HAPPY NEW YEAR

Our meeting this Friday 17th January takes us underground, overground, wondering freely about what lies beneath the streets and houses of Warwick, and elsewhere. Our speaker Alex Harvey is a founder and director of RiVR, which specialises in digitally surveying historic buildings and other structures and recreating them in Virtual Reality so that participants can feel that they inhabit the space. This talk focuses on the historic tunnels under Warwick which he and his colleagues have been exploring and recording for several years. What were these tunnels for, when were they made and who made them? Alex will be revealing all on Friday, we hope that you will join us. Doors open 7.00pm for teas, coffees and the all-important raffle, the talk starts at 7.30pm

Report on our Friday 13th December meeting at the village hall, when Paul Thompson entertained us with a dive into the expansion and contraction, under successive Emperors, of the Roman festival of Saturnalia, the Roman midwinter celebration, marked by parties, gift giving, and the disruption of social norms. In authentic costume he debunked several myths about the “Romans” and their dress, using volunteer Claire to demonstrate that the toga actually obliges the wearer to become one-armed, in order to keep the yards of curved cloth from falling off. The Roman mid-winter celebration of Saturn influenced subsequent Christmas traditions – the green tree, gift giving, the white bearded “old man”, parties and revelry, and even the extended festive season. A wonderfully relaxed and amusing presentation, with props galore. After such tales of Roman merriment, we enjoyed our own traditional fare of mince pies and mulled wine provided by the Committee.

The Archive. Colin has arranged to purchase archive quality storage materials to safeguard the longterm survival of the paper archive. Repairs have been completed to the room adjacent to the archive room which was damaged in the pre-Christmas storms. The archive was unaffected.

Forthcoming K&DLHG events

Date	Speaker	Title
13 Dec 2024	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times
25 Apr 2025	Maggie Wood	Ralph Sheldon and his Wonderful Tapestry
16 May 2025	John Frearson	The History of the Kaye and Nelson Lime and Cement Works, Southam and Stockton
June 2025	tbc	Outing tbc
18th July 2025	4:30pm-7:00pm	Harbury heritage collection and guided village tour
9th August 2025	11:00am-1:00pm	Burford Tolsey Museum and guided town tour
19 Sept 2025	Ginny Davis	The Mysterious Death of Amy Robsart, wife of Robert Dudley
17 Oct 2025	Jackie West	The Restoration of Ladbroke Church
21 Nov 2025	Bob Bearman	Stratford in 50 Buildings
12 Dec 2025	Members’ evening	Christmas Treats
16 Jan 2026	Travor Langley	Thomas Oken, Warwick’s Great benefactor
20 Feb 2026	Bob Booth	The Sweet Life in Bourneville: the Cadbury and Bourneville story from 1878
20 Mar 2026	AGM & John Parnell	AGM A History of the Circus

Other Organisations’ Events
Please check the Warwickshire Local History Society’s Other Societies’ Events page for a list of other
meetings of local history interest. You can access it here: Other Events (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)
27 January Marton History Group A History of Secret Marton Village Hall 7.30
28 January Stoneleigh History Society 1816 – The Year Without a Summer by David Morse. Village Hall
7.30.
31 January Welford and Weston Local History Society. In search of Health- early services in
Warwickshire 1820-1900 by Dr John Wilmot. Village Hall 7.30

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures
and talks which are open to our members. Contact www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group

Membership.
Membership for 2025 is £15. Visitor entrance will be £4.00 per meeting from January 2025. Cash or cheque payments can be made at any meeting.
If you would like to become a member of the group, our 2025 membership year starts in January. If you
attend 4 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!

We would urge those who can, to please pay by BACS to our bank business account:
Name: Kineton and District Local History Group
Sort code: 40-43-19
Account Number. 71281992.
Please include your full name so we can correctly attribute your payment.

Please make cheques payable to: Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or deliver to:
Alec Hitchman, The Hills Farm, Pillerton Hersey, WARKS, CV35 0QQ
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

KDLHG Committee

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Professor Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Archive Data Manager / Membership Secretary	Carol Clark
Archivist	Colin Such

The committee met on 6th January, hosted again by Colin Such. Roger Gaunt, our Vice Chair, announced that he was intending to retire from the committee at the March AGM

The committee has fallen to skeleton crew numbers, and we are keen to recruit new people to help run the group, volunteers would be welcomed and can be co-opted before the AGM, so please consider joining us.

The 2025-26 talks programme has been completed and two of the summer outing have been arranged (see forthcoming events above), Alec’s treasurer’s report showed satisfactory income and expenditure figures, and very helpful income continuing from raffle and refreshments. Colin has been extremely successful in selling Peter Ashley-Smith’s book, and the Joe Gerring book. The treasurer was asked to investigate online banking for the Group. A delegation visited the Village Hall with the Village Hall Trustee’s chair to consider the future of the Group’s cupboard where our equipment was stored until covid. We have responded to the’ VHT’s request for comments regarding the VH facilities, and we suggested permanent overhead projection gear and reliable sound equipment, and we would support any application for relevant funding to provide these. We need to confirm that our insurance through our membership the British Association for Local History (BALH) remains appropriate. The next committee meeting is set for 6th March 2025 at 7.00pm, again to be hosted by Colin

PLEASE NOTE DECEMBERS MEETING IS ON THE SECOND FRIDAY OF THE MONTH TO AVOID CHRISTMAS ACTIVITIES: SO ITS THIS WEEK! FRIDAY 13TH DECEMBER

Our meeting this Friday 13th of December, at the village hall, will delve into the Roman precursor of Christmas. Doors open 7.00pm for teas, coffees and the all important raffle. The talk entitled Io! Saturnalia starting at 7.30 will be by Paul Thompson.

Paul will describe the Roman midwinter 7-day celebration of Saturnalia, marked by parties, gift giving, and the disruption of social norms. After being primed with tales of Roman merriment we will enjoy the conviviality of mulled wine and mince pies. We hope that you will join us in this run up to your own Christmas revelries.

Report on 15th November talk about William James by our member Roger Butler. Roger gave us a brilliantly illustrated short history of the interrelated developments of the canals and the railways in the late 18th and early 19th centuries to set the scene for the innovative work of William James. His contribution was as a surveyor and entrepreneur. He worked with George Stephenson, surveying the difficult route of the Liverpool and Manchester railway, the first viable passenger line. He felt his contribution was usurped by Stephenson who developed the line while William was in prison for debt.
He was busy in many parts of England, with involvement with at least 13 major railway lines. Locally he promoted the Stratford to Moreton-in-Marsh tramway, as well as having a major interest in the Stratford
Canal. Roger showed us the surprisingly numerous relics of the tramway still to be found in the countryside between Stratford and Moreton-in-Marsh: – buildings, placenames, and footpaths still following the old track. Gill Stewart led the vote of thanks, drawing on her own fieldwork researching these fragments of William James’ works.

The Archive. Colin has secured a grant of £349.00 from the Warwickshire County Councillors Grant Fund through Councillor Chris Mills, to purchase archive quality storage materials to safeguard the long term survival of the paper archive. Many thanks to Chris Mills, and to Colin for his timely application.

