Tag: cheltenham

New Exhibitions on Display for the Centre

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

We’re excited to announce that the work of our students will be on display for the next few months as part of two exciting exhibitions.

Fashions & Textiles: A Gloucester Story

These panels exploring the history of Gloucestershire’s textile industry are on display at the Museum of Gloucester as part of the broader exhibition ‘Buttons, Badges and Blazers.’ This larger exhibition has been curated from the city’s costume collection of over 4,500 items, not previously on display to the public.

The exhibition runs from 21st October 2023 to 7th January 2024. For more details see The Museum of Gloucester website.

The 28th Regiment of Foot & The West Indian Campaign in The Seven Years’ War

History students have collaborated with the Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum in a groundbreaking study of the military roles of enslaved and free Black men during an 18th global conflict, investigating the involvement of soldiers from Gloucestershire in military campaigns in the West Indies during the Seven Years War (1756–1763).

The research examined how enslaved and free Black men were employed by the Gloucestershire Regiment during the conflict, shedding new light on what until now had been an underexplored element of the Glosters’ history. The study also examined the life of Ukawsaw Gronniosaw – also known as James Albert – who is believed to be the first person from an ethic minority to serve with the regiment and the first person to write a narrative of his experiences of transatlantic slavery.

The collaborative project has informed a new exhibition at the Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum entitled ‘The 28th Regiment of Foot & The West Indian Campaign in The Seven Years’ War,’ which runs from 1 November until March. The museum is open on Wednesdays to Sundays (10am to 4pm) and viewing is free with paid museum entry.

Matthew Holden, Director of the Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum, said:

“Collaborating with University of Gloucestershire on such a forward-thinking project has been a fantastic experience. Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum are looking to expand their exhibitions and exhibits beyond that which one might expect to find in military museums. With the help of University of Gloucestershire, we are really shining a light on 360 degrees of history.”

Dr Christian O’Connell, Academic Course Leader in History at the University, said: “I’m very proud of our students and the way they’ve been able to contribute to this important project. It has been a great opportunity to develop their skills and gain some valuable experience, but most of all, they have directly contributed to shaping public knowledge on an important and very timely subject.”

Royal Jubilees in Gloucestershire

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

This is the third of four projects that undergraduate History students at the University of Gloucestershire are conducting for the Centre in 2023, in partnership with a number of local heritage institutions in the area, including City Voices. In this project, students are researching how Gloucestershire has honoured royal celebration, and how it has mourned royal tragedy. It involves students Amy Brett, Sam Elliott, Elliott Lloyd, Sam Preece, Josh Priestley, and Sam Turton.

We started with a preliminary exploration of royal events that have taken place across the UK, as well as in Gloucestershire. We started as far back as 1327, examining the brutal murder of King Edward II. While we found a large amount of information about the architecture of King Edward’s tomb at Gloucester Cathedral, we quickly realised that we could find little information about the effect the King’s death had on Gloucestershire or how the county responded to it.

King Edward II’s tomb in Gloucester Cathedral, Photograph taken by J. Priestley, 13 March 2023

We discovered that royal jubilees were not really publicly celebrated before the reign of King George III. The most memorable local celebration took place under King George V, whose silver jubilee took place in 1935. This was an important event because we have found no evidence that King George III or Queen Victoria had local silver jubilee celebrations.

Pictures from the 1935 Silver Jubilee of George V (D4920/2/3/40, Gloucestershire Archives and Heritage Hub), and an article on local celebrations in Western Daily Press – Wednesday 1 May 1935, p. 8, British Newspaper Archive.

From our research at the Gloucestershire Archives and by using the British Newspaper Archive, we discovered that some of the de-facto traditions that took place as part of jubilee celebrations in 1935 and 1977 are still evident today. One example of this tradition is from the 1935 jubilee, when bonfires or beacons were lit across the county, such as those at Northleach, Cleeve Hill and Robinswood Hill. Similarly, a formal military parade took place in Gloucester city centre, starting from Gloucester Cathedral. This tradition still takes place in Gloucestershire, but instead of the regular military it is done by local Cadet Units.

