Books

Probate Inventories are a very interesting and useful type of historical source material containing, as they often do, detailed lists of the movable goods, chattels and credits (but not debts) of the deceased. They can include such items as personal belongings (household goods, money, clothes etc.), contents of a house going through it room by room, tools, agricultural implements and carts, livestock, crops, stock in trade, merchandise, rents and, in the case of mariners, wages owed by the Crown or Company the seaman was employed by. Inventories have been used by researchers investigating such topics as local economic history, the history of housing, farming, local industry and food and cooking and they are also useful and interesting to those tracing family history.

Most probate inventories survive amongst church court records - for example, there are some 40,000 in the records of the Archdeaconry and Consistory Courts of Canterbury, covering the eastern two thirds of Kent - but there are also a substantial number for Kent people amongst the records of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury (PCC). The PCC was the highest probate court covering southern England and sat in Doctors' Commons in London. I set out to list the Kent probate inventories in the PCC from the various class lists and catalogues at the Public Record Office, thinking that it would be a job that would take me a relatively short time. Five years and some 3,000 inventories later, my research is complete!

With the aid of a grant from the Allen Grove Local History Fund of the KAS, I have published, in alphabetical order of surname, details of all the probate inventories in the PCC for Kent people, those living elsewhere but who died in Kent and also some others who had property in Kent. The dates of the inventories range from 1490-1854, with most being made between 1660 and 1782. The listing is published in four Parts: Part 1 (Surnames A-C), Part 2 (Surnames D-L), Part 3 (Surnames J-Q), Part 4a (Surnames R-S) and Part 4b (Surnames T-Z). Each volume carries an index of place names and an index of 'stray' names, mostly executors and administrators of the deceased's estate. An introduction volume, supplied free with any of Parts 1 to 4, gives more detailed information about the records in question. The price of each of Parts 1 to 3 (each 72 pages) is £5, plus 60p postage inland, and of Parts 4a and 4b (each 44 pages) £4, plus 50p postage inland. They can be obtained from me at 99 Strangers Lane, Canterbury, CT1 3XN. From the Centre for Kentish Studies Bookshop, Maidstone, and from Canterbury Cathedral Archives. ISBN 0-9521828-5-8. My other Kent sources publications have been reported in this newsletter as they have appeared. They are all still in print and further details can be obtained from me at the above address.

Gillian Rickard
2.1.99

Under the Road: Archaeological Discoveries at Bronze Age Way, Erith by Maureen Bennell, published by Bexley Council 1998. 50pp. Colour illustrations. Available from Bexley Local Studies Centre, Hall Place, Bourne Road, Bexley, Kent DA5 1PQ (telephone 01322 526574) at £3, plus 60p post and packing.

When the Erith to Thamesmead Spine Road (Phase 4) was constructed in north Kent, major archaeological discoveries were made. This book describes Roman and medieval sites excavated ahead of construction and mesolithic, neolithic and bronze age finds, including part of a trackway, found in and below peat during monitoring of the marsh area. Bexley Council Engineers' Department has commissioned the book which is written by an archaeologist but aimed at the general reader.

Gaudeamus - a Historical Account of Music at The Grammar School, Maidstone by James Clinch

In 1999 Maidstone will celebrate the 450th anniversary of the granting of its Charter and the founding of its Grammar School. Music was certainly not on the curriculum at that time, and it is not until the 1860's when Royal Commissions were set up to survey educational establishments, that any mention is made of the subject. At that time Henry Faulkner Henniker became organist at Holy Trinity Church, Maidstone, and he was soon appointed Professor of Music at the School. He also taught at St Lawrence's College, Ramsgate, Sutton Valence School and Cranbrook School. Peripatetic teaching is not new!

This well-researched book owes its title, 'Gaudeamus', to the school song composed by Dr Henniker in 1908, and the author's lively style evokes more than a hundred years of musical teaching and performing. It also touches upon the founding of local amateur orchestras and choirs, the appointment of a County Music Advisor, the beginnings of the Kent Rural Music School, the formation of the Kent Youth Orchestra and so on. There are examples of programmes performed throughout the century and it is fascinating to see how tastes have changed over the decades. Mr Clinch has interviewed many former teachers and pupils and it is fortunate their memories have been preserved.

Maidstone Grammar School has enjoyed the skills of many well-qualified Directors of Music, but it is to the dedication and enthusiasm of a totally unmusical headmaster, Mr W.A. Daydon, it owed its musical renaissance after the Second World War and beyond. This volume is a tribute to all who have recognised the importance of music in education and proof of the author's well-publicised affection for, and knowledge of his old school.

A4 format ix + 111 pages, including four pages of photographs, illustrations and appendices.

ISBN 0 9530861 00

Published privately by the author, a former pupil, staff member and current Clerk to the Grammar School.

Price £10 (£11.50 incl. p&p from the author at 3 Upper Street, Leeds, Maidstone, ME17 1SL)

Archie Donald, Early Communications in the Tenterden Locality including Postal Services and Postmarks, (1998), 82 pages, spiral bound. ISBN 0-9512887-1-7. Available from Woodvale Press, The Pond House, Tenterden, TN30 6SB. -£8.50 including post and packing.

This book is a must for the postal, local and family historian, packed with the names of local personalities and facts and figures on the transport, communications and postal services throughout the Tenterden area over the centuries, a labour of love by our member Archie Donald.

It was interesting to read that by 1250 AD a National Carrier Network had been established. In 1750, R. Hammond's eight horse-drawn wagon was leaving Tenterden on Monday morning to arrive at the George Inn, Borough, on Wednesday, a journey of three days! One can wonder at the problems they must have faced along the way, mud up to the axles, sick horses and perhaps highwaymen thrown in for good measure.

Communications are dealt with in depth, from Fire Beacons to Signal Stations. While Cinque Ports Messengers were carrying administrative letters from 1449-1655, Tenterden was serviced from the nearest Stage Town on the six great roads that had a regular service in the 17th C, the author has included postal maps from this period. From 1721 when William Read was salaried Postmaster of Tenterden, the Postmasters are listed up to 1988 when the organisation was split into three.

The student of philately is well catered for, the postal markings of Tenterden date from 1714 through to 1997 and include Parcel and Railway letter stamps, some 30 pages of illustrations, which must be unique. Certainly a book that postal historians must have on their bookshelf.

Alec Miles

The Freemen of Canterbury 1800-1835 In 1990 Kent Record Collections published The Freemen of Canterbury 1800-1835, a list of freemen of the City of Canterbury in the last years before the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835 abolished their exclusive right to vote and to hold municipal office. The list, compiled from the city archives by Stella Corpe in collaboration with Anne M Oakley, is an invaluable source for the histories of the leading families of early nineteenth-century Canterbury.

In that period, the freedom of the city could be acquired in five ways - by patrimony, by apprenticeship, by marriage to the daughter of a freeman, by redemption (i.e. purchase) or by gift of the city - and the list shows, in addition to the name and trade of the freeman and method of acquisition, either the name and trade of the father (patrimony), the name and trade of the father (patrimony), the name and trade of the master (apprenticeship), the name of the wife and name and trade of her father (marriage) or the place of residence of the freeman, if not Canterbury (redemption). Citations enable reference to be made to the original sources from which the information has been extracted.

Copies of the volume are now available from English Record Collections (the successor of Kent Record Collections) at a reduced price of £10.00, including postage and packing. Orders, accoll!panied by cheques or money orders (made payable to English Record'Collections), should be sent to English Record Collections (Canterbury Freemen), c/o Anthony Adolph.

Michael Roper
Chairman, English Record Collections