Forthcoming K&DLHG events

Date	Speaker	Title
13 Dec 2024	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times
25 Apr 2025	Maggie Wood	Ralph Sheldon and his Wonderful Tapestry
16 May 2025	John Frearson	The History of the Kaye and Nelson Lime and Cement Works, Southam and Stockton
June, July August	tbc	Outings to Harbury, Burford and Ettington tbc
19 Sept 2025	tbc
17 Oct 2025	Jackie West	The Restoration of Ladbroke Church
21 Nov 2025	Bob Bearman	Stratford in 50 Buildings
12 Dec 2025		Members’ evening Christmas Treats
16 Jan 2026	Travor Langley	Thomas Oken, Warwick’s Great benefactor
20 Feb 2026	tbc
20 Mar 2026	AGM & John Parnell	AGM A History of the Circus

Other Organisations’ Events
Please check the Warwickshire Local History Society’s Other Societies’ Events page for a list of other
meetings of local history interest. You can access it here: Other Events (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures
and talks which are open to our members. Contact www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group

Membership.
If you are, or would like to become a Member of the KDLHG, our 2025 membership year starts in January
and will cost £15. Visitor entrance will be £4.00 per meeting from January 2025; if you attend four or more
of the nine meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!

We would urge those who can, to please pay by BACS to our bank business account:
Name: Kineton and District Local History Group
Sort code: 40-43-19
Account Number. 71281992.
Please include your full name so we can correctly attribute your payment.

Please make cheques payable to: Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or deliver to:
Alec Hitchman, The Hills Farm, Pillerton Hersey, WARKS, CV35 0QQ
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

KDLHG Committee

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Professor Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Archive Data Manager / Membership Secretary	Carol Clark
Archivist	Colin Such

The committee has met on 18th September in the Community Archive Room, and on 12th November hosted by Colin Such. Ilona has stepped down from the committee after 17 years, the last 9 years serving as our Secretary. The committee recorded their appreciation of her contribution to the smooth running of the group for so long, and future historians will be indebted to her for the “Snapshot” of the village she organised in 2008, with the multitude of photographs and items she collected, now safely housed in the Archive. We have also lost our Membership Secretary, Pam Redgrave, who has also stepped down from the committee. She will be sorely missed, but her legacy is the re-organised and up to date membership list, and her enhanced PR arrangements, which have done so much to keep our numbers healthy. Carol Clark has taken over the membership side of things.

The committee has again fallen to skeleton crew numbers, and we are keen to recruit new people to
help run the group, volunteers would be welcomed and can be co-opted before the AGM, so please
consider joining us.

Many of the discussions in the last two committee meetings have been to finalise the 2025-26 talks
programme, now virtually completed by Claire (see forthcoming events above), and to consider the details of managing the archive, ably overseen by Colin. The next committee meeting is set for 6th January 2025, again to be hosted by Colin at 7.00pm

On Friday 15th for meeting at the village hall, the doors will open at 7.00pm for teas, coffees and the all important raffle. The talk, starting at 7.30, entitled William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer, will be given by our member Roger Butler.

He was busy in many parts of England, with involvement with at least 13 major railway lines. Locally he promoted the Stratford to Moreton-in-Marsh tramway, as well as having a major interest in the Stratford Canal.

Those who have heard any of Roger’s previous presentations will know that we are in for a well researched and relaxed evening, illustrated by his always excellent photographs.

Report on Friday 18th October meeting. The talk by David Morse was
entitled A Dive into Leamington’s Photograpic Archive. David is Vice Chair
of Leamington History Group and has been researching Leamington’s social
history for many years. His talk outlined the major project being undertaken by
the Leamington group to collect, archive and interpret the photographic legacy of
the town. As the group’s archivist, David described the stages of developing
such a resource: collecting historic photographs through appeals and publicity;
sorting and cataloguing the resulting collection of 5,000 individual items into a coherent order; interpreting what they show, to contribute to the narrative of the town; and making the material available, to enhance the experience of living in an historic environment. David demonstrated this ambition through his talk with examples of before and after shots of corners of Leamington now unrecognisable from their earlier appearance. At Kineton we are now embarked upon a similar project within the Archive, and the Leamington experience is an example of how it can be done.

Report on 20th September talk by Maggie Wood. Maggie Wood was formerly Keeper of Social History for the Warwickshire Museum Service, and she took inspiration from a collection of local 19th-century smocks held at Warwick Museum, tracing the stories of the individuals who once wore them.
Smocking was a form of stitching to gather the usually linen fabric of a smock to make it stronger, more flexible and more waterproof. She promised some surprises, and one she developed was the attitude to illegitimacy in the late 19th century. The authorities – the Church, the legal system – stigmatised illegitimacy, but one of the characters followed by Maggie had several children out of wedlock by different fathers but lived with her parents and was not the social outcast depicted in the moralising tropes of the period. Maggie has analysed local marriage and birth registers to show that 41% of brides were pregnant at their weddings, and 10% already had a child. Clearly the attitude to sex outside wedlock was surprisingly more relaxed in the general population than that of the authorities. That Maggie presented an entertaining and informative evening about the people and conditions in our area more than a century ago was no surprise to us.

Forthcoming K&DLHG events

Date	Speaker	Title
15 Nov 2024	Roger Butler	William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer
13 Dec 2024	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times
25 Apr 2025	Maggie Wood	Ralph Sheldon and his Wonderful Tapestry
16 May 2025	John Frearson	The History of the Kaye and Nelson Lime and Cement Works, Southam and Stockton
June, July August	tbc	Outings to Harbury, Burford and Ettington tbc
19 Sept 2025	tbc
17 Oct 2025	Jackie West	The Restoration of Ladbroke Church
21 Nov 2025	Bob Bearman	Stratford in 50 Buildings
12 Dec 2025		Members’ evening Christmas Treats
16 Jan 2026	Travor Langley	Thomas Oken, Warwick’s Great benefactor
20 Feb 2026	tbc
20 Mar 2026	AGM & John Parnell	AGM A History of the Circus

Other Organisations’ Events
Thursday November 21st Warmington Heritage Group The Warmington Judd Family and where it has
taken me, by David Judd 7.30pm in the Village Hall

Please look up the Warwickshire Local History Society’s Other Societies’ Events page for a list of other meetings of local history interest. You can access it here: Other Events (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures and talks which are open to our members. Contact www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group

Membership.
Membership for 2025 is £15. Visitor entrance will be £4.00 per meeting from January 2025. Cash or cheque payments can be made at any meeting. If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2025 membership year starts in January. If you attend 4 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!
We would urge those who can to please pay 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.
Members note that if you pay by cheque make it payable to:
Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or delivered to:
Alec Hitchman, The Hills Farm, Pillerton Hersey, WARKS, CV35 0QQ
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

KDLHG Committee

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Professor Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Archive Data Manager	Carol Clarke
Archivist	Colin Such

The committee has met on 18th September in the Community Archive Room, and on 12th November hosted by Colin Such. Ilona has stepped down from the committee after 17 years, the last 9 years serving as our Secretary. The committee recorded their appreciation of her contribution to the smooth running of the group for so long, and future historians will be indebted to her for the “Snapshot” of the village she organised in 2008, with the multitude of photographs and items she collected, now safely housed in the Archive. We have also lost our Membership Secretary, Pam Redgrave, who has also stepped down from the committee.
She will be sorely missed, but her legacy is the re-organised and up to date membership list, and her enhanced PR arrangements, which have done so much to keep our numbers healthy.
The committee has again fallen to skeleton crew numbers, and we are keen to recruit new people to help run the group, volunteers would be welcomed and co-opted before the AGM, so please consider joining us.
Many of the discussions in the last two committee meetings have been to finalise the 2025-26 talks programme, now virtually completed by Claire (see forthcoming events above), and to consider the details of managing the archive, ably overseen by Colin. The next committee meeting has been provisionally set for 7th January 2025, again to be hosted by Colin at 7.00pm

Our first autumn meeting will be this Friday 20th September at the
village hall, doors open 7.00pm for teas, coffees and the allimportant raffle. The talk starting 7.30 will be by Maggie Wood, entitled Mr Gaydon of Brailes and Other Stories Told Through a Collection of Smocks. Smocking was a form of stitching to gather the usually linen fabric of a smock to make it stronger, more flexible and more waterproof. Styles of stitching, embroidery and even the shapes of smocks vary across the country, so the style of the smock worn by Mr Tickner from Ewhurst may be different to those worn by Warwickshire labourers. Maggie Wood was formerly Keeper of Social History for the Warwickshire Museum. Service, and her talk will be based on a collection of local 19th century smocks held at the museum, tracing the stories of the individuals who once wore them. She promises some surprises on the way. We have hosted talks by Maggie in the past and we can expect an entertaining and informative evening about the people and conditions in our area more than a century ago.

