1702 WSV Working Proof 17 Feb - St Albans History · generous bequests of books and papers from respected researchers (See Library Notes at Page 8). These valuable additions will

NEWSLETTER 203February 2017

ST ALBANS & HERTFORDSHIREARCHITECTURAL & ARCHAEOLOGICAL

SOCIETY

President’s MessageOur new Vice PresidentThe Six Bells

Verdun TreeVisit to the Mary RoseRecent Library Acquisitions

Included in this issue:

Last Mail Coach to arrive in St AlbansA re-enactment? c.1890

Postcard from the Arthur Allen collection

www.stalbanshistory.org SAHAAS NEWSLETTER 203 Page 2

Follow us on Twitter at SAHAAS(@stalbanspast)

C��

President’s Message 3Peter Burley – Our new Vice President 5SAHAAS New Year Party 6

Library 7Clock Tower 11Coach Outing to the Mary Rose Museum 3 May 2017 12J.T. Smith – A Life in Research 13

Church Bell Ringing in St Albans during the First World War 15The County Societies Symposium 2016 17Bellmeadow – 137 Fishpool Street 18The Herts Advertiser is now being digitised 19

The Six Bells in St Michael’s Street 20Verdun Tree 21Obituaries 22Saturday night entertainment in Edwardian St Albans 24

Lecture Programme 25New Museum and Gallery - Progress 31

MEMBERSHIP

The Society welcomes Mrs June & Mr Keith Spark of Harpenden asnew members.

David SmithMembership Secretary

While every care has been taken in the preparation of this newsletter the publishers cannot be held responsible forthe accuracy of the information herein or any consequence arising from it



PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE

2017 began with a very well attendedand most enjoyable New Year party atVerulamium Museum. Our guestsincluded: the Deputy Mayor Cllr GillClark; Cllr Julian Daly, Leader of theCity Council and his wife; TracyHarvey, Head of Planning, who wasdeputising for Chief Executive JamesBlake; Cllr Annie Brewster, ProfessorTim Boatswain, Chairman of the CivicSociety; Caroline Eldred, DeputyChairman of the Museums and Galler-ies Trust and her husband; and CatNewley, Audience DevelopmentManager of the Museum, who con-tributed so much to the success of theevening. My thanks go to all whohelped.

I think the guest list reflects the wayin which inter-organisational linkshave developed and strengthened inthe last few years. Teamwork contin-ues to be important in the develop-ment of the heritage of St Albans andits tourist potential. It is good to seethat work has started on our newMuseum and Gallery and work on theAbbey Visitors’ Centre is due to startthis spring. Most of the moneyneeded for the Museum has beenraised, only 8% is still to be found.SAHAAS members have in various

ways, both as a society and individu-ally, supported this project from thebeginning and we continue to raisefunds through the Big Events lecturesand hopefully through another of ourpopular quiz evenings at KingsburyBarn in June.

As a result of the Old Town Hall build-ing work, the SAHAAS library has nowmoved to Sandridge Gate, where it isflourishing. We have received severalgenerous bequests of books andpapers from respected researchers(See Library Notes at Page 8). Thesevaluable additions will enable us tooffer an ever-growing assortment ofSt Albans and Hertfordshire materialfor study and general interest. It alsoinvolves the library team in consider-able work: building new storage,

Photo: John Humphreys



sorting and cataloguing and, hope-fully, later digitising more of thecollection. I would particularly like tothank: Donald Munro, Jon Mein andTony Cooper who organised themove; Frank Iddiols who planned andexecuted the practicalities of it; AndyLawrence who was generous with histime and his van; Ailsa Herbert wholiaised with us from the Abbey end;Sarah Keeling who was our liaisonwith the Museum; and the fifty or somembers who volunteered to moveboxes. Any new members who wouldbe interested in helping in the on-

going work at the library shouldcontact us.

We look forward to Kate Harwood’sseminars on historic gardens in Marchand early April in the library and hopethat this will be the first of manyevents using the new facilities.

So this year we have much to lookforward to in addition to our lecturesand outings and I wish you all a happyand healthy year.

Helen Bishop President

Another excellent buffet. Val Argue withhelpers Sue Mann and Caroline Howkins

Many thanks to all who contributed to the buffet and helped arrange the foodand serve the drinks.

Val Argue

Photo: J. Humphreys



PETER BURLEYOUR NEW VICE PRESIDENT

In the last newsletter, Helen Bishop advertised the needfor a Vice President to assist her in her tasks and duties.With so many activities being taken on board, rangingfrom support for the New Museum and Gallery project,a new focus on research into the social history, as wellas archaeology and architecture in the city, and ourinterface with both the Council and other interest groupsand societies, demands the presence and attention of our President. FollowingHelen’s call for a Vice President, supported by our SAHAAS Council, Peter Burleyhas offered his services and we welcome him to Council.

The following is a short biographical note to introduce him to our widermembership.

Peter read history at the University of York and did research into the late French‘ancien régime’ at University College London. He then pursued a career in localgovernment and in the regulation of health professions until retiring from theNursing and Midwifery Council in August 2016. He maintained an active interestin history with a book, film season and various media appearances at thebicentenary of the French Revolution in 1989. In 1999 he became involved withthe planning inquiry on land on Bernards Heath (site of the second battle of StAlbans, Wars of the Roses, 1461) and this led to a commission - together withtwo colleagues - for a book on the two battles of St Albans in 2007. He hascontinued to research and present on the battles and has researched otherlocal history topics in St Albans.

He is Honorary Secretary of the St Albans University of the 3�� Age (U3A), amember of the South East Region Committee of the Battlefields Trust, acommittee member at the Friends of Bernards Heath and was on the St AlbansMuseums and Galleries Advisory Group. Peter’s next project is to try to findexactly where the Duke of Somerset (killed in the First Battle of St Albans, 1455)is now buried and give St Albans the credit for a second royal burial at theCathedral.

Bryan HanlonHon. Secretary

Peter Burley



SAHAAS NEW YEAR PARTY

The Society’s New Year Party tookplace on 6 January – as usual at theVerulamium Museum. With kindofferings from many of our members(thank you!), Val Argue organised asumptuous finger buffet, whilst liquidrefreshments of the alcoholic, andnon-alcoholic, variety were in thehands of Bryan Hanlon, CaroleOldknow and Robin Green. Bryanalso organised one of his quizzes, wonby John Morewood, and Andy Law-rence won a bottle of wine for winningthe Museum’s pub quiz version ofBBC2’s “Only Connect” programme.