Some of our group members have visited Gloucestershire Cathedral Archive to discuss with their archivist the role the Cathedral has played in royal celebrations and commemorations. The Cathedral has a limited collection on Royal celebrations (especially in comparison with Gloucestershire Archives) because it was only in the 21st century that the Cathedral became a hub for Royal Celebrations. Two notable exceptions to this are a note added to the record of service book of a small memorial service to commemorate the death of King George VI in 1952 (no collection was taken, and there is no note of how many people attended), and the moat of flowers left at the Cathedral following the death of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997.

We intend to look more closely into local newspaper reports held in the British Newspaper Archive to explore further reports of how Gloucestershire celebrated royal events and mourned royal tragedy. We will be making more visits to Gloucestershire Archives to collect photographic materials, and we’ll also spend a research day at the Gloucester Cathedral Archive to explore their collection further and to gather data on historic and more recent royal events.

The GCHQ Trade Union Dispute

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

This report comes from second year undergraduate History & Politics student Kit Boulting-Hodge, who is conducting a research project for the Cheltenham Labour Party as part of HM5002 Engaging Humanities. It is an example of how our students can gain valuable experience and develop a number of transferrable skills, while contributing to important heritage work in the area.

I’ve been working with Cheltenham Labour Party to gather information about the campaign opposing the 1984 state-imposed ban on trade unions at GCHQ. This project was triggered by the death of the prominent figure Mike Grindley. Before his death, Mike was concerned that the lessons from this campaign, fought by 14 GCHQ workers, would be lost and the current government may try again to ban trade unions at GCHQ. Interviewing trade union activists from the time of the protest, including one of the 14, has been an enlightening experience.

The move to de-unionise GCHQ was premeditated and was initially rejected at multiple stages by various parliamentary select committees, even some dominated by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative allies. There was a court battle, which the government lost. This, however, set the precedent that the government has the power to de-unionise workplaces if due process is followed. The case cost the government huge amounts of money, but that was just the beginning.

Letter from Council of Civil Service Unions to the PM in 1984

When the government finally formulated their plan, each employee was given two options:

1: accept the money on offer as compensation to leave the trade union and have the choice to be part of the Staff Association. The Association was obviously a sham replacement that didn’t have the organisational structure of a trade union. Staff morale was incredibly low at this point, but this was the only viable way to create the impression that the workers were being represented.

2: refuse to leave the trade union and breach the new contract, which meant that the employee could be fired.

The unions, however, offered a third option: not to sign. This worried the government because most of the workers seemingly supported this option, right up until management pressed the employees for a final decision. Initially, apart from 14 workers, all employees agreed to stay at GCHQ, but many soon quit and found jobs elsewhere.

Publication by the Council of Civil Service Unions

The following years, extending through John Major’s period of office, were focused on finding a peaceful means to reverse the government’s decision. The protestors went on annual marches, and they held regular meetings to check on progress. The unions never relented. Even in my interviews that were not directly related to GCHQ, some respondents mentioned GCHQ towards the end.

The most important outcome of the dispute is that Thatcher’s government failed. Eventually, in 1997, the ban on trade union membership at GCHQ was lifted, with the exception that the parts of GCHQ dealing with secret and sensitive information were not allowed to strike. In essence, Tony Blair had agreed with the Thatcher government that hundreds of days of work had been lost because of the dispute. This infuriated most of the 14 campaigners. By this stage, the dispute had been going on for over 13 years, so it had inevitably lost some momentum.

All but one of the original 14 campaigners received the Trades Union Congress award. One of the protestors refused the award because of the continuing ban on strike action by sections of GCHQ. It is often difficult for trade unions to win their battles. The achievement at GCHQ was one of a kind.

Cheltenham and Gloucester’s Refuges for Women and Girls

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

This is the second of four projects that undergraduate History students at the University of Gloucestershire are conducting for the Centre in 2023, in partnership with a number of local heritage institutions in the area, including City Voices. This project involves students Matthew Morgan, Holly Lasfar, Tyler Tomlin, and Olivia Jordan.