Report on August 16th visit to Stratford Guild Chapel
Our expert guides Pamela Devine and Janet Hall introduced our group to the history and original function of the 15th century chapel before describing the internationally important series of wall paintings. First the “Doom” above the chancel arch, showing the Last Judgement, with the saved on the right hand of God and the sinners on the left. Unusually for Doom paintings there are no popes, princes or the rich among the damned, but they are conspicuous among the saved. But then, it was commissioned by the elite of the town!
The painting has suffered some deterioration since its discovery in the early 19th century, but copies made at the time by Thomas Fisher can supply some of the missing elements. A frieze of images and texts running along the north wall of the nave show people from all stations of life being led off by Death in a dance of death, while corresponding images on the south wall show scenes from the life of Adam. . These friezes are now hidden by panelling, but two section were exposed for us to see.

The wall paintings were covered with limewash less
than a century after they were created. This event was recorded by John Shakespeare, the playwright’s father, in his role as Chamberlain of Stratford Corporation.
Since 2022 the chapel has benefitted from Heritage Lottery Funding to conserve and interpret the surviving 15th century paintings, which constitute a rare scheme created at a single period as one programme. Although some parts have been destroyed or overlaid. work continues to enhance and interpret this internationally significant series of images.
Our thanks to our Chapel guides Pamela and Janet, and to Rosemary for arranging this and our other summer outings to Lighthorne village and Stanway House. The trips have been enjoyed by all who joined us.

Forthcoming K&DLHG events

Date	Speaker	Title
20 September	Maggie Wood	Mr Gaydon of Brailes, stories told through a collection of smocks
18 October	David Morse	A Dive into Leamington’s Photographic Archive
15 November	Roger Butler	William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer
13 December	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan. 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb. 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar. 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times

Other Organisations’ Events

Warmington Heritage Group begin their series of evening talks Thursday September 19 at 7.30pm in the
Village Hall when Sealed Knot members Verna and Stephen Wass will be discussing the impact of the
English Civil War on the town and people of Banbury and punctuating the talk with live music played on
instruments of the period. It promises to be a hugely entertaining evening.
Then on Thursday, 17th October at 7.30 in the village hall John Bishop will talk on the history of the
Gaydon RAF base.

RAF Gaydon opened in 1942 and is known for its role during the Cold War, when it was under the control
of RAF Bomber Command as it was the first Royal Air Force (RAF) station to receive the Vickers Valiant
when No. 138 Squadron RAF re-formed here in 1955.
In 1978, the site passed into civilian ownership and today contains the British Motor Museum, the
headquarters of automobile manufacturer Aston Martin, and the Jaguar Land Rover Gaydon Centre.

Please look up the Warwickshire Local History Society’s Other Societies’ Events page for a list of
other meetings of local history interest. You can access it here: Other Events (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures and talks which are open to our members. www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group.

Membership.
Membership for 2025 is £15. Visitor entrance is £3.00 per meeting.
If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2025 membership year starts in January. If you attend 5 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!
With our bank now charging for payments by cheque or cash, we would urge those who can to please pay 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.
Members note that if you pay by cheque make it payable to:

Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or delivered to:
Alec Hitchman,
The Hills Farm,
Pillerton Hersey,
WARKS,
CV35 0QQ

Cash payments can be made at any meeting. For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

KDLHG Committee

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Membership & PR	Pamela Redgrave
Archive Data Manager	Carol Clarke
Archivist	Colin Such Ilona Sekacz

The committee last met on 11th June in the Community Archive Room, and the June Newsletter summarised its discussions. The next committee meeting will be on 18th September in the Community Archive Room at 7.00pm

Our last summer outing of 2024 will be this FRIDAY, AUGUST 16th. Afternoon guided visit to STRATFORD GUILD CHAPEL meeting at 2.00pm in the chapel (CV37 6EP)
There are still places available on this trip, pay at the door, cost £5.00.

Stratford’s Guild of the Holy Cross was an essential element in the
medieval economic and social life of the town. In the 15th century
the increasingly rich and influential Guild built the almshouses,
the Guild Hall, the grammar school and the Guild Chapel.
The chapel we now see was built in the 15th century, and has
undergone many changes of use in the last half century.

It contains internationally important wall paintings, which were covered with whitewash less than a century after they were created. This event was recorded by John Shakespeare, the playwright’s father, in his role as Chamberlain of Stratford Corporation. Since 2022 the chapel has benefitted from Heritage Lottery Funding to conserve and interpret the surviving 15th century paintings, which constitute a rare scheme created at a single period as one programme. Although some parts have been destroyed or overlaid by later painting, and some are hidden behind wooden panelling, work continues to enhance and interpret this internationally significant series of images.

Report on the evening tour of LIGHTHORNE VILLAGE on 21st June

We had an enjoyable evening in benign weather, led by our member Colin Such, who until recently resided in Lighthorne and who has amassed a wealth of information about its history and characters. He gave us a brief illustrated introductory history of the village in the Village Hall, noting the prehistoric beginnings of the settlement and the nearby Roman activity.

We then went out to view the Old Post Office and the historic buildings at the adjacent cross roads, including the Old Forge and the (well-attended) Antelope Hotel pub. We then walked up Old School Lane, noting in passing a fine farmhouse, and a notorious establishment, before arriving at the Old School, now converted to domestic use.

When we returned to the crossroads your reporter reluctantly fell by the wayside suffering from a painful foot problem. Undaunted, Colin led the group up Church Lane to St Laurence’s church to view the church and its notable stained glass.

The church tower was built in the 1770s by Kineton mason Samuel
Eglington, who had been employed on the new house at Compton Verney. The main body of the church is 19th century, but there is some early glass incorporated in the windows. Although I missed this part of the tour Colin has written a detailed article about the stained glass based on the research of the late Peter Hinman and Aiden McRae Thomson (in the Lighthorne History Society Archive and available online here:
http://www.lighthornehistory.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/LH1342014.pdf).
Well worth a read.
Our thanks to Colin for giving us the benefit of just some of his encyclopaedic knowledge of Lighthorne’s past in such a calm and engaging fashion.

