This report was originally distributed to members of the Bristol Record Society as a .docx email attachment in September 2023
1 The Bristol Record Society’s (BRS) Annual General Meeting will be held at Bristol Archives in 2024 and will be a blended event with some members attending in person and others doing so virtually by means of Zoom. Full details will be sent to members as soon as they become available.
2 The Council met twice during the period covered by this report, and in September 2023 was made up of the following members: Jonathan Barry (General Editor), Richard Coates, Allie Dillon (City Archivist), Sophie Evans (Heritage Development Librarian, Bristol City Council), Jonathan Harlow, Evan Jones (General Editor for Digital Publication), Roger Leech (General Editor), Peter Malpass, Benjamin Pohl, Steve Poole, John Reeks, Richard Stone (Treasurer), Kathleen Thompson (Secretary). During the City Archivist’s absence the Senior Archivist, Anne Lovejoy, attended in her place.
3 It was with great regret that the Council heard of the deaths of two of its editors: Clive Burgess (vols 46, 53 and 56: The Pre-Reformation Records of All Saints Church Bristol) and Jon Cannon (vol. 62, jointly with Nicholas Orme, Westbury on Trym: Monastery, Minster and College).
4 Council now reports on its activities during this period to address its charitable objectives, which are:
- To encourage the preservation and the study of historical documents relating to the history of the City of Bristol.
- To promote, improve, and maintain public education in and appreciation of the significance of such documents and other historical and archive material.
Publications in numbered series
5 The 2022 publication (volume 75) was The Minute Book of the Bristol Library Society, edited by Max Skjönsberg and Mark Towsey. This volume proved popular and was reprinted in summer 2023.
6 The 2023 publication (volume 76) is:
The Shirehampton Church-yard Book, edited by Richard Coates (Bristol: Bristol Record Society, 2023) 978-0-901538-46-8
7 It is hoped that vol. 77 will be published early in 2024 and will be:
Graffin Prankard’s letterbook, edited by Mary Miles.
Proposals for new volumes continue to arrive providing the Society with a tentative publication schedule until 2027.
E-publication
8 E-publication on the BRS website is now a major part of the Society’s programme and Full details of the Society’s epublication programme during 2023 were circulated to members by email on 27 April and 6 September 2023.
9 In addition to making such publications available on the Society’s website, there is also a recently launched collection, the Bristol Record Society Collection, on the leading website Archive.org
10 The Society’s website has also been modernised and new pages added, and we are grateful to the General Editor for Digital Publication, Dr Evan Jones, for undertaking this time-consuming task for us.
11 Works in our series, Occasional Digital Publications, appear only on the website. A particularly important publication this year was Time, Space and Power in Later Medieval Bristol by former Council member, Professor Peter Fleming. The Yorkist History Society will publish a revised version of this work as Late Medieval Bristol: Time, Space and Power in 2024. This year we have also published Michael Whitfield and Jonathan Barry (eds.), The Case Notes of William Logan, Physician of Bristol, 1713-15 (Bristol Record Society electronic publication, April 2023), covering records relating to this Georgian physician.
12 Since 2020 the Society has also been engaged in digitising and epublishing high-resolution visual sources, such as the Millerd Map (1728), the eighteenth-century Buck prospects of Bristol and the Pocock prints. These images have now been uploaded to Wikimedia in order increase their accessibility and make them easier to use in Wikipedia pages. In many cases the images have now been inserted into relevant Wikipedia pages, which have been edited where necessary. Recently high-resolution copies of images from printed books have also been uploaded to Wikimedia.
13 The Council acknowledges with thanks the generous gift of Mrs Eileen Buxton, who presented the Society with a copy of Ashmead’s map of 1833. With her permission the map was sold and £375 was realised which enabled the digitisation of further volumes.
Other activities
14 The Society has also contributed to the Bristol 650 celebrations of the grant of the city’s charter in August 1373. Evan Jones produced a google map that shows the county boundaries as they existed from 1373-1835. The map marks the location of the shirestones in the eighteenth century and provides a safe nine-mile walking route, which allows for detours necessary as a result of later building work. A Wikipedia article for the perambulation has also been produced and a series of articles on placenames on the route. A civic perambulation, following the route, took place on 30 September, to mark the 650th anniversary of the original perambulation (also called ‘beating the bounds’), led by the Deputy Lord Mayor and High Sheriff.
15 The Council must again warmly thank Bristol Archives for its contribution to the Society’s work. Our AGM is held at the Archives, our book stock is stored there and all the Archives staff publicise the work of the Society. We are particularly grateful to Sarah Taylor, who distributes our volumes, and Anne Lovejoy, who supports our annual meetings.
16 The Council also wishes to place on record the Society’s thanks to John Roost and the team at 4Word. Not only do they produce our volumes to a high standard, but they have continued to support us with technical advice.
Council, Bristol Record Society, September 2023.
Bristol Record Society 