Happy New Year to all who follow and support West Sussex Record Office! We have a lot planned for 2018, and thought we would use the start of the new year to highlight some of our upcoming talks and events that may interest you in the coming months. Our regular 'Talks on Tuesday' series will…
Author: West Sussex Record Office
Celebrating our collections dating from 780AD to the present day, and keeping you up to date with Record Office events
Merry Christmas from WSRO!
Wishing all of our friends and followers a very Happy Christmas from everyone at West Sussex Record Office! Many thanks to everyone who has been following our posts and supporting us through 2017. We’ll be back in 2018 with more exciting stories from the archives! Christmas/New Year closures – Saturday 23 December to Tuesday 26…
What we’ve been up to: WSRO’s annual Closed Fortnight period
Every year come December, West Sussex Record Office closes its doors to the public for an annual period of stocktaking, cleaning, and cataloguing. This year, we began closed fortnight with a deep clean of our public searchroom! Staff pitched in to dust shelves and clean books to make sure our library collection and resource material was in good shape for researchers to…
Continue reading ➞ What we’ve been up to: WSRO’s annual Closed Fortnight period
Explore Your Archive Campaign 2017
Throughout the past week, West Sussex Record Office has been celebrating the annual National Archives and Archive and Records Association's 'Explore Your Archive' campaign. The campaign 'aims to open the phenomenal archival collections held by organisations – public and private – across the UK and Ireland, whatever their size and scale, and wherever they are', and saw archive…
In Remembrance – Driver George Slater – Graylingwell War Hospital – WW1
I had assumed that every patient who died in a UK war hospital during World War 1 would have a Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) headstone, but I was wrong….. I am cataloguing the records of Graylingwell Hospital in Chichester, among which are some items about Graylingwell War Hospital (1915-1919). There are no existing formal…
Continue reading ➞ In Remembrance – Driver George Slater – Graylingwell War Hospital – WW1
Witchcraft and the ‘Wicked Women’ of Sussex
Prior to the British Witchcraft Act of 1735, the infamous witch trails of the Early Modern period saw widespread moral panic sweep through a religiously unstable Europe, resulting in the horrific punishment of individuals for their supposed sorcery. Although no instances of witch drowning or burning have been evidenced in West Sussex, accusations of witchcraft still led to the persecution…
Continue reading ➞ Witchcraft and the ‘Wicked Women’ of Sussex
‘All the fun of the Fair’: A history of Chichester’s oldest surviving fair
From the 18th – 21st of October this Year, the Chichester Festival Theatre car park at Northgate will be closed for Chichester’s annual Sloe Fair, representing a tradition that has lasted for over 900 years It is the longest-running, and last surviving of five ancient fairs in the city, as the right to hold the Sloe…
Continue reading ➞ ‘All the fun of the Fair’: A history of Chichester’s oldest surviving fair
Wild Was the Wind in West Sussex: The Great Storm of 1987
‘Earlier today, apparently, a woman rang the BBC and said she heard there was a hurricane on the way. Well, if you’re watching, don’t worry, there isn’t’ Many will remember the immortal words of weatherman Michael Fish, whose casual dismissal of the approaching storm left the UK public completely unprepared for the weather front that…
Continue reading ➞ Wild Was the Wind in West Sussex: The Great Storm of 1987
Family History Fun Day – A genealogical extravaganza for all the family!
Come along and join us at Horsham Library on Saturday 21 October, 10:00- 4:00pm for a West Sussex Libraries Family History Fun Day! There will be an opportunity to meet experts from Sussex Family History Group, West Sussex Record Office, Times Digital Archive, Guild of One Name Studies and others. Information Librarians and Archivists will be available to…
Continue reading ➞ Family History Fun Day – A genealogical extravaganza for all the family!
Record of The Month
Forgery and Scandal at Chichester Old Bank I first came across the story around this month’s record when volunteering at Chichester District Museum (now the Novium). The Social History Curator at the time said that sometime in the early 1800s a man -John Binstead, a drawing teacher, was charged with forging a bank note from…
West Sussex Record Office 