Dear All,

In January we welcomed Prof. Jackie Eales who spoke about Canterbury's society from the 1641 poll tax through to the Civil War (1642 to 1646). This society includes the city's gentry, clerical people and other "middle class" tradesmen such as the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker. The talk related to a project to publish an historical map of Canterbury. As always all are welcome but we do ask non-members to make a small contribution to the society’s costs.

We meet next Monday, 10th February, 7.30 pm at Barham Village Hall when Celia Heritage returns to give a talk “Above & Below Ground: Exploring a Pre-Reformation Church and Churchyard” when she will take you on a trip round the parish church and churchyard, helping you to learn, observe and appreciate many different aspects of the sacred place, which was the centre of village life not just for religious reasons but also in so many secular ways. She will look at the changing interior of the church pre- and post-Reformation and show how, with a little keen observation, you can notice so much. She will also look at the origin of our churchyards and how they evolved into places of burial, and then, using a selection of archaeological site photographs (mainly from Kent), take you underground to show you inside the resting places of some of our forebears (vaults and brick-lined graves) and finish by showing why thousands of gravestones have been lost or destroyed..

Celia is the author of ‘Cemeteries and Graveyards. A Guide for Local and Family historians.’ A professional genealogist for over 20 years Celia worked as a lecturer for the Institute of Heraldic and Genealogical Studies and as a Research Manager for Ancestry.com as well as running her own busy research and lecturing business. She founded “Reframing Roots” a distinctly new emerging discipline that utilises family history with therapeutic insights to understand how ancestry shapes our mental and emotional makeup.

In March, on Monday 10th, we will be at Kingston Barn at 7.30 when Roy Logan will be giving his talk “Whisperings of War”.

As always all are welcome to our talks but we do ask non-members to make a small contribution to the society’s costs.

We have had some interest in all the visit options for May but not yet enough for any of them to justify a visit. If you might be interested do let me know without giving commitment at this time.

The three are as follows. Do look at the web sites for information about the locations.

1 – The Weald and Downland Museum ( https://www.wealddown.co.uk) the home of TV’s Repair Shop.

2 – IWM Duxford ( https://www.iwm.org.uk/), Duxford is Europe's largest air museum, where you can see historic aircraft, exhibitions and events.

3 – A visit to the Greenwich Area which as well as the Greenwich Palace and related attractions could include The Thames Barrier (https://www.visitgreenwich.org.uk) and The Abbey Mills Pumping Station (https://www.thameswater.co.uk/media-library/home/about-us/responsibility/thames-days-out/sites/heritage/abbey-mills-information.pdf). The latter, while not sounding too exciting is well worth a visit as a prime example of Victorian engineering.

Please come back to me if you have any possible interest in any of the above to see if it is worth investigating.

As always if you do not wish to continue to receive these monthly notes just return this e-mail with your name and I will delete you from the circulation list and acknowledge your request. You can rejoin the list at any time.

Thanks

David Wood