eastsussex.gov.uk
East Sussex
Record Office
Report of the County Archivist
April 2009 to March 2010
Back cover: Bathing beauties from the inaugural programme for SS Brighton, 1935 (ACC 10439)
2010/11_411
Front cover: The Maltings from Lewes Castle, c1930 (ACC 10305), with details of the
Paine separation agreement, 1774 (ACC 10423)
County Archivists of East Sussex
1950-1953
BernardCampbellCooke(1897-1953)
1953-1959
FrancisWilliamSteer(1912-1978)
1959-1964
RichardFDell
1964-1965
MaryElizabethFinch(1923-2007)
1965-1970
CedricGHolland(1932-1983)
1970-1974
SCarlNewton
1974-1981
AlanArthurDibben
1981-2000
CharlesRogerDavey
2000-2010+
ElizabethMargaretHughes
Theshapeofthingstocome?Acomputer-generatedviewbasedonourplansforTheKeep,
includingaprojection-wallonthefrontelevation.
Introduction
Welcome to this 60th anniversary edition of our annual report. The first County Archivist of
East Sussex was appointed in January 1950, which is the date that we have taken as marking
the official beginning of East Sussex Record Office. Read more on ESRO’s official history and
developments, its ups and downs, later on in this report in Christopher Whittick’s amusing and
thought-provoking recollections. As if in anticipation of the anniversary, we were honoured in
November by a visit by His Royal Highness the Duke of Kent, who toured The Maltings to meet
staff, Friends, searchroom visitors and local children to learn more of what we do.
Elizabeth Hughes (ESRO), Peter Field (HM Lord Lieutenant), Christopher Whittick (ESRO)
and HRH the Duke of Kent, examining his grandmother Queen Mary’s signature in the
Lewes Castle visitors’ book, 1927
To deal with the present, the year was once again dominated by efforts towards achieving
The Keep, the partnership project between East Sussex County Council, Brighton & Hove City
Council and the University of Sussex to build a new Historical Resource Centre, but the core
work of the Record Office also continued as busily than ever, despite several disruptions, as
this report seeks to illustrate. In the year of events marking the second centenary of his death,
we were delighted to bring back to Lewes a most important document dating from Tom Paine’s
time in the county town. It was another year in which accessions reached record numbers,
but our spirits were dampened by the sudden death of Julian Fane, who had become such a
charming friend and generous benefactor to the office.
1
Following the decision of the Heritage Lottery Fund not to contribute towards The Keep, an
options appraisal was undertaken to consider a way forward. The results indicated that an
affordable building could be achieved within the existing partnership funding and this design
was taken forward. The revised design is similar in concept to the original proposal. The
capacity of the strongrooms remains the same, ensuring that there will be enough space for
accruals for twenty years after opening, in accordance with British Standard 5454. The socalled ‘People Block’, which will house the public and staff areas, has been reduced both in
size and specification. However, we are confident that the resulting building will be something
of which all the partners can be proud.
An assessment of the revised design’s sustainability by BREEAM (BRE Environmental
Assessment Method) rated it as Very Good; but local planning regulations require an Excellent
rating. Work on improvements continued during the year and at the time of writing we are
optimistic that we will achieve Excellent. Features contributing to the building’s sustainability
include rainwater recycling, a biomass boiler for heating, the inclusion of a green roof
(indigenous grassland mix) to the public and staff block and photovoltaic cells on the plant
room roof. We expect to submit a planning application in the late summer or autumn of 2010.
We also began to draw up Activity and Business Plans, appointing consultants to help us. The
Activity Plan will ensure that the service reaches as many people as possible both on and off
the premises, including schools and local communities as well as traditional users. Some of
this work will be done in partnership with other services and organisations such as libraries,
museums and the voluntary sector.
The Business Plan will set out the running costs for the services within The Keep, including
those proposed in the Activity Plan, and the income that could be achieved to help to offset
them. Both plans were due to be completed in the autumn of 2010. Extensive consultation
has been undertaken with interested parties, possible partners, users and potential users
throughout the life of the project and this continued throughout the year, culminating in
preparations for a major public consultation exercise across East Sussex and Brighton and
Hove and beyond to be held in May 2010, seeking views on the project as a whole and on
the current designs. The Keep project has attracted national attention, both for its ethos of
partnership working and for its sustainability; Wendy Walker, the programme manager, was
invited to give a presentation to the All Party Parliamentary Group on Archives in May 2009.
Detail from a map of Berwick
Common, 1752 (ACC 10255)
2
Partnership working was also the key to Living the Poor Life, a nationwide project co-ordinated
by The National Archives (TNA) to catalogue and digitise the correspondence between officials
in 21 local nineteenth-century Poor Law Unions and the Poor Law Commissioners in London.
East Sussex Record Office recruited, encouraged and supervised a group of volunteers to
work on the letters from the Rye Poor Law Union 1834-1843 held at TNA, working from
digitised images, and the results were expected to go online in late summer 2010 on TNA’s
website (www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/livingthepoorlife). The correspondence adds an extra
dimension to the information held at ESRO and is an invaluable source for family and social
historians.
Buildings and weather featured quite strongly in Record Office life this year. The Maltings
was closed during August while structural works in the strongroom were carried out. 10%
of our holdings at The Maltings were transferred to Newhaven to reduce the loading on the
mezzanine and supports were installed on both levels. At the same time, the public and staff
areas were completely redecorated. I believe that it was worth the disruption as the place
looks a lot fresher after its paint job – and tidier! In December and January we also lost half
our heating to coincide with the worse snow for 30 years and had to run a limited service from
the hall while it was sorted out. However, with the exception of one day, the Record Office
remained open throughout with staff going to great lengths to get to work to serve the few
brave searchers who also struggled in. Our Southover outstore was completely re-roofed from
January to April, requiring us to limit production of documents for three months, and extractors
were installed there to help control the humidity. The cold weather also affected our archive
store in Newhaven when a pipe burst, sending water into the storage area. Fortunately, it was
noticed almost immediately and damage was minimal, but we took the incident as an added
incentive to redouble our efforts to box up as many archives as possible, both as a buffer
against adversity and in preparation for the move to The Keep. This has been a major project
this year and will continue as we prepare for the move.
We have continued to seek external funding to support the core service and have had
considerable success, as the Document Services and Outreach and Learning sections of this
report explain. And we have several potential projects in the pipeline, including a European
Union INTERREG co-operation with our colleagues from the archives départmentales of SeineMaritime, based in Rouen.
Jane Bartlett was kept busy by requests under the Data Protection and Freedom of Information
Acts, and achieved a response-rate within the statutory timescales of 93%, well above average
for local authorities. In 2009 we received 582 FOI requests, a 33% increase over 2008 (437).
The service continued to host the East Sussex Museum Development Officer, who is paid for
by the government’s Renaissance Funding. This post supports museums within the county,
helping to identify additional financial support, but also benefits the Record Office by opening
up new partnership and funding opportunities.