Our group project focuses on the history of places of refuge and support for women and girls in Cheltenham and Gloucester. Specifically, we have studied the Home of Hope, Park Street Mission, North Parade Home for Girls, and Cheltenham Female Orphan Asylum. We are interested in researching this subject to learn about the various ways Gloucestershire aided women in need in the past. When we started the project we assumed that many of the women who sought help from these places were victims of abuse or violence, but we have since learnt that some of these places of refuge, like the Home of Hope, were places that looked to support and train girls and young women who were experiencing problems in their lives.  

Our research into the evolution of the Cheltenham School of Industry, founded in 1806, has revealed some of the provision of refuge spaces for women and girls in Cheltenham in the early nineteenth century. The School of Industry’s founder was Queen Charlotte, wife of King George III. Conducting research through the examination of archival documents and numerous newspaper reports makes clear that the school remained a respected site of refuge. It was well-funded by local subscribers. Upholding religious teachings and importantly focusing on the training of girls as respectable domestic servants, the home played a significant role in ensuring that the girls were successfully engaged in employment on their departure. In honour of its founder, the school was renamed Charlotte House in the 1950s. The building was demolished in 1958.

We are also looking into a number of small refuges in Cheltenham and Gloucester, including those run on a weekly and part-time basis, such as the Park Street Mission in Gloucester. We are interested in the religious underpinnings of these women’s refuges, as well as the role of women in the official and unofficial hierarchy of these organisations. Park Street Mission is well-documented. It was a well-run refuge, which came as a surprise to us when considering the period in which these institutions existed. There appears to have been a consistent membership of the Mission, and from this we can determine the potential positive impact such refuges had on their membership. Much of the available information on the Mission derives from the organisation itself, and collecting this information means that the worthwhile story of women’s refuges can now be told. 

Another interesting aspect of these refuges was their ‘sale of work’ events. These are particularly evident in our research into the Cheltenham Female Orphan Asylum. These refuges had been set up to aid women and girls who had lost their way and who now needed support. The training provided by these organisations, and the accompanying sale of work events, enabled women to develop skills that would help them find gainful employment. The sales also generated income for the refuges themselves.

Religion played a key role in the way these refuges operated, and it is interesting to see how closely linked key members of local churches were to these organisations. This is evident in the example of the Cheltenham Female Orphan Asylum subscriber lists and from the membership of the management boards. Highlighting these important elements in our research has helped us to decide how best to convey the stories of the refuges. 

Legacies of Slave Ownership in Cheltenham

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

As part of our partnership with the City Voices programme of the Gloucester History Festival, undergraduate students in History at the University of Gloucestershire are undertaking a number of local history projects for 2022. The third project examines the legacies of slave ownership in Cheltenham, extending the work conducted by students in 2021. The project group is made up by students Steve Hannis, Ben Haidon, Sam Burgess, Tom Gullick and Harvey Pearce.

In 1833 the Abolition of Slavery Act was passed in parliament, starting the slow process of the emancipation of all slaves in the British Empire. As a result of abolition, the government agreed to pay compensation to slave owners for the ‘loss of their property.’ Any slave owner who wanted to claim compensation had to apply. This process created detailed records of slave ownership in Britain. These records are the starting point of our project, which aims to examine some of the issues relating to the abolition of slavery and compensation paid to people residing in Cheltenham.

We began our project in January and began using the Legacies of British Slave Ownership database. We started by looking at various individuals living in Cheltenham who claimed substantial amounts of money under the Compensation Act. Many of these individuals left little trace of how they spent the money, bringing us to the conclusion that most of them simply lived off it. We researched various people, but many were dead ends. Then we discovered William Hinds Prescod, who moved to Cheltenham after Emancipation. The records showed that prior to abolition, Prescod was the largest slave owner in Barbados after inheriting a number of plantations from his uncle in 1815. He claimed £37,000 in compensation following the abolition of slavery, over £4,000,000 in today’s currency.

Our research so far has demonstrated the complex nature of this subject, with Prescod being a particularly complicated figure. A Cambridge educated Lawyer, Prescod freed over twenty slaves during his time in Barbados and fathered 4 children with a freed slave. One of these children was Samuel Jackman Prescod (fig 1), who became the first black politician in Barbados. Prescod also fiercely contested other claims made against his uncle’s will, claiming that his relatives intended to put their hands into his pocket. After this online research we visited Gloucestershire Archives where we managed to find proof that Prescod bought his Cheltenham estate, Alstone Lawn, for £1,200 just after he received his compensation. We found the original record for this transaction, on the document was Prescod’s signature still intact. Some further research online found that his estate eventually fell into disrepair and was burnt down by suffragettes in 1913.

