Hatcher 's book.

D. M. PALLISER

PRIDE OF PLACE: MORE LOCAL HISTORIES HAMPSHIRE: A DOWNLAND VILLAGE - PRESTON CANDOVER by Philip Sheail (Barry Shurlock, 174 Stockbridge Road, Winchester S022 6RW, 94 + x pp., 1979), £2.90; NORTHAMPTONSHIRE: TITCHMARSH by Helen Belgian (author, 10 Islington, Titchmarsh, Kettering, Northants, 128 +xii pp., 1979), £6.50; WOLLASTON by David Hall (The Wollaston Society, The Museum, High Street, Wollaston, Northants, 278 + xiv pp., 1977), N.P.; SUFFOLK: HADLEIGH by W. A. B. Jones (author, 9 Bridge Street, Hadleigh, Ipswich IP7 6BY, 136 pp., 1977), £3 including postage ; WILTSHIRE: SHEEP BELL & PLOUGHSHARE - BRATTON by Marjorie Reeves (Moonraker , 180 pp., 1978), £4.95; WORCESTERSHIRE: HANLEY CASTLE by Pamela Hurle (Phillimore, 168 pp., 1978), £3.75; SUFFOLK: LOOKING BACK AT FRESSINGFIELD Fressingfield WEA (82 pp., duplicated with drawings and photographs, 1979), £1.25 .

When David Hall's Wallas ton is described as 'the fruits of a decade of labour' and Pamela Hurle's Hanley Castle as her 'second village history', the reviewer ought to set more critical standards than for those booklets reviewed in the last batch. Wollaston is one of two first-class Northamptonshire histories which are foils to one another . Hall has carried out a remarkable series of parish surveys of medieval field-systems and is now a professional archaeologist. One of his aims was to inter-relate 'archaeology and history taking Wollaston as an example' . Mrs Belgion, a retired headmistress, fell in love with Titchmarsh, discovered through its association with John Dryden, and retired there in 1961. She covers the whole sweep of Titchmarsh history from the 'site, soil and early settlements' to 'the twentieth century', and pays tribute to the considerable use she has made of David Hall's work in her topographical studies. Both books are illustrated by D.avid Hall's beautifully clear maps and plans and by admirably selected photographs. Helen Belgion's is marred by the failure to include plate numbers in the captions, so that following references in the text is difficult. W. A. B. Jones' Hadleigh is even worse: the numbers given to plates

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in the contents are uniformly different from those given in the text. Blemishes like this should not mar books of this quality.

Helen Belgion's strength is in her feel for people, from the medieval lords of the manor to the famers and wage-earners of more recent centuries, and in her writing which makes one want to read to the end even when one does not know Titchmarsh. David Hall's gift is in interpreting the physical past, in relating field archaeology and maps to documents. Both authors print local documents. Mrs Belgion's selected family trees, wills, inventories, population and tax lists illustrate her narrative. David Hall's approach is more comprehensive: the enclosure of Titchmarsh, for example, is described concisely in three pages; a chapter of thirty-four pages is devoted to 'Inclosures' in Wollaston. This is because David Hall sets out to take the reader through the whole process as it occurred, with documentation, and then relates what happened in Wollaston to regional history. This makes Hall's book a useful guide and example for other local historians (cf. the description of manorial court administration and records pp. 98-100), but it has the inevitable consequence that his book is less easy to read, and that he sometimes makes rather sweeping assertions with which not everyone would agree. 'Much nonsense has been written about minor Roman roads' (p. 9) is rather a damning description of the Viatores' work; and tallage was not quite 'an arbitrary tax made by the Crown on manors ... passed on to the villagers' (p. 68). Helen Belgion slips up too: John, eighth baron Lovell, is described as 'a staunch Lancastrian ... made Chief Forester ... by Edward IV', which needs some explanation. The family tree (p. 22) and the text (pp. 23-4) differ considerably and the Lovells shed their last 'I' erratically.

These two, nucleated, arable villages were not alike in their history. Titchmarsh had a few more inhabitants than W ollaston in Domesday Book but thereafter Wollaston continually grew, to produce the social and economic complexities which Hall describes. Titchmarsh remained much smaller. It was very much an 'estate' village and there is much revealing material about such a village in its history. 'Gardens for the Poor' were let from 1820 to occupiers who attended some place of worship every Sunday; they were to plant as many potatoes as their families required but not to sell any. One farm in 1850 enforced Rules for Agricultural workers which included 'Everyone will be expected to attend Divine Service' and 'Anyone smoking out of his house or garden between 4 o'clock in the morning and 6 o'clock in the evening' was to be fined.

