Wednesday 29 February 2012

Cornwall Record Office Visit

Today Carole and I went to Truro to visit the Cornwall Record Office. It was a gloriously sunny day and felt like a bit of a treat not being shut up in the office for the morning! The Office is a very short walk from Truro station, on the site of the rather splendid Old County Hall. From the outside, it looks like your average '60s prefab - brown and boxy and rather small. It's got nice big windows, though, where you can see all the readers at work, poring over their records. However this initial impression doesn't do the service any justice at all, as we soon discovered when we were shown around.

We were met by Alison, one of the Senior archivists, who gave us a tour of their stores. It was quite a shock to discover just how tardis-like the building is! We certainly could not have guessed the size of the place, with seven store rooms containing 4 miles of shelving. All the rooms are temperature and humidity controlled as well, which is crucial to the preservation of archives. All their records relate to the history of Cornwall: from Parish Registers and Tithe Maps to architectural drawings and business records - and so much more! Some of the highlights we got to see included a document registering the Cornish artist Alfred Wallis on board a ship when he was 19 years old in 1876. Not much is known about Wallis' early life and there is some debate as to whether he went to sea at all, but this seems to make the case that he did. It wasn't until after the death of his wife that he began to paint seriously, and he is now accepted as one of Cornwall's most important artists. We also saw some very old and quite tiny manuscripts from the late twelfth century, which were largely deeds and documents relating to a property. One thing I do miss working in an archive of relatively modern records is looking at the really old stuff! These manuscripts were preserved beautifully. They had been written on parchment in beautiful Latin script in iron gall ink, which adheres firmly to the parchment and can't be erased by rubbing or even washing. We also saw a lovely glass negative by sir George Airy, Astronomer Royal from the 1830s-80s, of Neptune, from the 1840s. One other item that we were quite amused by we found in the business archives section, though we didn't dare try to get it out - it was an enormous leather bound ledger dating to the early 19th century that was at least half a metre thick. Luckily those records are not often requested by the readers!

Finding out more about the Cornwall Record Office was really valuable, as it is really important to know what other services in your local area are providing. Very often if we have a family history enquiry, for example, that we cannot answer here, we would pass them on to the Record Office, and I now feel much more confident in doing so as I have I good idea of what they hold. It was also valuable experience in that, although I have experience now in Specialist, Museum, and HE archives, I had not had experience of a County Records Office. Although they are a relatively large service (compared to our team of 3!), it seemed as though all the members of the team had quite varied duties, which really appeals to me as often working in a large team means you have a focus on only one or two particular duties. I really like the idea of working with records that relate to the history of a place, particularly when they go back hundreds of years! Also, being that bit more public facing must be really rewarding. I really enjoy the human contact you can have in archive work - being able to pass on a bit of knowledge and providing people with the tools to carry out their work. Working within a Record Office is definitely something I'd like to aim for when I have completed my course.

So, all in all, a very eye-opening and interesting morning spent in Truro!

Sunday 26 February 2012

Some Titanic Research

This year, as I'm sure you are all aware, marks the one hundredth anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic on her maiden voyage from South Hampton to New York on the 15th of April, 1912. A couple of weeks ago the Service was contacted by local media investigating the number of passengers on board who came from Cornwall. Many of these passengers appear to have been young emigrating miners, and we were asked whether any of them had links with the Camborne School of Mines, for which we have holdings in our archive collection. I thought this would be a really interesting piece of research to carry out, and as it turned out, was incredibly poignant.

I found an extremely useful website, the Encyclopedia Titanica, and used this for my initial search. This site offers a comprehensive list of passengers and crew, each with an individual biography. It allows you to search a number of lists, including lists of passengers by class. The lists show basic information, including name, age, occupation, and whether they were rescued or not. Since I was interested in miners, I focused on the 2nd and 3rd Class lists at first and looked for all those whose occupation was listed as 'Miner'.

