For our Christmas season talk on Wednesday 10th December we welcome Sean Callery, Blue Badge tourist guide, writer and raconteur.
‘Tis the season to be jolly knowledgeable about Christmas and some of its Cotswolds connections! Sean’s talk explains many Christmas customs, from Advent to Yule logs, including the three Cs – Cards, Carols and Crackers.
Today’s Yuletide celebrations grew from a mixture of pagan customs, folklore and royal fashions. But Sean also covers some Cotswold traditions and explains the Cotswolds background to one of our most famous Christmas songs.
About Sean Callery
Sean is qualified tour guide with a background as a teacher and children’s author.
His Blue Badge tourist guide is for the Heart of England (which covers the area between Birmingham and Gloucester) and he specialise in the Cotswolds. He has written a book about its quirky sights and stories called Offbeat Cotswolds.
Publishing this book drew on his experience from writing about 70 children’s books. Some of these were stories but mostly were non-fiction, for some of the UK’s top publishers. Sean researches his information and finds fun ways to present it .
It will be an enjoyable evening – do join us!
The talk will be at the Village Hall in Milton on Wednesday 10th December at 7.30pm, with refreshments from 7.15pm
Members free, of course. Guests £5.00
Keep an eye on this page for any updates nearer the event
Our November 2025 evening talk welcomed Juliet Heslewood, who presented a history of Fairford Church with particular emphasis on the developent and design of the stained glass windows which are a prime feature of the building.
The evening saw around 50 members who were entertained by some fine and detailed illustrations of the windows. We also had insights into their construction and stylistic influences.
About Fairford Church
The Church of St Mary in Fairford is one of the Cotswolds’ finest wool churches — built in the late 15th century when local families grew wealthy from sheep farming and trade. Their prosperity – Juliet used the term “visible spending” – is reflected in the church’s beautiful stonework and magnificent windows.
Fairford is an outstanding church because of its fascinating complete set of medieval stained glass windows, the only such set in England. The glass is rare, and is of the highest quality.
Juliet gave us a brief outline of church architectural development from Romanesque to late Gothic, with several illustrations of some well-known examples of churches in those styles. Fairford represents the Perpendicular Gothic style, and typical of this style, the church is full of light, with its tall windows supported by elegant buttresses.
Fairford’s Stained-Glass Windows
Fairford’s 28 stained-glass windows are almost unique in England, forming a complete medieval story of the Bible, from Creation to the Last Judgment. Highlights include the Creation Window, showing the making of the world, and the Annunciation, where Gabriel greets Mary.
Juliet also took us through some insights into the construction of such stained glass windows, and explored the influences – North European rather than Renaissance Italy, which informed the style of the designs and imagery.
Window No 9: The Ascension
Survival Stories
The story of their survival is told in several landmark events. A few of the panes were damaged during a storm in November 1703; they were either repaired, some being modified or replaced. During 1889-90 twenty-six windows were repaired and re-leaded.
The windows were taken down for safekeeping during the Second World War and in recent years this remarkable heritage has been carefully restored between 1986 and 2010 under the direction of Keith Barley.
Juliet reminded us that although little is recorded about its founders, the Tudor writer John Leland noted that the wool merchant John Tame began the church, and his son Edmund completed it. As for the designs themselves, there are no written records, and so historians have to piece together hints and guesses – this gave the talk an extra dimension of interest, as Juliet explored these for us.
Today, St Mary’s remains one of Gloucestershire’s most remarkable examples of faith, art, and local pride.
About Juliet Heslewood
Juliet Heslewood is the author of The History of Western Painting: A Young Person’s Guide, as well as a series of themed art books for Frances Lincoln and the recent novel Mr Nicholls.
She has written many other books including one on Van Gogh that led her to be interviewed in a BBC 4 Arts programme on television.
Our October 2025 evening talk welcomed Diane Purkiss, professor of English Literature at Oxford University , and fellow and tutor at Keble College.
Diane’s talk explored the often-overlooked history of English food from the perspective of the poor, focusing on the 99% who lived hand-to-mouth.
Another well-attended evening was rounded off with a string of questions from members who clearly enjoyed a fascinating and entertaining talk.
Diane drew from personal experience and historical sources to illustrate how poverty shapes food choices though the ages. She touched on medieval subsistence diets right through to 20th-century working-class meals. In particular, she highlighted the ingenuity of families who stretched meagre resources — surviving on foraged greens, dairy scraps, and offal — and the emotional toll on mothers trying to provide for family needs.
