New from Mitcham and Tooting

This week, we’ve added three exciting newspaper titles to The Archive, covering intermittent years between 1877 and 1919. We’ve also updated 33 pre-existing titles from across Britain and Ireland, with a total of 265,524 new pages added.

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Mitcham and Tooting Mercury

This week’s first brand new addition is the Mitcham and Tooting Mercury. Previously named the Mitcham and Tooting Mercury, Streatham & Balham Times (before switching to a shortened title in 1918), this local paper reported on news from across South London.

Mitcham and Tooting Mercury, 10 May 1913.

The pages of the Mitcham and Tooting Mercury document the rapid transformation that South London underwent in the early 20th century, as villages were incorporated into the suburbs, housing was expanded, and modern transportation reached previously rural areas. You’ll also find reporting on political and social milestones within this exciting new title.

Western Weekly News

We’ve also added the Plymouth-based Western Weekly News to The Archive this week. Established in 1861, this title was a weekly companion to the Western Morning News. It contains general reporting on news and agricultural and maritime events across Devon, Cornwall and the wider West Country.

Western Weekly News, 6 January 1877.

We’ve added pages from intermittent years between 1877 and 1899, offering insight into what life was like in the South West of England in the late 19th century.

Westmeath Examiner and Longford and Meath Reporter

Based in Mullingar, Ireland, this week’s third new addition was established in 1882 by John Patrick Hayden, a nationalist who was just 19 years old. The newspaper documents the factional and ever-shifting world of Irish politics, including the Land War (1886-1891).

Impassioned political reporting in the Westmeath Examiner and Longford and Meath Reporter, 23 December 1882.

The Westmeath Examiner and Longford and Meath Reporter’s loyalties were split, and this was on purpose. In 1890, when the Irish Parliamentary Party split, newspapers that leaned too heavily on one political side were ostracised. To survive this fragmented landscape, the Examiner platformed both pro-Parnellite and Unionist positions.

John Patrick Hayden’s intention to give a voice to the people of Westmeath, Longford and Meath was set out in the paper’s first edition:

The vast majority of the people in so important a district are underrepresented by a local organ. This is not as it should be… One of the principal aims of the Examiner will be to keep alive and intensify the spirit of self-reliance which now pervades the people, to give greater facilities on all occasions for the free expression of the people’s wishes.

Our Updated Titles

As well as adding three brand new titles, we’ve also updated 33 of our existing publications. This week’s biggest update was made to the Staffordshire Sentinel; we added 46,760 modern pages from 2002 and 2003. We also made a substantial update to the Surrey Mirror, with 33,984 pages added, also from the early 21st century.

New titles

Updated titles

This week we have updated 33 of our existing titles.

You can learn more about each of the titles we add to every week by clicking on their names. On each paper’s title page, you can read a free sample issue, learn more about our current holdings, and our plans for digitisation.

You can keep up to date with all the latest additions by visiting the recently added page.  You can even look ahead to see what we’re going to add tomorrow.