In using documents to research landscape history and ecology, there are two related golden rules to observe:
In any conflict of evidence between what the landscape itself has to say and ...
Princethorpe College, which is located in a former Benedictine priory, owes its existence to the French Revolution. However, its story really begins in the 17th century.
On 13th May 1630 Marie Granger ...
Restoration
In September 2015, Kenilworth’s Pound was officially opened following restoration driven by Councillors Gordon and Pat Cain and the Kenilworth Civic Society. A campaign involving local residents raised interest and ...
In the archives of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust there is a database listing the names of children in the town who were apprenticed to trades in order to keep them ...
For a small village, Church Lawford certainly had its fair share of clock makers, of which Daniel Dalton was one. There is an intriguing record that may explain how the ...
Although there are piles of weighty solemn looking documents kept in the strongrooms of the Warwickshire County Record Office, there are a good deal of gems down there that could be ...
At Christmas time families often have their own traditions and stories for the holiday period, unique to their own personal histories and communities. In many cases, these stories are represented ...
There was schooling in Warwickshire’s Chilvers Coton in the 17th Century without the aid of a school building, because of the educational concerns of the Newdigate family of Arbury Hall. ...
My heritage recipe challenge was to tackle this delightful invention found in the Wise family records.1 The 18th century writing is clear and the instructions quite simple and not too daunting. ...
Young boys were employed in Warwickshire coalfields in the 18th and 19th centuries.
6d a day in 1729
A coal account book in the Newdigate archives refers to the use of boys ...
It isn’t Christmas without a mince pie and once upon a time it wouldn’t have been a mince pie without the addition of actual minced meat. When the Warwickshire County ...
In times gone by, the way to learn a craft and earn a living was to be apprenticed to a master. You would be legally bound to the master for ...
The length of time involved in an apprenticeship – often seven or even ten years – inevitably meant that there were problems, some more serious than others. The records cared ...
Many of the apprentice records held by Warwickshire County Record Office relate to paupers. The parish had to care for children when their parents died or became unable to support ...
The recipe book
Divided into sections for cookery, preserving, physicke and chiurgery. Index at back. 350 pages. This belongs to the Newdigate collection. It is undated but estimated to be early ...
Given the TV programme featuring Britain’s biggest family, you might be interested to hear about a very large Warwickshire family reported by the Rugby Advertiser in 1912 as follows. It ...
Migration
I should have known things would not be any different, even back in the 1700s, given that my grandparents up and relocated to Canada from Leicestershire, England in 1913. People ...
Hon. George Shirley
George Shirley was born in 1705 at Staunton Harold, Leicestershire. At the age of 16, he joined the army as an ensign in the First Regiment of Footguards. ...
The historical background and development of gardens has always interested me. When I first started my research work, I regret to say that I had never even been into my ...
(continued from the Master Bakers of Coventry)
The ‘property’ of the Bakers’ Company was handed over to the Corporation of Coventry by Mr Thomas Windridge, c.1908.
It consists of:
Three books of minutes ...
On browsing through the minutes of the Coventry & District Master Bakers Association, which are kept in the City Archives, I found many interesting items relating to the bakery trade ...
2016 sees the three hundredth anniversary of the birth of Capability Brown (CB300).
He was baptised on 30 August 1716 at Kirkharle, Northumberland, the son of a yeoman farmer and a ...
The Warwick House of Correction or Bridewell stood on the corner between Saltisford Rock (now Theatre Street) and Bridewell Lane (formerly Wallditch and now Barrack Street); the site is roughly where ...
Before 1798, there is often ambiguity about whether the owners or occupiers are listed as proprietors. The names can be out of date, as changes were not always updated straight ...