The local paper: The premier history publisher of the Victorian era?

Andrew Hobbs, University of Central Lancashireahobbs2@uclan.ac.ukTwitter: @hobbbhttps://uclan.academia.edu/AndrewHobbs [handout in Talks section]

In 1712, ‘13 and ‘14, the Lancashire recusant and Jacobite Thomas Tylesley kept a diary, which reveals life among the Catholic Lancashire gentry in the run-up to the failed uprising of 1715.

By the late 1860s the diary was in the hands of Thomas Parkinson of Myerscough Cottage near Preston.

Parkinson allowed a local newspaper editor, Anthony Hewitson, and a young Roman Catholic antiquary, Joseph Gillow Jnr, to transcribe the diary.Hewitson then published this historical source document, verbatim, with footnotes, week by week in his paper, the Preston Chronicle from Oct 1871.

Two years later Gillow and Hewitson revised their transcription and published this in book form.

Preston Chronicle 9 Dec 1871

The wholesale transcription of a historical source, with footnotes, in a local weekly paper

The publishing of the Tyldesley Diary is a good example of:• The Victorian boom in history, inc publication of historical documents• A NW ‘local history community’ (Kidd) of scholars, writers, amateurs• Central role of local newspapers in publishing and popularising history

in 19C and into 20C

History writing in local newspapers:• reached all levels of society• Was used for a purpose: to strengthen and trade on local identities

4 elements in Tyldesley Diary example:1. Historical sources2. Research, writing and publishing by members of a local history

community3. Publishing in local newspapers4. Publishing in books

1. Historical sourcesGillow and Hewitson were doing similar work to history printing clubs which took off in Victorian era, e.g. Chetham Soc (est 1843), Record Soc of L&C (est 1878), Lancs Parish Register Soc (1898) – same all round country• Central gov made records available – several local papers gave a summary of the Report of the

Keeper of Records, cataloguing new national history records – this was reported even when there was no local connection to documents – 1850s

Growing demand, increasing popularity of history – why?• Sir Walter Scott historical novels• Speed of social, technological change? Belief in progress, optimism (Whig view of history)?

Nostalgia? Distancing from superstitious past of folklore?

• Besides historical documents, memory was an important source in other cases – the Victorians liked contemporary history (perhaps because of pace of change?) – popularity of memoirs, reminiscences

2. Who were the local historians involved with publishing history in the local press? The gentleman amateurJoseph Gillow, co-editor of Tyldesley Diary, was a major historian of the Roman Catholic church. Had a private income, born Preston, family could trace connections back to Conishead Priory, links to Lancaster furniture family; ‘the Plutarch of the English Catholics’• Compiled 5-volume Biographical and Bibliographical Dictionary of the

English Catholics• Honorary recorder of Catholic Record Soc (est 1904)

TT Wilkinson, FRAS, of Burnley -- another gentleman amateur• Contributor to local and national mags, local papers, on maths, philosophy, astronomy, geology, history

• Published most of his work, on local topography and archaeology, in Transactions of Historic Society of Lancashire & CHeshire

• Books: History of the Parochial Church of Burnley (1856); The Folk Lore of Lancashire (1867); Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports (1873) – jointly with friend John Harland

• From middling family of farmers and doctors, Mellor nr Blackburn; went to school then had private tutor; he and others formed a mutual improvement society in Mellor

• Contributed poetry and Burnley district news to Blackburn Standard

• Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Soc, Corresponding member of Mcr Lit and Phil Soc, Hist Soc of L&C

• Became teacher – Burnley Grammar School

• Invited to contribute to Notes and Queries at its launch

• Contributed to local histories, inc Baines, Harland

• ‘Contributed oocasional papers on our local antiquities to the Burnley Advertiser, Burnley Gazette, on civil war, Pendle Witches, ‘Burnley in the olden time’ – also for Blackburn Times

• Poetic eulogy in Blackburn Advertiser (handout) shows public status of the local historian

Not a gentleman, not an amateur: John Roberts Boyle (1853-1907) of Hull• Born Accrington, educated at Manchester Grammar School• Swedenborgian minister in Hull, then Newcastle; wrote educational and

historical books, member of most of the learned societies of Yorkshire • Record clerk to the Hull Corporation 1897-1905• Popular archaeological lecturer• 1905, caught trying to flog letters of Andrew Marvell to Hull Corporation• Sentenced to 12 months with hard labour, died in Hull workhouse infirmary• Shows the difficulty of being a full-time historian if you don’t have a private

income

Local editors and journalists as writers of history• Hewitson, co-editor of Tyldesley Diaries: son of a stonemason, apprentice printer at