The Record Office’s other activities and achievements, no less important than those already
mentioned, are covered in the rest of this report.
3
Archive Services
Public Services
Searchroom attendance has shown a decrease during the period, partly the result of
the various building works during the year and the wintry weather. However, document
production figures increased despite the closures. Most visitors (61%) were tracing their
family trees, 27% were studying local and house history, 4% were educational users and 3%
business users. Although the number of hours of paid research was considerably down on last
year, the number of copies sold remained buoyant.
Postal and email enquiries were down on last year but, as ever, ranged across a wide variety of
subjects including English Civil War pro-Royalist tracts; arrests in Brighton during the general
strike of 1926; the trial of author Rupert Croft-Cooke; and the infamous Eastbourne Crumbles
murder of 1924. We were also able to provide information about their time in local authority
care in the 1950s to several enquirers for whom no case files had survived.
Improvements to note this year, in addition to the decoration work, included an additional
Saturday opening (we now open the second and fourth Saturdays each month) and the
installation of an adjustable table for the hall. This was bought by FESRO, our Friends’
organisation, and has made access to resources more convenient for wheelchair users.
We took part in another national user survey in May. The results showed a continued high
level of satisfaction with the quality of advice (94% good or very good) and helpfulness and
friendliness of staff (99%). 81% of respondents rated the overall service good or very good.
The restrictions of the Record Office building continued to score us low on physical access
(18% poor or very poor) and visitor facilities (26% poor or very poor). Asked to state where
improvements were most needed 51% mentioned visitor facilities, 40% physical access,
17% document delivery, 16% copy services, and 13% catalogues and guides.
The survey also revealed our visitors’ reasons for using the Record Office. 68% are studying
for their own personal recreation but 15% are in formal education, 11% on personal or family
business and 6% came in connection with their employment. While the majority come to the
area primarily to visit the Record Office, 22% stay overnight, 53% eat out locally, 59% use local
services and 24% visit other places of interest, contributing to the local economy.
Detail from a
map of Berwick
Common, 1752
(ACC 10255)
4
Public Service statistics
Search room visitors
Visitors not able to have
first choice of day
Documents consulted
Post/email enquiries
Telephone enquiries
A2A website hits
ESCC website hits (ESRO pages)
Copies sold
Hours of paid research
2006-2007
5,623
2007-2008
4,683
2008-2009
4,937
2009-2010
4,318
589
35,792
3,498
7,136
363,070
544
36,115
3,381
7,913
329,036
7,751
326
6,607
262
513
27,502
3,988
6,589
N/A
2,346,753
5,729
241
469
29,176
3,804
5,277
N/A
3,349,891
6,496
177
Propaganda leaflet
designed by Jasmine
Rose-Innes dropped
by the RAF over
French-speaking
Belgium in 1943
(ACC 10362)
5
Document Services
Again the number of deposits has risen – in excess of 400, not counting items such as parish
magazines and additions to existing archives which often appear on our desks, sometimes
causing minor landslides. Of that number, the Letter in the Attic project (of which more below)
accounts for over 80 separate accessions. We are glad that so much material continues to
find its way to us, and express our grateful thanks to the donors and depositors of archives,
and to our Friends organisation (FESRO) for funds to purchase the many items which become
available in the saleroom, privately and online.
Major additions have come from organisations which have deposited in the past such as the
East Sussex Federation of Women’s Institutes and the Lewes Little Theatre; the latter included
papers of its founder the Revd Kenneth Rawlings (1885-1969), rector of Lewes St Michael,
pacifist, actor and the theatre’s original producer and director. Accessions also came from a
wide range of schools, ecclesiastical parishes, parish councils, the Freemasons, and solicitors’
offices. All cannot be mentioned individually here, but a full list can be found at the end of
the report. Every depositor must be congratulated for their good record-keeping, and we are
delighted that they have the confidence to entrust their archives to our care.
We exist primarily as custodians of the records of East Sussex County Council. The Transport
and Environment Department was the source of an interesting copy of an artist’s impression
of the manor of Mote in Iden in c1500 (10415), prepared for an issue of The Meresman, its
in-house rights-of-way journal. We also received photographs showing work on the Lewes
by-pass, 1975-1977 (10373) – it is hard to believe that it was opened only in 1977. County
Council records which are no longer needed for administrative reasons are transferred to our
Record Centre at Newhaven, which holds almost 150,000 files. A part-time archivist, Beki Cox,
has been appointed to work on the appraisal of these records to ensure that items of historical
interest are preserved, and to create much-needed space at the records centre. At the time of
writing, she had appraised almost a thousand files.
As part of a clearing exercise in Lewes Town Hall basement, we received a large transfer of
minutes and other records from Lewes District Council (10211; 10336). The records were
suffering from mould, a constant threat in badly ventilated storage areas, and needed a
lengthy stay in our conservator’s cavernous chest freezer. Hastings Borough Council Planning
Department sent a set of terrier sheets, c1950, showing sites owned by the council (10290)
and providing a valuable key to the deeds of the properties.
Before the advent of local authorities, Justices of the Peace sitting in Quarter Sessions had
administrative as well as judicial duties. We received notebooks of Robert Henry Hurst,
recorder of Hastings and Rye, 1862-1882 (10301) as a private donation; it is always gratifying
to receive such strays from official records. We are the repository for other authorities, such as
hospitals, and organisations responsible for rivers, water-supply, drainage and sewerage. A
wage-book for Crowborough Hospital, 1946-1949 (10462) provides a useful insight into preNHS staffing, and we received three useful drainage plans for Hastings Local Board of Health,
1857-1859 (10424) to add to our holdings for Southern Water.
6
As the Diocesan Record Office for Anglican parish records, we hold the archives of all the
county’s ancient parishes. Recent gems include a map of Berwick common by Christopher
Mason, 1752 (10255), and watercolours of the wall paintings of Southease church by
Clive Rouse, 1936 (10524). We have also had deposits from a range of churches of other
denominations, including the long-established Alfriston United Reformed Church (10249),
which closed for worship in 2010.
Whereas many records arrive unsolicited, others need to be actively pursued. It was fitting that
in the bicentenary year of the death of Thomas Paine (1737-1809), author and revolutionary,
our major sale-room success was the purchase of the separation agreement between him and
his Lewes wife Elizabeth Olive, 1774 (10423). As with all our purchases, no County Council
money was involved: the bid was made up of grants from the MLA Purchase Grant Fund, the
Friends of the National Libraries, FESRO, Lewes Town Council and donations from several
individuals. We are very grateful to them all. It could be argued that the financial settlement
made to Paine as part of the agreement meant that he was able to afford his passage to
America, a springboard to a world stage and immortality. Over two centuries later his words
were quoted by Barack Obama in the presidential inaugural speech in January 2009. On 4 July
2010 it gave us great pleasure to present a copy of the document to Tony Benn, in Lewes to
unveil Marcus Cornish’s statue of the town’s most famous inhabitant.