We were pleased to welcome ourdeputy mayor, Cllr Gill Clark. Sheaddressed members and guests in ashort speech which showed a genuineappreciation of St Albans and its her-itage and our contribution as asociety. She congratulated membersof our Society for its research andpublications as well as working with

the Civic Society in keeping the ClockTower open and great visitor attrac-tion. She also suggested to our gueststhat the city’s planners should climbto the top of both the Clock andCathedral towers to look at the diver-sity of roofs in the city before makingdecisions about changes to the land-scape. With both the leader of SADCCouncil and Head of Planning present,we hope they took notice!

The Museum’s Audience and Develop-ment Manager, Cat Newley, displayedthe equipment for the ‘talking build-ings’ (see Newsletter 203 page 27)that will be used on the hoardings thatare now appearing around the oldTown Hall. To demonstrate how itworked, she played a voice recordingin which the tower recounted itshistory (with Caroline Howkins as thevoice).

In all, a most enjoyable evening – weare looking forward to next year!

Photo by John Humphreys

Cllr Gill Clarka d d r e s s e smembers andguests

Cat Newley windsup the talkingb u i l d i n g smachine

Photos: J. Humphreys



LIBRARY

It has been a very busy period for thelibrary dominated latterly by accom-modation planning and bringing inSAHAAS materials from the Magentastore, and the Beardsmore Collectionfrom the Cathedral.

Library computing and hardware.Malcolm Merrick has successfullyestablished a local Wi-Fi connectedLibrary network via the SADC Guesthub. The second computer andlaptops are able to access SAHAASfiles of slides et cetera held on themain computer. Colin Smart has deliv-ered a very good scanner kindlydonated by his son. We are still havingproblems with printing via Wi-Fi andmay have to seek professional advice.

Library management system. ASAHAAS delegation had a very inform-ative visit to the CILIP Library Manage-ment Systems showcase inBloomsbury on 18 November. We sawa number of prospective replace-ments for Heritage which should giveus much more, including hosting andan OPAC (On-Line Public Access Cat-alogue), at very competitive rates. Wewill be looking at and testing two orthree of the systems in greater detail

in February and March, in time hope-fully, for a migration in June.

Reorganisation of the Library RoomSpace. Frank Iddiols drew up a guideplan for incorporating SAHAASmaterials held in external store. Thesewere moved into the Library room inthe week before Christmas.

Beardsmore Collection. This notablegift from the Cathedral was packed upon 11 January, shelving dismantled onthe 13�� and the whole transferred toSandridge Gate in barely 2½ hours onthe morning of Saturday 12��. JonMein drew up volunteer workingparty rotas for the several stages,which all went off very efficiently.Particular thanks are due to TonyCooper, Frank Iddiols, Andy “The Van”Lawrence, Caroline Howkins, AilsaHerbert from the Cathedral Libraryand who is our liaison person at theAbbey, and to Sarah Keeling of theMuseums’ Service and the Cathedralfor their invaluable help in making thissuch a smooth operation. Thanks arealso due of course to all the volun-teers involved.

It may take a couple of weeks for theshelving to be erected and the booksand files placed on shelves to besorted and allocated by SAHAAS and



the St Albans Museum. But the Librarywill hopefully have returned to normalby the time you are reading this.

Gifts and donations. Early inDecember Dan Smith, son of J.T.Smith, helped us transfer to SandridgeGate some 12-15 box files of hisfather’s meticulously arranged mate-rials relating to lay properties in StAlbans, plus some books and journals.Gerard McSweeney's papers arrivedin the library on 30 November. Therehave been smaller separate donationsof interesting prints and ephemerafrom the Cathedral and from HALS.Tony Cooper and I will be going toview Eileen Roberts' material inFebruary.

Donald MunoLibrarian

Library Notes February 2017Recent Acquisitions

Hertfordshire: Domesday and OldEnglish 10-hide groups. Compiled byV S White. Wheathampstead: V SWhite, 2016. 558pp. maps, tables.A reading of the Domeday Book anda summary of the contents by hun-dred, with a reconstruction of OldEnglish 10-hide groups and 120-hidehundreds, 1065-1086 A.D. A set ofproposed Old English half-hundredssynthesised for a Hertfordshire pro-posed to be south of the Icknield Way

that would appear to have beendefined in part by the line of Romanroads. (Note: Wording quoted fromthe title-page.)

Wheathampstead, Hertfordshire:transfer of ownership 1060. Compiledby V S White. Wheathampstead: V SWhite, 2012. 238pp, tables, maps,appendices, index.

This volume examines the transfer often hides of land in Wheathampsteadfrom the ownership of King Edwardthe Confessor to that of WestminsterMonastery. The compiler draws onthree translations from the Latin orig-inal to provide a reading of the textand translations, and interpretationsof the bounds of the land. The studyaims to stimulate discussions ofWheathampstead’s Saxon origins.Appendix 3, “Background material”contains facsimiles of papers aboutWheathampstead history.

Wheathampstead, Hertfordshire:details of the fallen, researched andcompiled by Margaret and TonyPankhurst. Wheathampstead: V SWhite, 2014. 248pp, illus.Records the names and details availa-ble of the servicemen killed as a resultof action in the First World War,remembered on war memorials andthe Roll of Honour, and others with aWheathampstead connection.



Articles from recent journals

In: The Local Historian, vol 46, no 4,October 2016Pp 315-326 ‘John Pierpoint Morganand the Wall Hall estate during twoworld wars’, by Marie-France Wienerand John Russell Silver.The fortunes of the British countryestate in the first half of the 20��century are explored, as exemplifiedby the Wall Hall estate near Alden-ham. In WW1 it served as a centre forcare of the wounded, and its garagewas converted to a Voluntary AidDetachment (VAD) hospital. In WW2a British Red Cross hospital was set upat a model farm on the estate, and themain house accommodated Armyadministration staff, including theArmy Selection Board.

In: Harpenden and District LocalHistory Society Newsletter, no 130,December 2016.Pp 17-22 ‘Traces of rabbits inHarpenden and Wheathampstead’, byJohn Wassell.This article discusses the survivingevidence for the breeding of rabbitsin the district in late medieval timesas reflected in field names.

Tony Cooper

Plans of the Fishpool Street area

We have recently acquired for use inthe Library copies of three plans of theFishpool Street area to the east of andincluding St Michael’s Manor. Theydate to the early 17th century, c.1790and 1841 respectively. The source forthese is surprising, namely thearchives of St Bartholomew’s Hospitalin London. It appears from theresearch of the late Alan Pickles thatthe Hospital (in the guise of the pre-Dissolution Priory) owned a thin stripof land here from 1319 to the 19thcentury.

