Search the blog

In honour of Remembrance Day, during the month of November, The British Newspaper Archive will be focusing our attention on military in the newspapers.  Coming up this month we will feature blogs about our special military titles, researching military history, women and war, and wartime rationing and fashion, as well as a guest blog about a remarkable Great War discovery from The Archive.  To begin our military month, we are delving into the newspaper headlines through the years for the…

Emma Willis explored the back streets of Birmingham, uncovered a violent ancestor, and revealed magnificent Irish craftsmanship in her family tree.  In this week’s episode of Who Do You Think You Are?, we followed the lives of three of Willis’ ancestors: James Gretton, Richard Fowler, and Michael Kirwan.  We will take a closer look at the newspapers and explore what more we can discover about the stories and lives revealed.James GrettonEmma Willis found out that her three-time great…

It is that time of year.  The sun is shining and we have been to the DIY store at least three times to buy new patio furniture or get new flowers.  The gardens are set and now we need to get the barbeque prepped and have friends over to enjoy the sun.  This month, in Cookery Corner, explore the British Newspaper Archive for some delicious recipes to have for your barbeque.Barbecue PartiesWe can see from the newspapers, outside…

This week thousands have assembled at Who Do You Think You Are? Live in Birmingham to demolish those brick walls, learn new tricks of genealogy, and hear about the latest news of family history.  Most of us have searched the newspapers for obituaries, but much more can be revealed about our ancestor’s lives than the memorials at their death.  Today, we will take a look at the divorce courts, bankruptcy notices, illegitimacy cases, and committee minutes.The mid- to late…

Whilst Mothering Sunday is now commonly combined and celebrated with the secular holiday of Mother’s Day in the United Kingdom and Ireland, its origin is religious in nature and separate from that of the American Mother’s Day.Starting in the 1700s, individuals would attend a special service on Laetare Sunday (the fourth Sunday of Lent) at their mother church (usually the church where an individual was baptised or their local parish church/closest cathedral). This activity was soon coined as going…

You can search more than 390,000 newspaper pages from 1914-1918 at The British Newspaper Archive, with more being added all the time. Juliet Greenwood got in touch to explain how she used the collection to research World War One recipes for her novel, We That Are Left.**************When I first began writing a novel set during the First World War, I knew I wanted to focus on the experience of women and civilians.For Elin, the heroine of We That Are Left,…

WW1 editions of the Evening Despatch now onlineThe Evening Despatch was published in Birmingham throughout World War One. Over 4,000 pages from newspapers published in 1915, 1917 and 1918 have just been made available to search online.Search the Evening Despatch  Newspaper pages added every weekThousands of extra pages are added to The British Newspaper Archive each week. We’ll be adding more from the Evening Despatch soon, so be sure to check the recent additions regularly.See what’s been added in the…