Coventry Archives

The regulars who use the records at the Herbert will already know this but prices to use a camera have been increased. A camera pass at our last visit was £5 for unlimited use, yesterday £5 was the cost for up to 5 images whilst unlimited images cost £10. I don't know how long this incease has been in place. Documents now have to be requested by 3.30pm the previous day.

I don't understand this I'm afraid! Could you explain what you mean, please?

Hello Anne, When carrying out research at record offices/archives there are various ways of doing it. Some simply study the documents and make notes or copy them out longhand. Many take a laptop and transcribe the documents out whilst at the record office. My wife and myself photograph the documents, assuming the staff have no objections, and then either study them at home or as my wife does, transcribe them at leisure. This is especialy useful for items such as minute/log books and obviously maps and photographs. My wife has a long term project in comparing Bedworth schools with schools from other areas, Coventry and beyond, so photographing the books makes the task a lot easier. Just for interest between 1875 and 1920 (approx) the Bedworth schools which were supported by the Nicholas Chamberlaine Trust stand comparison with many schools in the area. Photographs have to be taken without flash so not always easy. With few exceptions record offices are not set up for photography although Warwick has one small light/copy stand available. A good record office for photography is the Surrey office at Woking. Hope that makes it clearer for you.

heritage, I think Anne is referring to the camera charge, I don't understand that bit myself, do you mean they charge you for using your camera?

There has been a charge for using a camera in record offices for quite a while. The cost has gradually increased but £10 is rather over the top. Warwick Record Office also has a charge for plugging your laptop into the mains supply. This has the effect of bad tempered clashes between the receptionist and the casual visitor, happens a lot. It doesn't help that each record office has its own rules/charges, even down to the age of documents that the researcher can see. This is particularly applicable to school log books.

Searching the "Coventry Collections" website I see that there is a lot in the collection now referring to air raid damage. I am not sure if these are newly referenced documents. There appear to be some schedules of damaged property as I came across a couple for Coundon number 9 area which included Poole Road where I lived. This is only an index, sadly the documents are not available online but I thought it might be of interest to anyone able to visit the Herbert.

The History Centre was digging through uncatalogued stuff when I was there last. They'd unearthed a pile of great photos of Lady Herbert's Garden and Cook Street. There was a tram image collection too.

Helen, Many thanks for this and your previous post. I can confirm that we are currently discussing with Coventry City Council and Historic England to have a number of the Archaeology and Conservation department photographs, that were transferred to us last year, digitised in the future. It may take a little while to get the Pictures of Coventry images appearing on the Coventry Collections database. However, we have recently recruited some new digitisation volunteers who will be assisting us, and so we are aiming to have all of them up in time for the City of Culture year. This particular reference you mention of uncatalogued material is a bit before my time, as I began working at Coventry Archives fairly recently. However I can confirm that there are images that feature both places amongst this recent transfer of material from the City Council. These images can be viewed if you want to book an appointment in our research room, which is open Wednesday-Friday 10.30am-3.30pm. Please email historycentre@culturecoventry.com The tram images may be part of another collection that I haven't come across yet. Many thanks, Victoria.

Anne, Many thanks for your email. As you will have seen from my previous posts, we are at the very early stages of digitisation here at Coventry Archives. I have conducted a quick search on Coventry Collections under the subject term Second World War, and the following 15 reference items appeared via this link. If you have a specific query then please email historycentre@culturecoventry.com and we will aim to assist you. Many thanks, Victoria.

Thanks for the reply Victoria. I know that there are a substantial number of images amongst the History Centre collection that were not part of the Pictures of Coventry online collection, including images in books and boxes eg there is a sketch of the Cow Lane Bushill & Sons factory and a drawing of the end of the Bridewell on the St John's side of the Bablake boys' school, these are not recorded anywhere else as far as I know. It's very interesting to hear that there are new collections from the Council that are making their way to the Herbert. I've examined the images on Historic England and am endlessly surprised at the wealth of images that are being added to the internet. I periodically come across paintings in other museums and I wonder if you're going to have a shout out to them to see if there are any gems that could be added for the period of the City of Culture? I believe there might be another William Henry Brooke collection out there. Wouldn't it be magical if it could be borrowed. If you need any help identifying locations of views within the city, I would be happy to assist, eg I've managed to place almost all of the Dr Troughton sketches to their exact location on the Board of Health map. Good luck with your preparations for 2021.

We now have full free access to British Newspaper archive available on computer no 3 within Coventry Archives covering the following newspapers: Coventry Evening Telegraph [1891-1979] Coventry Herald [1808-1940] Coventry Standard [1836-1969] Coventry Times [1855-1889] Please request this computer when booking for the 2.5 hours max slot per person per day. Charges from 50p per A4 page apply for print outs.

From 19th July Coventry Archives Covid19 guidance has altered. We recognise that it may take some time for visitors to adjust to the new arrangements made possible under step 4, and that some visitors may be taking their first steps back into the archives and other public spaces. We therefore recommend that all visitors continue to wear face coverings while visiting the archives, as a courtesy to other visitors and our staff and in line with government guidance. We will also encourage all visitors to be considerate and maintain a reasonable distance from each other while in our area. Therefore, some of our computers will continue to remain covered for the time being. Booking appointments for the research room are extended to all day 10.30am-3.30pm per person and the maximum amount of references has increased back to 10 at any one time. Computers/microfilm readers must still be booked - these can be booked all day but please note that only the first 2 hours are free. Each additional hour costs £2.00. Tables will no longer need to be booked but revert to a first come first served basis. If you are booking all day then the cost of a photography permit has been revised as follows: £10.00 for students/elders, £15.00 for other adults non-commercial and £40.00 for adults working for a commercial sector. Coventry Archives Team.

Some of you may have seen the announcement about the launch of the 1921 census which has been digitised and will be made available through Find My Past. This will be the only source of availability as a microfilm version has not been created. We currently have free access to all records and transcriptions available on Find My Past through a Library subscription. However this will not be the case with the 1921 census. More details are available here on the Find My Past website. The cost for access will therefore be £2.50 for every record transcript and £3.50 for every original record image. For all 12-month Pro subscribers, there will be a 10% discount on any 1921 Census purchases. Find My Past/National Archives are charging for access in order to cover the cost of digitising and transcribing the 18,235,242 images created from the records. We have been informed by Find My Past that at some point it will become part of the Library subscription but that date has not been announced as yet. I know that this will be disappointing for some of you but regretfully this decision is not of our making. Once Find My Past/National Archives do announce the date that the 1921 Census becomes part of the Library subscription then we shall update you all. Victoria Northridge Archives Manager

After the earlier disappointing news of the 1921 census I now have some good news. Thanks to Coventry Family History Society's hard work, we have been provided with a series of databases of original resources that they have kindly given us CD copies of. These have all been downloaded onto Computer no.7 for searching. Titles include Holy Trinity burials 1837-1900, Foleshill St Laurence Parish registers 1564-1837 and Windmill Road cemetery burials 1909-1994, to name but a few. There is also an update to London Road cemetery burials 1972-1994. Please ring on 024 7623 7583 or email at archives@culturecoventry.com to book a slot during our normal opening hours. Victoria Northridge Archives Manager

Hurrah, Coventry Collections is working again.