Report on Friday July19th afternoon guided tour of STANWAY HOUSE
Stanway House dates from the late 16th – early 17th century, and the gardens have been continually enhanced by successive generations of the Tracys. The family is still in residence. The day was the hottest of the year to date, and the golden coloured Cotswold stone buildings looked their best, but we were glad to be mainly indoors. Our guide Marie-Therese led us through the apartments open to the public, while the family, and the dogs, passed through us en route to the pool, judging by the evidence of their attire. A massive 17th century shove ha’penny table with a single huge oak top was a feature of the Hall – it might have been constructed in situ it was so enormous. The long winter evenings before the internet seem to have been occupied by sitting in chairs covered in original Morris fabrics, and flicking stamps attached to coins at the high ceiling, where a few stamps are still to be seen. Ilona admitted to having played this game too, although not at Stanway House. Possibly to counteract the effect of too many dinners we saw a rare Chippendale exercise chair, looking uncomfortably like an instrument of torture.

Up some steps, giving a glimpse of a servants’ passage, we came to the sitting room, containing two Chippendale settees, with elaborate canopies embellished with chinoiserie accessories,
including a pagoda and little bells. Here Marie-Therese pointed out the portraits of several 18th and 19th century ancestors who fatally drank or duelled themselves into contention for Darwin awards.

The next room was a smaller book-lined intimate room, with Edwardian photos of three beautiful sisters, one whose private life seemed to be intent on making up for the gene pool deficit racked up by her forebears.
Making our way into the sunshine through a servants’ back door we saw the remnants of the elegant landscape garden depicted in one of the 18th century paintings in the Hall. A little steepled building stood at the head of what had been a long cascade emptying into a raised canal. This is now the site of the spectacular 91-metre high fountain – the highest gravity-fed spout in the world. The fountain was turned on for us, and was truly remarkable.
Our thanks to Rosemary for arranging both these stimulating outings, enjoyed by all who joined us.
The Community Archive Colin and Carol have continued cataloguing the material in the archive. We
have taken delivery of 10 archive quality archive storage boxes donated by the Warwickshire County Record Office through the good offices of Colin.
The shelving is now installed, and Colin has catalogued and indexed all the paper archive, while Carol is organising the digital material.

David Beaumont has kindly donated a WWII child’s gas mask, from a
Kineton source. I never knew such objects existed and it looks fearsome if
necessary thing, but it brings home the reality of a war only a few can now
bear witness. It looks horribly like that Caravaggio painting of David With the Head of Goliath.

Forthcoming K&DLHG events

Date	Speaker	Title
16 August	Guided Outing 2pm	Guided tour of Guild Chapel, Stratford
20 September	Maggie Wood	Mr Gaydon of Brailes, stories told through a collection of smocks
18 October	David Morse	A Dive into Leamington’s Photographic Archive
15 November	Roger Butler	William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer
13 December	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan. 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb. 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar. 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times

Other Organisations’ Events
Please look up the Warwickshire Local History Society’s Other Societies’ Events page for a list of
other meetings of local history interest. You can access it here: Other Events (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures and talks which are open to our members. www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group.

Membership.
Membership for 2024 is £15. Visitor entrance is £3.00 per meeting.
If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2024 membership year starts in January. If you attend 5 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!
With our bank now charging for payments by cheque or cash, we would urge those who can to please pay 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.
Members note that if you pay by cheque make it payable to:

Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or delivered to:
Alec Hitchman,
The Hills Farm,
Pillerton Hersey,
WARKS,
CV35 0QQ

Cash payments can be made at any meeting. For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

KDLHG Committee

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Membership & PR	Pamela Redgrave
Archive Data Manager	Carol Clarke
Archivist	Colin Such Ilona Sekacz

The committee last met on 11th June in the Community Archive Room, and the June Newsletter summarised its discussions. The next committee meeting will be on 18th September in the Community Archive Room at 7.00pm

On Friday evening June 21st we take a short trip to Lighthorne for our first summer outing of 2024.
Meet at 6.00pm, Lighthorne Village Hall, CV350AY. Cost £5.00 (can be collected on the day)
The forecast is for a fine day and we look forward to an enjoyable evening led by our member Colin Such, who until recently resided in Lighthorne and has amassed a mine of information about its history and characters.
Evening tour of LIGHTHORNE VILLAGE

Lighthorne is mentioned in the Domesday survey of 1086 as “Listecorne”. An interpretation of this as “the light/ bright thorn bush”, has been challenged by Peter Hinman who proposed “hidden valley” or “stream valley” as more likely.
Once owned by the Earls of Warwick the village later became part of the Compton Verney estate owned by the Lord Willoughby de Broke.

The church tower was built
in the 1770s by Kineton
mason Samuel Eglington,
who had been employed on
the new house at Compton
Verney. The main body of
the church is 19th century,
but there is some early glass
incorporated into the windows.
The earliest of the 4 bells is 15th century, one is 17th century and two are 19th century.
The village has many attractive historic features, and we will be guided expertly around these historic sites by Colin Such, the Lighthorne History Society archivist and K&DLHG committee member and archivist.

FRIDAY JULY 19th Afternoon guided tour of STANWAY HOUSE

Cost £20.00 (book in advance, numbers limited)
Stanway House and gardens in Gloucestershire are about 30 miles from Kineton. The house dates from the late 16th – early 17th century, and
the gardens have been continually enhanced by successive generations of the Tracy family and their descendants.

The spectacular 91 metre high fountain – the highest gravity fed spout in the world – being one of the latest additions opened in 2004.
The house has stairs and level changes etc which make it unsuitable for people with mobility issues. The fountain and garden are fully accessible, Meet 2.00 pm Stanway House entrance. GL54 5PQ

NB this is not a coach trip, to avoid unnecessary car trips please consider car sharing

FRIDAY AUGUST 16th Afternoon guided visit to STRATFORD GUILD CHAPEL Cost £5.00

Stratford’s Guild of the Holy Cross was an essential element in the medieval life of the town. The Guild built the almshouses, the Guild Hall, the grammar school and the Guild Chapel.

The chapel we now see was built in the 15th century, and has undergone many changes of use in the last half century. It contains internationally important wall paintings, which were covered with whitewash less than a century after they were created. The event was recorded by John Shakespeare, the playwright’s father, in his role as Alderman of the Corporation.
Meet 2.00pm in the chapel.

The Community Archive
Colin and Carol have continued cataloguing the material in the archive. We have taken delivery of 10 archive quality archive storage boxes donated by the Warwickshire County Record Office through the good offices of Colin. Here is a find from a collection of unlabelled photographs:
Tales from the Archive from Carol
I was looking through a small suitcase of someone’s old family photos in the Archive recently. Amongst the mostly loose photos was a small, slightly battered album, and on one of the pages I spotted a photo of ….. my father!
It was one of four snaps on a page labelled “Weston Park Nr Shipston on Stour”, featuring a Girl Guide camp in perhaps the early 1920s. To be fair, I already had an analogue copy of the same photo, but this one, although only a 2″ x 3″ snapshot, turned out to be of better quality once I’d scanned and enhanced it.
At the time Dad was a young gardener at Weston Park (between Cherington and Long Compton), and features in the photo in the back row, on the right. The other two older men were also gardeners, and the girls at the front were Girl Guides. I was told by my aunt in the 1980s that the Guides were from Birmingham, and the other gardeners used to tease Dad by sending him on spurious errands into the depths of the Guides’ camping area.
The name “Baldwin” is written on the back of some of the loose photos. Now I wonder whose album it was, and how they were connected with the Girl Guide camp?

Carol Clark

Forthcoming K&DLHG events

Date	Speaker	Title
21 June (eve)	Colin Such 6pm	Guided tour of Lighthorne village
19 July (afternoon)	Guided Outing 2pm	Visit to Stanway House
16 August	Guided Outing 2pm	Guided tour of Guild Chapel, Stratford
20 September	Maggie Wood	Mr Gaydon of Brailes, stories told through a collection of smocks
18 October	David Morse	A Dive into Leamington’s Photographic Archive
15 November	Roger Butler	William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer
13 December	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan. 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb. 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar. 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times

Other Organisations’ Events

Warwickshire Local History Society Summer outings.

