Dickson Archer & Thorp
The story of how the Dickson, Archer and Thorp collection came to be acquired by Northumberland Archives is almost as rich and compelling as its 200 year contents. Often described as a ‘time capsule’ due to the detail it can offer us about Northumberland’s social, political and economic story, this value had been left largely unexplored until its recent acquisition by the Northumberland Archives.
In 2016-2017 we raised £182,240 to allow us to purchase the collection and engage a Volunteer Co-ordinator who is working with volunteers to uncover some of the stories hidden within the collection.
Manorial Documents Register
Northumberland Archives has been working with The National Archives to revise, update and computerise the paper based Manorial Documents Register. Our project is now complete and the Northumberland Manorial Documents Register will be launched mid-2018. We are currently developing a legacy project that will allow us to promote the use of manorial records in our care and held elsewhere and encourage the volunteer transcription of some of the records discovered in our project.
Peregrini
As part of a Heritage Lottery Fund Landscape Partnership Project, Berwick Record Office is running the Community Archive element of the Project. The project is aiming to set up a Community Archive on Holy Island and also on the mainland. The project is looking at the heritage of Holy Island as well as the coastal strip from Cocklawburn south to Budle Bay. The project includes transcription of sources, cataloguing and research and creation of a website.
Stannington Sanatorium Project
In August 2013 Northumberland Archives was awarded a Research Resources in Medical History Award of £77,717 from The Wellcome Trust to catalogue and part digitise records of Stannington Sanatorium, the first purpose-built children’s TB sanatorium in the United Kingdom. A further grant of £49,100 was awarded by the Wellcome Trust in 2015 to allow the digitisation of core documents from the patient case files.
The project features blog posts, an online exhibition and digitised collections.
Northumberland At War
In May 2014 Heritage Lottery Fund made a grant of £46500 to Northumberland Archives to allow us to explore some of the many collections that we hold relating to the First World War.
The Northumberland at War blog can be found here and 'This Week In World War One' posts can be found here
Our Families
This Project was run in 2015 - 2016 and was part of the Berwick 900 Project. The Record Office managed the volunteers and provided training on Family History as well as proving information for the Berwick 900 themed weekend. The project resulted in the creation of an online database of Freemen admissions, 1800 - 1940 and a publication - Tracing Your Family History in Berwick, Tweedmouth and Spittal.
Swinburne Deeds
In December 2015 we were awarded a grant of £14850 from The National Manuscripts Conservation Trust to support the conservation of the Swinburne deeds - a collection of 758 deeds and charters mainly.relating to the history of the Northumberland/Scotland border.
Conservation work is currently underway and once complete the deeds will be digitised and made available via our webpages.