A History of The Bourne Valley Historical Society
The first meeting of The Bourne Valley Historical and Record society was held on 3rd February 1948, and as such we are one of the oldest such groups in the area. At that time their were 12 founding members: Rev. and Mrs Blair, Commander and Mrs Skyrme, Mrs Sassoon, Mrs Piggot, Messrs B F White, A Bray, John Musty, S Rogers, J E Rowden, and C H Bray who was appointed secretary. Dr Stone, an archeologist of international renown who had lived in the village since 1928, became President.
The aims of the Society was at first to collect information about the history of the district, with a view to publishing a complete history.
Secondly, to assist in the preservation of any documents, maps or prints and to encourage the upkeep of any ancient monument, buildings, trackways or other objects of historical interest.
Thirdly, to preserve any documents etc,as may be donated to the Society
The area of interest was define as the Bourne Valley between Boscombe and Ford
For the first 38 years the meetings of the society took place in the homes of members. They were mainly devoted to discussions on new material and the copying of them into record books.
One of the most notable members of of the early days of the society was Charlie Bray, the first secretary. Mr. Bray who was employed as an electrician at Porton Down spent all his spare time researching the history of the local area, teaching himself Latin and Old English in order to transcribe ancient documents. In 1951 the first chapter of Charlie’s book “The History of Winterbourne Appeared” . This was followed by 26 quarterly instalments each of about 1500 words.
The Winterbourne Parish magazine known as “The Three Winterbournes” also started life in 1948. The magazine was founded to reflect the affection the villagers had for the area and to record parish activities and to write a “History of Winterbourne”
Ironically, in 1959, Charlie Bray was knocked off his bicycle on the way to a BVHS meeting and he succumbed to his injuries. having died intestate, the Treasury Solicitor confiscated all his possesions including his well stiocked library and the archives of the Society. These were later reclaimed from the Treasury by Mr J Judd, who then went on to publish another history of the area called A Popular History of winterbourne Gunner.
Mr Judd died in 1965 and together with him the parish magazine also died, and there were no further publications for 30 years
In 1986 the mammoth task of cataloguing the records held by the Society was begun and this was finished in 1989.
The opening of the new Glebe Hall in 1990 further helped the Society to prosper but it was not until the opening of an extension to the building that the archives could be properly stored there.
Our current Secretary, Maureen Atkinson played a leading role in the campaign to plan build and pay for the new Glebe Hall, in which all of our meetings are now held.
Maureen has continued to be the backbone of the Society ever since, including producing a monthly newsletter, which she brought into the 21st century, by introducing the distribution of the magazine by email. As I write this, we learn that Maureen has been awarded the title “Local hero of the Year” by the Wiltshire life magazine, for her work and dedication to not only the BVHS but to the entire community. The award could not be more appropriate and is richly deserved.
The creation of a Website by archivist Tony Goodenough brought the Society even further into the digital age, but one of the most important changes was brought about by our current Archivist, Angela Armstrong who took on the absolutely mammoth task of digitizing the complete archive. With little experience in this type of thing, Angela has produced a superbly well organized database of all the records which are now easily searchable.
Another individual who stands out as an important contributor to the Society is one time archivist Dr. Keith Norris, who has written more about the area around the Bourne Valley than perhaps anyone else. We are lucky to have most of these publications and notes in the archive.
As we approach the 75th anniversary of the organization, the Society goes from strength to strength and we regularly attract new members. the number on people having contributed to this success are too numerous to mention individually but their work and dedication has produced the successful Society we have today.