Our AGM will take place on Friday 19^th March in the Village hall at 7.30pm, followed by the talk by James Ranahan, postponed from last month. 

The AGM Agenda, the,Minutes of the 2021 AGM,  the reviewed 2021 Accounts, and the Chairman’s and Treasurer’s reports will be circulated in the next few days in order to make the AGM business as brief as possible. The main business of the AGM will be to accept these reports and elect a committee for 2022-23  

All members of the present committee are standing for re-election:

David Freke Chair,                                        

Roger Gaunt Vice Chair,                               

Alec Hitchman Treasurer,                               

Ilona Sekacz Secretary,                                 

Claire Roberts Programme Secretary,           

Catherine Petrie PR,

Pamela Redgrave Membership Secretary,

Isobel Gill,

Rosemary Collier,

George Lokuciewski, 

Peter Waters

                                    ,

Nominations to the 2022-23 committee are invited and may be proposed and seconded at the meeting.  Please consider joining us.

DEJA VUE! (appropriate for a talk on photography)

Following our AGM  James Ranahan, has kindly agreed to give his postponed talk The Photographer’s Gaze: viewing Warwickshire since 1839 . 

He will take us back into the Warwickshire of the last century and a half.   This is a period of Warwickshire’s boomtime, for some, and then bust, for some, and change, for all.  In the 19^th century the industrial towns benefitted from new canal and railway transport links, with the north Warwickshire coalfield fuelling huge urban population growth.  In the late twentieth century de-industrialisation forced radical changes on these communities.  Agricultural fortunes grew until the middle of the 19^th century, then dipped to desperate straits for landowners and agricultural workers at the end of the century.  In the twentieth century the two World Wars impacted on Warwickshire in ways which left permanent changes in the landscape and society.  Our own member Roger Butler has shown us historic images of local canals thriving with commercial traffic, becoming abandoned and lost in derelict wastelands and then reviving as amenities at the centre of leisure and retail activities (think Banbury).   Increasingly we use photographs to chart change – our own “snapshot” of Kineton 10 years ago is already, inevitably, an historic record. 

Photographs have increasingly documented these changes, and by the 21^st century photography has changed from its original elite specialist pursuit to a ubiquitous reflex available to anybody with a smart phone.  James’ title “The photographer’s gaze …” suggests that he will consider what subjects photographers have chosen to focus on and how they have presented them –  which of the infinity of possible views have they selected and frozen for posterity?  And how have these choices themselves changed over time?   James’ work is looking after these records.  He is an archivist with the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, specialising in the photographic records, and was previously for many years the Photographic Archivist at the Birmingham Library. We are eager to hear his postponed presentation.

At present there are no mandatory covid-related restrictions on the use of the village hall, so we expect to present a normal evening, with refreshments.  However, we advise that masks be worn when moving around, unless taking refreshments, and that the hand washing facilities be used.  Seats will be spaced, although not at the previous 2m distance. 

2022-3 Programme: 

Mar 18	AGM, followed by James Ranahan	The Photographer’s Gaze: Viewing Warwickshire Since 1839
22 April	Alan Benjamin	‘The History and Music of Morris Dancing’ with instrumental accompaniment.
20 May	Anne Langley	‘Early allotments in Warwickshire’ a major institution of Victorian village life
June/July	tbc	Walk around Ilmington  (date and time tbc) Visit to Brailes  (date and time tbc)
12 August	2.30 pm	Walk around Chipping Norton with Blue Badge guide
16 September	Norman Hyde	‘Tennis the Leamington Way.’ the oldest tennis club in the world and its importance to Leamington over 170 years.
21 October	Roy Smart	‘David Beatty – The Last Naval Hero’ fame and celebrity following the Battle of Jutland, the greatest naval battle in history.
18 November	Rosemary Collier	The History of the Royal Horticultural Research Institute, Wellesbourne
9 December	Richard Churchley	‘Christmas Songs Through the Ages’ the Middle Ages to the 1940s
20 Jan 2023	Beat Kumin	‘For a Good Cause – Church Ales and Early Modern Drinking Culture.’
17 Feb 2023	David Fry	The Silk Ribbon Industry of Coventry’
17 March 2023	AGM

Membership.   If you are, or would like to become, a Member of the group, your 2022 subscription is due (still £10pa!).  Our Treasurer Alec Hitchman awaits!  You can pay by cheque made payable to Kineton and District Local History Group, sent or delivered to Alec Hitchman, The Hills Farm, Pillerton Hersey, WARKS, CV35 0QQ,  or by BACS to our bank business account:

name: Kineton and District Local History Group,

sort code: 40-43-19;

acc. no. 71281992. Please include your full name so we can correctly attribute your payment.

Or you can join at any talk.

Other Society Events.

Warmington Heritage Group

Thursday March 17^th  in the Village Hall at 7.30pm

Professor Andrew Hopper of Oxford University , Principal Investigator of AHRC Project, ‘Conflict, Welfare and Memory during and after the English Civil Wars, 1642-1710’ www.civilwarpetitions.ac.uk will talk about ‘The Human Costs of the British Civil Wars’ (based on the Civil War Petitions Project), to include some reference to our own area.