The earliest plan is perhaps the mostinteresting. It is based on asouth/north orientation with the Verat the top. This extract (see page 10)shows the property abutting theHospital’s land to the west; this is nowSt Michael’s Manor but was then theGape family’s property. As tanning issaid to be the source of the Gapes’wealth, the presence of what appearsto be a tan-yard to the south of thehouse is significant. Perhaps thosemembers with an interest in industrialarchaeology can advise whether earlymodern tan-yards were open to theelements and what the purpose wasof the building immediately to theeast.



These are important maps for thoseinterested in the development of thispart of Fishpool Street and should beconsidered in conjunction with AlanPickles’ notes as well as Chris Saun-ders’ article ‘A Sixteenth Century

Tannery in St Albans’ (Hertfordshire’sPast, no. 3, Autumn 1977). There isplenty of scope for a review of theirfindings.

Jonathan Mein

Early 17th century plan ofwhat is now

St Michael’s Manor

© St Bartholomew’s HospitalArchives

Courtesy of St Bartholomew’sHospital Archives

S

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CLOCK TOWER

Usually at this time of year we wouldbe preparing to open up the ClockTower for Residents: Enjoy St Albansat the end of January. However, StAlbans District Council have decidednot to support this event any more.Instead SADC will be supporting theBig Weekend (1-2 April), which is allabout giving Hertfordshire residentsthe chance to discover – or rediscover– the array of fantastic things to seeand do on their doorstep. Encouragingthem to spread the word about theircounty – be a tourist in your ownhome town. The Clock Tower willbe joining in by opening up for bothdays and offering tickets in theBig Weekend prize draw.(www.hertsbigweekend.co.uk).

The opening of the Clock Tower forthe switching on of the Christmaslights on Sunday, 27�� November,went well – 287 visitors for the 4½hours we were open. This year the StAlbans Christmas lights were switchedon in four different places – St Peter’sStreet, outside the Arena, the VintryGardens and in front of the ClockTower. A selection of Christmas Carolswas played by St Albans City brassband outside the Clock Tower beforethe lights were officially turned on bythe Mayor, Cllr Frances Leonard.

Preparations are in progress for theClockateers’ Party to be held in theMuseum on Friday, 31�� March 2017at 7.30pm. Invitations will be postedin February to all our Clockateers butanyone thinking of becoming a Clock-ateer is welcome to come along tooand find out more about helping tokeep this iconic building open to thepublic.

The Clock Tower will be opened bySAHAAS on Good Friday, 14�� April2017 for the start of the summerseason and then will be manned onalternate weekends by SAHAAS volun-teers and Civic Society volunteers untilthe close on Sunday, 1�� October 2017.

As always, Mike and I would like tothank all the Clockateers for givingtheir time to keep the Clock Toweropen for the public to enjoy and wehope to see you all at the ClockateersParty on Friday, 31�� March 2017.

Caroline HowkinsMike Carey

Photo courtesy of Andy Lawrence



COACH OUTING TO THE MARY ROSE MUSEUM 3 MAY 2017

A coach outing is being arranged to visit the award-winningMary Rose Museum in Portsmouth on Wednesday 3 May2017. The Mary Rose captured the world’s imaginationwhen she was raised from the Solent in 1982. Her dramaticstory is now revealed in full inside the new purpose-built,£27 million museum.

Entry to the museum for seniors is £13.50 which includes a harbour cruise. They donot do guided tours of the museum but they offer some interesting adult learningpackages at an additional £10.00 per head. The title chosen for our visit is:

I hope some of you will sign up for this workshop – it coincides well with theobjectives of our Society.

The coach will leave Westminster Lodge car park at 8.45 a.m. and Portsmouth at4 p.m. If private car parking is required at Westminster Lodge, bring enough changeto pay the parking fee of £5.30. Traffic permitting the journey should take 2 hoursand cost £17.50 per person. We hope to arrive at 10.45 a.m. Once tickets havebeen distributed, members will be free to view the displays in the Museum and takea Harbour Cruise. There are four different eating establishments and also picnicareas for those taking their own lunch. The workshop will take place in the afternoonand last for one hour.

Please contact Pat Howe preferably by email [email protected] 01727 857274.

The basic cost will therefore be £31.00 plus £10.00 for those attending the interactiveworkshop. Please send cheques made payable to SAHAAS to Pat Howe, 7 CranmoreCourt, Avenue Road, St Albans, AL1 3QS by 24 February 2017.

Pat Howe

Lost and Found: The Archaeology of the Mary Rose.The Curator explains the content of the workshop thus:

Discover the archaeological story from seabed to showcase. The Mary Roseproject has transformed our understanding of Tudor history, maritimearchaeology and conservation science. Use microscopes to discover theconservation process and handle real rope and wood from the wreck.



J.T. SMITH FSA MAA LIFE IN RESEARCH

John Thomas Smith [J.T.] died on hisninety-fourth birthday on 23 August2016. He was born and educated inBirmingham. In 1942, at the end of hissecond year at the University, he wascalled up and served five years in theRoyal Engineers, crossing to France on‘D’ day and saw service in France,Belgium, Holland and Germany. On hisdemobilisation he returned to com-plete his degree in English and History.In 1949 he joined the Royal Commis-sion on Historical Monuments ofEngland (RCHME) where he remainedthroughout his working life.

Initially working in Dorset andWiltshire, which involved somearchaeology, he went on to Shrews-bury where he investigated, with dis-tinction, its 17th century historicbuildings as well as researching timberbuildings in Breconshire. For ten yearshe surveyed threatened buildingsthroughout England and finallybecame Head of Architectural Investi-gation at the RCHME.

Retirement for many gives them theopportunity to explore differentobjectives from those that they expe-rienced previously. J.T. and Heather

Smith, movedfrom PottersBar to StAlbans andcreated a col-l a b o r a t i v eproject on17th century St Albans under the aegisof this Society. Over 70 members wereinvolved.

He chaired a packed meeting at StAlbans School at which he outlinedthe objectives. Much hard researchfollowed, undertaken by individuals,couples and groups and the resultswere printed in 2003 in a book pub-lished by the University of Hertford-shire Press entitled: St Albans1650-1700 a thoroughfare town andits people edited by J.T. and MikeNorth. Five of those listed in the bookas contributors were present at hisfuneral on 7 October 2016 at WestHerts Crematorium.

The work by so many individuals wasnurtured by J.T. and his wife whoacted as the group’s secretary andwho provided everyone with regularup-dates and, each summer, organ-ised a social gathering at their home.At the reception held following J.T.’sfuneral, two of his former colleaguesfrom Keele University explained to me



that the St Albans collaborativeproject was part two of a project thathe began in the early 1950s when hecarried out an examination of mid-17th century Shrewsbury’s historicbuildings for his Master of Arts disser-tation!