Coming home: Paul Myles, Christopher Whittick and Bloomsbury’s Simon Luterbacher with the Paine
separation agreement of 1774 (ACC 10423)
7
Another auction success was the purchase of three Sheffield Park map books, 1820-1824
(10261). As avid readers of our reports will know, the estate archive was dispersed in the
saleroom in 1954 and 1981 and we endeavour to mop up any remnants which come to
our notice. These fine little volumes are pocket-sized, and would have fitted nicely into the
greatcoat of the land agent making his rounds. We were given an interesting valuation of the
estate made in 1760 by Richard Way for his prospective brother-in-law John Baker Holroyd in
1760 prior to his purchase of the estate (10442). Way did his best to dampen the impetuous
Dubliner’s enthusiasm for the property. Houses are ‘ready to fall’, rack-rents are low ‘the idle
disposition of the people towards smuggling is perhaps the cause of this great evil’. Land sells
cheaper in Sussex than in any counties and few people choose to purchase in the wilds since a
‘great part of the land is wet, cold and poor…’.
We were delighted to discover that local writer Julian Fane wished to entrust his extensive
archive to us, at the same time offering a generous endowment. His first editions included
what was to be his fiftieth and final work The Night Sky, for which a launch was planned, to be
co-hosted by our Friends organisation. Sadly he died on 13 December 2009 before this could
happen. Thanks are due to Diana Crook, Julian’s archivist and FESRO member, for keeping the
papers in such excellent order. Collecting a major deposit is usually a cause for celebration,
but it was a miserable day indeed when we drove away from Rotten Row with Julian’s papers.
Maidstone Museum kindly put us on the trail of the records of Plumer Verrall, an early 19thcentury Lewes auctioneer. We visited Kent to meet one of his descendants, who donated an
auction book, 1832-1839, and other items, including a rental of the manor of Isfield, 1864
(10489). Kent was practically home territory compared to a trip to Devon to collect the archive
of the Drewe family of Oakover in Ticehurst and Castle Drogo, which had been assembled by
the grandson of Julius Charles Drewe (1856-1931), founder of Home and Colonial Stores. In
1910 he commissioned Edwin Lutyens to design and build Castle Drogo, a forbidding granite
fortress now administered by the National Trust (10210).
It is good to receive records which represent the county’s maritime heritage. The Sussex
Division of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve was established, under the command of Admiral
Brand of Glynde Place, soon after the RNVR was founded in 1903. During the Second World
War HMS King Alfred, a training centre for officers, was based next to its headquarters in
Hove. This subsequently became the King Alfred Centre, and in 1951 the Sussex Division was
constituted as HMS Sussex. We received a wonderful archive of photographs and films which
include an earlier group of naval volunteers, the Brighton Battery of the Royal Naval Artillery
Reserve, or Volunteers (10215; 10284). An 1877 photograph album shows a riotous collection
of sailors, many of whom look as if they have come straight from a production of HMS Pinafore.
Close to home, a set of photographs show Southover Grange after its purchase by Thorold
Arthur Stewart-Jones, a barrister and businessman, in 1907 (10321). They are a poignant
reminder of peaceful times – Stewart-Jones was killed on the Western Front in 1915, aged
41; his sixth child was born two months after his death. His widow, Eva Joan, and mother,
Emily Pauline, were prime movers in erecting a granite cross outside the north-west corner of
Southover Church, dedicated in 1921; the family left the Grange in the following year.
8
The Brighton Battery of the Royal Naval Artillery Reserve, 1877 (ACC 10284)
A British tar is a soaring soul
As free as a mountain bird
His energetic fist should be ready to resist
A dictatorial word
His nose should pant and his lip should curl
His cheeks should flame and his brow should furl
His bosom should heave and his heart should glow
And his fist be ever ready for a knock-down blow
W S Gilbert, HMS Pinnafore, 1879
9
Moving from town to country, farming is represented by deeds and papers of the Fleet family
of Shortbridge Farm, Fletching, 1779-1929 (10394), a day book of Thomas Carey of Crowlink
Farm in Friston, 1868-1895 (10204), the Gay and Corbett families of Horsmans Farm, in
Sedlescombe, fruit farmers (10245), and the Hole family, tenant farmers of Birling Gap Farm at
the turn of the twentieth century (10501). Rural concerns are apparent in letters from Elizabeth
Harcourt of Wigsell in Salehurst, 1708-1709 (10464), who worries that her crop of hops will be
spoilt by the hot weather. Photographs of the Wickham family, 1890-c1950 (10265) feature the
Nutley Brass Band (above), which was established from the remnants of the Ashdown Forest
Temperance Band. Charley Wickham worked
as an agricultural labourer, gardener and
carter; he also played the euphonium and was
a founder-member, and later its bandmaster.
Photographs of Beacon School, Crowborough,
came up on eBay, and although our bid was
unsuccessful, we were able to contact the
purchaser, who generously agreed to sell them
to us for less than he paid. The photographs
date from the 1920s and 1930s, when prepschool life clearly involved naked bathing, the
pursuit of butterflies and be-goggled masters
with their motorbikes (right), reminding one
how much attitudes have changed (10279).
10
The sale of the contents of Stoke Brunswick School merited a pro-active response. Brunswick
School, based in Hove from 1866 and the alma mater of Winston Churchill from 1884 to 1888,
migrated to Haywards Heath in 1897; in 1958 it found a new home in the historic Dutton
Homestall in Ashurst Wood, a re-erected Cheshire mansion of the 16th century which had
belonged to the Dewar family of whisky distillers. It was joined there in 1965 by Stoke House
School from Seaford, which had moved to Sussex from Stoke Poges in 1913, presumably for
the bracing sea air. The new institution was named Stoke Brunswick. The school, which lies
one field inside the county boundary, closed suddenly in July 2009 and the contents were put
up for auction. With very little notice we were able to step in and buy several lots of school
photographs, and a subsequent appeal for the rest led to the acquisition of four additional
accessions of photographs, either for scanning or as donations.
Sports day at Stoke House School, Seaford: headmaster Arthur Spring-Rice Pyper pushing for
second place (ACC 10512).
We borrow photographs and papers to scan when the owner does not wish to part with
the originals. We acquired a miniature of William Dallaway of East Hoathly, a friend and
contemporary of the diarist Thomas Turner (10378), and copies of a set of miniatures of the
Sclater family of Sutton Hall and Newick Park, c1805-1860, were added to the family archive
(10433). Scans were also made of glass negatives showing John Bodkin Adams (1899-1983),
general practitioner and acquitted murderer (10405). These date from the 1920s and 1930s
and show Adams as a pillar of the community, and a trusted helper at local boys’ camps.
We continue to add to our fine collection of maps. Awcocks, Coxs and the Mill Farms in
Fletching, part of the estate of Sir Thomas Spencer Wilson, were depicted in 1764 by Henry
Watson (10341), thought to be his only survey of an estate in the British Isles; it probably
resulted through acquaintance with Sir Thomas when they served in the same regiment.
