Explore the Past

newsletter No.34: September 2016

Our cover shows some of the documents and archaeological finds photographed by our digitisation team. From the main image, a detail from the 18th century Hanbury Hall map book; both sides of a Roman stater (donated to Worcester City Museum and reproduced by permission); a neolithic leaf arrowhead (3-4000BC) found at Clifton Quarry; a miniature hammer from Lowesmoor and a blue medicine bottle from Chipping Norton, both 19th century.

Find out more online:www.worcestershire.gov.uk/waas

Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service

The Somme

July marked the centenary of the start of the Battle of the Somme. On 1st July a commemorative service was held in the Cathedral. In the morning students from schools around the County took part in a variety of creative activities which led to performances of drama, music and poetry. A number of students visited the Hive to find out more about the First World War and particularly the Somme from the archives, before having a go at creative writing in response to what they found. Some amazing poetry and prose pieces were produced, one of which was read out at the Service in the afternoon.

The Somme Project, a Worcestershire Libraries and Learning project to commemorate the Battle, is on display in The Hive. Working in partnership with schools and local groups each Library in the County researched local casualties who died during the Somme offensive, telling their individual story. For The Hive’s display we researched five men who are on the war memorial at All Saints Church. The exhibition is in the shelf end display cases on Level 3 until Nov 2016.

Find My Past

This website, a popular family history resource with millions of records, is, due to a recent partnership between the website and local archives now freely available within The Hive. Just type in www.findmypast.co.uk to any computer in The Hive

Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service, in particular John and Jonathon in the digitisation team, recently worked with Find My Past on a large national project to provide high quality images of 141 pre 1915 school registers from Worcestershire and other areas of the West Midlands which are now available on the Find My Past website. For the first time you will be able to use the records created when your family were admitted to infant, primary and secondary schools.

Archival Photography at the Hive

In 1990, the Worcestershire Record Office began offering an in-house microfilming service to individuals and organisations who wanted to have film copies of archive materials. This improved access to the collections archives and at the same time helped to preserve the original material. As the decade moved on and the photographic world became more digital than analogue, the Record Office kept pace by adding a high-end Hasselblad digital camera to its armoury which allowed users to have high-resolution, full colour copies of archival materials in a quality that microfilm could not match.

Good though it was, that early Hasselblad digital camera was soon superseded by a more advanced medium-format camera and digital capture combinations capable of producing even higher resolution digital images. With the general expansion of digital camera use there was raising awareness of the benefits of digitisation and users began to expect high-quality digital copies as the norm and the Service ensured it could meet those expectations by investing in the best digital camera technology available operated by a fully trained and experienced team of archival photographers.

Now, as part of the Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service, the Archival Photography arm has developed still further. It is housed in a purpose-built darkroom in The Hive and fully equipped with the latest PhaseOne digital camera systems. The team offer a professional digitisation service to all, whether individuals or organisations, and can work with archival materials of almost any type. Where once only documentary archives like maps, books, and

other paper-based materials could be microfilmed, now almost anything can be digitally captured including film, 35mm slides, magnetic audio and video tape, photographic prints and artefacts.

This ability to produce high-quality digital images of a range of materials has proved attractive to many organisations beyond the world of archives. Our recent customers have included archaeology services from Warwickshire, Suffolk and Leicestershire as well as more traditional customers like the National Trust, English Heritage, Worcester Cathedral Library, Worcester Porcelain Museum and other archive services across the West Midlands. The team also continues to digitise material for individual researchers and those with private collections. They produce images for customers around the world including Australia, the USA, Europe and, a little more locally, Gloucestershire where we were commissioned by the Berkeley Castle Estate to photograph a collection of family archives including papers, photographs, and an 8 metre long family scroll.

As in 1990, the Service still microfilms material for clients but the greater emphasis today is on producing high-quality digital copies of archival and archaeological materials for any individual or organisation interested in preserving and expanding access to their precious collections.

You can discover more about the archival photography service, what they do, and how they do it, by visiting our website at www.worcestershire.gov.uk/info/20186/commercial_services/989/digitisation_and_microfilming_service

Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service

Criminal Records of the Marches Project

Archive staff are currently working with Shropshire Archives on a National Cataloguing Grants funded project to sort, catalogue and conserve the archives of West Mercia Police. The records cover the 19th and 20th centuries and include both information on the organisation of the police, their buildings and personnel and their approaches to crime, its prevention and punishment. There are also records relating to individual police stations, individual officers, local crimes and criminals and particular events such as the General Strike, the Cyprus emergency of 1950s and the murders of ‘Bella’ and Florrie Porter during World War II. Because of the personal nature of the information contained within some records some more modern material may be closed for up to 75 years. Some records are in poor condition, perhaps because of over-handling or poor storage in the past. For example the descriptive registers giving detailed information on individual police officers have loose, ripped or scuffed bindings. These require cleaning, conserving and repackaging before they can be made available for research. This aspect of the work is being funded by a grant from the National Manuscripts Conservation Trust.