Pamela Hurle and W. A. B. Jones are both history graduates, but they have written greatly contrasting books. Hanley Castle, in the 'Heart of Malvern Chase', has eleven chapters based on topics, two of which are on schools. Mrs Hurle provides an admirable history of the grammar school and of the growth of other schools. So disproportionate an allotment of space is explained: 'The 19th century writer, John Noake, . commented on the remarkable number of schools in the village, ... to this day, Hanley (has) more schools than would normally be expected in a village of its size ... schools best reflect the changing attitudes of society' (pp. 101-2). Unfortunately the local

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economic and social history is much less well handled , The description of pre­enclosure farming reads like an undergraduate essay of thirty years ago. There is far too much generalisation and far too little use is made of local material. The Northamptonshire histories provide a salutary contrast.

Hadleigh in Suffolk, a clothmaking town, old borough and 'peculiar ' of the Archbishop of Canterbury has a richer history and more records than Hanley. Mr Jones, honorary archivist to Hadleigh Council, has been able to draw on this wealth. He has adopted a fairly strict narrative approach, with two chapters on each of the four centuries from 1500 to 1900; one chapter is on religion, the other on social , economic, educational and administrative history. 'It may seem that religious affairs have occupied too much space ... over hundreds of years, earning a living and religion have been the mainsprings of life for very many people' (p. 129). As an Archbishop's peculiar Hadleigh has had an extraordinary rich procession of rectors; indeed Mr Jones' history is almost a potted history of the churches in England, not because he generalises but because of the wealth of detail about local churchmen and dissenters of every kind. Detail is the strong, and the weak, point of this book. It is full of people, information and incident but becomes, especially in the later chapters, rather more like a fascinating Commonplace Book than a history. Mrs Hurle, in contrast, lacks the detail but does tell a coherent story conveying the feeling of life in a distinctive community. Hadleigh's beautiful church and associated buildings, with many portraits and other subjects, provide pages of splendid illustrations to Mr Jones' book but marred, as I have said, by nightmare wrong numbering.

The last two books are quite different from one another and from the great majority of local histories. They are jewels. Philip Sheail's A Downland Village is a portrait of Preston Candover in Hampshire in the two decades on either side of the 1851 census. There have been many recent demographic, economic and sociological studies of Victorian communities based on the census returns, but none, to my knowledge, which combine these modern scientific approaches with the charm of Miss Mitford or Flora Thompson. Philip Sheail has done so in a neat little book as beautifully printed and illustrated as it is written . He has spent over fifteen years collecting information and, unusually for local historians, followed the people of mid-nineteenth century Preston Candover in and out of other places to which they moved or from which they came. A massive amount of information has been sifted and interpreted skilfully and sympathetically and brought alive by old photographs and beautiful sketches, apparently by the author. This is one of those rare little books which leaves the reader with a lasting glow of pleasure.

Marjorie Reeves' Sheep Bell and Ploughshare has something of the same qualities. In 197 4 she acquired a treasure chest of family possessions which she has opened to the reader with taste and understanding. 'Possessions' is the right word because this extraordinary collection contained not only documents of all kinds 'from the seventeenth to the early twentieth century', but an incredible variety of personal possessions from children's games and clothes to household utensils and furniture. Marjorie Reeves has used this material to write the

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history 'of two village families', the Whitakers and Reeves of Bratton in Wiltshire. They were Baptists : the Whitakers were farmers and schoolmasters; the Reeves were blacksmiths who founded a successful ironworks. The author is the daughter of Robert Reeves and Edith Whitaker. She has revealed the local power of a Baptist community, its culture and its happiness. A great deal of laughing at one another, music, and writing united the Whitakers; there were · many literary women in the family. We are indeed fortunate to be able to see, in such intimate detail, some eight generations of a remarkable family growing up and living their lives. Whatever revelations may come from the constant improvements in quantitative studies of history, they can never be fully satisfying without the complement of such 'miniatures' as Marjorie Reeves has given us.

• • • • FOOTNOTE. Too late for the first part of this review we received LOOKING BACK AT FRESSINGFIELD by a group of WEA students, which 'is a study of some aspects of life in the village before 17 50 and from 1851-19 51 ', to complement an earlier publication, A Century of a Suffolk Village, which covered 17 50 to 1851. There is no attempt at a narrative history of the community but a most impressive selection of materials for the history of ... The first fifty-five pages contain a thorough and wide-ranging analysis of some 282 wills and 45 iµventories, and makes use of other kinds of information, for example, the local guild and guildhall and local field names. The last twenty ­five pages contain an interesting collection of jottings for the modern period, the more interesting because the records surviving are rather patchy. There are no school log-books' for example. It is instructive how much the authors have managed to make of what survives.

