British Association for Local History - For all Local History resources

Font size: A A A

www.balh.co.uk

OUR PUBLICATIONS

BALH GUIDED VISITS
Visits are arranged to places of interest to local historians, often not easily accessible to individuals.

See EVENTS page for current programme.

MEMBERSHIP
Click Here to become a member of the BALH

ACCESSIBILITY
How to make this site easier to use.

Search The Site

The Local Historian
Volume 31, Number 4 - November 2001

Contents

[ Close all Abstracts ]

Current issue

Editorial
By: Alan Crosby

[ Read Abstract ]
To Margaret Bonney, with thanks
This is the first issue of The Local Historian for which I have been the sole editor (the August 2001 issue having been the swan song of my predecessor, Margaret Bonney). Naturally, this is an opportunity for me to reflect upon the way that the journal has evolved over the years, and to begin to set down my thoughts about its future. Much more important, though, is that it allows me to pay tribute to the outstanding work which Margaret has undertaken during her ten years as editor of the most influential and highly-regarded local history journal in Britain. Hers has been a remarkable achievement. She took over at a difficult time in the life not only of The Local Historian but also of the British Association for Local History, and her contribution to the continuing success of both has been quite invaluable. The major developments in the organisation during the last decade have been paralleled by, and reinforced by, a continuous process of improvement to the journal. Moreover, this improvement has been accomplished without any compromising of the key principles upon which its editors have always insisted: that it should be accessible, free of jargon and the abstruse realms of esoteric theorising, and as broad as possible in its catchment and readership, yet at the same time should be produced to the highest technical standards and have impeccable academic and scholarly credentials. Margaret Bonney has triumphantly accomplished this difficult task, reconciling what to some might seem conflicting aims.
Her own systematic and methodical approach to the job of editor is exemplified by the excellent quality of the journal. But on reading through the files of correspondence and the archive of material about every article published over the past ten years, I have been very much aware of- and filled with admiration for - Margaret's wider role as guide, advisor, and patient and firm critic to authors from a multitude of backgrounds and a huge diversity of experience. Time and again, fresh from receiving a text copiously annotated by the editorial red pen, contributors have written to thank her warmly for her help and guidance, not taking offence but recognising that her sensible and practical suggestions represented a real enhancement to the quality of their work. Everybody who is involved in British local history owes Margaret a great deal, directly or indirectly, and all who have read and used The Local Historian over the last decade will know that she is indeed a hard act to follow. Margaret has now started the latest stage in her varied career, and is an archivist at the Leicestershire Record Office. We wish her every success and happiness in the future, and thank her most sincerely for all that she has done for local history and The Local Historian.
First thoughts
What is the purpose of this journal'? I suppose that all newly-arrived editors think, consciously or subconsciously, about that question, and with a slight variation it was one of the challenges posed at my interview for the editorship of The Local Historian. This is a journal of record, which will be kept and referred to over the years rather than being read once and discarded. It is now almost fifty years old and throughout that half-century has been at the forefront of local history in Britain. Like other respected and authoritative journals, it earns its place on the bookshelves because it is solid, permanent and serious. It is also, however, the journal of a subject with many tens of thousands of non-professional participants, so it has to be readable and unintimidating, diverse and eclectic, with unrivalled coverage of current research and investigation in each and every aspect of local history.
All over the British Isles people are researching, recording and writing local history with a multitude of different themes and approaches. Work of the highest value is being undertaken, important findings are being reached, and existing and new sources are being exploited and analysed. Yet, too frequently, work of great value and interest remains largely unknown outside the immediate locality, and the research which lies behind it is conducted in comparative isolation. One of the key roles of The Local Historian is to provide a medium of exchange, whereby case-studies, discussions of sources, and ways of approaching and conducting research become more widely disseminated, so that work done by a researcher in one part of the country may inspire others in a different area, or provide a contrasting or comparable study against which to measure findings. The pattern of a historical process researched in Northumberland might be cross-referenced and compared with that of the same process in Wiltshire - are they different, or are they similar, and why should those differences or similarities be observable. At the same time, general discussion can reinforce and bring up-to-date the use which is made of sources or methods by local historians as a whole - the Hearth Tax, or probate inventories, or feet of fines, or anyone of a host of other types of raw material for our study. As has so often been observed, and so rightly, local should not mean parochial: a limited geographical framework should not implicitly mean a limited analytical or methodological perspective. We should all be eager to learn from the experience of others, to share the findings of our own research, to acquire new ideas and fresh approaches not only to how we study in detail but also to how we perceive our subject in general. The Local Historian offers that approach and for fifty years has demonstrated that local history is at once a serious, accessible and rewarding subject. I trust that under my editorship it will continue to develop and reinforce that central role in British local history, and that you, its readers, are satisfied with the result. If you are not, please tell me.

Voluntary charity in early nineteenth century Ulster: Counties Armagh and Down in the 1830s
By: George M Beale

War memorials and local history: the UK National Unventory of War Memorials
By: Lorraine Knight and Nick Hewitt

The Canney Hill Pottery
By: Cliffe Howe

Unfolding Shropshire's past
By: David R Jones

Reviews

Recent Publications in Local History

The Local Historian - November 2001 Issue