The police records will provide a valuable resource not only for research areas such as the nature of crime or the role of the police in the community, but also for family historians whose ancestors served in the police or found themselves on the wrong side of the law. The incredible detail recorded in some records also provides a unique window on the daily lives of both those who were police officers and those who were members of the criminal fraternity.

Community Archaeology

A team from Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service, led by Aisling Nash and Rob Hedge, has recently completed a Historic England funded project to assess the untapped potential of voluntary and community research into archaeology and local history across England. This project has enhanced our understanding of the quantity of research undertaken by volunteers, its potential to enhance research resources such as Historic Environment Records, and its value in shaping the way we set priorities for research.

The quality and importance of much voluntary research has long been recognised; however, the scale, breadth and value of its overall contribution to the historic environment sector has been poorly understood. By combining a national survey with local case studies, the project explored how and why researchers are motivated and what types of research are undertaken, as well as looking at the challenges involved in publishing and sharing research, and ensuring the excellent work done by volunteers and community groups has a lasting legacy.

To find out more, and download our report, visit: https://historicengland.org.uk/images-books/publications/assessing-value-of-community-generated-historic-environment-research/

Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service

Mammoth!

We were recently called out by Tarmac when a tusk was found at their Clifton Quarry. Two of our archaeologists went out to excavate it and check for any more remains. It was an isolated find which once belonged to a

young adult woolly mammoth.

The tusk is currently on display at Worcester City Museum & Art Gallery.

top left - the tusk as found; above - Graham Arnold and James Spry gently lift the object; left- conserved, itendified and safely mounted in the Museum.

Trainee news

Nina O’Hare and Elspeth Iliff (pictured at Shifnal, Shropshire) have now been with us for 8 months on their NVQ course in Archaeological Practice and have had a variety of experiences, from excavating timber-lined ditches and a Bronze Age barrow, to archiving finds and processing environmental samples. Nina said that “the NVQ has given us a great opportunity to learn about and gain experience of the many different skills involved in field archaeology. It is rare to receive such comprehensive and varied training, but it is incredibly valuable in helping us become good archaeologists rather than just good at digging holes”.

In response to a national scarcity of archaeologists, WAAS have been the first archaeological organisation in the country to provide paid employment to university graduates whilst enabling them to pass an NVQ. It provides robust training and a solid introduction to the profession. The scheme is based on National Occupational Standards and is managed by the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists. Last year, Jesse Wheeler and Jamie Wilkins completed the course and are now fully fledged archaeologists, working on our growing number of projects. Reflecting on the impact the course has had on her, Jesse said “it was valuable to build on an academic education by learning the practical skills which are essential to our workplace. The structured methodology of the NVQ married well with the in-house training we were receiving day to day, and provided a method of validating our progression when learning different skills within the Service.”

WAAS casts a wider net

Over the past few years Worcestershire Archaeology (our Field Section) has been asked by customers to work further afield. In the past we have undertaken projects in Worcestershire and the adjacent counties – Warwickshire, Gloucestershire, Herefordshire,

Shropshire, Staffordshire, together with the Black Country and Birmingham. Here we are on home territory, within the landscapes of the West Midland claylands, and working with sites and artefacts we are very familiar with.

More recently, however, we have been working in Hertfordshire, Middlesex, Surrey and Wiltshire. It is great that we are reaching more customers and getting wider experience but working this far from home has its own challenges. This is why we are delighted when our customers

complement us on a job well done. For example a Historic England inspector said about a recent site in Hounslow “I feel the evaluation is such a comprehensive piece of work that you have really provided very good information for your client and this office on the significance of the site”. The team is also very positive. Project Officer Pete Lovett said, “Working outside our normal range provides fresh opportunities and challenges. As the landscape changes, so too can the archaeology. The experience of excavating these sites will help everyone to improve, as they apply their existing skills to potentially unfamiliar territory.” Of course wider experience and broader horizons will benefit the work, and the research, that we undertake in the west midlands.

On the downside we are not too sure we leave all the locals very happy – our team joined in the quiz at the Rose and Thistle in Frimley Green, Surrey, and won twice on the trot.

Further information:telephone: 01905 822866

post:Worcestershire Archive & Archaeology ServiceThe Hive, Sawmill Walk, The ButtsWorcester, WR1 3PB

web site:www.worcestershire.gov.uk/waas

Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service is the main contact point for all information about archaeology and history in the county. Keep up to date with our latest news and events through the year:

Blog: www.explorethepast.co.uk/Twitter: @explorethepast Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WorcsAAS/To have a newsletter sent by email, please contact explorethepast@worcestershire.gov.uk

Unless otherwise stated all photographs and images are ©Worcestershire County Council.