Diane used Langland’s Piers Plowman to illustrate the harsh realities of medieval subsistence, where hunger was a constant threat and diets consisted of oatcakes, curds, and foraged greens.
This portrayal aligns with the broader climatic backdrop of the Little Ice Age — a period of cooling that disrupted agriculture across Europe. Shortened growing seasons and crop failures deepened food insecurity, especially for the landless poor. Piers’s seasonal diet, lacking fat and protein, reflects the nutritional deficits common during this time, when even modest luxuries like pork or bacon were rare.
Diane warned against romanticising such diets, noting that children often suffered from pellagra, scurvy, and rickets. The Little Ice Age magnified these hardships, turning subsistence into a daily struggle. With these and many other examples, Diane showed how climate, poverty, and social inequality intertwined — and how the poor, despite everything, developed resilient foodways to survive.
As the industrial revolution took hold, rural families with gardens and communal knowledge fared better than urban slum dwellers, who had to rely on convenience foods. Government denial of malnutrition and misguided advice compounded hardship, while experiments revealed the transformative impact of simple additions like milk and butter.
Evacuees during WWII exposed cultural divides in food habits, revealing how deeply foodways are tied to identity and survival. Diane urged respect for the resourcefulness of the poor, reminding us that bad diets stem from scarcity, not ignorance.
Her talk – delivered with humour and wit – was a tribute to the dignity and creativity of those who made do with little — and a call to honour their legacy in how we think about food today.
About Diane Purkiss
Diane works on witchcraft, folklore, the English Civil War, and food. Her book ‘English Food: A Social History of England Told Through the Food on Its Tables’ is available now in paperback.
She is now working on a book about the English at sea and a study of executions in Tudor England.
Our first talk of the new season was held in Milton Village Hall on Wednesday 10th September.
We welcomed Stephen Barker, who offered what was for most of us, a unique view of life for the soldiers of the First World War.
Upwards of 50 members appreciated a fine multi-media presentation, which included Stephen’s fascinating commentaries around a set of amusing and incisively satirical contemporary postcards.
Soldiers often turned to humour to alleviate the stress of life in the trenches. Jokes, puns, and satirical songs were a part of the soldiers’ oral culture. Much of the humour was lost on those outside the soldiers’ group, but it resonated with the soldiers and allowed them to cope with the strain of service and combat.
Stephen’s presentation took a light-hearted look at trench humour in slang, in tunes and cartoons – plus satirical journals and concert parties. Humour around the subjects – including joining up, training, officers and men, jibes at the enemy, and the view of war through “Old Bill” – were all illustrated in contemporary cartoons and images.
Stephen’s rendition of a hilarious episode featuring the strictly Presbyterian General Haig and a column of particularly expressive marching men drew much laughter and warm applause from the group.
This was most definitely an alternative view of war, and what came across quite emphatically was that the participants of the time did not see themselves as victims. Use of irony and bawdy humour, coupled with a sense of detachment, gave soldiers an element of control in the face of extraordinary pressure.
About Stephen Barker
Stephen is an independent Heritage Advisor who works with museums, universities, and other heritage organisations to design exhibitions and make funding applications. He worked at Banbury Museum, the Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum amongst others.
Stephen has delivered projects for various universities including Birmingham and Oxford. He delivers presentations and tours related to the First World War and British Civil Wars. He is a Trustee of the Bucks Military Museum Trust and is an Arts Council Museum Mentor. He is the author of ‘The 8th East Lancs in the Great War’ and ‘The Flying Sikh: Hardit Singh Malik’.
The Wychwoods Local History Society presented a special evening of entertainment with the renowned band Oxford Waits on June 11th 2025.
Mr. Tim Healey: Narrator, vocals, shawm, recorders
The Oxford Waits presented a lively evening of 17th Century music and song that ranged from the bawdy to the lyrical and poetic. Despite being all acoustic the music filled the village hall. Readings from contemporary records were woven into the performance along with a demonstration of country dancing from the period. We were also given an exposition of some of the historic instruments they were using – including the cittern, lute, hurdy gurdy, nykelharpa and hammered dulcimer.
The event was a special addition to our season of activities and proved to be a great success. It was a very entertaining evening, with many comments from society members and visitors saying how much they enjoyed the show.
The Oxford Waits take their name from a real-life band of city musicians, known as ‘waits,’ who flourished in Oxford during the 17th century. Performers appear in period costume, and concerts are enlivened by street ballads, dance tunes, airs and rounds as well as readings from diarists and poets. Superb singing voices are matched by specialist skills in an array of period instruments.
