Archive

For this week’s Treasure Faye Sturgess, Archive Assistant, has chosen a plan of St Helen’s Church, Worcester dating from 1636 which was brought to our attention by a customer using our service. This item highlights how our users can bring collections to life for staff by giving us insights into their hidden gems. Here, Faye...

Maud, the eldest daughter of Charles Lyttelton 8th Viscount Cobham and her husband Hugh Wyndham were living in South Africa at the time of the outbreak of the First World War and remained based in South Africa for much of the duration of the War.  Maud was a keen letter writer, corresponding regularly with family...

An exhibition from Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service is being held at The Hive to mark the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War. The exhibition begins on Monday 4 August to mark the 100th anniversary of the date Great Britain entered the war. The displays will include photographs and documents based on...

For this week’s Treasure Julia Pincott, Archive Assistant, has chosen one of our most popular resources used by customers in our Self Service Area at The Hive – our microfilmed newspaper archive. Here, Julia tells us more about a particular feature in Berrows, which focused on the effects of the First World War on the...

This week our Learning and Outreach Manager, Paul Hudson, has chosen one of our more popular archive sources – the Quarter Sessions records – as his treasure. Here he tells us more about a particular story that caught his attention: In April 1802 Ann Williams, Mary Priddy and Ann Collins were brought before the Worcestershire...

This week’s Treasure is a letter which forms part of the archives of the Bomford family of Atch Lench [Church Lench]. The Bomfords are a well-established land-owning family in Worcestershire. They are perhaps most well known for their part in the development of farming technology through Bomford & Evershed ltd. This letter illustrates another side...

This month, in order to set the documents covered by the Manorial Documents Register project in context, we will look at what a manor looked like in the landscape.  This is a really brief overview, but if you wish to find out more, lots of exciting work has been done by archaeologists and historians—please do...

The first copy of the much anticipated children’s history of Worcester, “Stories of Worcester”, arrived at The Hive yesterday to the delight of staff and authors alike. Pat Hughes (front left), co-author of ‘Stories of Worcester’ and WAAS staff Claire Haslam (r-l) and Julia Pincott (r-r) who have assisted with the process of publishing the...

During the process of sorting and arranging the Lyttelton collection, one of the boxes was found to contain a locked volume.  There was nothing on it to indicate what it was and there was no key anywhere in the boxes.  It was referred to as a ‘locked volume’ in the original list which accompanied the...

This week’s Treasure is a large series of docquets, which form a part of the Croome collection – the archives of the Earls of Coventry: As part of the official papers of Sir Thomas Coventry (1578-1640) 1st Baron of Allesborough, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England held in the Croome collection are a...