Samuel Jackman Prescod on a
Barbadian bank note.

Prescod’s wealth was demonstrated by the fact that he also amassed a substantial art collection that was auctioned off by his family in 1861, 13 years after his death in 1848. A record of the auction of Prescod’s collection is held at the National Gallery. After looking through these records we found that a significant proportion of his collection was acquired on a series of trips to Italy, which means he took part in the ‘Grand Tour’ custom of his era. His collection was made up of sculptures, vases sketches and paintings, with the most notable artists being Rembrandt, Vandyke and Guido (fig 2). Our research has also revealed evidence that Prescod invested in shares in the Assembly Rooms in Cheltenham. The Assembly Rooms was a hub for the elite in Cheltenham due to its versatile nature. It was the site of art trading, theatrical productions, and political activities (which had also included debates on the abolition of slavery). The site of the Assembly Rooms is now the Everyman Theatre, giving us a potential link between Prescod’s wealth and the present day.

“The Philosopher” By Rembrandt, a
painting similar to one of the pieces owned by
Prescod.

What we have found so far is interesting, but there is a lot more to learn about Prescod. We are going to conduct further research into his investments in the local area, as well as his activity in Barbados before abolition, with the hope that we find out more about the legacies of slavery and how these may have impacted the town. We have recently found Prescod’s will, which may provide some further information. All the information we have found so far has given as a lot of leads, we are hopeful that once we have followed all of these up, we will have a clearer picture of Prescod’s story.

The Legacies of Slave Ownership in Pittville and Cheltenham

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

This year, our students are working on a number of important local history projects covering the hidden lives of prominent women, exploring the experiences of lockdown, and uncovering links with slavery. All the projects will be exhibited in September as part of the ‘City Voices’ programme of the Gloucester History Festival. This post is one of five projects, and explores the legacies of slave ownership in and around Gloucester, and includes Alfie Lansdown, Jack Vincent, Sam Hodges, and Will Clark.

Our research project focuses on the legacies of slavery in Cheltenham, and we chose this topic partly in response to the recent protests around the portrayal of slaveholders in Britain and the corresponding Black Lives Matter movement. We aim to discover the ways in which legacies of the transatlantic slave trade are still visible around the area in which we live and study. Our research has considered the effects and legacies of the 1833 Slavery Abolition Act. We aim to uncover the historical opinions of local people by researching the time period around when the act was debated in order to see if the abolition movement was supported locally. We’ve also been looking directly at the legacies of slavery evident in Pittville today, one of Cheltenham’s most distinctively Regency-era areas . We have focused on two key individuals who benefitted from slavery and were compensated directly by the 1833 Act.

Map of Pittville in 1855

Our research began by identifying the connections to slavery amongst people who lived in the Pittville area. First, we used the UCL database of Legacies of British Slave Ownership, and work done by Pittville History Works to identify the most significant local slaveholders. One of the key individuals is Solomon Mendes Da Silva, who lived at 5 Blenheim Parade in Pittville. He received over £6000 in compensation (equivalent to £767,000 today) for his plantations and the slaves who lived on them. His largest plantation, in St Ann’s, Jamaica, covered 300 acres and had 96 enslaved workers. Da Silva is significant to our study because he directly benefitted from the act. He generously spent this money in the local Jewish community and put funds into a local Synagogue. He spent his final years living in the gated community around Pittville Park, which has many of its large homes still standing

A similar home in Pittville costs £1,950,000 today

.