Not content with one project hebecame chairman of HertfordshireArchaeology’s Editorial Committeeand created a constitution which setout its aims and objects. In the 1990stwo societies, East Herts Archaeolog-ical Society and SAHAAS held 80 percent of the equity equally whilst theformer Herts Archaeological Trustheld the balance. Unfortunatelyneither society ratified the proposedconstitution.

Four volumes of Herts Archaeologybetween 1991 and 2009 containedarticles that he wrote on St Albans’history. These were: Nine HundredYears of St. Albans: architecture andsocial history (vol. 11); A Tudor officialand his house in collaboration withFrank Kilvington and A Builder’s Esti-mate of 1722 and its implications(both in vol. 12). In vol. 14 he pub-lished two articles written with GerardMcSweeney: one investigating thehistory and architecture of Hall Place,the mansion immediately to the northof St Peter’s church demolished in1904; the other assessing the devel-

opment of Ivy House and ‘BleakHouse’. Again working with Gerard heproduced for vol. 16 A 17th centuryButcher’s shop: 30-32 Market Place,St. Albans. Few individuals have con-tributed so much to our understand-ing of the city’s history and for thisreason he was elected an HonoraryMember of the Society to great accla-mation.

J.T.’s major Hertfordshire contributionwas his survey entitled EnglishHouses, 1200-1800: the HertfordshireEvidence (1992) supported by Hert-fordshire Houses: selective inventory.It is perhaps too easy to forget thatJ.T. is recognised not just locally butnationally and internationally for hiswork on the development of medievaltimber-framed buildings as his manypublications indicate. A foundermember of the Vernacular Architec-ture Group in 1954, he was Presidentfrom 1969-72 and became an honor-ary member in 2001. Its annualjournal has become an authoritativeBritish source.

Heather (who died earlier in 2016)and J.T. Smith had three sons – Dan,Martin and Tim. He was always cour-teous, approachable and willing todiscuss problems wherever and when-ever he met members. He was a realgentle-man. One commodity he lovedwas red wine and visits to French



CHURCH BELL RINGING IN STALBANS DURING THE FIRSTWORLD WAR

Contrary to popular belief, churchbell-ringing continued throughout thewar. There were restrictions howeverand this note considers how theteams at the Cathedral, St Michael’s,St Peter’s and St Stephen’s respondedto them.

Almost the first time they rang afterthe outbreak of war on 4 August waswith the bells half-muffled to honourDean Lawrance who died on 12August – the Hertford County Associ-ation of Change Ringers had beenstarted in his sitting room in 1884. Heremained a staunch supporter untilhis death frequently preaching atevensong for their annual festival.celebrated in St Albans on EasterMonday.

The first one during the war took placein April 1915 and there was a detailedwrite up in the Herts Advertiser. At theaccompanying AGM the secretaryread out a Roll of Honour of thosewho had enlisted which he said wouldbe added to the Peal Book when it wascomplete. Almost a third of themembers had joined up by this stage.This obviously curtailed ringing which,apart from at the annual festival, wasalmost entirely restricted to Sundayservices. Even this was often impossi-ble both because of lighting restric-tions and a ruling which forbade loudbells during the same hours to avoidalerting enemy aircraft. At least thelatter meant there was no point intrying to black out church towers.

The secretary of the Association, whowas in the Cathedral team, stressed inhis annual reports that bell ringerswere church workers and askedretired ringers to return to help out.

vineyards for fresh supplies were aregular occurrence. It was fitting thathis favourite red wine was offered tothose who attended the reception atFreddie’s Restaurant on Friday, 7thOctober 2016.

John G E Cox

Websites:Shrewsbury: topography and domestic archi-tecture to the middle of the 17th century.http://etheses.bham.ac.uk/5658/Obituary, by Bob Meeson and Nat Alcockwith Martin Millet. Salon 369, 6 September2016http://us6.campaign-archive1.com/?u=5557bc147d34993782f185bde&id=e4f75369ddGuardian Obituarieshttps://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2016/dec/14/john-smith-obituary-other-lives



Tommy Conley, of the St Peter’s team,continued ringing there and tolling atthe cathedral throughout the waralthough he was in his eighties.

Before the Association’s AGM on 1 April1918 the secretary had requested infor-mation about what ringing was possibleand how many ringers had enlisted. Atthe start of the war there were 44ringers in the St Albans teams; by 1918three of these had been killed and afurther 25 had enlisted making a totalof over 60%. Ten ringers had gone fromthe Cathedral team and they could nolonger manage even to ring for Sundayservices as there were only two left. Theteams from St Michael’s and StStephen’s had to combine and rang oncea Sunday at each of the churches. StPeter’s still had eight and could ring forservices

In St Albans the death toll among ringerswas fairly low with two from the StMichael’s team and Bob Kirby, who hadbeen the Association’s librarian, from StPeter’s. The Association’s secretarywanted to have a marble plaque put inthe cathedral in memory of the ringersin the county who had been killed butthis was not possible.

The first full peal in St Albans after thewar was rung in the cathedral on NewYear’s Eve 1918 and took three hoursand eighteen minutes. The bells werehalf muffled in memory of the fallen inthe war.

More or less all the information includedhere came from the Hertford CountyAssociation of Change Ringers AnnualReports for 1913-1934, which are boundtogether in one volume, and the HertsAdvertiser.

Sheila Green

The Ringing ChamberSt Albans Abbey

Photo courtesy of St Albans Abbey


THE COUNTY SOCIETIESSYMPOSIUM 2016Last September, I attended the latestbiennial County Societies Symposium,organised by Victoria County History(VCH), the British Association for LocalHistory (BALH) and the Royal Histori-cal Society. The theme for the day was‘Responding to 21�� Century Chal-lenges’. The Institute for HistoricalResearch, Senate House, Londonhosted the symposium, which wasattended by over fifty delegates, rep-resenting some forty organisations. Itwas a stimulating day, with five mainspeakers and lively discussion.

Historic England and Crowd-fundingFirst up was John Hudson, head ofpublishing at Historic England. Hissubject was crowd-funding, which hedescribed as the Internet equivalentof subscription publishing. He told usabout a successful crowd-fundingcampaign that Historic England hadrun for their book Place-making, theArt of Capability Brown. The technol-ogy partner used was a companycalled Unbound that specialises incrowd-funding for book publishing.The campaign achieved 88 per cent ofthe target fund in one year, withpledges from 213 people.

Historic England has now launched aservice for publishing books in associ-ation with heritage bodies, withcrowd-funding accounting for all orpart of the costs. It is aimed at ‘sub-stantial’ books, rather than for thesouvenir guide market.