LIONEL M. MUNBY

PARISH REGISTERS

GUIDE TO THE PARISH AND NON-PAROCHIAL REGISTERS OF DEVON AND CORNWALL, 1538-1837 compiled and introduced by Hugh Peskett (Devon and Cornwall Record Society, Extra Series, Vol. II, 258 pp., 1979), available from the Society, 7 The Close, Exeter, £5 inc. postage; THE REGISTERS OF KIRKBY ST CHAD'S CHAPELRY, MARRIAGES AND BURIALS, 1610-1839 edited by Walter L. French (Knowsley Borough Libraries, 197 pp., 1979), £1.25. Mr Peskett's immensely thorough compilation is surely a model of its kind. The user of parish registers is all too accustomed to tracing these documents through a wearisome variety of lists and indexes: the guides and lists of county record offices, the lists in the Society of Genealogists' Library and the College of Arms, the occasional lists in public libraries (any of which may contain both microfilmed and typed copies of registers) and the Computer File Index held by

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the Society of Genealogists and major record societies. Many originals are still held in parish churches, but, as this volume shows, a gratifying number are to be found in south-western record offices. The Guide, which brings together information from all these sources and many more , is aimed at the rapid provis ion of dat a for the local student, and it is clear that it will be of incalculable value. Ho wever, as the compiler points out there is nothing 'definitive' about this kind of volume or project, which is subject to continual up-dating, and its very existence will prompt new discoveries. Its most striking feature is its thorough exploration of the whereabouts of Catholic, Jewish and dissenting registers. How many of our traditional parish register societies or communities seem to assume that the world is made in an Anglican image?

Unhappily, much of the information here given, vital though it is, will be of negative assistance to the student of local population or family studies, for -with the outstanding exception of the registers of the Society of Friends, classified under RG 6 in the Public Record Office - most of the nonconformist or dissenting registers yield little information until the end of the eighteenth century. In some counties and regions , the Catholic records are somewhat fuller than is indicated here. The volume as a whole is greatly augmented in value by an excellent introduction by its editor, who provides, amongst other things , a splendid and erudite plain man's guide to sectarian groups and denominations in England. As Mr Peskett indicates, even the most thorough survey can scarcely hope to warn students against the manifold pitfalls hidden within individual registers - in dating, accuracy , comprehensiveness, later transcription and interpolation of error, and sheer accident of loss or recovery.

Every regional record society should aim, nevertheless, at the production of a volume organised on these lines. A major problem of record use in England is the lack of guides, within regional record offices and libraries , which tell users where non-locally situated sources, within the same general class, are likely to be found. This is not to disparage the excellent reference sections which these offices or libraries hold. There are simply not enough compilations like Mr Peskett's . It is good that record users should have a pressure group to speak for them, but vital that comprehensively and imaginatively organised indexes appear at the regional level, to help students and archivists alike.

The late Mr Walter French's transcript of the St Chad's Chapel registers (which relate to part of the old Walton parish near Liverpool) is a modestly duplicated monument to local enterprise , a gallant little supplement to the mighty work of the Lancashire Parish Register Society . One is not likely to disparage such efforts when one considers the vital demographic uses to which the late Mrs Kathleen Leonard's extended transcripts of the noted Hawkshead registers have been put - and these, too, were purely local enterprises and labours of love. A gentle implied criticism may also be made; Mrs Leonard's earliest work , though similarly duplicated, was indexed.

J. D. MARSHALL

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PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED SOURCE MATERIALS , GUIDES AND HISTORIOGRAPHY

Annual Report of the County Archivist 1979, by J. M. P. Farrar (Cambridgeshire County Council, 1979), from the County Record Office, Shire Hall, Cambridge, 25p .

Archaeology in the Ordnance Survey 1791-1965, by C. W. Phillips (Council for British Archaeology, 1980), from the CBA, 112 Kennington Road, London SE 11 6RE, £3.95.

The Armour of the Roman Legions, by H. Russell Robinson and Ronald Embleton (Frank Graham , 1980), from the publisher, 6 Queen's Terrace, Newcastle upon Tyne NE2 2PL, £1.50.

Aspects of Marriage: an example of Applied Historical Studies, by D. R. Mills (The Open University Faculty of Social Studies , 1980), £1.00.

Bastardy and its Comparative History - studies in the history of illegitimacy and marital non­conformism in Britain , France , Germany , Sweden, N orth America, Jamaica and Japan, edited by Peter Laslet , Karla Oosterveen and Richard Smith (Edward Arnold, 1980), £24.00.

Bibliotheca Cantiana or Antiquarian Kentish Books . Vol. I -up to 1836, edited by John Russell­Smith (John Hallewell Publications, reprinted from the original 1836 edition, 1980), £20 .00.

Catalogue of the History of Education Museum, edited by P. H.J. H. Gosden and W. B. Stephens (University of Leeds, 1979), from the

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Curator of the Museum of the History of Education , University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT .

Charlton Parish Register 1787 -1812, transcribed by Julian Watson (The Charlton Society , 1980), from Mr J. Hider, 107 Charlton Lane, Charlton, London S.E.7 , £-1.55 plus 50p post (cheques and P.O .s payable to J. G. Smith).

The Diary of Abigail Gawthern of Nottingham, edited by Adrian Hen stock (Thoroton Society , Record Series XXXIII, 1980), £4.75 .

The Drovers, by Shirle y Toulson (Shire Publications , 1980), 75p.