Shortly after its completion Watson travelled to Bengal as field engineer with the East India
11
Company, and the Fletching survey came with his printed plan of the marine docks under
construction at Calcutta, c1780. In June we bought three very scrappy-looking letters relating
to the marriage-negotiations of Sir Thomas’s second cousin Elizabeth Wilson between 1725
and 1727 (AMS 6916). They revealed a fascinating story of intrigue and illegitimacy – by
general repute Elizabeth was the daughter of the statesman Spencer Compton, Earl of
Wilmington – with an added strand of Jacobitism. The negotiations, conducted by the family
lawyer Anthony Trumble (who had married Elizabeth’s mother), foundered in 1727. Elizabeth
became the wife of James Glen of Linlithgow (1701-1777), for whom Compton obtained the
governorship of South Carolina in 1738.
Our holdings for the Coleman family of Brede were supplemented by the purchase of a plan of
estates of William Coleman in Brede, Beckley, Ewhurst and Udimore in Sussex, and Ivychurch,
Kent, by John Adams of Tenterden, 1823 (9286). We also bought a plan of Bell Reeds in
Mayfield and Waldron showing land enclosed from Beacon Down Common, c1820 (10251).
Long ago we obtained a photograph of William Figg’s map of Banks and other farms in Isfield
and Barcombe, 1820, which was given to the owner of the farm by William Grantham in 1978.
The present owners have now kindly agreed to deposit the original with us (10445).
A cartographer’s tools delicately depicted by the meticulous penmanship of
John Adams of Tenterden, 1823 (ACC 9286)
12
Additions to records of a large number of sporting organisations include committee minutes of
Maresfield Lawn Tennis Club, 1948-1968 (10331), and Buxted Park Cricket club records, 19572009 (10330). We were delighted to be the recipients of memorabilia commemorating Glynde
and Beddingham Cricket Club’s historic victory in the National Village KO Cup at Lords in 2009,
an event attended by several members of staff (10377).
Writer Sheila Kaye-Smith (1887-1956), who was born in St Leonards and based many of her
works locally, was not represented in our holdings until the purchase of letters, 1922-1923,
which pre-date her marriage to the Rev Theodore Penrose Fry, a curate at Christ Church St
Leonards in 1924 (10288). Both later converted to Catholicism, whereupon Fry had to give up
his Anglican curacy. The couple moved to Northiam where they established a Catholic chapel,
St Teresa of Lisieux. The letters consist of answers to a series of questions submitted by a
journalist, requesting information on the sources of her novels. We were delighted to trace a
copy of the resulting article in the 1923 issue of The Bookman.
Luckily on a number of occasions we have been offered a second chance to acquire records
which have eluded us. Deeds of 14 High Street, Lewes, 1610-1829 which had formed part of
the library of Sir Robert Megarry, were inspected in 2006 at booksellers, who were offering
them for sale at £850. That was declined, but the opportunity was taken to make a detailed
calendar of them. They were subsequently purchased by the person who had alerted ESRO to
their existence, and we have so far picked off six of them since their appearance on eBay in
2009 (10268).
We might shudder at the thought of letters being sold for the value of their postage stamps
alone, but that is the way of the philatelical world. A collection of interesting letters to William
Tanner, a watchmaker working in Gibraltar, from his family in Seaford and Horsebridge, 18141819, was spotted in the Tunbridge Wells stamp auction catalogued as postal history items,
and our man on the spot snapped them up at a bargain price (10432). Many letters of the
Courthope family of Whiligh in Ticehurst have been purchased from stamp dealers in the past,
and we were able to buy a further cache of twenty-five, 1813-1879 (10518).
Turning from philately to twitching, four volumes of the papers of Thomas Parkin (1845-1932),
of Hastings, ornithologist, Fellow of the Royal Geographical and Royal Historical Societies, and
founder-president of the Hastings and East Sussex Natural History Society, contain letters,
copies of his articles, and local sale particulars, 1891-1933 (10323). Parkin was the fourth
son of the Rev John Parkin, the vicar of Halton, Hastings, and after dabbling with the church
and the Bar, where he never received a brief, found his calling in travel and birdlife. He helped
establish Hastings Museum, to which he donated a collection of stuffed birds when it opened
in 1892; this was followed in 1930 by his collection of around 5,000 birds’ eggs. He retained
only that of the extinct Great Auk, of which he was especially proud.
Other interesting purchases include papers relating to the sale of the estate of Thomas
Lennard, Earl of Sussex, in Cumberland and Sussex, 1706-1717 (10263). Thomas Lennard
(1654-1715) inherited the Barony of Dacre from his father Francis Lennard, and was created
Earl of Sussex in 1674. He served as a gentleman of the bedchamber 1680-1685 and in
the words of the Complete Peerage ‘through litigation, reckless extravagance and losses by
gambling, he had to sell, in 1708, Herstmonceux and other estates.’ A photograph album of
13
Glyndebourne, 1883-c1954 (10238) which descended in the family of the former housekeeper
Georgina Daniels, adds to our knowledge of this famous local mansion. Papers concerning the
service of William Ivor Grantham in the 6th (Cyclist) Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment
(Territorial Army), 1915-1985, another eBay purchase, expand the archive of the Grantham
family of Barcombe (10269).
An international flavour was added by the papers of Jasmine Rose-Innes (1915-1998), writer,
artist and photographer, 1918-1998 (10362), whose interesting and varied life began in South
Africa, where she became a member of the Black Sash, a non-violent white women’s resistance
movement. The archive includes a set of propaganda leaflets which she designed during
the Second World War for dispersal in occupied Europe. This work was commissioned by the
designer and typographer Robert Harling, who also hired Eric Ravilious to produced woodengraved vignettes for his Admiralty Weekly Intelligence Report.
Propaganda leaflet designed by Jasmine Rose-Innes dropped by the RAF over
Flemish-speaking Belgium in 1944 (ACC 10362)
14
Raising the Tibetan flag in Sedlescombe:
the Pestalozzi Village, c1960 (10461)
We are involved with the lottery-funded project ‘Pestalozzi – 50 Years in East Sussex’ and
travelled out regularly to the Pestalozzi International Village at Sedlescombe to assist with
the conservation and listing of its archive. Set up initially to help European refugees following
the Second World War, the trust has offered educational opportunities to many students from
Third World countries in the years since its inception, and the archive will be deposited here
when the project is complete.
15
A tip-off from Ditchling Museum led to our acquisition of Ditchling Common terriers – lists of
owners and occupiers, sometimes accompanied by totals of stock grazing on the common
– and minutes and accounts, 1760-1864 (10516). A plan by the schoolboy Thomas Brown
Daniel of a perambulation of the boundary of the Borough of Hastings, 1820, includes
picturesque place-names such as Old Woman’s Tap and New England Bank, with a flotilla of
ships and boats out at sea, their rigging shown with apparent accuracy (10565). Daniel grew
up to be a master-mariner but died prematurely when commanding the Hercules of London,
bound for New South Wales, in 1835.
