All articles in Local & Family History
13th December, 2017 in Local & Family History, Society & Culture
Is the future of Harrods safe?
Harrods is an iconic institution. It is at the same time a local shop to the residents of SW1, a department store for those with the resources to buy quality goods at premium prices and a tourist attraction for visitors to London. It has been on its present site as a Harrod’s sho…
23rd November, 2017 in History, Local & Family History, Society & Culture
The Manchester Martyrs of 1867
In 1858, a young man by the name of James Stephens founded a secret society which he called the Irish Republican Brotherhood (an early forerunner of the IRA). This soon became known as the Fenian Movement, derived from the Fianna Eirann, a legendary band of Irish warriors led by…
14th November, 2017 in Local & Family History, Society & Culture
More change in the village: Farming in the early 20th century
Looking across the field behind my house, everything looks much as it might have done eighty years ago – gently sloping land for grazing cattle gives way to the hills behind, the field fringed by native hedgerow. This landscape seems worth preserving because there’s somethi…
14th November, 2017 in Local & Family History, Transport & Industry
Voices of Sunderland’s industrial past
‘I wish I’d asked questions while I’d had the chance.’ Having worked closely with history groups and those interested in historical research, this is something I’ve heard time and again. It got me thinking about my own life. My Gran is almost 80 and would often mention snippets o…
13th November, 2017 in Archaeology, History, Local & Family History
The secret history of London’s oldest house
It is the oldest private home in the City of London but its outward appearance gives few clues to its fascinating and ancient heritage. In fact, most people are unaware of its existence. It hides in plain sight at numbers 41-42 Cloth Fair – a narrow street sandwiched between the…
31st October, 2017 in Local & Family History
Phantom rider: Haunted by a hitchhiker
Imagine yourself driving down a lonely country road at night – you’re alone with only the car radio and the dashboard lights for company. As you round a bend you see coming out of the blackness a solitary figure standing thumbing for a ride. Do you stop and offer a lift, or…
31st October, 2017 in Local & Family History
The History Press ‘Haunted’ authors on all things paranormal…
Spooky stories have long been a part of cultural tradition, just think back to nights spent huddled around campfires on camping trips or sleepovers with your friends and you can guarantee that someone told a ghost story to try and scare someone else (inevitably giving themselves…
23rd October, 2017 in Local & Family History, True Crime
The lost girls of Liverpool
Child murder is as rife today as it was in our ancestors’ lifetime. There are two unsolved child murders in Liverpool that have always struck a very tragic chord with me. Some people speculate that they were both carried out by the same hand; I am prone to agree. Margaret ‘Madge’…
17th October, 2017 in Local & Family History, Sport
The Christian origins of Dings Crusaders
In Bristol in the late Victorian period there was a widespread attempt by socio-religious institutions to provide wholesome influences on the lives of the urban poor. These voluntary organisations nearly all had one feature in common: a reliance on the support of religious bodies…
2nd October, 2017 in Aviation, Local & Family History
Aviation landmarks of Norfolk and Suffolk
Throughout Norfolk and Suffolk many landmarks still remain which point to the strategic importance of these counties in the First and Second World Wars and during the Cold War. These include airfields and traces of their buildings, remains of former radar stations, decoy airfield…
21st September, 2017 in Biography & Memoir, Fiction, Local & Family History
The origins of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth
J.R.R. Tolkien lived for much of his early life in and around the British industrial city of Birmingham, but he was born in Bloemfontein in the Orange Free State in southern Africa in 1892. Both his parents, Arthur and Mabel, had moved there from the Birmingham area and married i…
21st August, 2017 in History, Local & Family History, Women in History
When Henry VIII met the Holy Maid of Kent
On Monday 20 April 1534, a twenty-eight-year-old Benedictine nun was taken from her cell in the Tower of London, stripped of her religious habit and bound hand and foot to a hurdle. She was dragged behind a horse for five miles through London’s filthy streets to Tyburn, where she…