The English Clergy - the Emergence and Consolidation of a Profession 1558-1642, by Rosemary O'Day (Leicester University Press, 1979), £12.00.

Essex Country Houses - a pack of six colour postcards (Essex County Council, 1980), from the Central Library , Shewell Road, Colchester COl lJB , 50p the pack.

Hampshire Treasures Survey -Vol. I - Winchester City District (Hampshire County Council , 1979), from Hampshire Council of Community Service, Beaconsfield House, Andover Road, Winchester S022 6AT, £3.50 .

The Handwriting of English Documents, by L. C. Hector (Kohler & Coombes, Darking , facsimile reprint of first edition 1958, 1980), £7.50.

The History of Bridgnorth (Bridgnorth Historical Publications, reprint of 1821 edition, 1978), from the publisher, 41 Victoria Road, Bridgnorth, Salop Wl V 4LD , 80p plus lOp post.

The History of Maidstone, by J.M. Russell (John Hallewell Publications, reprint of 1881 edition, 1978), £10.00.

An Index to the 1851 Census for Hampshire. Vols. I and II, edited by Sandra Smith (Hampshire Genealogical Society, 1980), from Mrs S. Smith, 12 Woodlands Way, North Baddesley, Southampton S05 9HE, £1.50.

Liverpool 1907, by Walter Dixon Scott; illustrated by J. Hamilton Hay (Gallery Press, reprint of 1907 first edition, 1980), £6.00.

Local History and Reference Material on Micro.film, collated by Pat Southern (Metropolitan Borough of Stockport, 1980), from the Central Library, Wellington Road South, Stockport SK 1 3RS, 20p.

Local History Tutors of Great Britain - a Directory, edited by Alan Rogers (Department of Adult Education, University of Nottingham, 1980), from the Dept., 14-22 Shakespeare Street, Nottingham NGl 4FJ, N.P.

The Penguin Dictionary of English and European History 1485-1789, by E. N. Williams (Penguin Books, 1980), £8.95 hardback, £2.95 paperback.

People, Property and Polling in Mid-I 8th Century Kidlington, Oxfordshire - an Exhibition Catalogue (Kidlington Local History Society, 1980), from G. J. Gracey­Cox, Bellhangers, 64 Mill Street, Kidlington, Oxford, £2.00.

Place-names of Greater London, by John Field (Batsford, 1980), £6.95.

Plan of the Parish of St. Marylebone in the Co. of Middlesex by Peter Potter c1832 (Westminster City Library, The St Marylebone Society, 1979), from the Westminster City Libraries, Marylebone Library, Marylebone Road, London NWl 5PS, £3.50 plus 40p post.

Politics and the Appointment of Justices of the Peace 1675-1720, by Lionel K. J. Glassey (Oxford, 1979), £10.00.

A Preliminary and Interim List of Gardens and Parks of Outstanding Historic Interest (International Council on Monuments and Sites, U.K., National Committee, 1980), from Marcus Binney, Country Life, King's Reach Tower, Stamford Street, London SE 1 9LS, £ 1.25 inc. post.

Reactions to Social and Economic Change 1750-1939, edited by Walter Minchinton (University of Exeter, 1979), from the Publications Office, The University of Exeter, Northcote House, The Queen's Drive, Exeter EX4 4QJ, £2.00.

Robert Lowery - Radical and Chartist, an autobiography, edited by Brian Harrison and Patricia Hollis (Europa Publications, 1979), £ 14.50.

Roman Britain, by John Wacher (J. M. Dent, new edition of 1978 hardback, 1980), £4.50.

Social Welfare Arc~ives in Britain and the U.S.A., by Colin Harvey (Heatherbank Press for the Museum of Social Work, 1980), from the publisher, 163 Mugdock Road, Milngarie, Glasgow G62 6BR, £1.75 plus 35p post.

Posters and Chartism in Stockport - a collection of thirteen posters, compiled by T. D. W. Reid (Metropolitan Borough of Stockport, 1980), from the Central Library, Wellington Road South, Stockport SK 1 3RS, £ 1.00.

Subterranean Britain - Aspects of Underground Archaeology ... , edited by Harriet Crawford (A. & C. Black, 1980), £7.95.

The Third Book of Remembrance of Southampton 1514-1602. Vol. IV 1590-1602, edited by T. B. James, transcribed by A. L. Merson (Southampton Record Series Vol.

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XXII, 1980), from the Sales Officer, Southampton Record Series, c/o University Library, Southampton S09 5NH, £10.00.

From Middle England - a memory of the thirties in school in Wolverhampton, by Philip Oakes (Andre Deutsch, 1980), £5.95.

Women at Work and in Society -Sources in the Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick, by Susan Edwards and Richard Storey (University of Warwick Library, 1980), from The Modern Records Centre, The Library, The University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, 50p.

LOCAL HISTORIES

Cromer Past, by E. A. Goodwyn (privately published, 1980), from the author, Cherry Hill, Ashman's Road, Beccles, Suffolk, 90p.