I found nine Cornish miners in total, hailing from Redruth, St Ives, Harrowbarrow, Gunnislake, and Penwithick. Owing to the close proximity of Redruth, St Ives and Penwithick to Camborne it seemed feasible that the men from these areas could have attended the School. I looked the nine names up in the School's Student Registers, which date back to 1900 and list the students that have passed through the Camborne School of Mines, but was unable to find any of the names of the Miners on board the Titanic. Although I had to conclude from this that it was unlikely of them were old CSM students, but I was still really interested in their stories.

Example of an entry from a CSM Student Register. Photo: Charlie Hey

The biographies give a poignant insight into the lives of the passengers - details of their families, where they were going, how much their ticket cost, and if their body was recovered details of their clothing and effects. Tragically, the nine men I found all lost their lives in the sinking. A Mr Ernest Charles Cann, a 21 year old china clay labourer from Penwithick, boarded the Ship with a 3rd Class ticket with his friend, William Saundercock. He had been married only five months; both were lost. Stephen Cernow Jenkin had emigrated to Michigan in about 1903 with his brother and worked in the copper mining industry. He had returned to St Ives in the summer of 1911 for a family visit and was not due to return on the Titanic, but coal strikes meant that he couldn't take the ship his ticket was for, and he was given a place instead on the Titanic instead. Apparently he had misgivings about travelling on this ship, and shortly after leaving St Ives for Southampton returned to his parents to leave his valuables should anything happen to him.


The website also has contemporary newspaper articles covering the event. Here I found the story of John and Lizzie Chapman in the West Briton and Cornwall Advertiser. The childhood sweethearts from Liskeard had married only 4 months previously and were travelling to Washington, where John had recently emigrated. The trip on the Titanic was to be their belated honeymoon. When John was not allowed into a lifeboat, Lizzie refused to leave her husband. They both lost their lives.

Although the initial enquiry around possible CSM students on board the Titanic came to a dead end, I felt privileged that I had been able to research from a local angle a momentous, albeit terrible, event, and to do so using part of our collection. I have always enjoyed the research side of working in an archive, particularly if it involves researching a person or people as with family history enquiries, because an archive can give you a really personal insight into someone's life or a little window into the past. I couldn't go any further with the CSM angle, and you don't always find an answer, but doing the research is an enjoyable process, which is even more enjoyable and rewarding when you get a result. And it doesn't stop there. The most satisfying bit of all is knowing that, once you've passed on your findings, the enquirer/researcher might be able to dig even deeper, using the information you have provided them with. A small piece of information can open up a whole can of worms!

Wednesday 8 February 2012

The Highway Code!


When I moved to Cornwall to take up my post at Tremough, I decided that this might be the perfect opportunity to learn to drive. So, just after Christmas, I made the first step and bought myself a theory test book and Highway Code. Now, admittedly, after an initial burst of zeal, I have not got very far with reading it. It isn't the most thrilling read and I would much rather pick up the novel I am currently reading and curl up with that on a winter evening, rather than test myself on stopping distances. I have also got a pile of archives and records management textbooks to get through before my interview next week.



However! A few weeks ago I had to look through the Camborne School of Mines magazines whilst answering an enquiry, and in the December 1935 issue I found this amusing and very appropriate article:


Copyright Camborne School of Mines



Copyright Camborne School of Mines



Copyright Camborne School of Mines


Copyright Camborne School of Mines

After doing some research, I discovered that the Highway Code was first published in 1931, so celebrating its 80th year in 2011. It was first published in its entirity in 1934, not long before this article was written. According to the Department for Transport website, the Code has undergone some considerable changes since its first publications, as you would hope! For example, in 1931 mirrors were not even mentioned and drivers were advised to sound their horn when overtaking. When reading my modern copy, it seems to me that using your horn is forbidden in virtually every situation! And I don't think it's possible to check your mirrors enough times before making any sort of manoeuvre. And apparently, more than a third of the original book was taken up describing various hand signals road users should use, while nowadays it's only a single page. Well, I'm certainly glad that's one thing I won't have to learn, although there are five times the amount of pages to get through nowadays. In any case, I think I will stick to my current version; I'm not sure how well "Belicon's" advice would go down with a driving instructer!

Thursday 2 February 2012