Each year the document collection at Sheffield City Archives grows in size. Last year we received around 600 boxes of archival material dating from 1669 to the present day including photographs, architectural plans, glass negatives, ancient deeds, oral histories, minute books and digital files. Each item reveals a bit more to us about Sheffield’s history. What follows is a brief look at some of the collection highlights from 2017...
As we look ahead to 2018 and the centenary commemorations
of the end of World War One, we are
able to reflect on the impact of war on ordinary Sheffielders by the letters, diaries
and photographs that were left behind.
Last year we received a diary kept by Lance Corporal Sydney Staley
(1897-1991) and letters written from the front by Lance Corporal Frederick
Powell Walton (1897-1968) and Private Edward Guite (1884-1918) - the latter were
found in an attic in Sheffield, and give a somewhat harrowing account of his
experiences. The papers of Frederick
Powell Walton came to us in quite unusual circumstances. Sheffield resident, Neil Woodall, stumbled
upon an old cardboard box lying discarded beneath a hedge in his back garden on
Edgedale Road in Nether Edge. Lifting the lid on the box, Mr Woodall found
inside a fascinating assortment of photographs of First World War soldiers and various
papers relating to the Home Guard in Sheffield during the Second World War. He is baffled as to how the box of records
ended up abandoned at the bottom of his garden. On the day he found the
records, rain was falling and dripping through the hedge onto the flimsy
cardboard box lid. The records would doubtless have been damaged beyond repair
and lost forever had he not spotted them in the nick of time.
At the end of 2017, The Star newspaper moved from its
historic home at Telegraph House on York Street to new premises on Pinfold
Street. This raised the question of what
was to happen to its vast subterranean archive.
The Archivists headed underground to take a look, and it was agreed that
The Star would donate all of its
historic volumes to the City Archives.
After months of heavy work, we finally got the entire archive over to
Shoreham Street just before Christmas. The
collection includes big dusty newspaper volumes dating back to the 1700s, glass
negatives which contain images that haven’t been seen for decades and other
material (including negatives and photographs) which will eventually get added
to Picture Sheffield for all to see. The
material is currently being conserved and packaged by our Conservator and
Preservation Assistant which may, in itself, take most of 2018! 
Two interesting collections of oral histories were also donated to the City Archives in 2017 by
community groups. The Abbeydale Picture
House Oral History Project has been busy interviewing people about their
recollections of the old picture house and we now have a fascinating set of
interviews conducted with Allan Jackson, D. Butler, H. Burgess, J.D. Andrew,
Jean Muir, Mary Marsden and Mick Humble which can be listened to at the
Archives. We were also pleased to
receive copies of the Sheffield Feminist Archive Project’s interviews conducted
with female activists in Sheffield. Discussions
cover trade unionism, work place equality, the Sheffield Film Cooperative and
the film making industry, education, feminist campaigns, Greenham Common, sexism,
the LGBT scene and many other topics. So
far, the group have interviewed Kate Flannery, Pat Bairsto, Chrissie
Stansfield, Nell Farrell, Melissa Wright and Katie Edwards with further interviews
currently in the pipeline. The work that
these groups do is of great importance to our broad historical understanding, as
they give voice to the stories, emotions and opinions that are often omitted from
the official record.
A few items of local interest turned up in
London last year which we were able to repatriate to Sheffield. These included a diary belonging to Thomas Staniforth of Darnall (later a
prosperous merchant and Mayor of Liverpool and prominent slave trader) in which he writes (during August
1799) of his colliery interests in Sheffield, his visits to the Cutlers’ Hall
and the Sheffield Infirmary and about how he must ‘keep a watchful eye on his
fields and the haymaking’. The diary offers a short snapshot of life for the Sheffield gentry in 1799 but makes no mention of his business activities in Liverpool. The second item was an account book of the Surveyors of the Highways, Handsworth. Surveyors were appointed to view the roads,
fixing days for statutory labour, and collecting ‘compositions’ from
parishioners (i.e. payment in lieu of labour).
The volume dates from 1793 - 1825 and details all payments made
including: wheelbarrows, levelling the road, making a road to a quarry and
getting out stone, clerks’ fees, labourers' wages etc. It is unclear where these items have been for
the best part of 200 years, but we are pleased they are back in the Sheffield
and now part of the city collections in perpetuity.
We also took in public records from Sheffield Magistrates’ Court, HM Coroner and the NHS. Records were also deposited by Sheffield City Council, the Diocese of Sheffield, the Feoffees of Ecclesfield (dating back to 1669), local businesses, community groups and private individuals.
A full list of archives received by Sheffield City Archives (and other archives around the country) is published by The National Archives each year:
You can also search Sheffield City Archives' online catalogue here: http://www.calmview.eu/SheffieldArchives/CalmView/Default.aspx?