London - The Biography of a City, by Christopher Hibbert (Penguin Books, 1980), £4.95.

Montaillou .- life in a medieval village in France, by Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie (Penguin Books, 1980 version of 1978 first English hardback edition), £2.50 paperback.

Twenty Centuries in Sedlescombe, by Beryl Lucey (Regency Press, 1980), £6.50.

Stoke Ferry - the Story of a Norfolk Village, by Doris E. Coates (The Harpsden Press, 1980), from the publisher, Guyda Cottage, Harpsden Village, Henley on Thames, Oxfordshire, £4.95.

A Short History of Sussex, by John Lowerson (Dawson Publishing, 1980), £ 10.00.

The Enigma that is Trimley - a short history of two Suffolk parishes, by Ray Howlett (privately published, 1980), from the author, 48 Old Kirton Road, Trimley, Ipswich, Suffolk IPlO OQH, £1.20.

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LOCAL STUDIES

From Hastings to Culloden -Battlefields in Britain, by Peter Young and John Adair (Roundwood Press, 1979), £12 .00.

Prisoners of England - the German Prisoners of War in England in the Second World War, by M. Kochan (Macmillan, 1980), £15.00.

Banbury and Shutford Plush, by Vera Hodgkins and Christine Bloxham (Banbury Historical Society, 1980), from Banbury Museum, Banbury, Oxfordshire.

Photographs of Old Bolton, by Chris Driver (Hendon Mill Publishing Co., 1980), £2.30.

The Bridgnorth Castle Hill Railway, by F. B. Foxall (Bridgnorth Historical Publications), from the publisher, 41 Victoria Road, Bridgnorth, Salop WV16 4LD, 35p plus lOp post.

Bygone Traffic on the Severn with Special Reference to the Port of Bridgnorth, by W. Watkins Pitchford (Bridgnorth Historical Publications, reprint of 1935 lecture, 1980), from the publisher, 41 Victoria Road, Bridgnorth, Salop WV16 4LD, 95p plus lOp post.

The History of St. Mary's Church, Chatham, Kent, by Edwin Harris (John Hallewell Publications, reprint, 1978), 50p.

Traditions of East Anglia - studies in folk life, by Robert Simper (Boydell and Brewer, 1980), £7.50.

The Origins and Evolution of Field and Settlement Patterns in the Herefordshire Manor of Marsden, by June A. Shepherd (Department of Geography, Queen Mary College, University of London, 1979), from the publisher, Mile End Road, London E 1 4NS.

A Postal History of Durham City, by H. M. Oxley and D. M. Williams (Durham County Library, 1980), from the County Library, County

Hall, Durham DHl STY , £1.50 plus 35p post.

Poverty and Piety in an English Village - Terling, Essex 1525-1700, by Keith Wrightson and David Levine (Academic Press, 1979) , £ 11.20.

The Minor Clergy of Exeter Cathedral, 1300-1548, by Nicholas Orme (University of Exeter, 1980), from the Registry, Northcote House, The Queen's Drive, Exeter EX4 4QT , £4.50 .

Caroline Fox of Falmouth (1819-1871), a Quaker Blue-stocking -friend of J. S . Mill, the Carly/es and F. D. Maurice, by R. J. N. Tod (William Sessions, 1980), from the publisher, the Ebor Press, York Y03 9HS, £3.00.

Back of Beyond - Life in Holderness before the First World War, by Alice M. Markham, introduced by John Markham (Lockington Publishing Co., North Ferriby , Humberside, 1979), from the publisher , The Studio, Railway Station, North Ferriby, North Humberside , £1.80.

Around Historic Kent , by Malcolm John , drawings by C. A. T. Brigden (John Hallewell Publications, 1978), £3 .95.

Kent in the Fifties, by Reginald Turnor, with wood engravings by Monica Poole (John Hallewell Publications, 1978), £4.50.

Sailorman Between the Wars - the Journal of a Thames, Medway and Coastal Bargeman, by John Allendale (John Hallewell Publications , 1978), £6.50.

Bygone Gravesend and Bygone North West Kent - compiled from the postcard collection of Malcolm John (John Hallewell Publications, 1979), £1.50.

Bygone Medway, views compiled from postcards in the collections of Malcolm John , Jenifer Roberts and

John Sifleet (John Hallewell Publications, 1977-1979), from the publisher , 172 High Street , Rochester , Kent , Vol. I 99p, Vol. II 99p, Vol. III £1.50 .

Kingston upon Thames as it was in old photographs, by Brya n Woodriff (Hendon Publishing Co. , 1980), £2.30 .

The Changing Landscape 1750-1840 in Lanarkshire, by Eric Hunter, Irene Watson, Jacqueline Rosie (Jordanhall College of Education , 1978), from G. F. Gold, History Dept. , Jordanhall College, Southbrae Drive, Glasgow Gl3 lPP, 60p .

