On 21st September Chris Hobson gave a talk on Victorian Fairford using a PowerPoint presentation.
He talked about five research tools that he had used to discover the history of Fairford:
- the national census
- trade directories
- the Times Digital Archive
- the National Burial Register
- the Internet
Chris Hobson
Using these sources he then briefly covered four topics: population, transport (coaches and railways), medical and the asylum, shops and services. He then showed an example of what can be found on the Internet by illustrating the career of Alfred Sandling Cowley whose life can be traced from Fairford to South Africa and then to Australia where he became a prominent politician.
Chris then outlined a project that he has been working on that aims to record every resident of Fairford during the 19th Century starting with basic information from the sources mentioned above. When the database is more complete the aim would be to make it available to researchers either via the FHS website or on a PC in the planned Heritage Room of the Community Centre. If anyone would like to assist in finding information to make this project more complete, please contact Chris on Fairford 711768.