The Oxford Waits have performed at a wealth of festivals, churches, theatres and arts centres, as well as featuring on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4. In 2006 they performed before her Majesty the Queen at the Royal Opening of Oxford Castle.
The Society’s AGM followed the format we introduced last year. The formal business was followed by ‘Glimpses into the Archives’, a short series of presentations by the Archive team.
An exhibition of historic pictures of the Wychwoods was on display throughout the evening.
Chairman’s report
The chairman’s report, available to download, is published here:
Members were given some insights into the work of the archive team, especially around the preservation of oral history files, and around the collection, collation and archiving of photographs.
David Betterton chose excerpts from the 1988 interview with George and Meghan Bradley. These out-takes demonstrated the human side of everday life in wartime Wychwoods, where George remembered his Home Guard friends in conversation with John Rawlins as they looked together at a picture of George’s Home Guard platoon [ details here ], and where Meghan recalls the visit of three Canadian soldiers looking for food and a wash [ details here ]. Also included were amusing anecdotes from Duncan Waugh’s 1991 talk on emigration to New Zealand, as a post-script to the archive team’s work on the Cospatrick story.
Carol Anderson chose to demonstrate the often fascinating and rewarding insights which come from the piecing together of disparate elements of the society’s archive. By way of illustration, Carol presented a series of images under the title ‘A Wartime Friendship’. These images illustrated the collected archive material on the Stoter family and in particular the relationship between Mrs Lilian Stoter and the playwright Christopher Fry and his wife Phyllis, who were wartime residents in Shipton.
Taking material (photos , letters and receipts) and adding contents from the publication ‘A Sprinkle of Nutmeg’ (wartime letters of Phyllis Fry) , Carol showed how she has unearthed more elements of a fascinating story which points us toward further research into the Stoter family.
See also:
Alan Vickers ‘ Memories of Christopher Fry in Shipton’ in the Wychwood Magazine here
Upwards of 70 members and guests enjoyed another successful and informative evening, once again featuring a topic of great local interest.
Laurence’s talk introduced us to the Chipping Norton Branch line in the context of the historic rail link from Banbury to Cheltenham which was completed in stages to 1887. He illustrated the story with a fine selection of photographs mainly by the renowned local photographer Frank Packer.
These images took us station by station ( and halts) on the journey. A feature of many of the stations was the obvious care and attention to their upkeep, with shrubs and flowers often in abundance.
The completion of the ‘through route’ from from Banbury to Cheltenham was a final phase, building successfully on earlier developments. Important among these was the opening in 1855 of the Chipping Norton connection to Kingham, and thus to the Oxford to Worcester line.
Railway Station at Bliss Mill
Laurence briefly referenced how the ‘Gauge War’ between GWR’s broad gauge and other companies’ narrow gauge delayed progress. Narrow gauge prevailed in 1846, allowing the branch line’s authorisation in 1854. Constructed in under a year, it connected Chipping Norton Junction to a station near Bliss’s mill.
[ See also Ralph Mann’s talk on the rise and fall of Bliss Mill here ]
Chipping Norton Branch Line: The Next Chapter
The next chapter in the story took place on the western side of the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway. Encouraged by the success of the Chipping Norton venture, a branch was proposed from the Junction to Bourton-on-the Water with an extension to Cheltenham. This was opened in 1861 as a branch from Chipping Norton Junction to Bourton, with an intermediate station at the foot of the hill near Stow-on-the-Wold.
But with Hook Norton remaining isolated, a particular driver for a final development was the discovery of Ironstone deposits around Hook Norton, Bloxham, and Adderbury. This phase was completed in 1877 and was aptly illustrated by Laurence with a number of images of the iron works, and also the attendant development of viaducts, tunnels and railway architecture.
Laurence also took us through the story of the steady decline – through reduced passenger numbers and industrial decline – and ultimate closure of the line. By the early 1960s, the decision was made to close the Chipping Norton Branch Line as part of the Beeching cuts. The Chipping Norton Branch Line officially closed to passengers on March 18, 1962, and freight services ceased shortly thereafter.
About Laurence Waters
Laurence Waters is a retired Photography Teacher with an interest in local railway history particularly in Oxfordshire. He has written a number of books on the subject and is the Honorary Photo Archivist for the Great Western Trust at Didcot Railway Centre
Subject: Archaeological developments in the Chipping Norton area.
Paul’s talk featured the ‘new’ Romano-British settlement at Chipping Norton and examined its position within the wider context of Roman Oxfordshire.