Music and Tradition in Early Industrial Lancashire 1780-1840, by Roger Elbourne (D. S. Brewer for the Folklore Society, 1980), £10.00 .

Li verpool Road Station, Manchester - an historical and architectural survey, by R. S. Fitzgerald (Manchester University Press , 1980), £11.50 hardback , £5.90 paperback.

London Particulars - childhood memoirs of the early twentieth century, by C. H. Rolph (Oxford University Press, 1980), £6.95.

By Rail to Mildenhall, by Peter Turner (Mildenhall Museum) , from the Museum , 32 Market Place, Mildenhall, Suffolk IP28 7EF, £1.00 plue l 5p post.

A History of RA.F. Mildenhall, by Colin M. Dring (Mildenhall Museum, 1980), from the Museum , 32 Market Place, Mildenhall, Suffolk IP28 7EF, £2.00 plus 20p post.

Inns and Harbours of North Norfolk, by Phil Drackett (Royal Automobile Club, 1980), £2.75.

Northampton Clay Tobacco -Pipes and Pipe Makers, by W. R. G. Moore (Northampton Museum and Art Gallery) , from the Central Museum and Art Gallery, Guildhall Road , Northampton , £1.00 plus 2lp post .

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Early Man in Portsmouth and South East Hampshire, by David J. Rudkin (Portsmouth City Council, 1980), from the publisher, Civic Offices, Guildhall Square, Portsmouth PO 1 2AZ, 50p.

Rochester - a sketch in pen and verse, by Malcolm John (John Hallewell Publications, 1977), £ 1.00.

Rochester Inns and Signs, by Edwin Harris (John Hallewell Publications, reprint, 1976), 50p.

The Complete Tourists Guide and Handbook to the Ancient City of Rochester (John Hallewell Publications), £1.00.

Dickens' Rochester, by John Oliver (John Hallewell Publications, 1978), £3.95.

Carnival - a People's Uprising at Romans, France, 1579-1580, by Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie (Scholar Press, 1980), £12.50.

Helensburgh and Garelochside in Old Pictures, by Brian D. Osborne (Dumbarton District Libraries, 1980), from the publisher, Levenford House, Helenslea Road, Dumbarton G82 4AJ, £1.50.

The Development of Public Services in Kirkintilloch 1870-1914, by Jessie Shanks (Jordanhill College of Education, 1980),from G. F. Gold, History Dept., Jordanhill College, Southbrae Drive, Glasgow Gl3 lPP, £1.50.

Rails to Portpatrick, Scotland, by H. D. Thorne (T. Stephenson & Sons Ltd., 1976), from the publisher, Prescot, Merseyside, £5.95.

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Raiders over Sheffield - the Story of the Air Raids of 12th and 15th December 1940, by Mary Walton and J. P. Lamb (Sheffield City Libraries, 1980) , £5.95 hardback, £2.95 paperback.

Carols of West Somerset , by Glyn Court (privately published, 1980), from the author, Hill Head House, W ashford, W atchet, Somerset, 40p.

The Houses and Inhabitants of Thomas Ellis Owen's Southsea, by R. C. Riley (Portsmouth City Council, 1980), from the publisher, Civic Offices, Guildhall Square, Portsmouth POI 2AZ, 50p .

Stafford as it was in old photographs, by Roy Lewis and Joan Anslow (Hendon Publishing Co., 1980), £2.30.

By Train to Kinver, Staffs., 1901-1930, by D. M. Bills and E. and W. R. Griffiths (Elda Publications, 1980), from the publisher, 26 High Street, Kinver, Staffs., 70p.

Politics and Printing in Winchester 1830-1880, by Roy and John Lewis (The Keepsake Press in association with Winchester City Museum), from the Keepsake Press, 26 Sydney Road, Richmond, Surrey TW9 lUB, £1.50.

The Genera/Strike in York, 1926, by R. I. Hills (University of York, St Anthony's Press, 1980), from St Anthony's Press, St Anthony's Hall, York YOl 2PW, 80p plus 15p post.

Grenoside Recollections - life in a Yorkshire Village, by Harold Wasteneys, edited by J . D . A . Widdowson (Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language, University of Sheffield, 1980).

NOTES ON NEWS Compiled by Bettie Miller (Secretary of SCLH)

Association of County Archivists: Chief officers of record offices operating within the jurisdiction of local authorities have decided that there are issues which have a particular significance for the services which they provide, and that they would value opportunities to talk together about them and respond jointly . To facilitate such an interchange and to make a ready collective response more easy, an Association of County Archivists has been formed with membership drawn from the heads of archive services in the shire and metropolitan counties of England and Wales. William Serjeant of Suffolk County Council is the first Chairman of the Association, and Allan Seaman, of Tyne and Wear, its Secretary. Further information may be obtained from Vic Gray, Press and Public Relations Officer, Essex Record Office, County Hall, Chelmsford CNl ILX (Tel. 0245 67222 Ext . 2103).