Warwickshire Local History Society

K&DLHG is affiliated to WLHS and our members are entitled to join their meetings.

Tue 15 Mar 2022 at 19:30 The next WLHG talk via Zoom :.

Two short presentations by members, on aspects of current research.

‘Rokeby Camp, Rugby’, Christine Howling considers this local example of the 1946 Squatters’ Movement.

‘Warwickshire’s pioneering role in the development of dog shows’.   In the month that Crufts is hosted by the N.E.C. at Bickenhill, Ruth Barbour discusses the county’s contribution to the development of dog shows.

Please visit WLHS’s Eventbrite page:WLHS Members,’ Meeting Tickets, Eventbrite, to register your interest for this talk.  A link and joining instructions will then be sent to you a few days before the lecture.  Non-members are welcome to attend online meetings free of charge, for a limited time and subject to ticket availability. Annual Members’ Meeting.

Tuesday 26 April 2022           Annual General Meeting.  Speaker to be confirmed

Saturday 7 May 2022  Edgehill Battlefield Walk, A morning outing followed by optional lunch.  Led by Martin Russell, the Vice President of Shipston and District Local History Society (this finishes at the local pub and members can choose to stay for lunch if they wish).  Full details and prices to be confirmed.  

 

The Dugdale Society

Loss Accounts Project

Those who have an interest in the Civil War, and Edgehill in particular, may be pleased to know that the project to transcribe loss accounts that David Beaumont and Catherine Petrie were involved in is now complete and there will be an on-line launch on Saturday 26 March 2022 from 2.30pm to 3.30pm.    Please click on the link below on Saturday 26 March to join the on-line event.  Further details of the event are set out in the attached ‘flyer’.

Click here to join the Live Event

Please ensure that you access the link (which uses Microsoft Teams) before 2.30pm on Saturday 26^th March. You will be held in a waiting room and the host will let you in just before 2.30pm when the event is due to start.  Please ensure your microphone and camera are switched off when you join.

This project, created and managed by Dr Maureen Harris, ran from June 2018 to June 2020.  It was supported by the Friends of the Warwickshire County Record Office and the Dugdale Society, and received funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund.   

With support from County Record Office staff and experienced project ‘assistants’, Maureen led a team of volunteers from across the county (including members of the Friends) in exploring the human cost of the First Civil War through transcribing and tabulating the ‘Loss Accounts’ and researching the people and events they discovered within them.  The ‘Loss Accounts’ itemise the financial and material losses sustained by local inhabitants through Parliamentary activity before and during the First English Civil War between 1642 and 1646.

British Association for Local History.  The Kineton Group is also a Member of BALH and they run lectures and talks which are open to our members. 

Check their website www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Birmingham and Warwickshire Archaeological Society

Tuesday 5^th April  7.00pm Medieval Grafitti of South Warwickshire Churches by David Freke

Venue St John’s House Museum Warwick.  For tickets see website www.bwas-online.co.uk

Tickets bookable from BWAS website.

 

Warwickshire in WWII

The link below takes you to a fascinating article about WWII in the locality, keep going to the end to read about PoW Camp 31 at Ettington. 

https://www.forces.net/heritage/history/doorstep-history-german-soldiers-buried-warwickshire?fbclid=IwAR2glVLC2bOpFyt0W1hkJRPiG_zjVhlc7d-y4KjAfZ3uBySlvBj7w63esv0

Don’t forget to check our own website at:

Kineton and District Local History Group (kinetonhistory.co.uk)

 

OBITUARIES

Three of our long-standing members, each of whom contributed greatly to the group, have passed away in the last month.  Bob Crockett, who many of you will remember regularly maned the kitchen with his wife Doreen, has died after suffering for some years with Alzheimers Disease.  Our sympathies are with Doreen.  Richard Hurley who retired as our Treasurer in November 2018, died in early March after suffering a very aggressive brain tumour.  Again ,our thoughts are with Brownwen and his family.  Both in their different ways were stalwart members of the group of many years standing, and though for different reasons we have not seen them at our meetings for several years, they are missed. 

 

2021-22 KDLHG Committee

President:                               Robert Bearman MBE           

Chairman                               David Freke                            

Vice-Chairman                        Roger Gaunt                           

Secretary                               Ilona Sekacz                                      

Treasurer                                Alec Hitchman                        

Outings Secretary                   Isobel Gill                                    

Programme Secretary             Claire Roberts                               

Other committee members

Rosemary Collier    

George Lokuciejewski 

Catherine Petrie     

Pamela Redgrave  

Peter Waters                                                                                                     

Committee News.  The committee last met via Zoom on 17^th January and a summary was included in the January Newsletter.

Date of next Committee meeting:  14^th March via Zoom 4.00pm,  NB change of time

DF 11.03. 22

Contact:  David Freke   tel: 07876 290044

Email frekedj@globalnet.co.uk