Challenge of Relaunching VCHShropshireJames Bowen spoke about therelaunch in October 2015 of the VCHShropshire publication. Inactive since2002 in Shropshire, VCH had returnedto the county as a voluntary society.It needed to find new sources offunding since the County Council wasno longer able to support them. Theyrequired £37,000 for the new edition.They also needed to recruit volunteersfor what was to be a collaborativecommunity project aimed at research-ing and writing the history of all partsof Shropshire.

The strategy for the relaunch was tostart by doing single-parish studiesthat would allow local research to bepublished quickly. Breaking the workdown in this way made funding amore manageable task than a full RedBook. The products are known as‘Shorts’. The first Short was for theparish of Wem and was crucial to thesuccessful re-establishment of theVCH for Shropshire.

Follow us on Twitter at SAHAAS(@stalbanspast)Continued on Page 32



BELLMEADOW137 FISHPOOL STREET

Bellmeadow was our home for almost26 years and during that time wecame to love the house with its exten-sive garden which extends to the riverVer. J.T. Smith in his catalogue ofEnglish Houses 1200-1800 describesit as having been built c1500 as a smalltimber framed Wealden house but ithas undergone considerable changesover the centuries. The presententrance hall is the site of the originalopen hall and there were two roomsone on each side of the hall. Initiallythe house was single-storey and therafters in the present attic roof showssigns of smoke blackening from thefires in the open hall. At some time,probably in the middle of the 17��century, the hall was divided into twostories and the fireplace was movedto the rear of the hall with thechimney stack added above it.

There are signs in one of the first floorrooms that both ends bays on thisfloor were jetted from the front of thehouse. Sometime in the 18�� centurythe front of the house was rebuilt inbrick to form a flat wall defining thewindows and the front entrance, aparapet in front of the now tiled roofwas also added. At about the sametime two additional rooms, one of

which served as the kitchen, wereadded on the ground floor to the rearof the house.

The house was originally owned byfamily at the Manor house, now StMichael’s Manor hotel, and it isassumed that it was always occupiedby employees of the family. Howeverin 1932 the tenancy was given toJoseph (Bertie) Brett and his familywho were not employees of the Gapefamily at the Manor. Bertie Brett wasan engineer, councillor, and one-timemayor of St Albans.

At this time the house was connectedby three cottages to the building(which was until recently the BlueAnchor) and a small garden back ofthe house was separated from theriver by a field which belonged tothe Manor. The Brett children wereonly allowed to play in the field withon Sunday afternoons with permission

Postcard courtesy St Albans MuseumsBellmeadow



of the Gape family. Shortly after thewar the cottages were demolishedand Brett was able to purchase thehouse, the land where the cottageshad stood and the field behind thehouse thus forming a huge gardenextending down to the river.

In 1971 the Bretts sold the house andland to friends, John and Nancy Ever-ett. John Everett was keenly inter-ested in the local area and wrote abook on the history of St Michael’svillage. Subsequently the Everetts soldoff the land where the cottages hadbeen and a house was built on it in1994.

Mary has family connections with theEveretts and in 1987 we were offeredfirst refusal on the sale of the house –something we didn’t hesitate to takeup as we had visited the house onmany occasion and realise that it wasa very special case. We were veryhappy in Bellmeadow but eventuallywe felt that age was stopping us fromgiving the house and the garden thelove they deserved and so we sold itto a younger family in 2013.

Mary and Geoff Kirk

THE HERTS ADVERTISER IS NOW BEING DIGITISED

A 10-year project to digitise up to 40 million pages from the British Library’snewspaper collection has almost reached its half-way point. At long last copiesof the Herts Advertiser newspaper are being scanned and made available onthe web. (see www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk).

While this is good news for those interested in the history of the city andsurrounding district, there are limitations. Firstly, although the paper was firstpublished in 1855 the project will only digitise editions from 1858 onwardsuntil 1927. Later editions are available on microfilm in St Albans CentralLibrary. The earliest three years (1855-57) can be viewed only at the BritishLibrary at St Pancras. The second limitation is that, at the time of writing, just25 years are on line with more to follow in due course.

Lastly, it does come at a cost. You have pay a subscription to view the digitalcopies. The current rates are £12.95 for a month or £80 for a year. Subscribersto Findmypast also have access to the Herts Advertiser.

Jonathan Mein



THE SIX BELLS IN ST MICHAEL’SSTREET

A recent discovery in Kingsbury manorrecords changes the accepted viewthat the Six Bells has a continuoushistory as an inn and public housedating back over 400 years. The imageof continuity is illusory, the result ofthe conflation of the Six Bells with asimilarly-named but separate estab-lishment.

This is the long-closed Bell Inn. It waslocated 50 metres to the north of theSix Bells, close to the bridge (see map)and on a site now occupied by StMichael’s ‘Lower’ School. There isgood evidence to show that it wastrading in the 17th century and intothe 18th when it was operating on asignificant scale with stabling for 50horses. The manorial papers (HALS,Gorhambury xi/57) indicate that theinn was still open in 1764 but shut by1768, the building converted to a

maltings in which trade it remainedfor another 80 years at least.

Why the Bell Inn shut is not clear. Dueto technical innovations and increas-ing efficiencies in the transport net-work, there was a marked decline inthe number and overall capacity ofthe town’s inns in the 1700s. One ofthese efficiencies was the completionin 1765 of the new bridge over the Verto replace what appears to have beena simple packhorse bridge and ford.We will likely never know whether theproximity of the closure of the inn andthe opening of the bridge was justcoincidence.

The smaller Six Bells public house wasperhaps licensed in the 1750s, proba-bly in the 1770s and definitely so by1786. It remains a venerable pub, justnot as venerable as we thought.

Jonathan Mein

St Michael’s tithe map, 1843(HALS, ref. DSA/4/87/2)



VERDUN TREE

Members who have not recently walked upfrom the Abbey through Waxhouse Gate willnot be aware that a new ‘interpretation panel’has been installed (courtesy of the CivicSociety) near the Verdun Tree. With text inFrench and German as well as English, thepanel explains the significance of the Battle ofVerdun during the First World War. Farlonger than the Battle of the Somme, thebattle for the French to maintain control of the ancient fortress city of Verdunis considered to be the longest fought in recorded history. The tree itself,close to the path leading to the Village Arcade, has grown from a conker takenfrom one of the last trees left standing on the battlefield.

Bryan Hanlon

Photographs J Humphreys



Dr. Eileen Roberts MA PhD FSAEileen was a memberof the Arc and Arc formany years beforebeing elected an Hon-orary Member. Shedied in October 2016aged 88.

