Our next Event - Tithe Maps - February 21st at 2 pm at the Somerset Heritage Centre. For more details click here
A New Events Secretary
I am delighted to be able to announce that we have a new Events Secretary, Karen Rockell. Karen has come to Somerset from London where she was very involved with the Friends of Richmond Park where she worked with their Archives and arranged events. Since losing Sue Berry at the last AGM, we had a large hole to fill on the committee and I am sure that Karen will carry out those tasks admirably. We have had a meeting with the Wells Archivist, Julia Wood, with a view to holding a Friends meeting at Wells Museum and Karen will be making all the arrangements for the April 24th.
More new events will be announced in due course.
The Dickinson Project Document Protection Appeal Update - The Dickinson Family of Kingsweston Estate Papers
During the Annual General Meeting an appeal was launched for help from the Friends of Somerset Archives to preserve documents contained in the Dickinson Papers. Eleven volunteers came forward - as many as the project can currently accommodate - and we are now working at the Somerset Heritage Centre each Tuesday on preserving the collection.
The background to the collection is explained by Janet Tall, Head of Archives:
The Heritage Service has been given the very significant and large archive of the Dickinson family of Kingsweston by the current owners. This archive of 65 boxes contains many important documents, especially for the 18th century. The family had extensive sugar plantations in Jamaica, and business connections in the southern American colonies.
The collection includes correspondence for five generations of the family, and describes their political, business, estate and personal interests. The papers are of international importance, especially for the history of Jamaica, slavery and trade. Many of the documents require preservation and all require cataloguing, as the current catalogue list is very limited. We are developing a project to fully catalogue the papers once sufficient documents have been through the preservation process.
Mervyn Richens, the County Senior Conservator adds:
We have welcomed an orderly, dextrous and enthusiastic group of volunteers who have been trained to deal with documents that had suffered through storage and needed unfolding and protecting. This work will make them more accessible to researchers and will enable much more efficient cataloguing which will again help researchers. The more important bundles marked as ‘red star bundles’ will be protected which will allow researchers easier and safe access to these important items.
The Tithe Apportionments If anyone would like to join our transcribing team by transcribing a parish of your choice that has not already been done, please contact Jenni by clicking here. The task is not too taxing, does not need great computing skills and can be done in your own time - there is no rush to complete the job. We will give you full instructions and indeed answer any queries or try to solve any problems that you might have. If you are already a transcriber and would also like, perhaps, to do another parish, please contact Jenni by clicking here.
Any suggestions or comments about the website should be emailed by clicking here to web@friendsofsomersetarchives.org.uk - Malcolm Daniels, webmaster.