Working in an archive you never know where your enquiries will take you, just like the question about an estate agent from Ferndown, which led to a box of records concerning one of Britain’s best magicians. William Stickland, known as Bill, ran an estate agents on Victoria Road, Ferndown, but he was also an entertainer… Read more The Wessex Wizard
We are sharing a monthly look at the farm diary of John Foss, written from his dairy farm in Kingston Russell in 1851. October 1851 A trip to London We last left John as he arrived in London to visit the Great Exhibition. He wakes up the next day “not very well very sick & Poorley” – a bad… Read more The Diary of John Foss: October 1851
The Big Church Project, launched in 2018, focuses on the future use and development of Blandford Forum parish church. A central aim of the project is to engage with diverse communities and to record their contribution to the history of Blandford Church and its surrounding area. Using parish registers and other records such as censuses… Read more The Big Church Project: History and Diversity
Burial registers are an incredibly useful resource for those researching family history. Most entries record the name, age and place of abode of the person who has died, but sometimes extra notes are included in the margins. This is the third of three blogs about burial registers, you can read part one here, and part… Read more What Do Burial Registers Tell Us? Part Three
Please be aware that the following blog contains quotes from an audio recording which includes racial language as reported from past experiences. Dorset History Centre does not condone the use of such language, but recognises that such terms were used in the past and are reflected in historical records. — The Dorset Sound Archive, cared for… Read more Black History Month: John Stockley
Burial registers are an incredibly useful resource for those researching family history. Most entries record the name, age and place of abode of the person who has died, but sometimes extra notes are included in the margins. In a series of three blogs we will look at some of the interesting information that can be… Read more What Do Burial Registers Tell Us? Part One
We are sharing a monthly look at the farm diary of John Foss, written from his dairy farm in Kingston Russell in 1851. September 1851 “A very dry scorching day” best described September in 1851. Hardly any rain falls until the end of the month, causing the potato crops to wilt and the cow’s milk… Read more The Diary of John Foss: September 1851
Our current circumstances feel so unexpected, but until recently deadly infectious diseases were common in our UK communities. Various forms of isolation have been a common response, and the first of these were medieval hospitals for lepers. Indeed, our records show that John De Plyers made a grant of land in Parkstone to St. Margaret’s Hospital and Leper House in the thirteenth or fourteenth century. By the seventeenth century ‘Pest Houses’ were often provided by parishes, landowners or boroughs and provided isolation and basic nursing. Among other examples, Poole Borough Mayoral accounts of… Read more Disease, Isolation and Vaccines
Many of us these days are used to seeing rabbits, in our countryside, alongside roads, and even owning them as pets. However, during the Pleistocene Age rabbits became extinct here surviving the Ice Age only in warmer climes. They were reintroduced into Britain following the Norman conquest, with the Norman’s valuing them for the table… Read more Not Quite Peter Rabbit or Benjamin Bunny: Coney Farming in Dorset
In 1876 James Buckman founded the Dorset Natural History and Antiquarian Field Club, which was modelled on a club in Cirencester of which he had been a member. He was the secretary of this club and editor of The Proceedings until his death in 1884. The Dorset History Centre holds several of his drawings of… Read more The Buckmans – Pioneers of New Ideas
Recent Comments