Born in Canada, and able to trace herancestry back to the voyage of theMayflower, she became a teacher inoriental art but moved to St Albans in1960 with Basil, an architect. Deter-mined to obtain a London UniversityDoctorate she studied the mouldingsof Perpendicular windows in over 100north Hertfordshire churches. A copyof her thesis is kept in the LocalStudies Library at HertfordshireArchives and Local Studies at Hertford.

Well-known locally as a city and Abbeyguide she compiled an inventory ofthe buildings on and around the siteof the future Maltings shopping centrewhilst employed by Herts PlanningDept.

Her most important publicationsinclude The Wall Paintings of St AlbansAbbey (1993), The Hill of the Martyr(1993) and Images of Alban (1999).

She was meticulous in all herresearches on the architectural historyof St Albans and Hertfordshire andwas also an expert calligrapher andembroiderer.

Norman AlveyNorman joined the Arc & Arc in Febru-ary 1978. By 1982 he had taken onan active role in the Architecture andLocal History Group which, in thosedays, organised the Tuesday lectures.He was later Chairman of that groupfor four years up until 1995.

In parallel, he joined the British Asso-ciation for Local History and was Sec-retary and later Treasurer of thatorganisation. He shared with ourSociety the activities of the Associa-tion by giving news in our Newsletterand also inviting us to join theiroutings. He also made a significantcontribution to the 17�� Century

OBITUARIES

The recent months have seen the loss of six of our members, two of themHonorary. The obituary of J.T. Smith appeared in our last Newsletter and biograph-ical essay is at Page 13. Below are obituaries for the five other members and, onbehalf of the Society, I offer our condolences and sympathy to all their families.

Helen Bishop



Research Group. It was decided tocreate a database on computer, quitea novelty at the time. One of the fewmembers familiar with computersthen, Norman assisted with patienceand encouragement and miraculouslysolved the difficulties that we encoun-tered.

He published a book on Reeds School,and a number of articles with titlesranging from ‘History of Computers’,to the intriguing title ‘From RamrygeChantry to Oxfam’. He also gave anumber of interesting lectures to theArc & Arc.

Although members knew Normanquite well it was a surprise to read anarticle in the Herts Advertiser in 2014which announcedthat Norman hadbeen awarded amedal from theRussian state inrecognition of hisinvolvement in theArctic convoys of1944. He hadserved on HMSChaser, an escort carrier, which wascharged with protecting an unusuallylarge convoy of about 40 merchantships carrying vital military suppliesfrom the UK to Murmansk.

Mike AdamsMike’s membership began in Novem-ber 1995. He died on 10�� November2016. He was an active member ofthe Society and a Clockateer. He willbe particularly remembered by themany visitors to the tower both for hisfriendly welcome and the informationhe was able to offer.

David Kelsall MB BSDavid joined the Society in November1995. He practised as a GP but wasalso known as an artist, potter, book-binder, goldsmith, IT expert, in fact ‘atrue renaissance man’. David playedan important role as the HonoraryArchivist at St Albans Cathedral for 22years. Many researchers benefitedfrom his knowledge and skills, partic-ularly with a camera, as frequentacknowledgements in local historypublications pay testament. Daviddied suddenly at home on 23 Decem-ber 2016, aged 87, and his funeral washeld at the Cathedral on 31 January.

Mary BakerMary and her husband, Anthonyjoined the Arc and Arc in February1980 and their membership has con-tinued unbroken. She died on 1stNovember after a short illness. Herfuneral was held at St Stephen’schurch on Friday 18th Novemberwhere she regularly worshipped andshe is buried in the churchyard.



SATURDAY NIGHT ENTERTAINMENT IN EDWARDIAN ST ALBANS

In writing up our research for the Home Front book, there was plenty ofmaterial that had to be left on the ‘cutting room floor’. One such item wasan interesting snippet from an oral history tape held in the Imperial WarMuseum’s collection. It was a recording of Thomas Russell talking about hischildhood in the city in the early 1900s (ref. IWM 656, Reel 3). As you willsee, he described the highlight of a night out in St Albans, in the processcasting a different explanation as to why contemporary photos show apoliceman directing traffic at the top of Holywell Hill.

‘The chief entertainment was for the people to stand on the pavementwatching the policemen directing the traffic because in those days motorcars could not get up that hill if they were stopped so he had to see that anycar coming [along the High Street or London Road] had to stop to let thisone [cross] … he’d go back if stopped. This was all there was’.

Home Front Research Group

The Peahen Crossroads c.1912

Postcard courtesy of Andy Lawrence



LECTURE PROGRAMME

14 February - 19 May 2017

Tuesday 14 February 2017What Lies BeneathMike Neighbour

Today, very little is left to remind usthat until recently there was not one,but two, major mental hospitals onthe site which we now call Highfieldand Highfield Park. Among the 19��century farms, Hill End Farm gave itsname to the huge late Victorian struc-tures which became Hill End Asylum. The later hospital, Cell Barnes Colony,is the subject of a separate lecture. The lecture will begin with the frac-tured early 19th century society whichgave rise to private, and later, publicinstitutions caring for those requiring

protection. Protection from what, toothers, was considered normal life.The lecture will attempt to answer thequestion Why did Hill End close?

Albanian Mike Neighbour has spent nearlyhalf of his life in St Albans – having beenborn here and brought up on the Beau-monts Estate before the days of made uproads and street lighting. He was edu-cated at Fleetville, Beaumont and Mar-shalswick schools. Now retired, Mike'scareer was spent teaching in many of thecounty's schools, both secondary andprimary. Having a close and detailedattachment to the eastern districts of StAlbans, he began to explore the historywhich pre-dated his parents' recollections.He has written two books under thebanner St Albans’ Own East End, and hecontinues to research more of the undis-covered story of the eastern districts.

Friday 24 February 2017War Among the Ruins: MedievalHeritage and the First World WarProfessor James G Clark

The First World War is frequentlyrepresented as the first truly ‘indus-trial’ conflict, which starkly focusedthe terrifying power of machines. It isoften overlooked that this mecha-nised warfare was wrought in a largelypre-industrial landscape, indeed in anenvironment marked above all by

All lectures begin at 7.45pm

All lectures will be held atSt Albans School except thosemarked VM – which will be held atVerulamium Museum.

Those marked PP advise that park-ing at the school may be limited -Use Gombards Car Park

Late changes of venue will be noti-fied on our web site and via e-news



monuments to the artistry and pietyof a medieval world. The disjunctionbetween tank manoeuvres and thetracery of a rose window was not loston the fighting men who were movedto save a shard of stained glass as theypassed up and down the line. Theeffect on the public authorities andthe wider community on the homefront – in Belgium, France, andEngland especially – was even morepowerful. In fact, it might be arguedthat the experience of the war markeda turning-point in our relationshipwith our medieval heritage.