Although the emphasis here is necessarily on new accessions, we also spend much of our time
cataloguing the backlog of holdings to make them fully accessible to our users. One major
listing project was the archive of the influential theologian Alec Vidler (8784), and included
letters from his friend Malcolm Muggeridge written while teaching in India between 1921 and
1935. The deposit contained papers of no fewer than sixteen members of the extended Vidler
family of merchants and auctioneers, who were deeply embedded in the fabric of Rye society.
Finally, a cautionary tale. Against our advice, several large bundles of deeds were withdrawn
from the office by their depositor. We were amazed to be contacted by the police within a
matter of hours to be told that the deeds had been found abandoned, still in the bag in which
they were taken. Initially viewed with suspicion, the package had luckily not been treated as a
potential explosive device, and when opened a copy of the withdrawal form led the trail to us.
The theft had not even been noticed. To those still in any doubt, the moral of this story is that
your documents are definitely safest when held in our custody.
Muscular Christianity? Alec Vidler at a mission to fruit-pickers at West Walton, Cambridgeshire, 1932
(ACC 8784/9/6/3)
16
Work in Brighton and Hove
The Brighton Tigers’ heart-throb? Diminutive ice-hockey star Patsy Sequin, 1937 (ACC 10439)
In June I received a phone call from Harold Corbin CGM who had deposited his grandfather’s
First World War letters with us back in 2003. When I collected them he mentioned, as an aside,
that he also had some papers relating to his own service with the RAF in the Second World War
and wondered whether we would be interested in these at some point.
Mr Corbin’s archive (AMS 6867) contains service records, photographs, memoirs and
newspaper cuttings relating to his service with RAF Coastal Command between 1943 and
1945. He was awarded the Conspicuous Gallantry Medal (Flying) in September 1944 for a
number of actions against enemy shipping. Following one raid against German Navy ships at
Bordeaux, Harold Corbin and his observer Maurice Webb baled out over Brittany as a result
of severe damage to their Mosquito. They evaded capture and were picked up by the French
Resistance who swiftly handed them over to American troops; the pair were back in England
within 48 hours. The telegrams sent by Corbin’s CO to his wife in Hove on consecutive days
(AMS 6867/2/1/7-8) illustrate the wildly fluctuating fortunes of war: on 18th August 1944 he
was missing presumed dead; the following day he was found safe and well in Allied hands.
Meeting depositors is one of the pleasures of our job and some years ago I had a memorable
session with Trevor Chepstow and his enormous collection of programmes, photographs,
newspaper cuttings and correspondence with former staff of the Sports Stadium Brighton
in West Street (10439). Very sadly Mr Chepstow died last year but on his instructions, his
executors deposited the collection with us to ensure the long-term safety of his labour of love.
The SS Brighton, as it was usually known, seems to be held in great affection by Brightonians
who can remember the theatrical ice shows and the Brighton Tigers ice hockey team who
played their home matches in the art deco building. Mr Chepstow was able to collect a great
deal relating to the Tigers, who enjoyed much success between 1935 and 1965.
17
This collection is an important addition to our holdings of sports archives. Although we hold
the archive of Sussex County Cricket Club we have very little for Brighton and Hove Albion
FC and the club’s own archive is thought to have been dumped during the move from the
Goldstone Ground in 1997. But in August we received a large collection of programmes for
matches between 1963 and 2009 which goes some way towards rectifying the loss; we hope it
will form the basis for further deposits relating to the club (10320).
Aside from the collection of Trevor Chepstow we received or purchased a number of archives
relating to theatrical performance in Brighton. The largest is a fascinating series of letters
sent to the manager of Brighton Aquarium, mostly written by prospective performers or
their agents, and bought with the help of FESRO (AMS 6432/5). As well as housing fish and
marine creatures, the Aquarium contained a concert hall which staged musical, theatrical
and vaudeville shows. If the manager decided to book these acts (and other records we hold
would reveal whether he did), the public would have been in for some acts of mixed quality.
Who would not pay good money to see ‘Elexis, the Electric Lady’ who could give powerful
shocks to members of the audience? On the other hand Elexis’ agent also offered ‘one of the
largest giants ever exhibited who measures 5’ 11” and 40 stone’. The freak show appears to
have been alive and well in the theatrical world of the late nineteenth century; also on offer
were the vocal duo Herr Joseph Drasal who stood at 8’ 4” and Colonel Ulpts who was 34
inches tall. Some impresarios obviously had more ambition than putting a very fat man of
above-average height on the stage for people to stare at, or pairing a dwarf with a giant in a
singing duet: James Fuller of Hornsey Rise, London, had devised a show called ‘Our Heroes
in the Soudan’ [Sudan] which, according to an attached cutting, was a ‘grand pictorial and
mechanical illustration of the principal incidents of the war in the east ... complete with battle
effects showing 2,000 mechanical figures’.
Colonial wars cropped up again when four Theatre Royal playbills were donated in February
(10478). These included a poster for a production of War of Afghanistan or The Horrors of
the Khyber Pass dating from October 1843. More Theatre Royal playbills dating from the mid1860s came up at a local auction in March (AMS 6895). Once again the generosity of FESRO
allowed us to make this purchase, which sheds a little light on the early life of Nelly Rollason
who acted in many of the productions. In 1867 she married Henry Nye Chart and, as Ellen Nye
Chart, went on to manage the theatre after her husband’s death in 1876.
A theatrical agent takes advantage of the craze for all things Japanese – The Mikado would appear two
years later (AMS 6432/5/15/6)
18
Design for the sign for the
Margaret McMillan school at
Carlton Hill, Brighton, 1933
(10468)
Another influential Brighton woman, the landowner and
merchant’s wife Letitia Tarner (1841-1933), bequeathed
land on Carlton Hill to the Brighton and Hove Nursery
School Association. Original photographs, lists of
children’s birthdays and brochures of the nursery came
our way when QueenSpark Books deposited their
archive in October (10468). The school still runs as
the Tarnerland Nursery but opened in September 1933
as the Margaret McMillan Open Air Nursery School
as a tribute to the socialist propagandist. McMillan
(1860-1931) espoused the concept of ‘physiological
education’, valuing the physical well-being of children as
much as their intellectual development, and the nursery
sold itself on having baths, land for play and a nurse
who would check each child every morning for minor
but contagious ailments. Perhaps rather improbably,
the records contribute another important strand in the
history of Brighton’s radical past.
The last couple of years have been difficult ones for Brighton and Hove’s churches and
November saw a significant event in the history of St Peter’s which was leased to Holy Trinity
Brompton, an evangelical congregation. Before the handover I cleared the storeroom of any
archives. Sorting and listing the records (PAR 277) has been a dirty, time-consuming but
worthwhile process – we now have the original plans of the chancel dating from 1904; images
of most of the Vicars of Brighton, c1785-c1997 and First World War rolls of honour to mention
but a small fraction of the accession.
