Geraldine and Martin – Can you help?
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
2w ago
In this blog post Archive Assistant and B-26 Marauder fan, Neil Wiffen, seeks assistance with some research. For years I have known a story about Geraldine and Martin who lived in the vicinity of Great Sailing. ‘And who were they?’ I hear you ask. Well, in Roger Freeman’s B-26 Marauder at War (Shepperton, 1978 – copy in ERO Library) there’s a picture (p. 109) of a crashed B-26 Marauder named Geraldine, with some of the crew that flew it, and the following caption: ‘Wake over Geraldine … Parents of the real Geraldine returned the naming gesture by having their baby son christened Martin!’ This ..read more
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Welcome to Essex: remembering the USAAF
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
1M ago
  Tickets are selling fast for our forthcoming event, ‘Welcome to Essex’: remembering the USAAF. The Saracens Head in Chelmsford (Now ‘The Garrison’) was used as the American Red Cross Service Club. In the spring of 1944, the United States Army Air Force (USAAF) reached peak strength in Essex during the run-up to the hotly anticipated invasion of Europe — D-Day. Week after week new units of the USAAF flew into recently constructed airfields across the county, to start participating in the air campaign against the Luftwaffe and German coastal defenses. Small, rural villages across Esse ..read more
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Where there’s a will, there’s often an archaic word!
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
1M ago
Chris Lambert, ERO Archivist The ERO’s collection of wills, stretching from 1400 up to 1858, is widely used by family historians, but also by those trying to get closer to our ancestors’ material lives and their mental worlds. In particular, wills can tell us about the language that they used. A query from our friends at the Oxford English Dictionary recently brought this example to our attention. Will of Thomas Leffyngwell of Pebmarsh (catalogue ref: D/ABW 23/83) It comes from the will of a man from Pebmarsh called Thomas Leffyngwell, made in January 1553 when he was sick and probably close ..read more
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Sir Eduardo Paolozzi in Essex
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
2M ago
When you visit the Essex Record Office, you will see a selection of artwork from Essex County Council’s collection displayed on the ground floor and in the Searchroom. One of the pictures to catch my eye during my first week at the Record Office was a signed screenprint called “Untitled” (1965) by Sir Eduardo Paolozzi (1924-2005). The overlapping patterns in this print are reminiscent of his earlier work creating collages made from newspapers and advertisements. Sir Eduardo Paolozzi (1924-2005), “Untitled”, 1965. Signed screenprint. 23″x 23 1/2″. Essex County Council art collection 329. I’m fa ..read more
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Planes, trains and automobiles (but mostly planes)
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
4M ago
Chris Lambert, Archivist Surprise presents are the best. The Record Office recently welcomed an unexpected gift from the Friends of Hylands House, who had acquired this splendid wedding album. It belonged originally to Dorothy Cadwell Taylor, heiress to an American leather goods fortune, who ended her life as the widow of an Italian count. In between, while living the life of a wealthy socialite, she had been married briefly to Claude Grahame-White, a pioneering British aviator whom she had met while crossing the Atlantic on the ‘Olympic’. Bride and groom leaving Widford Church with a scout g ..read more
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Essex Record Office publications now available online!
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
5M ago
Just in time for Christmas, Essex Record Office has teamed up with Museumshops.co.uk to make our publications available to purchase online for the very first time. Many of these publications have been printed in limited numbers and were previously only available from the Essex Record Office Searchroom. Our shop can be found at https://museumshops.uk/shop/essex-record-office/. Over this week we will be taking a look at some of our most popular publications, all of which can be bought from our online shop! First up, is one of our bestsellers: “Pilgrims and Adventurers”. “No English county has st ..read more
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What on earth is a Seax – Essex Day 2023
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
5M ago
The 26th October is the feast day of St Cedd, it is also Essex Day. Over on our social media we have taken you on a treasure trail of where you can find Seaxes here at the Essex Record Office. The three Seaxes will be familiar to many Essex residents as part of the logo for Essex County Council and on a red background, as their Coat of Arms. But what is a Seax and why has Essex taken it as their symbol? Customer Service Team Lead, Edward Harris delves deeper. Essex County Council was first granted it’s Coat of Arms by the College of Arms on the 15th July 1932 comprising: Gules, three Seaxes ..read more
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Just who is St Cedd? Essex Day 2023
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
5M ago
The 26th October is St Cedd’s day. It is also known as Essex Day as St Cedd is Essex’s very own patron saint. Bur who is St Cedd? And why is he held in such high esteem in Essex? Archive Assistant, Robert Lee takes a look at the life of St Cedd. St Cedd – A Hagiography Icon of St Cedd Cedd’s life began in the Kingdom of Northumbria under the tutelage of Saint Aidan of Lindisfarne. The oldest of four brothers (Chad, Cynibil & Caelin), Cedd in particular would be unwavering to the Celtic Rite imbued to him by Aidan. Cedd’s introduction to Christianity was anti-diocesan: not liturgical and ..read more
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Solanum Lycoperiscum – the tomato
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
6M ago
The home-grown tomato season is coming to an end and to mark this, ERO Archive Assistant and vegetable patch correspondent Neil Wiffen, delves into the history of the tomato. Tomatoes in season are one of the joys of summer, especially if you can grow your own which, warm from the greenhouse, are a delight to eat. In our modern world they are available all year round, but this is a rather recent phenomenon, as with so many of our salad and soft fruit crops. It’s really only in the last 40 or so years that they have become such staple fare for before that, the cost of heating greenhouses was su ..read more
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400th anniversary of William Byrd (c.1540-1623)
Essex Record Office Blog
by admin
9M ago
July 2023 marks the 400th anniversary of the death of the composer William Byrd, who for over 25 years lived in Stondon Massey. Byrd was a recusant Catholic who refused to attend the services of the Church of England. While living at Stondon Massey, Byrd composed two books of illegal Latin religious music known as the ‘Gradualia’. The first set of 1605 was dedicated to the Earl of Northampton, and the second set dated 1607 was dedicated to Byrd’s great friend and patron, Lord Petre of Writtle who lived nearby at Ingatestone Hall. According to a household inventory dated 1608, the Petre family ..read more
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