Catering Arrangements: If your local history group is visiting an area and would like tea, why not ask the local Women's Institute if it can provide it? Horncastle Banavallum WI in Lincolnshire did this for a society, members of the Institute donating the food so that some of the money raised from the charge made could be given to charity. It would be unreasonable to expect a response on every occasion, or on the part of all Wis, but the Institutes' willingness to be helpful is so well known that local societies might bear local Wis in mind

when wanting to arrange refreshments, particularly in those parts of the country where restaurants are few and far between.

Centre for Environmental Interpretation: Following fierce competition from thirteen universities, the largest polytechnic in Britain, Manchester Polytechnic, has won an award of £75,000 from the Carnegie United Kingdom Trust to set up a Centre for Environmental Interpretation. The purpose of the Centre is two-fold. It will further develop the philosophy , theory and practice of interpretation, promoting improved opportunities for the interpretation of Britain's rural and urban heritage. Secondly, it will offer advice and assistance to those engaged or interested in the practice of interpretation, and provide training in the skills and techniques required. It is believed that a site, or aspect of the environment, is capable of successful interpretation , that the public can be helped to sense the intriguing connections between events and places, and gain a 'feel' for the flow of history. Interpretation is deemed to be not merely a matter of giving information, nor a presentation of an exhibit, but an attempt to provoke a reaction and to generate a sense of involvement.

First, First: The University of Hull is introducing a two-stage part-time degree in regional and local history, commencing in September 1980. Stage one will lead to the certificate in

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regional and local history; stage two to a B.A. Honours degree in regional and local history. The certificate course may be taken in its own right. Students who gain the certificate at an acceptable level will be eligible for entry to stage two. Those who already hold the University's diploma in local history may apply for direct entry to stage two, as may people with similar qualifications from other Universities, and graduates whose courses included a good element of regional/local history. Details available from Alan Fowlie, Co ­ordinator of Continuing Education, Department of Adult Education, 195 Cottingham Road, Hull HUS 2EQ.

Guide to Traditional Buildings: A book, 144 pages in length and fully illustrated with maps, photographs and diagrams, has been published by EP Publishing Ltd. at £4.95 a copy, to serve as a guide to traditional buildings in England, Wales and Scotland which are accessible to the public. The traditional buildings in this publication are the small, old -mainly medieval - cottages, farmhouses and communal buildings which were constructed from locally found materials such as wood, stone, cob and occasionally brick. Copies of Traditional Buildings - Accessible to the Public by J. R. Armstrong, are available from bookshops or, in case of difficulty, direct from the publisher at East Ardsley, Wakefield, West Yorkshire WF3 2JN. If ordering from the publisher, please add 30p to sale price for carriage and packing.

Heralds and Heraldry in the Tower of London: The establishment of The Heralds' Museum at the Tower of London in March of this year achieved an ambition which the Heralds of England have pursued for the last twenty years, and fulfils a main objective of the College of Arms

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Trust, founded in 1956. The Museum was the brain child of Sir Anthony Wagner, Clarenceux King of Arms, who has become its first Director. In it visitors can trace the development of heraldry from Norman times to the present day. The Museum - only the second of its kind in the world - is open from 1st April to 30th September inclusive, between 9.30 a.m. and 5.00 p.m. weekdays, and from 2.00 p.m. until 5.00 p.m. on Sundays.

Fire! Help needed: Alan Parnell, FRIBA, 6 W el beck Street, London W. l. is keen to hear from anyone with experience of the effect of fire legislation on historical buildings. He has been commissioned by the Department of the Environment to study the problems involved in meeting the requirements of fire legislation when historic buildings undergo change of use, and to compile a schedule of case histories.

Historic Gardens and Parks of the East Riding: A two-year research programme on the conservation of gardens a_nd parks of historic interest is under way. Funded by the Ernest Cook Trust, it is being carried forward by the Institute of Ad­vanced Architectural Studies at the University of York. Part of the project is concerned with the investigation of suitable methods by which a comprehensive Survey of Gardens and Parks of Historic Interest in the United Kingdom might be carried out. Although gardens and parks are often acknowledged as being an important part of the British national heritage, up to now there has been no thorough survey and there is therefore no central record of them.

An East Riding Historic Gardens Study Group has been set up to assist the survey, by making a record of the landscape gardens and parks of the

county, using forms produced at the Institute of Advanced Architectural Studies . The Group will be led by David Neave, WEA Tutor Organiser, and will begin work in the autumn. Initially it is intended to hold a six­week WEA course at Beverley, on 'Historic Gardens and Parks of the East Riding', which will introduce the history of landscape gardening and the sources for its study, using East Riding examples from the Middle Ages to the nineteenth century .

Methodist Register: A register is being compiled of people actively interested in the history of British Methodism. Anyone wishing to be included on the register should write, enclosing s.a.e. please, to John A. Vickers, British Secretary, World Methodist Historical Society, 8 7 Marshall Avenue, Bognor Regis, W. Sussex P02 I 2TW.

