Alfred Oscroft was a place-names authority and polymath. Born in Nottingham, he was awarded a scholarship to the recently founded Nottingham University College, but, instead, trained as a teacher at Saltley College. After a short spell as a teacher, he joined the Royal Engineers in 1891 where he rose to Company Sergeant Major (WOII). He…

The relationship between John Milner and Winchester printer and ‘respectable bookseller’ James Robbins (1761-1844) is an early example of a ‘publisher and his author’. When Robbins asked him to write ‘a faithful account and description of Winchester’ he did so. It was a risky match, a Catholic priest and a young untried printer, but the…

The daughter of George Washington Sandell, head of a local shipping firm of Sandell & Son, Elsie was born in Southampton and spent much of her life in the town. At the time of the compilation of the 1939 Register, however, she was residing at a guest house in Axminster, Devon, with her father and…

Born in Dunston, near Gateshead, Rutherford was the son of a railway worker. He was educated in the Newcastle area and attended the University of Durham, from where he graduated with an MA in history. Postgraduate study was undertaken at the University of Michigan, with the subject of his PhD thesis being South Africa’s federal government in the late nineteenth century.

The son of a clergyman, Charles was born in Fulham. It is not known where he undertook his primary and secondary education (to use modern terminology), but he secured a place at Cambridge to study mathematics, garduating with a first class degree in 1905. From 1906 to 1911 he was a fellow of Pembroke College…

He belonged to the Benedictine monastery of St Swithun’s, Winchester, living in what is regarded as the earliest period of historical writing, though ‘the beginnings of the true antiquarian scholarship at Winchester’ has been set in the late 17th century (John Crook, 2003). Scholars are certain that his works include two manuscripts generally called Historia…

J Horace Round was one of the pre-eminent historians of his time, a genealogist so expert in the convolutions of the British peerage that he was appointed Honorary Historical Advisor to the Crown.  Another specialism was Domesday Book, and his translation and discussion of the Essex entries was widely regarded as a tour de force of…

Rolt was an engineer at heart but his complex character, as well as being instrumental in establishing the canal and railway preservation movements, also found joy in ‘the beauties of the English countryside’.  He was aware of the rapid changes taking place in post-war Britain and the dangers inherent in the economic concept of unlimited…

Kenneth Roberts inherited a passionate interest in archaeology and local history from his father Betton. Together they would walk miles in search of earthworks and in visiting churches, and young Kenneth compiled four volumes of notes and sketches recording these encounters. His survey of the cross-dykes at Leydene secured his election to the Hampshire Field…

The transformation of the inland village of Milford to an up-market seaside resort (incorporating parts of Hordle parish) left an architectural heritage of houses designed by William Ravenscroft. Although many of these primarily Edwardian properties have now fallen victim to the bulldozer and developer, many still remain, including Ravenscroft’s own residence, Briantcroft, in Barnes Lane.