Our missing nightwatchmen have come home!

Thanks to your incredible generosity our joint crowdfunding project with Belper Historical Society was successful and we’ve been able to buy this amazing nightwatchmen’s report book. Local historian Adrian Farmer visited the Record Office to see it for himself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8NOx7O22WA As we exceeded our target we will be spending the extra money on creating a …

Record Office events go online

Those of you who had visited the record office or began following our blog before the pandemic hit will know that we always liked to keep the record office a busy place.  Throughout the year our events programme would be packed with talks, workshops, and special events.  Like with so much, the pandemic put a …

Local and Community History

May is Local and Community History Month so this seemed an appropriate time for a new research guide for anyone embarking on a local or community history project. Giving a definition of local and community history might seem a bit odd as it feels rather self-explanatory, but whether you are looking at the history of …

Tithe maps

A guide to finding and using Derbyshire tithe maps and awards Tithe maps were created for a large number of Derbyshire parishes between 1836 and 1853, and are a great resource for local, family and house historians as they are large scale maps accompanied by a schedule giving a range of information including showing who …

Newspapers

A guide to the uses of local newspapers and where to find them (updated Jul 2020). From the 18th century to the present day, newspapers are an invaluable source of information for family and social historians: births, marriages, deaths, advertisements, crime, coroners' reports, sports and entertainments, elections, farm and property sales, bankruptcies, disasters, scandals, and …

Online Resources

There are hundreds of online resources for Derbyshire history, this guide highlights some of the most useful.  As web addresses tend to change, only the site name is given. Family History Records Ancestry: billions of records from across the world including UK census returns 1841-1911, birth, marriage and death (BMD) indexes 1837-2007, Derbyshire Anglican church …

Accessing our resources from home

As we cannot provide access on site at the moment due to the coronavirus, here are some links and tips for research you can do from your computer at home. Do your family history Baptism, marriage and burial registers for Church of England parishes, some as early as 1538, are on Ancestry (charge applies).  See …

The Perils of the Miners’ Pit Head Baths

Among our work, we have been creating a database from Derbyshire National Union of Mineworkers' tribunal cases relating to illness and injury.  Among the many injuries, illnesses and diseases, were those caused by visits to and working in the pithead baths. Before the construction of pithead baths at collieries, miners would travel to and from work in dirty, …

‘Is there any post?’ -FitzHerbert project catch up

The FitzHerbert project has been quiet for some time so I wanted to write a catch up blog to update you on progress and share with you one of the highlights of the collection. Firstly, I want to mention the title of the post: this is surely a familiar phrase in every British household. Especially with …

Dastardly Deeds, Danger and Drinking Dens in Draycott & Church Wilne!

Just in time for Halloween, our Local Studies Library has an intriguing set of booklets on display, describing some of the 'darker' history of  Draycott. These have been produced by the Draycott & Church Wilne History Group. 'Rogues and Miscreants' starts with an interesting summary of Crime and Punishment including the 'The Bloody Code,' the justice …