Public Record Office: The Record Users' Group was one of the bodies that wrote at the beginning of the year to the Advisory Council on Public Records to express its concern about the notice given by the Keeper of the PRO that "As a contribution to the reduction in size of the Civil Service announced by the Prime Minister on 6th December last (1979) the Public Record Office Reading Rooms in Chancery Lane will be closed in the course of the next two years. The records at present produced there will be made available to the public at Kew" only. Section 1(2) of the Public Records Act, 1958, states that "There shall be an Advisory Council on Public Records to advise the Lord Chancellor on matters concerning public records in general and, in particular, on those aspects of the work of the Public Record Office which affect members of the public who make use of the facilities provided by the Public Record Office". Notwithstanding this

prov1s1on, the decision to close the Search Rooms was taken without consulting the Advisory Council. The Council was, and is, strongly opposed to the idea of closure. Its Chairman, the Master of the Rolls, wrote to the Lord Chancellor asking that the decision be reconsidered.

When members of the Record Users' Group met the Keeper of the PRO on the 27th February, 1980, they learnt that an assessment made earlier by the Ci vii Service Department of the staffing requirements of the Public Record Office showed a need for a complement of 4 78. At the beginning of 1980, the staff numbered 441, 37 below strength. By the 1st April, 1981, the figure is expected to be 430, that is to say 48 less than the number thought necessary . If the cuts proposed are fully implemented, staff in 1982 will total 390, 88 or 18% below the recommended complement. This factor alone points to a case for applying a far less stringent cut than the one of I 0% proposed.

And what effects will the proposed closure of the Search Rooms at Chancery Lane have on users? As many as 100 people visit Chancery Lane daily. No figures are available to show how many of those visitors travel from distant places to central London by rail. Assume it to be 60%-and the figure may well be higher-then 60 people will daily go to and from central London to Kew by underground train at a cost of cheap day return tickets totalling £78. Collectively, over a fifty week period they will spend over £19,500, and 30,000 hours in travel time. And while the visitors are travelling by train to Kew, the records they wish to see-and which are housed at Chancery Lane-may be travelling at risk in transit to, or from, Kew by

. road . Yes, the records may actually

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be going in the opposite direction to those who would consult them, for it will not be until many of the visitors reach Kew that they will be able to consult the catalogues from which they can learn which documents they require to enable them to do their work. And these are only some of the difficulties likely to be encountered.

The proposal to close the Search Rooms at Chancery Lane was one of the subjects discussed by members of the Records Users' Group during the meeting they had at the House of Commons on 3rd June 1980, with two Members of the All Party Heritage Group, its Chairman, Patrick Cormack, and Philip Whitehead .

The importance of the nation's heritage was accorded recognition by Parliament in the passage of the National Heritage Act. This established a National Heritage Memorial Fund for financially assisting the acquisition, maintenance and preservation of land, buildings and objects of outstanding historic and other interest. £ 15 millions or more of public money is to be made available to the Fund . The public records comprise many millions of documents of varying shape and size extending as far back as 1086, when Domesday Book was compiled. Those records occupy some eighty miles of shelving. Every year new accessions amounting on average to one mile of shelving are taken into the Office. The present proposal to cut the expenditure of the Public Record Office--the major national record repository in this country - so as to achieve a 10 per cent. saving of something of the order of £225,000 a year is inconsistent with the thinking and feeling embodied in the National Heritage Act, and will impose an unreasonable burden on a department which is already understaffed in

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relation to the enormous and priceless holdings for which it is responsible, and to which the public has a right of access. ·

A Chance of a Life-time! Name an Organisation: Readers of this journal will know that the Report of the Committee to Review Local History recommended a strong independent national organisation for local history in England and Wales. The Standing Conference for Local History may, of course, serve as the foundation on which to build such an independent organisation with sufficient resources to provide a wide range of services and to champion the needs of local history and its practitioners. A group of people are currently drawing up suggestions for presentation to the AGM of SC LH on the 19th September , 1980, for the constitution and membership of an independent national organisation. It seems probable that these will include proposals that the body seek charitable status, and that membership should be open to all, individuals, societies and institutions alike.

To qualify as a charity, the new organisation would have to convince the Charity Commissioners that its work is educational, and that it confers social and recreational benefits, not just upon its members but upon the community at large. Now to the chance of a lifetime! Name the independent organisation for local history. If you have any views on the name by which you think it should be known, please let the Secretary of SC LH know, as soon as possible, at 26 Bedford Square, London WC 1 B 3HU . Each and every idea will be .considered .

PHOTOMATIC 80. Produces high quality real photo­

graphic black & white postcards for many museums

and societies throughout the country . The sale of

postcards of your area will create interest in your

local history and at the same time supplement your

funds. We can work from most types of originals

and also produce photographic booklets and book­

marks. SEND FOR DETAILS AND SAMPLES TO

0(i\ (:.Jl.:J Tel : HATFIELD 62506

Hatfield, Herts. AL9 7DX I a'