local history

The Faversham Society

‘Widening access’ and ‘access for all’ are two of the slogans that characterise today’s heritage practice, but the community-minded people of Faversham have been doing access for half a century. Open House, held almost every July since 1982, sees the…

Ruins, Remains and Relics: Sussex

Review by Robin Hughes. Ruins, Remains and Relics: Sussex is a miscellany, organised into the three titular groups, of various historical curiosities from across the historic county of Sussex. Horlock explicitly emphasises the ‘unusual, offbeat, and decidedly quirky’, and the…

The Kilvert Society

The Reverend Francis (Frank) Kilvert (1840-1879) died as a result of peritonitis at the age of 38, days after returning from his honeymoon in Scotland. Although greatly mourned by his widow, family, and parishioners, he would nevertheless have been an…

The origins of Old St Oswald Church, Fulford

Many a church guide claims that their present building sits on the site of a more ancient structure. But how accurate are these claims? Recently the Fishergate, Fulford, and Heslington Local History Society (FFH) – a community group with a long-standing and very active interest in their historic landscape – decided to try to find out whether this was true of the deconsecrated medieval church, dedicated to St Oswald, that sits on the east bank of the River Ouse, in the village of Fulford, some 2km south of York. Chris Catling reports.