Saturday 29th June. Roman Mancetter. At the Roman Mancetter Centre and St Peter’s Church, Mancetter 2.00 – 5.00pm.
Hear about Mancetter’s role as a town of front line strategic importance during the early years of the Roman invasion and then the history of the medieval town and guild, all within the beautifully maintained late medieval church of St Peter.
Price: £11 WLHS and associate members, £13 non members, including
afternoon tea/coffee and cake.
The event and venue are fully accessible. Free parking available. There
are 50 places on this trip. Bookings close on 15th June. mancetter-poster-1.pdf (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

Saturday 6th July. Holy Trinity Church, Sutton Coldfield. 2.00 –
5.00pm
Learn about the history of Holy Trinity Church from its founding in
1250 with its rich heritage of stained glass, memorials, unique woodwork and glorious painted ceilings.
Price: £11 WLHS and associate members, £13 non members, including
afternoon tea/coffee and cake.
The event and venue are accessible. Limited free parking; we recommend public transport for this event (the railway station is a short walk). There are 60 places on this trip. Bookings close on 22nd June.
sutton-coldfield-poster-1.pdf (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

Saturday 20th July. Guided tours of Harbury. Tours start at 9.15am,
12.20pm and 5.30pm
Take a guided tour of the historic village of Harbury with volunteers
from the Harbury Heritage Centre and learn about the history of the
village. Then visit the Harbury Heritage Centre for refreshments and a
chance to browse the historical documents in their collection, including
photographs and maps.
Price: £7.70 WLHS and associate members, £9.70 non members,
including tea/coffee and refreshments.
The event and venue are accessible. Free parking available (including a separate area for people with mobility needs). There are 60 places on this trip (20 on each tour). Bookings close on 6th July.
For more information including how to book please download the Booking Form.
harbury-poster.pdf (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)
As Associate Members, members of the K&DLH are eligible for the WLHS rate.

Please look up the Warwickshire Local History Society’s Other Societies’ Events page for a list of
other meetings of local history interest. You can access it here: Other Events (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures and talks which are open to our members. www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group.

Membership.
Membership for 2024 is £15. Visitor entrance is £3.00 per meeting.
If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2024 membership year starts in January. If you attend 5 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!
With our bank now charging for payments by cheque or cash, we would urge those who can to please pay 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.
Members note that if you pay by cheque make it payable to:
Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or delivered to:
Alec Hitchman,
The Hills Farm,
Pillerton Hersey,
WARKS, CV35 0QQ
Cash payments can be made at any meeting.
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

KDLHG Committee

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Membership & PR	Pamela Redgrave Carol Clarke Colin Such Ilona Sekacz
Archive Data Manager	Carol Clarke
Archivist	Colin Such Ilona Sekacz

The committee met on 11th June in the Community Archive Room. The Village hall has been booked for the 2025-6 programme. The possibility of obtaining a grant from Council Infrastructure Levy was discussed and an approach to the Parish Council agreed. The Treasurer reported that our current financial situation is satisfactory, and that the raffle has raised useful funds, the wine less so. It was agreed to discontinue offering wine but when we recommence evening talks in September to continue starting at 7.00pm with tea and coffee before the talks. Good progress was being made in the archive, with the shelving and filing cabinets installed. Suggestions for talks and outing venues in 2025-6 were invited. Efforts to get our message to the wider community continue. The next committee meeting will be on 18th September in the Community Archive Room at 7.00pm

Continuing our new format trial on May 17th, we will open the evening at 7.00pm when members
and visitors can enjoy a glass of wine (suggested donation £3.00) or tea/coffee (£1.00) and obtain raffle
tickets before the talk begins at the usual time of 7.30pm. We hope you will come early and enjoy a
relaxed and chatty prelude to the evening. The raffle has raised £144.00 so far, please continue to
support it.

This Friday our speaker, Anthony Hitchcox, will reveal the past of nearby Radford Semele: a History in Photos.
Anthony Hitchcox has put together a collection of photographs belonging to residents “with the aim of taking a historic look back at the village from the lens of a camera”. His book ‘takes a historic look back at the village from
the lens of a camera’.
After the loss of his family photos some years ago and hearing of other peoples’ similar experiences, Anthony Hitchcox decided to put together a collection of photographs belonging to fellow villagers.
He also researched stories of the village through historic records and articles from local newspapers in The Leamington Courier from years gone by.
(article from Warwickshire World).
We look forward to an informative evening
about a neighbouring community.

Report on our April 19 talk led by Rosemary
Collier, our new Chair. Our speaker Emma
Bromley described The Black Book of
Warwick: a Tudor Town Clerk’s Diary. We
heard that this was the minute book of the
Corporation of Warwick compiled by the Town
Clerk, John Fisher, from 1563 to 1590. It
became his personal diary. Emma has been
transcribing the full document, as the transcription published in 1898 by Thomas Kemp missed out about a third of the original text.

Emma’s work, including notes on the text, will be published under the auspices of the Dugdale Society, and Emma acknowledged the support of our President, Bob Bearman, who is the General Editor of the Dugdale Society. John Fisher was possibly a man with a chip on his shoulder, envious of his more prosperous relatives, and guarding his status jealously. This led him into feuds, notably with John Greene whose associates he described as “gorballied choorles, gowtyte wretches, craftye knaves, and other names as best likid him”. Fisher’s time coincided with significant national events, and he describes the disastrous visit of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, to Warwick, which resulted in Dudley forcing the Corporation to give him the property which became the Lord Leycester Hospital. The 19th century translation of the Black Book was used extensively to inform the scenes in the Warwick Pageant at the castle in 1906, and Emma’s full text, when it appears with her notes, will prove a new goldmine for researchers.

The Community Archive Room. The Archive Room at The Mill in Mill Street, Kineton, has now received all the material previously stored at The Ark in Pillerton Hersey. Thank you to Alec and Ilona for help in the move. Carol Clark and Colin Such have started the job of cataloguing. The Newsletter will feature interesting items as they come to light. The completed catalogue and index will be uploaded onto our website, in order that the community can see what the collection holds and to encourage its use.

Our 2024 Summer Outings.
Rosemary has arranged a fine series of outings for this summer. We will be selling tickets for these at our May meetings or you can contact our Treasurer directly (see contact details below)

Forthcoming K&DLHG talks at the Village Hall

Date	Speaker	Title
17 May	Anthony Hitchcox	Radford Semele: a History in Photos
21 June (eve)	Colin Such 6pm	Guided tour of Lighthorne village
19 July (afternoon)	Outing 2pm	Visit to Stanway House
16 August	Outing 2pm	Guided tour of Guild Chapel, Stratford
20 September	Maggie Wood	Mr Gaydon of Brailes, stories told through a collection of smocks
18 October	David Morse	A Dive into Leamington’s Photographic Archive
15 November	Roger Butler	William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer
13 December	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan. 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb. 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar. 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times

Other Organisations’ Events

Warwickshire Local History Society Summer outings.