Lancaster Gazette, reporter, editor in Preston, bought Preston Chronicle• Some schooling in Ingleton, mutual improvement classes in Lancaster• Succeeded another historian/editor on Preston Chronicle, William Dobson, author

of 9 books on Preston, member of Chetham’s Society• Hewitson was a member of HSLC• Journalistic involvemnt in local history not new: Roberts (1972) found that in 1840s,

31 of 49 provincial editors whose book output could be identified wrote histories• Provincial editors 'wrote local history, local history which was full of intense pride

of locality’ (23)• The founding members of HSLC included 5 local paper editors

Anthony Hewitson

(1836-1912)

Hewitson’s history books• Our Churches and Chapels, 1869• Stonyhurst College, Its Past and

Present, 1870• Our Country Churches and

Chapels, 1872• The Tyldesley Diary, 1873 [with

Joseph Gillow]• History of Preston, 1883• The Story of My Village, Ingleton,

1840-50, 1893• Northward: Historic,

Topographic, Residential, and Scenic Gleanings, &c. Between Preston and Lancaster, 1900

• Preston Court Leet Records : Extracts and Notes, 1905

• Diary of Thomas Bellingham, An Officer under William III, 1908

Local newspaper readers as writers of local history

• Nearly 500 reader-contributors to the Newcastle Weekly Chronicle met together in 1891

• A report of the event said that 9/10 owed their title of ‘contributor’ to their involvement in the ‘Notes and Queries’ column of local history, folklore etc.

• The contributors were given a historical tour of Newcastle by Boyle, in the days before he started stealing manuscripts

All part of Kidd’s ‘local history culture’Elite members of learned societies felt 'a sense of responsibility for the dissemination of knowledge of the local past to the wider public.'

3. Publishing history in local print mediaNewspapers the most widely published and read local media containing history, but also local/regional magazines …1820s surge of provincial literary miscellanies, e.g. Lonsdale Magazine, including local history and topography.

Notes and Queries launched in London in 1849; by the end of the century at least 30 regional or local Notes and Queries had been published, becoming particularly popular from the 1870s onwards.

Newspaper Magazine Newspaper Magazine1800 1900

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Approx. numbers of metropolitan and pro-vincial newspapers and magazines,

1800

ProvincialMetropolitanLondon local

The majority of periodical titles were provincial …

Newspaper Magazine Newspaper Magazine1800 1900

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Approx. numbers of metropolitan and pro-vincial newspapers and magazines,

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ProvincialMetropolitanLondon local

The majority of periodical titles were provincial …

1851 1855 1856 1860 1865 1870 18710

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Numbers ofLondon andprovincialnewspapers,1851-71

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0.2 Articles containing words beginning 'antiquar'

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A crude word search of the British Newspaper Archive, excluding London publications, finds a growth in historical material through the century, with steep increases in the 1820s and 1840s-50s.

The local weekly paper was central to Victorian history publishing• For most people, the main way they read history was probably via the local paper

– more than books• More local paper titles thru 19C – but low sales• From late 1850s, sales overtook London papers (no nationals)• Most popular type of Victorian newspaper was local paper• Local papers different than now – more magaziney• History = staple type of content• Evidence of popularity: Blackburn Times started series of local hist stories illustratd

with pen and ink drawings 1888, ‘Bits of Old Blackburn’ – editor JG Shaw later claimed they had to print 500 extra copies each time it appeared, and the columns were later collected in book form (Poos 16-17)

1890: How much history in the local paper?Lancaster Gazette: 52,000 words in 24 sampled issues (of total 104 issues per year)= 225,000 words per yearx no. of English weekly newspapers (1000)= 225 million words of history in local weekly newspapers

1890: How much history in books?391 books and new editions published in 1890 (Publishers’ Circular ‘analytical table’ for 1890, ‘History, Biography &c’ category)x average no. of words per book in that category (224,000 words)= 87 million words of history in books

Examples of history in Lancaster Gazette, 1890, during boom period – a fairly typical local weekly6/26 issues, Jan-MarchOld inscription in Lisbon (29 words) History of interment in churches (110)Cashbook of poet Beranger (144) Origin of Christian fasting (85)