Just the other side of the Level from St Peter’s lies Park Crescent, designed by Amon Henry
Wilds in the 1840s. The minutes and accounts of the Park Crescent Grounds Committee were
deposited In July (AMS 6884) and reveal a great deal about the social life and everyday goings
on of residents in these exclusive houses. The sense of strained gentility which they exude
makes it perhaps not surprising that there is no mention of the 1934 ‘trunk murder’ of Violet
Kaye, whose body was found in the basement of number 44, and a wartime sense of discretion
produces only oblique references to the bombing of numbers 24-26 on 25 May 1943.
However, the committee were forthright in expressing their views on many other aspects of the
Crescent’s life. They did not like the idea of the Home Guard putting an ammunition shelter
in the grounds and in June 1945 they turned down the suggestion of a party to celebrate VE
Day as it was considered too long after the end of hostilities – a celebration for VJ Day was
suggested instead. This was also squashed when offers of support were deemed inadequate
to enable the party to go ahead. At the height of the war, ignoring the Government directive
to ‘Dig for Victory’, the committee felt that the lawns should not be ploughed to grow crops as
they considered the soil too poor and that such a disturbance would threaten the trees.
We hold a number of archives relating to the work of the Women’s Land Army in East Sussex
and we loaned some of them to Brighton Museum for their very successful exhibition
The Land Girls: Cinderellas of the Soil. Included was the diary of former Land Girl Pauline
Hockney (1919-1983), who served at The Deans, Piddinghoe (AMS 5439/1).
19
The diary gives a vivid description of her life in the Land Army and of her surroundings.
She clearly had no time for Brighton though, ‘Awful place, lousy shops, in fact just like
Hammersmith. Same sort of people as well.’
The insurance man James Gray (1904-1998) obviously viewed Brighton and Hove in a more
positive light and spent much of his life collecting photographs of the towns. In all he
compiled 39 albums of photographs, dating from the middle of the 19th to the end of the 20th
century. Some views are familiar and almost unchanged, whilst others are barely recognisable.
The collection was bequeathed to the Regency Society and last year they transferred the
originals to ESRO for safe keeping (10477). Thanks to their hard work every image in the
collection has been scanned and published on the Regency Society website. Views can be
searched for by road name or brought up in the original order imposed by Gray, who filed his
shots by area.
A boy and his dog on the site cleared for the new Marks and Spencer’s, Western Road, Brighton, 1932
(James Gray collection, The Regency Society; 10477/26)
Papers and scans collected by the Letter in the Attic project, which was run by My Brighton
and Hove community website and QueenSpark publishers, were transferred to ESRO in June.
The project encouraged people to deposit diaries, letters, postcards and memoirs relating to
Brighton and Hove and was a great success: in all 80 new accessions were received ranging
from individual letters to the archive of the Brighton Mendicity Society. The majority of the
records taken in by the project are scans from originals and the technical and administrative
challenge of making available records in a relatively new format means this excellent collection
is not yet accessible. Work to rectify this is on-going and I expect to report a successful
resolution in 2011.
New accessions are coming in at an almost unprecedented rate at the moment so next year’s
report looks like being a bumper edition.
20
Outreach and Learning
Led both by ESRO and in partnership with local organizations, our Outreach and Learning
projects have secured over £20,000 of funding.
If it wasn’t for the War was a
pilot project funded by a grant
of £10,000 from the Museums,
Libraries and Archives Council
(MLA) under the stage 3 Their Past
Your Future programme. It explored
the impact of the Second World
War on people’s lives, values and
beliefs. The project focused on
providing research skills and Oral
History training to schools. This
was a highly successful experience
that involved 86 pupils together
with teaching staff and trainee
teachers, oral historians, and three History can be fun – Their Past Your Future group from
volunteers from the Lewes District
Queens Park School, Brighton
Senior Forum who contributed
their life stories. The oral history interviews have been deposited at ESRO. The school observed
that the project had engaged the pupils who are less confident and usually don’t participate in
class and recommended it as a programme from which all schools would benefit. One of the
seniors participating said ‘This was the best thing I have ever done, really!’
Lives of Tradition, another project supported by a grant of £7,000 from MLA as part of the
Strategic Commissioning Programme continued its activities with Looked After Children. Its
aim has been the exploration of Sussex Traditions, combining archive collections from ESRO
and the University of Sussex with other heritage resources. Throughout the project the children
and their carers learnt about the Copper family history at ESRO and explored their archive
in an interactive learning workshop at InQbate, University of Sussex. The children also had
the opportunity to sing with John Copper and interview him about his memories. Children
also visited the Weald and Downland Museum, where they participated in blacksmithing
workshops, made lace doilies, did Morris dancing and listened to traditional storytelling.
Finally, the children were initiated into music composition at Crew Club’s studios in Brighton.
We continued to support the WRVS Heritage Plus project, one aspect of which was to help
local museums reach and engage older adults. WRVS provided training on the provision
of loan-boxes of objects to encourage reminiscences. ESRO visited Hastings, Eastbourne,
Brighton and Crawley, where we demonstrated the ability of archives to complement and add
context to objects used in reminiscence sessions. We have also supported the project’s family
history courses in Portslade and Peacehaven by facilitating on-site and outreach visits. WRVS
deposited the oral history material and publications produced as a result of their co-operation
with ESRO, including photographs, DVDs, recipe books, and childhood and courtship
memories from Newhaven, Peacehaven, Eastbourne and Brighton.
21
We were also awarded £5,000 from MLA for Real People, Real Voices, part of the Paralympic
Region Programme. This project, developed in partnership with Chailey Heritage and the
Oyster Project in Lewes (an empowering project run by and for people with disabilities), aims
to collect responses to the archives of Chailey Heritage; it was just getting under way at the
end of the financial year.
Sound Maps of London Road aimed to explore the social fabric of a major Brighton street
by collecting the memories, opinions and responses to changes in the area of people living,
working, shopping and studying there. ESRO supported this project, which was part of the
Adult Learning Festival, by providing facsimiles of maps, scrapbooks, newspaper articles and
photographs documenting the history of London Road and its communities.
We are partners with Action in Rural Sussex in Meeting Places, an HLF-funded project which
began this year, working with year six students from Netherfield and Sedlescombe Primary
schools and Claverham Community College to explore the history of buildings in Battle used
as meeting places. The research and oral history will be used to develop a travelling exhibition
partly accessible by mobile phone technology.
With the aim of engaging young families we have developed and trialled a session for underfives combining archive photographs and objects from the collection of the Schools Library
and Museum Service. Sessions focused on toys now and then and Sussex songs, and were
delivered in Eastbourne at Devonshire Children’s Centre. As part of National Family Week in
May, we worked at Hailsham with the library and with Marshlands Primary School children
and their families, including traveller children, introducing them to the idea of archives and
community history.