Saturday 29th June. Roman Mancetter. At the Roman Mancetter Centre
and St Peter’s Church, Mancetter 2.00 – 5.00pm.
Hear about Mancetter’s role as a town of front line strategic importance
during the early years of the Roman invasion and then the history of the
medieval town and guild, all within the beautifully maintained late
medieval church of St Peter.
Price: £11 WLHS and associate members, £13 non members, including
afternoon tea/coffee and cake
The event and venue are fully accessible. Free parking available. There
are 50 places on this trip. Bookings close on 15th June. mancetter-poster-1.pdf (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

Saturday 6th July. Holy Trinity Church, Sutton Coldfield. 2.00 –
5.00pm
Learn about the history of Holy Trinity Church from its founding in
1250 with its rich heritage of stained glass, memorials, unique
woodwork and glorious painted ceilings.
Price: £11 WLHS and associate members, £13 non members, including
afternoon tea/coffee and cake
The event and venue are accessible. Limited free parking; we
recommend public transport for this event (the railway station is a short
walk). There are 60 places on this trip. Bookings close on 22nd June.
sutton-coldfield-poster-1.pdf (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

Saturday 20th July. Guided tours of Harbury. Tours start at 9.15am,
12.20pm and 5.30pm
Take a guided tour of the historic village of Harbury with volunteers
from the Harbury Heritage Centre and learn about the history of the
village. Then visit the Harbury Heritage Centre for refreshments and a
chance to browse the historical documents in their collection, including
photographs and maps.
Price: £7.70 WLHS and associate members, £9.70 non members,
including tea/coffee and refreshments.
The event and venue are accessible. Free parking available (including a
separate area for people with mobility needs). There are 60 places on
this trip (20 on each tour). Bookings close on 6th July.
For more information including how to book please download the Booking Form.
harbury-poster.pdf (warwickshirehistory.org.uk)
As Associate Members, members of the K&DLHG are eligible for the WLHS rate

Please look up the Warwickshire Local History Society’s Other Societies’ Events page for a list of
other meetings of local history interest. You can access it here: Other Events
(warwickshirehistory.org.uk)

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures
and talks which are open to our members. www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group

Membership.
Membership for 2024 is £15. Visitor entrance is £3.00 per meeting.
If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2024 membership year starts in January. If you
attend 5 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!
With our bank now charging for payments by cheque or cash, we would urge those who can to please pay 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.
Members note that if you pay by cheque make it payable to:
Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or delivered to:
Alec Hitchman,
The Hills Farm,
Pillerton Hersey,
WARKS, CV35 0QQ
Cash payments can be made at any meeting.
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

KDLHG Committee

Our new Chair Rosemary Collier presided over the April meeting when I handed on the Chairperson’s ceremonial Gavel, carved by George Lokuciejewski from a single log. In return I was very touched
when the committee, presented me with an inscribed gavel, a card signed by the committee with a montage of K&DLHG events, and a bouquet of flowers to acknowledge Ilona’s secretarial support.
We would like to thank all the members past and present who contributed to committee meetings and helped behind the scenes over the years.
No group thrives without such collective support from its members.

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Membership & PR	Pamela Redgrave Carol Clarke Colin Such Ilona Sekacz

The new committee met on 2nd April in the Archive Room. A short note was included in the 15th April
Newsletter. The next committee meeting will be on June 11th in the Archive Room at 7.00pm.

Newsletter Contact: David Freke tel. 01295 670516 mob. 07876 290044 email: djfreke@gmail.com
DF 12.05.24

For our next 2 meetings, on April 19th and May17th, we are trialling a new format. In order to enhance the important social aspect our meetings we will open the evening at 7.00pm when members and visitors can enjoy a glass of wine (£3.00) or tea/coffee (£1.00) and obtain raffle tickets before the talk begins at the usual time of 7.30pm. We hope you will come early and enjoy a relaxed and chatty prelude to the evening. The raffle has raised £100.00 so far, please continue to support it.

The Black Book of Warwick. Photo Warwick County Record Office

Three other burgesses, John Dicke, Thomas Barrett, and John Nason were approached in turn, and each refused in turn and were promptly sacked from the Corporation. Finally following the appointment of new members Richard Fisher was elected as the new bailiff, and the new corporation was sworn in on October 6 th after a delay of nearly a month. ‘Twas ever thus!

Report on March meeting. On the Ides of March (the 15th) we held our 36th AGM, followed by Vanessa Morgan’s talk “Local Rogues and Vilains of the 19th Century”. The papers for the business part of the meeting had been circulated, so the AGM, conducted by our President Bob Bearman, was brief. Rosemary Collier was elected as our new chairperson, and while Isobel Gill and Catherine Petrie left the committee, with our appreciation for their long service, we welcomed Colin Such, Gill Stewart and Carol Clark onto the new committee. The remaining members of the 2023-4 committee were re-elected. Dr Robert Bearman agreed to continue as our President, and Peter Waters agreed to review our present year accounts.

Vanessa Morgan then regaled us with a catalogue of local 19th -century miscreants, many of whom came to sticky end. Our own Kineton constable (those were the days!) was involved in the detection and apprehension of one local criminal. The accounts read out by Vanessa, culled from contemporary newspapers and pamphlets, gave an insight into the assumptions and expectations of the period. In the time before photographs the descriptions of the accused were necessary to give an impression of the sort of people capable of doing the deeds they were accused of. The theories of the period held that character could be revealed in facial features, so a coarse and ugly appearance was a clue to criminality. Sometimes in the newspaper accounts there were hints of surprise that well dressed and civilized looking individuals were capable of the crimes they had committed. Public hangings or transportation to Australia were the harsh penalties for many crimes. We can find it hard to understand the brutality of the judicial system then, and the culture which led crowds of 10,000 to watch a public hanging. I wonder what part of our behaviour, which we accept as normal, if examined in a hundred years’ time, would be found to be as arbitrary and unacceptable. Our President led the vote of thanks to close the meeting.

The Community Archive Room. The Archive Room at The Mill in Mill Street, Kineton, has now received all the material previously stored at The Ark in Pillerton Hersey. Thank you to Alec and Ilona for help in the move. Carol Clark and Colin Such have started the job of cataloguing. The Newsletter will feature interesting items as they come to light. The completed catalogue and index will be uploaded onto our website, in order that the community can see what the collection holds and to encourage its use.

Our 2024 Summer Outings:

Rosemary has arranged a fine series of outings for this summer. We will be selling tickets for these at our April and May meetings or you can contact our Treasurer directly (see contact details below)

Forthcoming K&DLHG talks at the Village Hall and Summer Outings.

Date	Speaker	Title
19 April	Emma Bromley	The Black Book of Warwick
17 May	Anthony Hitchcox	Radford Semele: a History in Photos
21 June (eve)	Colin Such 6pm	Guided tour of Lighthorne village
19 July (afternoon)	Outing 2pm	Visit to Stanway House
16 August	Outing 2pm	Guided tour of Guild Chapel, Stratford
20 September	Maggie Wood	Mr Gaydon of Brailes, stories told through a collection of smocks
18 October	David Morse	A Dive into Leamington’s Photographic Archive
15 November	Roger Butler	William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer
13 December	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan. 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb. 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar. 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times

Other Organisations’ Events

30 April. The Sibford History Society is organising a coach trip to Hardwick Hall on 4 th September 2024, and they are looking for people to join them to make the trip viable. The coach booking needs to be confirmed and paid for by 30 April. The coach cost is £25 per person, Hardwick Hall is free to National Trust members and £18.05 for non-NT members. If you are interested please contact K&DLHG Treasurer Alec before 30th April, and he will collect the £25.00 coach cost (see below for his contact details)

Shipston History Society

The Museum in Shipston will be opening Saturdays ,Sundays, and Bank Holiday Mondays 12.00 – 4.00pm. Admission free. https://shipstonmuseum.co.uk/ They are also open to do town tours on weekdays by appointment. For more details about the Museum and History Society contact bekkyhillman@shipstonmuseum.co.uk. or rebeccajashley@googlemail.com.