We have made extensive use of the British Newspaper Archive to investigate the opinions of local people at the time of abolition. Through a collection of local newspapers we discovered that there was general support for abolition in Cheltenham. The Assembly Rooms hosted many large gatherings that debated the morals and validity of slavery. We also identified Cheltenham’s first Member of Parliament, elected in 1832. Craven Fitzhardige Berkeley petitioned parliament on behalf of the Cheltenham abolitionists. Furthermore, he was an advocate for progressive rights movements. The local community continued to advocate for abolition after the British Abolition Act was passed. Lectures continued at the Assembly Rooms pressing for the total abolition of slavery across the Atlantic, and many prominent abolitionists were invited to speak, including Britain’s leading abolitionist George Thompson.

So far, our research has given us a crucial understanding of the direct effects of slavery on Pittville and Cheltenham. Our study has shown that the problems linked to slavery directly affected the whole town and that slavery had an extensive reach.

The Life and Legacy of Lilian Faithfull

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

This year, our students are working on a number of important local history projects covering the hidden lives of prominent women, exploring the experiences of lockdown, and uncovering links with slavery. All the projects will be exhibited in September as part of the ‘City Voices’ programme of the Gloucester History Festival. This post is one of five projects, and explores the life of famous Cheltonian and humanitarian, Lilian Faithfull. Group members include Grace Fry, Sam Hodges, Megan Kenchington, Tom White.

This project contributes to the women’s history of Cheltenham by exploring the life and work of one of its prominent twentieth-century educationalists and philanthropists: Lilian Faithfull (1865-1952).

Her education: Lilian Faithfull was born on 12 March 1865. She was one of eight children. In recognising her potential, her father sent her to his brother–in–law’s prep school, where she received a well-rounded and rare education. She was the only girl among twenty-five boys, and she later paid tribute to the thorough education she received. After completing her schooling, she continued to study from home and through the university extension movement, which had started offering lectures in subjects such as History and Economics.

She then attended Somerville College, Oxford, where she received a first-class degree in English Language and Literature. She couldn’t officially graduate but claimed an ad eundem award from Trinity College, Dublin, in 1905. She was awarded an honorary MA degree from Oxford in 1925 and a CBE in 1926.

Her career: Lilian Faithfull’s first job in 1887-88 was secretary to the principal of Somerville College, Madeleine Shall Lefevre. She then taught for a year at Oxford High School. She was then a lecturer in English at Royal Holloway College from 1889-94, and was subsequently appointed to succeed Cornelia Schmitz as Vice Principal of the ladies’ department of King’s College, London. She describes this job as one of the happiest educational posts for women in England. The aim of the department was to provide women with the same sorts of opportunities that were provided by the university extension lectures offered by Oxford and Cambridge. Women aged seventeen to seventy came to listen to lectures given by professors at Kings College. Faithfull was active in pushing for the advancement of women’s education, pursuing courses of study leading to university examinations, academic degrees and diplomas.

During her thirteen years as Vice Principal, the numbers of students doubled, a hall of residence was opened in 1897, household science was developed as a serious branch of study, and much of the King’s financial debt was cleared.

In 1906, Faithfull was persuaded to apply for the position of Headmistress at Cheltenham Ladies’ College following the death of Dorothea Beale. At the Ladies’ College, she is remembered as a likable, easy-mannered leader, who had concern and appreciation for her students’ welfare.

During the First World War, Faithfull recalls how often she had to share the news of lost fathers and brothers.  She established an intercession room near her office, where students could go to pray and find some privacy. She also organised a Red Cross hospital in one of the boarding houses.

Faithfull also served as Justice of the Peace for twenty-five years, retiring on 17 January 1946. She was one of the first women magistrates to be appointed to the Commission of Peace in October 1920 and she was the first female magistrate to sit on the Cheltenham bench. On her retirement, the chairman (Sir Francis Colchester-Wemyss) said: ‘She has been a model of justice and will carry away with her the esteem and the affection of all the justices’.

Lillian Faithfull died on the 2 May 1952 at Faithfull House, Cheltenham, a home for the elderly that she had helped to found. She was buried in Cheltenham.

Our groups next steps: Sam and Grace are currently exploring the newspaper archives. We’ve had some success, finding new information and quotes about Lilian Faithfull’s role as magistrate. Tom and Meg will spend time in the University of Gloucestershire Archive and will read her memoirs. We’re hoping to find more personal reflections on the events of her life, as well as more information about her role as head mistress at the Cheltenham Ladies’ College and her career after retirement. Grace is going to chase the archivist at the Cheltenham Ladies’ College now that lockdown restrictions are being eased, in the hope of being able to access their records of her leadership. Melanie has forwarded to us some online information about Lilian Faithfull. Our key sources so far are an article from the Dictionary of National Bibliography archive, a few newspaper articles, and images from the care homes website.