Upwards of 65 interested members and guests enjoyed another successful and informative evening, featuring “close-to-home” history.
We learned of the initial geophysical survey carried out by Chris Knowles in 2021 on land around Glyme Farm, which made significant advances to knowledge of the site. Further developments in our understanding came from a 2022 survey by Wessex Archaeology.
Location of the siteView from the East
Paul showed us detailed and fascinating composite plans of areas of the site developed from these surveys, and photographs of the various trenches made to reveal building foundations, including the possibility of several shrines.
Archaeology has also revealed evidence of Iron Age features through pottery deposits, and from this Paul discussed in more detail and with fine illustrations, the pottery types found in the wider region, and also showed interesting timelines of “lost” coinage during the Roman period.
Roman Oxfordshire in Outline
For the second part of his talk, Paul showed maps and diagrams of the location of other, better known, Roman Oxfordshire sites, enabling us to see the Chipping Norton settlement in this wider context. He picked out Alchester as a major military garrison from the early Roman occupation, and discussed also Sansom’s Platt (Tackley), Swalcliffe Lea, North Leigh, as well as the 1930s studies of Ditchley, Wigginton and Shakenoak. These latter sites showed similarities to the Chipping Norton complex in terms of function, religious worship, animal husbandry and farming.
There is still much to be done at Chipping Norton , but Paul showed us how the initial surveys have revealed quality structures, materials and skeletal remains, so the chances of improving our knowledge are high. It was indeed good to learn of the importance of these new discoveries close to our home in the Wychwoods.
About Paul Booth
Paul’s career journey started at Warwickshire Museum, later joining the Oxford Archaeological Unit (OA) in 1990. As a Senior Project Manager at OA, he managed numerous fieldwork and post-excavation projects in Oxford and beyond, including HS1, M6 Toll, and East Kent Access Road. His projects also covered large-scale work on Iron Age and Roman settlements at Gill Mill, Oxfordshire, and post-excavation reporting on the late Roman cemetery at Lankhills, Winchester.
Paul specialised in Roman pottery and coins, conducting extensive editing work. From 2007-2018, he directed a training excavation for a University and OA project at Dorchester-on-Thames. Since retiring in 2019, Paul has focused on post-excavation work for the Dorchester project but remains actively interested in Roman settlement, pottery, coin, and burial/cemetery studies, particularly in the Oxford region.
Liz is a freelance local historian. She lives in Oxford and has an MSc in English Local History from the University’s Department for Continuing Education.
Whilst investigating child labour in the Industrial Revolution as part of her MSc she became interested in the experiences of child workers in Oxfordshire: a rural, rather than industrial, county.
A very encouraging group of 60+members and guests came to our latest evening talk and were presented with perhaps some quite counter-intuitive facts about the scale of child labour in the 19th Century England.
The image commonly evoked by the phrase ‘child labour’ is one of young children working in harsh conditions in the grimy factories and mines of the Midlands and the North. Yet in rural counties like Oxfordshire, child labour was as much a feature of everyday life in the nineteenth century as in industrialised areas.
Liz’s hour-long illustrated talk told the story of Oxfordshire’s child workers, many of whom started work part-time at the age of six or seven and, until the compulsory school legislation of the 1870s, left education for good by the age of ten to become permanently employed.
The conflict of attitudes around the need for education for children, especially of the poor, was very much a debate of the times. Many opted for the view that education for the poor was a waste of time. Set against this was, of course, the need for family income, where the alternative of destitution was a very real possibility. Thus, we learn that, even while legislation was being passed, and tightened up, children were still being made to work in a whole range of jobs, with long hours and health-compromising conditions. George Dew, Relieving Officer for the Bicester Poor Law Union reported a child residing at Cottisford working at the age of seven as late as 1873. His report asserted “It will do him more good than going to school”.
Oxfordshire children worked in agriculture. We learned that in 1861 there were 20,000 agricultural labourers in Oxfordshire. 16% of these were under 14 years old, with 300 of them between the ages of 10-14. 300 were actually younger than this.
However, the range of employment was much wider than agriculture. Children were employed in domestic service and in lacemaking, gloving and in a host of other small-scale occupations. Liz’s talk highlighted the differences between girls’ and boys’ experiences of these various occupations, and the particular fates of pauper apprentices.
Liz also highlighted the fact that, contrary to popular belief, cottage industry and agricultural work were by no means the ‘soft option’ in comparison with work in the factories and mines of industrialised areas.