With the support of staff, FESRO, The Sussex Family History Group, Family Roots Family History
Society, the Lewes Phoenix Project and our volunteers we ran a successful Open Weekend in
November. There were displays of East Sussex maps, tours behind the scenes, conservation
demonstrations and family and local history surgeries throughout the day. Of the participants
who returned their questionnaires 85% said they would return to use ESRO. Some of the
comments made during the day were: much more extensive than I’d realised; a wide and
varied mixture and very good as covered many areas of Sussex.
We also continued our active programme of talks and visits to a wide variety of family
history, local history and community groups as well as adult education courses run by Sussex
University and U3A. We achieved press and media coverage on the development of The Keep,
our involvement with the Pestalozzi 50th anniversary project and the purchase of Tom Paine’s
separation agreement. We also welcomed a crew from South Africa filming for that country’s
version of the celebrity family history series, Who Do You Think You Are?, investigating the
Bean family ancestors of the South African broadcaster and adventurer Patricia Glyn.
Outreach and learning statistics
Events and activities
Numbers attending
22
2006-2007
32
1,727
2007-2008
34
945
2008-2009
49
1,710
2009-2010
87
1,777
Conservation
In the course of the year, 475 documents passed through the studio for conservation
treatment. Some of these jobs involved only minor repairs to torn pages, but others,
particularly when the document is unfit for production, are much more time-consuming – the
total includes 50 volumes, which altogether took three months to complete.
Roughly 10% of my work originates in new accessions, some of which need immediate
attention at their point of entry into the office before going into storage. This can be a simple
job of cleaning or a major work of decontamination involving a three-month sentence in the
blast-freezer.
We continue to work on the archive of a firm of solicitors from Hastings, which came to us in
a shocking state. All the documents, amounting to at least three bays of shelving, needed
blast-freezing to remove the mould. This work needed to be carried out in stages, and has of
necessity to precede any archival work on the documents, the earliest of which dates from
1650. The job has already taken over two years, but we are now nearing completion.
There have also been a lot of glass plates coming our way of late; we have calculated that
over 1000 have been dry-cleaned and boxed this year. The archive of John Skelton’s drawings
continues to come to us in batches. All the designs have to be cleaned using specialist
vacuums before they can be packaged and placed in the strongrooms.
Repair work has taken up only half my time this year; the rest has been spent tackling adverse
environmental conditions. The weather has become so unpredictable that our air-conditioning
is insufficient to cope with it. At least six months of the year have been spent at our outstores:
repackaging many of the contents of Unit Y at Newhaven, and monitoring the replacement
23
of the roof at Southover. As well as being good housekeeping practice, the transfer of
documents, some of them loose on the shelves, into standard-sized boxes is an essential
preparation for the move to The Keep. We installed water alarms and pest traps into all the
strongrooms, which are proving most effective.
We have completely rewritten our preservation programme, and updated our preservation
policy, as well as the staff handling data sheets. Our volunteer policy has been rewritten as
have the transportation guidelines. Occasionally I have been allowed out of the studio to give
advice and guidance to other institutions on the appropriate storage of their archives.
For fun once a week a few members of staff have been learning how to make a book with me
during their lunch hours. This has proved to be quite a success with the books coming along
well and hopefully finished in time for Christmas.
As well as my usual helpers, the volunteers who have worked with me over the last year have
included a PhD student, a history of art undergraduate and a graduate bookbinder. I am
indeed very grateful to them, and provide tea and coffee as thanks.
Melissa Williams shows her work on a map of farms in Fletching (ACC 10341) to HRH the Duke of Kent
24
Records Management
The Record Centre continued to contribute to the success of the council’s accommodation
strategy by managing records which could no longer be held by departments due to space
rationalisation and office closures. We received from departments twice the amount we were
able to destroy, so pressure on space continued unabated.
However, we did begin to tackle one area of backlog at the Record Centre, the appraisal of
files that have reached the end of their working lives but which need to be assessed for their
historical value before they are either destroyed or passed to archives. We made a case to the
department to fund a temporary Appraisal Archivist and Beki Cox started work in November,
getting through the work like a knife through butter, and creating vital space at the Record
Centre.
We experienced further problems with our buildings this year and suffered from water intake.
Works carried out to reduce the risk of flooding included roof works to Units R and M in June
and the insertion of an additional drainage pipe in January to Unit M to enable water to drain
away from the building more effectively. These measures appear to have been successful.
We continued to work on revising retention schedules for East Sussex County Council, Brighton
and Hove City Council and East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service to ensure that they are both
up-to-date and future-proofed against departmental reorganisations.
Work experience placements, tours and advice were provided to people considering a career
in archives and records management. In September, we welcomed to the Record Centre
Hampshire County Council, who wished to see large-scale records management in operation
prior to setting up their own.
The Record Centre continues to meet its target of ensuring that all records are produced and
returned to our customers wherever they are based in East Sussex and Brighton and Hove
within 24 hours of receiving the request.
2006/07
1,829
Transfers received
metres
Transfers received: ESCC
911 m
BHCC
918 m
Other customers N/A
Destruction of time-expired material 1,912 m
Files returned to departments
3,872
2007/08
1,792
metres
928 m
804 m
N/A
1,328 m
3,629
2008/09
1,856
metres
865 m
920 m
71 m
1,156 m
4,528
2009/10
1,629
metres
888 m
734 m
76 m
811 m
4,373
25
Staff and volunteers
There have been quite a few staff changes. Sarah Jackson joined the public service staff as
Archives Assistant to replace Fiona James. At The Record Centre Sue Thomas retired after
41 years working for the County Council (11 for the Record Centre) and was able to go out
on a high note with an invitation to a Buckingham Palace garden party. Julie Williams also
left as Record Centre Supervisor to relocate to Lancashire, and Suzanne Mitchell, who had
been working as Deeds Clerk, was appointed to succeed her. We also received departmental
funding to appoint a temporary appraisal archivist at the Record Centre. James Painter was
with us for the year to help with the workload and we were able to employ other agency
workers for short periods.
We remain most grateful for the contribution made by our growing band of volunteers. In
2009/10 we had 37 volunteers who, at a conservative estimate, contributed 3,390 hours to
the Record Office, the equivalent of two extra members of staff. They carry out work that would
not otherwise be possible, including listing and indexing and assisting with conservation and
outreach work. We offer our sincere thanks to every one of them. We also took a positive part
in the County Council’s work placement scheme for under 19s and had five such placements
in 2009/10. One student became a long-term volunteer as part of her degree course, with
particular emphasis on outreach work and has gone on to seek work in community outreach.
Members of staff have also contributed significantly to professional matters nationally
and the promotion of historical and archival concerns locally. Elizabeth Hughes, County
Archivist, served as secretary of the Association of Chief Archivists in Local Government
and was involved in the negotiations to merge the organisation into the new Archives and
Records Association; as a member of the National Council on Archives and the Renaissance
South East Surrey East and West regional sub-panel; and as a trustee of Rye Museum.
