An interesting enquiry recently came in from a person seeking corroboration of the birth of her ancestor in Highworth and Swindon workhouse in 1909. This child’s birth certificate gave her address as 8 Highworth Road, Stratton St Margaret.

Devizes OS Map of Workhouse, 1923

It provided an example of the implementation of the advice of the Registrar General, who in 1904 suggested that the birth and death certificates of inmates should have a euphemistic address, one that spared the family the disgrace of the workhouse. 

The correspondent will send this example to the website www.workhouses.org.uk which alerted her to this practice, which has interesting implications for family historians. Intrigued by this I did a spot check on two births in the Devizes workhouse in December 1909. The birth register gave the address as 7 Commercial Road, Devizes. In each case the address was for the roads in which the institutions stood.

Checking the Devizes example was possible because all but the most current registers of the Wiltshire Registration Service are held in the History Centre. Its copy certificate service is now based at the History Centre. Its email address is certificates@wiltshire.gov.uk. Read on to find out about some of our new accessions......

New Accessions: Chippenham Burgage Map, 1820

Maps are probably the most accessible and informative type of archive and several important examples have recently been acquired. 


Map of Chippenham Showing Burgage Tenants,1820

 In 1820 a survey of borough properties in the town was commissioned. The resulting map and schedule identifies the 129 properties together with names of proprietors and occupiers (G19/1/49PC). Streets and public houses and public buildings are named, all of which contribute to its importance as a source for family and local historians.

The open field system of Broad Hinton was mapped in 1762 just before the land was enclosed (1390/134H). Comparison with a map made a year later after enclosure that is already in the archives (1390/41), reveal the impact of   this transformation of landscape and custom.

The arrival of an enclosure map for Great Somerford, c1810, came very much out of the blue, as the award has not survived, and the scheme was unrecorded apart from its enabling Act (3736/5H).

Although the Ramsbury enclosure award of 1778 did not have an integral map, a map of old and new enclosures was made soon after probably as an afterthought to clarify the arrangements for enclosure and apportioning tithes (3767/1H).

Steve Hobbs,Archivist