Liz’s talk drew on research from a range of sources, including school logbooks, census returns, newspaper articles, private correspondence and other contemporary accounts, offering us a wealth of detail. We were given much to reflect on in terms of how recently these attitudes to child welfare were the norm and not the exception.
Jonathan Maisey’s 2023 presentation with Joe Duxbury on the Windrush Quarries was particularly well-received and attracted interesting questions and feedback.
Jonathan and Joe were invited back to complete the story of the their work on the Windrush Quarries.
For Jonathan and Joe’s update presentation to their 2023 visit, we had an encouraging turnout of 40+ members and guests for the first talk of the year, so soon after Christmas and New year festivities and with snow still lingering.
After a quick recap on the work and findings of the Gloucestershire Speleological Society for Windrush 1 and 2, Jonathan took us through the highlights of the discoveries and research on areas of the quarries, suitably named Windrush 3 to 5.
Map showing Windrush 4 – Coloured Green
Quality Stone Arch in Windrush 2
We were reminded how the Windrush Quarries was opened in the strip of Taynton stone that crops out in a continuous band between the river Windrush and the main road past Burford (A40, Oxford to Cheltenham) that rises 150-200 feet above. The quarrymen moved from surface quarrying to underground activity to avoid the need to dig through layers of Hampen Marley Beds, and White Limestone.
Developing the story from the discovery of Windrush 2 and the establishment of the location of the “Windrush Stables” where the horses/ponies used for moving the stone were kept, Jonathan showed the locations of other sections of the quarry complex. These included the 2013 discovery of workings in Windrush 3, and more workings nearby discovered a year later known as Windrush 4, with a final set of workings discovered in 2015 known as Windrush 5 – currently the extent of the known workings of the quarries.
Workings in Windrush 3
We learned in the Q&A at the end, that in addition to extensive local use, Windrush stone has been used for some of the Oxford Colleges (estimates and accounts from 1716 & 1788 report Windrush stone being selected) and in 1804 replacing inner worn stone in some Oxford colleges as well as the exterior of Oriel Library. It is recorded in 1883 as being used in the inside of St George’s Chapel, Windsor. It was also used for the new Houses of Parliament in 1839.
Not everyone in the hall would share Jonathan and Joe’s passion for crawling through dark narrow spaces, but their enthusiasm and excitement at what they might discover – and the care, of course, in gingerly stepping onto fresh ground to avoid damaging any possible finds – was infectious.
Clay Pipe in Windrush 3
In Windrush 3
The clues which miners left behind all connect us in a time capsule to the local men who worked these quarries. These included slabs of good stone awaiting transport, the marks along the walls left by the tackle of the horse-drawn carts, carved drainage channels of varying and mysterious purpose, broken clay pipes, old shoes, bits of broken tools, and not least, the graffiti which gives us names and dates of many of those men.
Example Graffiti -Windrush 2. John Hooper/John Jackson/Joseph Wheeler/William Mason – November 41838. Plus – Anthony [Jackson]1800
Joe gave us a summary from census records of the numbers of stone masons, stone miners and mason’s labourers which showed a decline from the 1880s. But it seems that at no time were the quarries a major employer of skilled workers. However, the quarries offered an important additional income for landowners, and crucially, gave winter employment for farm workers during the lean months for agriculture.
Windrush War Memorial, reflecting some some local names seen in the mines. A subject for research?
Sadly, the social and economic value of the quarries was finally compromised by the introduction nationwide of new government regulations for mining activity specifically geared to the larger and vital national scale mines in the UK. An unintended consequence of such legislation was to make such smaller enterprises as the Windrush Mines uneconomical due to the prohibitive costs involved.
Our evening ended with some very engaging questions from many of the group, and particularly focussed around the possibility of finding descendants of the named miners, including any connections with workers employed by Groves in Milton.
About Jonathan and Joe
Jonathan Maisey has been involved with caving and the Gloucester Speleological Society (GSS) since 1983 and has undertaken a wide range of caving/mining trips across the UK, France and the USA. Nowadays, his underground interest is more towards mines rather than caves. Of particular interest are the underground stone quarries of the Cotswolds and ongoing work to uncover some of these lost mines. Jonathan has also been a member of the Gloucestershire Cave Rescue Group for 30+ years.
Joe Duxbury has been caving for nearly 60 years, and has been a member of GSS for about 40. He has visited caves throughout Europe and North America. Mines and underground quarries are just as interesting to him as caves, and Windrush has proved to be a fascinating project over the years.
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