Christopher Whittick served on the Sussex Historic Churches Trust, the editorial board of
Sussex Archaeological Collections, the Bodiam Castle Management Committee, as a trustee
of the Westgate Chapel in Lewes and of the Tom Paine Project. He taught palaeography and
administrative history for the University of Sussex, at the Latin and palaeography summer
school at Keele and on the UCL archives course. He is a Vice-President of the Sussex
Archaeological Society. Philip Bye was on the
council of the Sussex Record Society and the
Research Committee of the Sussex Archaeological
Society. He and Wendy Walker served on Screen
Archive South East advisory group. Wendy also
served on the Steering Group of the Public Sculpture
of Sussex: National Recording Project based at
Brighton University and was a member of the Local
Government Group of the Records Management
Society. Andrew Bennett served on the council of
the Sussex Record Society and was a member of the
Health Archives Group, and Andrew Lusted’s History
of the Trevor Arms and other pubs in Glynde and
Beddingham was published in May (right).
26
Friends of the East Sussex Record Office
FESRO has had another productive year, in which our activities ranged from involvement in
planning for the Keep, via the provision of both learning and recreation for our members, to
the contribution of almost £7000 towards the purchase of 48 groups of documents many and
various, ranging from the separation agreement of Thomas Paine and two map books of the
Sheffield Park estate, to a postcard purchased on eBay for 99p. Although the Paine separation
agreement was the outstanding item, we are proud to have made it possible for ESRO to
become such an effective presence in the saleroom. We all continue to be grateful to Ian Hilder
for his essential work of monitoring eBay and negotiating with depositors.
Our ability to be generous was enabled to
a large extent by the kindness and interest
of Julian Fane, and FESRO adds its sorrow
to that expressed elsewhere in this report
at his passing. His enthusiasm, friendliness
and support will be sadly missed by those
of us who were lucky enough to meet
and work with him. We aim to use his
gift, augmented with some of our own
resources, to set up a capital fund, rather
than making grants from income as we
do at present. As well as its more obvious
benefits, such a policy will have the added
advantage of keeping Julian’s memory
green among both the Friends and our
wider public.
The purchase of the Sheffield Park documents was particularly pleasing on two fronts. The
books themselves provide another piece in the jigsaw of the scattered archive which ESRO are
gradually working to re-create; in addition the auction house, Woolley and Wallis of Salisbury,
kindly waived their commission on the sale when they realised that the document had been
purchased on behalf of ESRO. I would like to take this opportunity to record our appreciation
of their generosity. The Friends have also promised to support the purchase of more mundane
objects like book rests, adjusting chairs and cups and saucers for use at social occasions and
classes held at the Record Office.
On a scorching hot day at the end of May, more than 30 members of FESRO and the West
Sussex Archives Society gathered at Lindfield, described by Pevsner as ‘without doubt the
finest village street in East Sussex’. As that description suggests, Lindfield lay in the eastern
division until 1974, making it an ideal location for a joint meeting We divided into two groups,
with one gratefully heading for the cool of the interior of the parish church of St John Baptist
with Colin and Judy Brent, and the other facing the heat of the high street with Annabelle
Hughes. Then we swapped round, before having tea and biscuits at The Tyger, a five-bay
Wealden house by the church.
27
September found us in Pevensey, where thirty friends gathered in the church of St Nicolas
to hear Colin Brent deliver from the pulpit a 20-minute talk on its history. The smallest of the
Five Ports, Pevensey is now a modest-sized village, strung out east to west along the spur and
overlooking the drained brookland with its highly productive grazing, extending northwards to
Hailsham and Herstmonceux.
In spring this year, Anne Drewery gave a series of evening classes in Latin for Local Historians,
which was a great success and a very pleasant social occasion. By the end, we all felt that our
rudimentary knowledge of the language had progressed, and perhaps more importantly that
we now had the confidence to tackle documents written in it. Anne donated her fees for the
class to our funds – so FESRO has doubly benefited from her instruction.
An administrative sub-committee was set up this year to consider how FESRO would fit into
the administration of The Keep. It has been suggested that a Trust Fund should be set up to
support The Keep in the future. Should the trust come into being the committee will continue
to monitor the position of FESRO in relation to it. We intend that our principal aim should
remain the provision of support for East Sussex and Brighton and Hove archives within The
Keep. At the same time we will also continue to seek to represent the views of the users and
assist in the provision of events and training for them.
When the request went out from ESRO to provide volunteers for a listing project on probate
records, we were happy to oblige. A conventional gestation-period now having passed,
it is appropriate to look back on our achievements. Until 1858, the probate of wills was
the business of the church courts, and the archives of three such jurisdictions are held at
Lewes – the Archdeaconry of Lewes (which stretches well into even old West Sussex), the
Canterbury peculiar of South Malling (ten parishes – or so we thought – from Cliffe Bridge to
Lamberhurst, with Edburton, Stanmer and Lindfield in addition) and the peculiar of the Dean
of Battle, confined to the boundaries of that parish. There are probably 43,000 registered wills,
but they are the tip of the iceberg – once original wills, administration bonds, inventories,
renunciations, proxies of guardianship and a host of other more obscure records are added,
the archive must contain getting on for 120,000 items.
Disdaining Battle as too small, we began work on South Malling. It immediately became
clear that the simple list of parishes within the peculiar masked a rather more complicated
jurisdiction, with parts of East Grinstead, Worth, Withyham, Hartfield and Framfield falling
within it. Michael Leppard kindly pointed out that in those parishes, each area was known
as ‘The Hamlet’. At the time of writing, we have processed over four thousand wills and
inventories, adding precise dates of the will itself and of the probate, the value of the estate
and the names of the witnesses, through which we hope to built up information on doctors,
lawyers and their clerks. Quite frequently, testators name the house, farm or hamlet at which
they live, and this information has also been added to the lists. The original wills themselves
range from elaborate affairs, decorated with illumination and flourishes, to scrappy notes of a
few lines; indeed it is quite surprising to see the level of informality that the church courts were
prepared to recognise as testamentary wishes.
28
The early wills – the series begins in 1588 – include a good number of do-it-yourself examples
in which testators, unrestrained by the lawyer’s formulary, allow us a view of their feelings. We
were all particularly charmed by John Gallett of Mayfield, whose will of 1598, was ‘written with
my own hand; and though it be but simply done and without any counsel, I would have none
of my children grudge at it, but be content and give God thanks that I am able to do for them
as I do’.
One matter that has exercised the committee during the year is how to recruit new members
to the group in order to ensure that it flourishes into the future. New membership forms have
been designed and are to be distributed to all libraries in both the county and the city in the
hope that we can achieve that aim during the coming year.
Sheffield Park and Home Farm
Sheffield
Farm, 1884 (10261)
29