James G. Clark is Professor of Medie-val History at the University of Exeter.An historian of the medieval church –and of monasteries in particular – hehas written and published widely onmonastic life, learning, and libraries,on the dissolution of the monasteriesand the Reformation. He has mademany contributions to TV and Radioincluding BBC’s Tudor MonasteryFarm (2013); he is currently historicalconsultant for the TV adaptation ofPhilippa Gregory’s The White Princess.

Tuesday 7 March 2017Wind, Water and Steam -The Story ofHertfordshire’s MillsHugh Howes

Hertfordshire has an unusually richand diverse milling heritage. As wellas its long tradition of corn milling, thecounty once enjoyed a reputation forthe milling of a variety of other prod-ucts, including pioneering papermak-ing in the west of the county,gunpowder and small arms in theeast, and also silk and cotton.

In recounting the history of all thetypes of milling in the county, Hughfocuses on the key factors of power,technology and transportation. Prox-imity to London helped the Hertford-shire mills to thrive but alsothreatened them – when the majorcorn exchanges were established inthe City of London and when vastquantities of imported grain began toarrive at the capital’s docks. Thesuccess with which individual millerswere able to meet these challengesdetermined whether or not theythrived. Moving away from the vagar-ies of wind and water by switching tosteam power and, ultimately, electric-ity was one of the keys to survival,while up-to-date milling equipmentand good access to both imported



grain and expanding markets werealso to prove crucial.

This is an account of a long-estab-lished commercial activity thattouches on many important aspectsof our history. It examines thedynamic of the nation’s history,prevailing economic forces and theparticular local conditions in Hertford-shire.

Hugh Howes is a retired CharteredTown Planner with fifteen years’ expe-rience as strategic planner for theEnvironment Agency and an earlierperiod with Bedfordshire County Coun-cil.

He has had a life-long interest in eco-nomic history and industrial archaeol-ogy. In his retirement he has publishedbooks on Strategic Planning for Water,Bedfordshire Mills, and The Strugglefor the Cornwall Railway.

Wind, Water and Steam, The Story ofHertfordshire’s Mills is his most recentpublication.

Tuesday 14 March 2017The Making of the Epic 1916Propaganda FilmThe Battle of the SommeTaylor Downing

The centenary of the Battle of theSomme was marked in the summer of2016. Filming the ‘Big Push’ were twoofficial film cameramen with giant,heavy hand cranked film cameras. TheWar Office edited their uniquefootage into a feature documentarythat was released in August 1916while the battle still raged in France.The film was a sensation. Huge crowdsflocked to see scenes the like of whichthey had never seen before because,with one or two exceptions, The Battleof the Somme film presented authen-tic moving pictures of the battle.Taylor Downing's talk about themaking of the film, its impact and theethical issues raised by it. His talk willbe illustrated with clips from the orig-inal film.

Taylor Downing is a historian, a best -selling author and an award winningtelevision producer who has producedmore than 200 historical documenta-ries for television. His latest booksinclude Breakdown: The Crisis of ShellShock on the Somme, 1916 (Little,Brown 2016) and Secret Warriors: KeyScientists, Code Breakers and Propa-gandists of the Great War (Little,Brown 2014) and Spies in the Sky: TheSecret Battle for Aerial Intelligenceduring WW2 (Little, Brown 2011).Taylor has spoken at SAHAAS twicepreviously.



Friday 24 March 2017Hertfordshire AlmshousesPaul Langston

Paul will speak about the benefactors,history and architecture of some ofthe more interesting almshouses inHertfordshire beginning with theoldest surviving and finishing at theend of the nineteenth century. Thetalk will be illustrated by photographshe has taken.

Paul is retired, having previouslyworked as Deputy Director of SocialServices for Hertfordshire. He has beeninterested in architecture ever sincehis parents took him into ChichesterCathedral as a very young child and inalmshouses as an early form of socialservices activity.

Tuesday 4 April 2017Wallingford Castle andthe Road to RegicideDr Katharine Keats-Rohan

After its demolition on the orders ofCromwell in 1652, one of the greatestand most magnificent royal castles ofmedieval England started its slow slideinto oblivion. With the Tower ofLondon and Windsor, it was one ofthree major Thames Valley fortressesthat maintained central control of the

kingdom. Wallingford played a crucialrole in all the key events from theNorman Conquest in 1066 to the exe-cution of Charles I in 1649. This lecturewill tell its story (with a cameo role forWallingford Priory, a cell of St AlbansAbbey, built in the reign of WilliamRufus).

Dr Katharine Keats-Rohan is a well-known medievalist specialising inNorthern France and the NormanConquest of England, on which shehas written voluminously since 1990.

She is a member of The WallingfordHistorical and Archaeological Societywhich worked alongside the recentarchaeological study, Burh to Bor-ough, led by Neil Christie; she co-ed-ited two British ArchaeologicalReports, The origins of the Borough ofWallingford (2009), and Wallingford:the Castle and the Town in Context(2015).

Tuesday 11 AprilThe Age of DecadenceDr Simon Heffer

Britain was at the height of its imperialpower in 1880. But by 1914 the statefaced threats from the rise of organ-ised labour, from the women’ssuffrage movement, from diehard



reactionaries in the House of Lordsand from Irish home rulers whowished to break up the Kingdom.

How did this remarkable change frominvincibility to vulnerability comeabout?

Simon Heffer is a historian, broad-caster and newspaper columnist. Hehas written biographies of ThomasCarlyle, Edward VII and Enoch Powell,and two books on English grammar -Strictly English and Simply English. in2013 he published High Minds, ahistory of mid-Victorian Britain, andhis next book, to be published early in2017, is the sequel, The Age of Deca-dence, dealing with Britain and itsempire from 1880 to 1914. He has aPhD in History from Cambridge Uni-versity, where as an undergraduate heread English at Corpus Christi College.

Friday 21 April 2017Saladin: Life and Legend – From theMedieval Age to the 21�� CenturyProf Jonathan Phillips

The Sultan Saladin remains one of themost iconic figures of the medievalage. As the man who recovered Jeru-salem from the crusaders in 1187 hebecame the hero of Sunni Islam. Manycenturies after his death, Saladincontinues to be an immensely potent

symbol of religious and military resist-ance to the West.

Jonathan’s lecture will reviewSaladin’s career and look at how hisreputation was formed and preservedover the centuries. A consideration ofSaladin’s place in the political andcultural worlds of the modern NearEast will conclude the talk.