24 April Wellesbourne Local History Group . Shops of Leamington Spa by Peter Coulls. Wellesbourne Village Hall. 7.30 guests £3.00.

18 April. Warmington Heritage Group. Writing Women Back into the Political History of Warwickshire by Professor Sarah Richardson. Village Hall, 7.30. Visitors £2.00

8 May Alcester & District Local History Society The Palaeolithic and Ice Age Environments of the West Midlands by Nick Daffern. 7.30pm, 6 th Form Centre, St Benedicts RC High School, Kinwarton Road, Alcester, B49 6PX

8 May Packington Hall Tour. Guided tour of the ground floor of the house and gardens by owner George Guernsey. £25.00 includes refreshments. Visit: www.historichouses.org to book

10 May Lighthorne History Group. From the Pillory to the Prison Cell by Ginny Davis, 7.30pm Village Hall

11 May. Berkswell Windmill Open Day. 12.00- 4.00

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures and talks which are open to our members. www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually. Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group

Membership.
The committee has reluctantly raised the price of Membership for 2024 to £15pa. This is the first rise in 8
years, and is required to meet the rising costs of speaker fees, hall hire, and speakers’ travel expenses, which
has become a significant amount. Visitor entrance remains at £3.00 per meeting.

If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2024 membership year starts in January. If you attend
5 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!

With our bank now charging for payments by cheque or cash, we would urge those who can to please pay 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.
Members note that if you pay by cheque make it payable to:
Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or delivered to:
Alec Hitchman,
The Hills Farm,
Pillerton Hersey,
WARKS, CV35 0QQ

Cash payments can be made at any meeting.
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

2023-24 KDLHG Committee

President:	Dr Robert Bearman MBE
Chairman	Rosemary Collier
Vice-Chairman	Roger Gaunt
Secretary	Gill Stewart
Treasurer	Alec Hitchman
Outings Secretary	David Freke
Programme Secretary	Claire Roberts
Membership & PR	Pamela Redgrave Carol Clarke Colin Such Ilona Sekacz

The new committee met on 2nd April in the Archive Room. We welcomed our new Chairperson and committee members, and Gill agreed to take on the role of Secretary. After receiving the Treasurer’s report, the main business was discussing the archive. Colin presented proposals for managing the archive and Carol undertook to establish the digital records. Carol and Colin agreed to start sorting and cataloguing. The committee discussed ways of raising funds to maintain the archive without draining the Group’s capital, while also fulfilling the Group’s constitution to involve the community. The next committee meeting will be on June 11th in the Archive Room at 7.00pm

Newsletter Contact: David Freke tel. 01295 670516 mob. 07876 290044 email: djfreke@gmail.com

RAFFLE: our first raffle at the February meeting was a great success, raising £60.91 for the group, the
first prize was a wonderful crochet throw made by Pam. Please come prepared with cash on Friday if
you want to take this opportunity to win a prize while supporting the group.

Before out talk on Friday 15th we hold our 36th AGM. The
papers for the business part of the meeting have been
circulated, please have a look at them.

The talk on Friday will be Local Rogues and Villains of the 19th
Century by Vanessa Morgan, a professional genealogist and
local historian. She has been researching local history for thirty
years and has written many articles for family history journals.
While researching for a book on local family history she
inevitably came across contemporary accounts of historic crimes
and misdemeanours. These became a new line of investigation,
culminating in a book focussing on Warwick – Warwick Murder
and Crime – well as giving her an intimate knowledge of the
shadier side of Warwickshire’s past. We will hear true crime
stories about robberies and murders in the Victorian county from
an expert investigator.

Report on our talk on Friday 16th February: The Battle of Edgehill 1642, delivered by Stephen Barker. Stephen is
familiar with Kineton, and the Village Hall, as he was intimately involved in the Battlefield Trust research project on the
Battle of Edgehill, being its principal fund raiser. He greeted several members who had been involved with the battlefield survey. Gill Ashley-Smith recalled that at the time she had pleaded for “no more Civil War”, while allowing that a sufficient lapse of time, and new research, made this evening’s topic more than timely. David Beaumont also looked back to his contribution to the project in his vote of thanks.

As well as describing the new insights revealed by the Battlefield Trust project Stephen emphasised the effects which the battle and the subsequent civil wars had on the local population. This evidence was supported by another recent project to which group members have contributed – the Civil War Loss Accounts transcriptions project run by Maureen Harris.

Other local sources quoted by Stephen were: parish registers, the unique headstone to Captain Gourdain in Warmington cemetery, and the monument to Captain Kingsmill in Radway parish church. My own trawls through parish registers have turned up 38 records of burials related to the Civil War in the villages around Edgehill, 12 of which are connected to the Battle of Edgehill, and another 17 to the battle of Cropredy Bridge in 1644. Many more fatal casualties who were cared for locally were not recorded, because in the chaos of the war record-keeping broke down in many parishes, including Kineton. Stephen gave us the startling fact that a far higher proportion of the country’s population died in the 17th century Civil Wars than were killed in the 20th century World Wars.
The packed Hall was highly appreciative of Stephen’s wide ranging but clear and well-illustrated presentation, as David
Beaumont thanked him on behalf of the Group.
.
The Community Archive Room. The Archive Room at The Mill in Mill Street, Kineton, is now being furnished and
archives moved in. We are pleased that among the nominees for the new committee are individuals with experience of
archives and digital management, so we hope that in the coming months we can enable access to the documents,
photographs, and tapes that the group has accumulated throughout its 36 year history, and make The Mill a centre for the collection of further material and for research.

Forthcoming K&DLHG talks at the Village Hall and Summer Outings.

Date	Speaker	Title
15 March AGM	Vanessa Morgan	Local Rogues & Villains of the 19th century
19 April	Emma Bromley	The Black Book of Warwick
17 May	Anthony Hitchcox	Radford Semele: a History in Photos
21 June (eve)	Outing	Walk round Lighthorne village
19 July (afternoon)	Outing	Visit to Stanway House
?? August	Outing	tbc
20 September	Maggie Wood	Mr Gaydon of Brailes, stories told through a collection of smocks
18 October	David Morse	A Dive into Leamington’s Photographic Archive
15 November	Roger Butler	William James – Stratford’s Pioneering Railway Engineer
13 December	Paul Thompson	Io Saturnalia
17 Jan. 2025	Alex Harvey	Immersive Tech to Explore Medieval Tunnels in Warwick and Elsewhere
21 Feb. 2025	William Deakin	History of the Hunt in Kineton
21 Mar. 2025	AGM & Martin Sinot-Smith	37th AGM followed by Daily Life in Tudor Times

Other Organisations’ Events
19 March Warwickshire Local History Society. Members’ Evening: Harvey Bloom: antiquarian and
author, by Robert Howe. Around 1910-12 the Rev Harvey Bloom made the first systematic surveys of village
churchyard memorials, including Kineton’s, and we owe much to his recording of inscriptions which are now
illegible. Lidar Surveys at Wappenbury fort by Colin Clay.
Primary School Hall, Aylesford School, Tapping Way, Warwick, CV34 6XR, at 7.30. As an Affiliated
Organisation entry is free for K&DLHG members.

