Articles by Rose Staveley-Wadham

This week our presses have been on overdrive as we have now passed a landmark of 38 million pages now available to search on the British Newspaper Archive. We have added 177,190 pages in total, with the bulk of these new additions stemming from Britain’s longest-running tabloid, the Daily Mirror, to which we have added over 110,000 new pages.We are delighted to present six brand new titles this week as well, representing historic headlines from England, Ireland, Wales and India.Register now

On 20 March 1966, an audacious robbery was orchestrated at Westminster Central Hall. On show were rare stamps with a total value of £3 million; but these were not the target of the very literal daylight robbery, undertaken under the noses of no less than six security guards. For also on display was the Jules Rimet Trophy, the solid gold prize presented to the winners of the football World Cup, which was to be held in England that summer.Sunday Mirror | 2 January 1966It

In this our latest animal-themed blog, we take a look at the extraordinary story of Tirpitz the pig. A shipwreck survivor, and charity fundraiser, we look through our newspapers to tell her remarkable and unlikely story.Register now and explore The ArchiveTirpitz and friend | Daily Record | 24 March 1916The tale of Tirpitz begins on board the SMS Dresden, a light cruiser of the German Imperial Fleet. Pigs were often kept on board battleships to supply fresh meat, but in a

We have been extremely busy over the past seven days here at The Archive adding an exciting array of brand new titles and pages to our collection. We have a bumper crop of new titles (twelve in all!), as well as updates to fourteen of our existing titles, covering England, Wales, Ireland and Northern Ireland. We are delighted to have added 141,258 new pages in all. Read on to find out more about our fabulous array of new regional, national and

Every Army, Air Force, Navy and Secret Service in the world has its feathered battalions, and when the story of the war is written finally it will be found that many a battle has been won, many a ship preserved and many a life saved through the help of the feathered soldiers.These were the words of Victor Newton as he wrote for the Aberdeen Press and Journal in 1943, describing ‘how pigeons play their part in war.’ And so, in

This month at the British Newspaper Archive we are celebrating all things pet related – and what better way to start than by taking a special look at some of the bravest cats and dogs that we have found in the pages of our newspapers?Irma the Alastian receives the Dickin Medal for rescue work during the Blitz | Illustrated London News | 20 January 1945From the role that dogs played on the European front during the First World War, and interwar domestic heroism,

We continue to celebrate Pride Month here at the British Newspaper Archive with this special blog exploring gender identity from the 1700s right up until the 1960s. Using newspapers taken from three different centuries, this blog will show how gender identity has always been fluid, and how members of the LGBTQ community have faced both persecution and prosecution for expressing their identity through how they dressed and presented themselves.‘Extraordinary Discovery – A Woman Dressed in Man’s Clothes’ | Illustrated Police News | 2

In 1928, novelist Radclyffe Hall published her seminal LGBTQ work The Well of Loneliness. Following the story of Stephen Gordon, an upper-class woman who finds love with one Mary Llewellyn and is consequently shunned by society, the work was groundbreaking in its lesbian subject matter.Radclyffe Hall | Graphic | 30 April 1927Although it was received favourably by many publications including the Daily Herald and Lady’s Pictorial, Sunday Express editor James Douglas began a campaign on 18 August 1928 to have Hall’s book banned – naming The

This week at The Archive we are delighted to announce the addition of nearly 200,000 brand new pages, having added 198,676 new pages in the last seven days. We have updated five of our English titles, spanning the north west and south west of the country, as well as one national title. Meanwhile, our other updated title hails from north of the border, coming from Dundee.Register now and explore the ArchiveMoreover, this week sees an incredible breadth of historical coverage

Described at the time in the pages of the Western Mail as ‘one of the most sensational events in the criminal annals of England,’ the arrest and prosecution of Oscar Wilde on charges of ‘gross indecency’ is a tragic chapter in LGBTQ history, and represents the wider persecution faced by the LGBTQ community at the time, as well as throughout the ensuing decades.Oscar Wilde | Illustrated London News | 27 February 1892In this special blog, we will explore how newspapers at the