The Soldiers of St Paul’s, Cheltenham

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

This post comes from second year undergraduate student Jason Thomas, who is conducting a project with the University’s Archives and Special Collections as part of the HM5002 Engaging Humanities module.

My project involves making a contribution to writing the short biographies of a number of alumni soldiers who attended St. Paul’s Practicing School, located at Francis Close Hall campus along with St Paul’s College in Cheltenham. In due course, a memorial board will be placed inside the chapel at FCH and an exhibition about the alumni soldiers is scheduled to take place in November 2021.

Commonwealth War Graves Cheltenham Cemetery

Many of the 41 students covered by this project lived locally and they all served as soldiers in the Second World War. The task involved analysing service records about the students, and preparing short biographies noting information relating to their family life, educational background, employment history and leisure activities. Most of the source material came from the Commonwealth War Graves website (which has a ‘Held in Honour’ page providing short biographies of the soldiers), grave register and registration information and a pdf copy of the burial site. The major challenge for me in writing the biographies was to ensure that they did not simply repeat the information already publicly available. With only two paragraphs to work with, it was important to provide some new insight to every story, even if the eventual outcome for each of the individual soldiers was ultimately the same.

Image of St. Paul’s Training College Practising School and environs, Cheltenham (1934)

My personal connection to Cheltenham has been further cemented by working on these biographies. Although my other interests in photography and walking had already established a sense of belonging to the town through visiting various buildings and the surrounding landscape, this project has imprinted an emotional link with Cheltenham that will stay with me for a long time. I considered it not only a duty, but also a pleasure to learn more about the everyday lives of these local people, their day-to-day normality, the routine of going about their business, until either by choice or by call, their lives were taken in a different direction. They have helped to shape Cheltenham’s wartime history.

New publications from CC4HH research

by CC4HH, posted in Uncategorized

We’re very proud to announce that we have our first academic publications on our community research projects. Two of these relate to the Cheltenham Lower High Street project, and the latest concerns Cheltenham: Diaspora.

Christian O’Connell’s paper entitled ‘”Poor, Proud and Pretty:” Community History and the Challenge of Heritage in “Darkest” Cheltenham’ was published in International Journal of Regional and Local History. The article discusses a collaborative local history project in Cheltenham Spa’s Lower High Street, an area that has suffered from “symbolic annihilation” through a long history of stigmatisation at the expense the town’s Regency-era heritage. Residents’ testimonies give voice to marginalised experiences that help to establish the area’s distinctive “sense of place,” which is rooted in shared experiences of exclusion, hardship and community cohesion. Through nostalgic recollections, they also reveal a significant grassroots willingness to challenge the exclusionary practices of Cheltenham’s dominant and exclusionary Regency narrative. However, present concerns about ethnic diversity and urban decay also exposed contemporary anxieties that are indicative of the broader context of Britain in the EU referendum era. While offering a “history from below,” the paper also considers how universities operating as “anchor” institutions can help to address contemporary issues of social alienation and spatial inequality by fostering a greater appreciation of the past.

Visitors react to the Cheltenham Lower High Street: Past, Present and Future exhibition at Chapel Arts in Cheltenham, June 2017.

Matthew Kidd who also contributed to the Lower High Street project, published his paper ‘”Us and Them:” exploring social difference in an English Spa town’ in the autumn edition of Oral History. This article draws on interviews with former residents of Cheltenham’s Lower High Street area to explore how ordinary Cheltonians understood their place in the town’s social hierarchy in the post-war period. While the initial findings of the Cheltenham Lower High Street: Past, Present, Future project suggested that residents articulated a working-class identity, this article contends that such an interpretation does not do justice to the ambiguity that characterised their views on social difference. Most struggled to express their feelings about the issue; when they did so, they tended to articulate a populist rather than class-based model of society. By exploring social difference in an atypical English town, this article seeks to contribute to ongoing debates about class in post-war Britain.

