Although her birth was registered in Medway, Kent, Katherine came from an old Shropshire family of lawyers and military personnel. Census records indicate that in 1891 the family were living in Gillingham and in 1901 in Devonport. It is not known precisely when but shortly thereafter, her father Major-General Edward Ranulph Kenyon C.B., C.M.G, the…

Dom Hockey belonged to Quarr Abbey, a Catholic Benedictine monastery between Binstead and Fishbourne on the Isle of Wight. It is close to a quarry that in the middle ages supplied ‘Binstead stone’ for the Tower of London, Winchester Cathedral, Romsey Abbey and other churches.  It was almost depleted by the end of the middle…

The Honourable Sir Henry Keppel GCB OM was a career naval officer who served in most corners of the world and rose to the rank of Admiral of the Fleet.  His autobiography, published in 1899, paints a vivid picture of a remarkable life.

Born in Jersey in 1883, educated at home, then worked in a bank. Illness left him unable to manage continuous professional work but he was interested in history and started to research stained glass from 1904. He also learnt to re-lead glass. He volunteered for service in WW1 but was declared unfit and worked instead…

Leach was educated at Winchester College 1863-1869 and at New College, Oxford. He won the Stanhope English Prize in 1872 and was a fellow of All Souls College 1874-1882. He was called to the Bar at the Middle Temple in 1876 and joined the Western Circuit. From 1884, he was Assistant Charity Commissioner (Endowed Schools…

Leland has been called ‘the father of English local history and bibliography’. His Itineraries, compiled c 1538 to 1543 provided a crucial source of comment and raw material for many who followed after and introduced the county as the most obvious unit for studying the local history of England.

Dorothy Liddell was born at Benwell, Northumberland to John Liddell and his wife Emily (née Berry) one of their six children.  In 1904 the family moved to Sydmonton Court near Newbury and four years later to Sherfield Manor near Basingstoke.

Educated at Balliol College, Oxford, he became Senior Science Master at Portsmouth Grammar School. Remembered as ‘a good scholar with wide interests and a remarkable memory’ (Washington and Marsh 1976, 29) in the 1880s and 1890s he wrote books on chemistry and geometrical drawing for Army candidates.  His interests also included Tudor Portsmouth, on which…

He was a Catholic priest whose extremely successful 8-volume History of England, from the First Invasion by the Romans to the Accession of Henry VIII, which was published in 1819 and in later editions, is said to have been the most popular work in print until the publication in 1874 of Richard Green’s Short History…

Hampshire was the first county to complete, before the First World War, its Victoria County History, those large red volumes that are the first-look source for so many queries. They were orchestrated and edited by William Page, but the research and writing depended to a large extent on a cohort of young graduates – mainly…