Finds in ruins of Fleece Inn (178) Origin of hospitals (170)Round Lancaster Castle, IX: Hornby (cont.) (2,000 x 3)

Women executed in French Revolution (246)

Local chronology for 1889 pt. 2 (1224) History of title, Duke of Lancaster (68)

Barrett Browning memorial (612) On this day in history (110)

Old Lancaster Names, pt. II (cont.) (2,000 x 2)

Dark history of Seward mansion, Washington DC (289)

Ttraditions of Valentine's Day (1037)

Lancaster Gazette 7 Jan 1804, p4

But history – including recent history was also part of the local weekly from the beginning of the century …

Lancaster Gazette February 25, 1804 p4

Lancaster Gazette May 20, 1809; p4

A spoof prologue, lampooning the antiquary, followed by a faithful transcription of Potts’s 1613 account of the trials of the Lancashire Witches (see handout), which continued weekly. Readers were expected to deal with huge slabs of transcribed historical documents.

Lancaster Gazette 23 Dec 1820

History was used by local papers to trade on local identity. Central place of history/ memory/ continuity in identity.

Ilustration in masthead of paper in Victorian new town of Barrow-in-Furness had history as its central image – features from Furness Abbey.

Preston Chronicle emblem, 1 September 1855

Preston Pilot emblem, 13 September 1851

Political differences in such imagery – Whig Preston Chronicle featured the Magna Carta alongside a sceptre and local historical emblem, while the Tory Preston Pilot omits the Magna Carta and places the Crown at the centre.

Historical fiction (see Graham Law’s work on the central role of the local weekly in publishing new fiction in the late 19C – e.g. Hardy’s Tess of the Durbervilles was commissioned by the proprietor of the Bolton Journal

Typical late-century dedicated local history column (see preface to a similar new column in the Burnley Advertiser in the handout)

Lancaster Gazette 20 Dec 1879

Local papers published sheet almanacs, intended to hang on the wall for the following year. These usually features chronologies of key dates in local and national history.

Types of historical content in 19C local pressBiography Chronology – inc almanacsMemoir/reminiscences Extracts of historical documentsTopography Archaeology, e.g. finds during constructionArchitecture PoetryFiction Drawings, maps, photographs, diagramsSummaries of lectures/talks Touristic guidesDialect writing Folklore, legends, customs, superstitionsNotes and Queries Dedicated history columns/series

History as essential to local weeklies‘It is essential … that [a local newspaper publisher] make it first and foremost a paper for the district, devoting a large amount of space to domestic news, and, if possible, giving some attention to local history and antiquities … if it can secure as editor a gentleman who takes an interest in county history and antiquities so much the better.’

A. Paterson, ‘Provincial Newspapers’, in Progress of British Newspapers in the Nineteenth Century (London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co, 1901), pp.79-80.

But beware …• Often motivated by local pride/patriotism – boosterism – selective• Local papers increasingly presented cross-class consensus• So … little on local slave trade involvement? Chartism?• But … local press not unitary, even within one paper, plus rivalry

between papers• So memoirs of old Chartists do appear in some local papers

Like the Tyldesley Diary, many local history books began their lives as newspaper content, before being republished in volume form often by the same newspaper publisher, who also published books as a sideline.Hewitson had the Tyldesley Diary ‘peer reviewed’ before publishing it in book form. He sent proofs to:• Alexander Goss, Bishop of Liverpool• Henry Fishwick of Rochdale – wrote or edited more

than 25 books, inc histories of Rochdale and Lancs, member of learned socs. ‘To the notes and gleanings page of the [Rochdale] Observer Literary Supplement he often contributed’

• Rev JD Banister, vicar of Pilling, antiquary• James Pearson of Milnrow, expert on

Fylde dialect, contrib to Notes and Queries (Hewitson diary 22 Thursday Feb 1872)

Lancaster Gazette 18 Dec 1875

As with this news report, local patriotism, and a feeling that local places were almost sacred in their meanings to local people, was central to newspapers’ publishing of history (see introduction to new Burnely Advertiser column on handout).

Lancaster Gazette 27 June 1868

Conclusions• More history in local papers than in books• For all but the elite, history was consumed mainly through local

weekly newspapers• This history was based on a sense of place• Local papers central to many parts of Victorian culture• Local press traded on local ID – memory/continuity central to local ID• Variable quality in terms of accuracy and omissions– but fascinating

stuff!