Finally, David Howell’s paper ‘Expanding Heritage Horizons through the Cheltenham: A Diaspora Project‘ has just been published in the journal Present Pasts, and can be read free online. This article considers the Cheltenham: Diaspora project, an exploration and promotion of migration heritage narratives in Cheltenham (UK). Cheltenham has a diverse history, but heritage provision in the locality has been consistently concentrated on 18th and 19th century Regency architecture. This has led to a marginalisation of non-elite heritage narratives, with no permanent platform for culturally diverse heritage themes in the region. In addition, informal, online history themed social media groups have, rather than expand heritage narratives, ultimately further narrowed heritage discussions. The Diaspora project looked to challenge the lack of diversity in the authorised heritage discourse, and informal online discourses of Cheltenham’s heritage, while enhancing the democratic nature of research projects coming out of the University of Gloucestershire. This paper considers the difficulties encountered in attempting to democratise heritage research, in a cultural climate that is rigid in its perception of what counts as ‘heritage’ and what is deemed as relevant by more ‘vocal’ local stakeholder groups. Ultimately the project reveals that while social media provides a useful avenue through which diverse heritage narratives can be pursued and promoted, ingrained attitudes regarding authorised forms of heritage are robust and resistant to the introduction of the unfamiliar.

From India to Cheltenham

by CC4HH, posted in migration, Uncategorized

This post comes for second year undergraduate student Lydia Munn, who has been working as a research assistant on the Cheltenham: Diaspora project.

When I first joined the Cheltenham: Diaspora project I was unsure where my research would lead me. After exploring some of the project’s initial findings, I decided that I wanted to focus on women’s stories as I feel their voices are often overlooked. I noticed one narrative the project had already started looking at was the Ayah’s, who were Indian women brought over to England during the 19th century by British colonial officers in order to look after their children on the long ship journey’s. The officers were supposed to pay for these women’s journey home, but many ended up abandoned and were sent to the Ayahs’ home in London.

Ayahs Home
The Ayahs’ Home in Hackney, 1904. Photo courtesy of the British Library.

Most of these women’s stories have not been written down and are lost to history, but one Cheltenham related name that kept appearing was ‘Ruth’. She was an Ayah in the service of Colonel Rowlandson, and she became the first person from India to be baptised in Cheltenham along with one of the Colonel’s children. What is even more interesting is she was baptised by a different priest to the child, one who could speak her native language: Tamil. Very few records surrounding these women have been saved. With some determination though, I found the record of her baptism on Ancestry. This record revealed her last name, or at least the name she had been given while in England, as Adnitt, a piece of information I had not been able to previously find. I wondered if she had kept the name, so I searched for it on shipping records but found nothing. It was so frustrating as there was so much information about the English family she lived with, but so little about her.

munn
Ruth’s Baptism certificate obtained from Ancestry.

I have not given up on Ruth and hope to one day find out more about her but I wanted to be of more use to the project. A few weeks before I had helped the Diaspora team set up a pop-up exhibition at the Cheltenham Community Rescource Centre. During this Bernice Thomson, who runs the centre, had mentioned that she ran a group on Monday’s called Sahara Saheli, for women had had emigrated to Cheltenham from other parts of the world. I contacted her and asked if any of the women would like to be interviewed for the project, she suggested I come along to one of the Monday sessions, in order to introduce myself and explain the project. I thought I could be of use to the Diaspora project as many of these women come from traditional cultural backgrounds and would feel more comfortable being interviewed by another woman.

Munn 2
The Cheltenham: Diaspora exhibition being installed at the Community Resource Centre on Grove Street.

The Sahara Saheli group was really welcoming and some of them seemed genuinely interested in the project. I conducted my first interview in March and heard the powerful story of a woman who came to Cheltenham from India in 1967. Over the next fifty years she watched a town change dramatically whilst dealing with immense loss and the need to support her family back in India. Sadly, due to the current Coronavirus pandemic it is unlikely I will be able to conduct anymore interviews this year, but I am so grateful that I have been able to have even the tiniest glimpse into some of these women’s amazing stories.