19 March Harbury Society. AGM and talk on Harbury Windmill- Past, Present and Future by Bill
Timson. Tom Hauley Room, All Saints Parish Church, Harbury. 7.30 guests £2.00.

21 March. Warmington Heritage Jackie West, Group. Alice and the Adventurer: the life and times of Alice
and Robert Dudley by Jackie West. Village Hall, 7.30. Visitors £2.00

British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures and
talks which are open to our members. www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.

Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group

Membership.
The committee has reluctantly raised the price of Membership for 2024 to £15pa. This is the first rise in 8
years, and is required to meet the rising costs of speaker fees, hall hire, and speakers’ travel expenses, which
has become a significant amount. Visitor entrance remains at £3.00 per meeting.

If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2024 membership year starts in January. If you attend
5 or more of the 9 meetings we hold every year then Membership is the best option!

With our bank now charging for payments by cheque or cash, we would urge those who can to please pay 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.
Members note that if you pay by cheque make it payable to:
Kineton and District Local History Group, and send or delivered to:
Alec Hitchman,
The Hills Farm,
Pillerton Hersey,
WARKS, CV35 0QQ

Cash payments can be made at any meeting.
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

2023-24 KDLHG Committee

President:                               Dr Robert Bearman MBE                  

Chairman                                David Freke                           

Vice-Chairman                       Roger Gaunt                           

Secretary                                Vacant                          

Treasurer                                Alec Hitchman                       

Outings Secretary                   Rosemary Collier                                    

Programme Secretary             Claire Roberts                            

Other committee members:

Isobel Gill

Ilona Sekacz 

Catherine Petrie (PR)

Pamela Redgrave (Membership)

Contact: David Freke tel. 01295 670516 mob. 07876 290044 email: djfreke@gmail.com

Announcement: as indicated at our previous meeting we need to enhance our income to meet the essential running costs of the Group. A relatively painless money raising method is a raffle, and our first pilot raffle will be held at this Friday’s meeting. In our present digital age raffles still rely upon cash, so could those who would like to participate in this please remember to bring some!

The subject of our next meeting on Friday 16th February is The Battle of Edgehill 1642, delivered by Stephen Barker, is about a local event which has national significance. The battle, known by contemporaries as “The Kineton Fight”, was the first set piece military action of the civil wars which engulfed England, Scotland and Ireland for almost a decade. History group members have long been involved in important local studies of the battle, including a detailed examination of the battlefield by the Battlefield Trust which has led to a radical reinterpretation of the topography of the battle. Most recently, our members have contributed to the transcription of the Civil War Loss Accounts for Kineton and local villages.

Stephen Barker is an author, researcher, museum consultant and military historian who has given many presentations on the 17th century English Civil Wars, as well as writing books on WWI. His work encompasses archaeology and documents, and he is keen to highlight local themes. We look forward to hearing his exposition of the events of Sunday October 23rd 1642, which took place on our doorstep.

Report on our first talk about Charlecote and the Lucys on Friday 19th. Our speaker, John Miles, is a guide at the National Trust property of Charlecote House and park, and he described the complicated Lucy genealogy with a relaxed presentation, backed by his encyclopaedic knowledge of the house and its family. The claim that Lucys have been living at Charlecote since the 13th century turns out to be only tenable because several “Lucys” were so named as a result of changing their original names to conform to the terms of a will requiring all inheritors of the estate to be called by the family name. John showed Kneller’s 1680 portrait of Captain Thomas Lucy which includes a black boy holding a horse in the background. A black boy, Philip Lucy, was baptised at Charlecote church in 1735, clearly too late to be the person in the portrait, but evidence that black servants were a consistent part of elite households. There are 17th century records of baptisms and burials of black individuals in several local parishes, including Myrtilla, buried in Oxhill churchyard.

John showed how the house and the park owed their development to successive Lucys. The park was designed by “Capability” Brown, who finally moved the annoyance of the public Stratford Road away from the vicinity of the house. Its diversion accounts for the abrupt corner at West Lodge on the B4086 Stratford Road near the Huncote Farm Shop. The 19th century saw a major make-over at the house as George Lucy and his wife Mary Elizabeth transformed the old draughty house into a Tudor-styled country house. As with many estates the late 19th century agricultural depression, coupled with 20th century taxation, led to the decline of the family fortunes. In 1944 Montgomerie Lucy gifted the house and estate to the National Trust, with the proviso that the family would continue to live in the house, which they still do in the private apartments.

Other presentations. On Tuesday 16th January Kineton Camera Club hosted our member David Beaumont, who presented a fascinating selection of his old photographs of the surrounding villages. And the following week, on the 26th, the Primary School invited those who had missed his first presentation of early photographs devoted to Kineton to a repeat of the December show. David did not disappoint on either occasion, and the school hall was full. The tea and coffee served by Chris Cartwright, Elizabeth Beaumont and their helpers was much appreciated.
The Community Archive Room. As many will know it has been a long-term ambition to establish a permanent base for our own growing archive of photos, documents, oral history recording, research notes. As long ago as 2005 our then Chairman Brian Lewis circulated a detailed paper exploring ways of achieving this. It has taken nearly 20 years, but at the end of 2023, through the good offices of Gill Ashley-Smith and Mary Wheilden, your committee agreed terms with The Mill on Mill Street, Kineton, to set up an Archive Room there. We hope soon to transfer the material currently stored safely, but inaccessibly, in The Ark storage facility in Pillerton Hersey, to the Mill. At The Mill it will be accessible, under supervision, for research and consultation, and the collection of further material. Much still needs to be done but we have taken a massive step forward.

Forthcoming K&DLHG talks at the Village Hall.

Other Organisations’ Events
15 Feb. Warmington Heritage Group. A History of Odd Islands and some Strange People: the Small Isles. by John Hunter. Village Hall, 7.30. Visitors £2.00
2 March. CBA West Midlands News from the Past day school. Priory Rooms Conference Centre, Bull Street, Birmingham. 10am to 4.00pm. Details at https://cbawestmidlands.org.uk
8 March. Lighthorne History Group. AGM followed by Why Look at Parish Churches? by Dr John Hall. Village Hall, 7.30
13 March. Long Compton History Society. Place Names, Landscape and Settlement in the Banbury Region by Deborah Hayter. Village hall 7.30. Visitors £3.00
British Association for Local History. The Kineton Group is a Member of BALH and they run lectures and talks which are open to our members. www.balh.org.uk for upcoming talks available virtually.
Don’t forget to check our own website at: Kineton and District Local History Group

Membership.
The committee has reluctantly raised the price of Membership for 2024 to £15pa. This is the first rise in 8 years, and is required to meet the rising costs of speaker fees, hall hire, and speakers’ travel expenses, which has become a significant amount. Visitor entrance remains at £3.00 per meeting.
If you would like to become a Member of the group, our 2024 membership year starts in January.
Members renewing note that 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,
With our bank now charging for payments by cheque or cash, we would urge those who can to please pay 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.
For queries contact Alec on alec.hitchman@btinternet.com

2023-24 KDLHG Committee

President:                               Dr Robert Bearman MBE                  

Chairman                                David Freke                           

Vice-Chairman                       Roger Gaunt                           

Secretary                                Vacant                          

Treasurer                                Alec Hitchman                       

Outings Secretary                   Rosemary Collier                                    

Programme Secretary             Claire Roberts                            

Other committee members:

Isobel Gill

Ilona Sekacz 

Catherine Petrie (PR)

Pamela Redgrave (Membership)

Contact: David Freke tel. 01295 670516 mob. 07876 290044 email: djfreke@gmail.com