Professor Jonathan Phillips is Profes-sor of Crusading History at RoyalHolloway, University of London. He isthe author of numerous books on thesubject including Holy Warriors: AModern History of the Crusades(2009) and The Second Crusade:Extending the Frontiers of Christen-dom (2007). He was the lead pre-senter in the History Channel’s TheCross and the Crescent and recentlyhosted the six-part series AncientRoads: From Christ to Constantine onAmerican Public Television. At presenthe is working on a major history of theThird Crusade.

Tuesday 9 May 2017The Hanseatic LeagueJeremy Goldsmith

Beginning as a medieval trading groupbetween merchant cities in NorthernEurope, by the 16�� century theHanseatic League had become an



international institution in its ownright. Possessing its own army anddiplomatic system the League becamethe greatest cross-border tradingnetwork in Europe.

The lecture looks at the history of theHanseatic League from its origins innorth German ports, particularly atthe role of the League in England untilits expulsion by rival Englishmerchants in the Elizabethan period.

Jeremy Goldsmith is an historian,writer and lawyer with a particularinterest in medieval English politicsand society. He has worked as a gene-alogist and heritage researcher forover a decade and has written for avariety of publications from scholarlyjournals and popular magazines tonational newspapers.

Jeremy has been a member of theSociety of Genealogists’ EducationCommittee and was for some yearsProgramme Secretary of the HeraldrySociety. He is currently collectingmaterial for a book on the Kenilworthprogress of Elizabeth I in 1575.

19 May 2017The Long Weekend: Life in the EnglishCountry House Between the WarsAdrian Tinniswood OBE

Adrian Tinniswood uncovers the truthabout a world half-forgotten, drapedin myth and hidden behind stiff upperlips and film-star smiles. Drawing onhundreds of memoirs, on unpublishedletters and diaries, he brings thestately homes of England to life, givingus an insight into the gilt and thegingerbread, and showing how theimage of the country house was care-fully protected by its occupants aboveand below stairs, and how the realitywas so much more interesting thanthe dream.

Adrian is the author of fourteen books onsocial and architectural history, includingthe Sunday Times bestseller, The LongWeekend.

Born in 1954, his career has combinedwork with heritage institutions such as theNational Trust and the Heritage LotteryFund with lecturing for English and Amer-ican universities.

Adrian lives in Bath and is a SeniorResearch Fellow at the University of Buck-ingham. In 2013 he was awarded an OBEfor services to heritage.

Doreen and Roy Bratby



NEW MUSEUM AND GALLERY - PROGRESS

Digging of the new basement gallery is well under way, scaffolding erected andhoardings in place, including one with our SAHAAS logo (opposite the Maltings).

Photographs J Humphreys



The society used a wide variety ofpublicity activities and channels forraising awareness of the relaunch,recruiting volunteers and raising thenecessary funds. Professional brandmarketing and publicity was used forthese campaigns and made a valuablecontribution to the success of therelaunch.

Value of Community-led ResearchGill Draper of BALH gave us interestinginsights into Historic England’s study‘The Value of Community GeneratedResearch’. The project looked at thepotential value of community-ledresearch, carried out by voluntarygroups, for understanding widerresearch questions and for providingevidence for inclusion in local HistoricEnvironment Records (HERs).

Gill had helped analyse the responsesfrom local and county societies.Evidently this had not been easy: thedefinition of ‘community generatedresearch’ had been hard to pin downand there were questions about thewisdom of assuming that the value ofhistory and archaeology researchcould be measured in the same way.

Findings included:● Only 23 per cent of local history

groups are likely to send researchto the HERs

● People resisted the idea that His-toric England had the right to setthe Historical Environment frame-work; there was a ‘clash of cul-tures’.

A report on the project and its findingsis available athttps://historicengland.org.uk/research/suppo r t - a n d - c o l l a b o r a t i o n / r e s e a r c h -resources/assessing-community-generatedrresearch/

Lessons in Creating and ConsumingHistoryJessica Lutkin of the England’s Immi-grants 1330-1550 database (Univer-sity of York) shared her experience ofa project that started badly.

This research database was set up inFebruary 2015 to shed new light onthe hidden age of population move-ment in the later middle ages. Thedatabase provides information on thenames, origins, occupations andhouseholds of a significant number offoreigners who chose to live and workin England during that time.

The research team set up a projectthat sought to use volunteers fromlocal history societies to help populatethe new database. Although the teamsucceeded in getting societies to sign

Continued from Page 17

Continued on Page 33



up to the project, quite a number ofsocieties did not in the end take part.

Jessica put this poor response downto communication failings – theresearchers hadn’t communicated theproject’s aims clearly and why it mat-tered. She said they should havedeveloped a more ‘hands-on’approach to bring the researchers andsocieties together, for example byusing discussion boards,telephone/Skype, workshops andpodcasts. She also felt that they hadnot given enough thought to what thesocieties had wanted from the project.

Modern Challenges facing CountySocietiesGillian Cookson, President of the York-shire Archaeological and HistoricalSociety, gave a fascinating talk on howa recent financial review led to thedecision to sell their headquarters of50 years and a major rethink of howthe society should function.

Their root-and-branch review pro-duced five urgent and importantactions:● Protect collections and manage

access to them● Negotiate the revolution that’s

happening in publishing● Develop a useful and user-friendly

online presence

● Control costs and maximiseincome

● Maintain a healthy level of mem-bership and volunteer activity.

As a result they gave their archive andlibrary to the University of Leeds on along-term loan. They decided to selltheir HQ, a lovely building that was nolonger fit for purpose. They rethoughthow they functioned, exploring newways of being collegiate. And theychanged their name – to include ‘His-torical’.

The review raised questions aboutwhat they did and why. For example,do people still want and value whatwe have to offer? We may be doinggood things, but what is this actuallyachieving as part of a bigger picture?And how can we have greater impactstill, reach more people, tap into thedemographics we tend to miss:younger people and children, minorityethnic groups, people who view ouractivities, and indeed, see us, as elitist,unwelcoming, irrelevant, and not forthem?

Gillian concluded by saying that ben-efits from the changes are alreadyappearing and that they see the futureas a land of opportunity.

Patricia Broad

Continued from Page 32



VISIT ST ALBANS – PUBLICITY C.1908

EDITOR’S NOTE

As always, I welcome contributions of text or photographs for considerationfor inclusion in the Newsletter and they should be emailed to me at:

[email protected] or post to Newsletter Editor,

12 Church Crescent, St Albans, AL3 5JD.

Just one of the items in the eclectic gift of 900 photographs andpostcards donated to the Society by the daughter of Arthur Allen

(see Newsletter 202 Page 8) and now digitised by Society memberMalcolm Merrick and available to view in the SAHAAS Library.

Documents

1702 WSV Working Proof 17 Feb - St Albans History · generous bequests of books and papers from respected researchers (See Library Notes at Page 8). These valuable additions will