Samuel Best was Rector of Abbotts Ann, near Andover, from 1831 to 1873, and instrumental in founding a (non-denominational) village school, long before such institutions were required by law.  He also created the Abbotts Ann Provident Society, believing that labouring families should not be denied the benefits of Victorian progress.

Capes was a particularly brilliant example of a clergyman scholar at the University of Oxford, where in 1870 he became Reader in Ancient History. He wrote several general works on ancient Rome and other Classical subjects and between about 1905 and his death transcribed and edited six volumes on the charters and records of Hereford…

George Cornwallis-West was the great-great-grandson of John Whitby, the flag captain of Admiral Sir William Cornwallis (1744-1819) of Milford-on-Sea. He was an unlikely historian, but his two historical works are of considerable value. Educated at Eton, he was more interested in hunting, shooting and fishing than academe. He was a champion army horse rider, and…

William Curtis was born in Alton, Hampshire one of ten children of William Curtis and Elizabeth (nee Heath). Privately educated, then apprenticed to his father, an apothecary/surgeon, he spent time in Edinburgh and London before joining his father’s practice.

Max Dacre was a ‘Geordie’ who left school at 13 and was in Jarrow at the time of the ‘Jarrow March’ (1936).  This early experience fostered in him a fighting spirit which was evident throughout his life.

‘[With] the death of Mr. William Dale’ states the obituary notice in Volume 10 of the Proceedings, ‘the Hampshire Field Club lost one who served it faithfully and enthusiastically nearly from its foundation.’

Daniel Defoe was a prolific writer, producing more than 300 works on a range of subjects. He is famed for his novel Robinson Crusoe (1719) but, often at odds with authority, he also spent time in prison and the stocks! His life involved spells as a merchant, landowner, traveller, bankrupt and secret agent.  His finest…

Stephen Dewar was born at Andover, the third child of Albemarle O’Beirne Willoughby Dewar and Florence Wilhelmina Rose, née Matthews.  Dewar was the great grandson of David Dewar, who is listed as an awardee in the 1830s, for compensation for manumitted property for the Dewar’s estate* on St Kitts, in the West Indies.

A good example of an amateur local historian who gained the respect of professional historians, John Drew achieved what he did as a result of poor health and private means. Not benefiting from an education at major schools or university, at the age of 17 he joined the family London-based firm Drew and Sons, which…

It would be easy to believe that the history of Eastleigh began in 1890, when the Carriage and Wagon Works was transferred by the London and South Western Railway from Nine Elms in London, thereby creating a rich tapestry of industry and town.