Milton Abbas Local History Group, Dorset, UK

There have been recent major changes to the way that Facebook allows the administrator to manage group pages. These changes took place without warning and now make it untenable to control content and members.

Facebook make it extremely difficult to to delete a group. For one thing, they don’t tell you how. After much time searching I finally found how to do it. After 1000 clicks I finally managed, so now there is no Milton Abbas Local History Group Facebook page. Any group with say more than 1000 members would be almost impossible to delete.

Apologies to the 143 members who had joined.

Milton Abbas, Dorset. A postcard in The Times. “English Village” Series (Set 11)

Year – undated

Publisher – Photochrom Co. Ltd., London & Tunbridge Wells.

In 1938, The Times collaborated with the Photochrom Company, Ltd. for the exclusive publication of a selection of its most attractive photographs as postcards. The inclusion of Milton Abbas in Dorset speaks to its unique beauty and as a fine example of a quintessential “English Village”. Others included Lenham in Kent and Stanton in Gloucestershire. These were printed in sepia with a matte surface and hand-finished. Each postcard originally sold for two pence and there were six in each series. Here we see a man with his horse & cart walking down “The Street”. The majestic chestnut trees shading the cottages, seen here in vigorous growth, were cut down in the 1953.

Text and image by John Quinn

We have been given a Bible with information on the RIGGS Family. Our transcription of the MS writing is:

Robert Riggs was born August 22nd 1816

Mary wife of Robert Riggs was born July 24th 1816

Ann daughter of Robert & Mary Riggs was born Sep 7 1834

Decd July 15th aged 16 1850

John Lowis Son or Robert & Mary Riggs was born September 27th 1836

Bethia daughter of Robert & Mary Riggs was born January 14th 1839 – died April 3 1874 Aged 35 years

Levi Son of Robert & Mary Riggs was born June 27th 1841

Elizabeth daughter of Robert & Mary Riggs was born April 6th 1844

Jane daughter of Robert & Mary Riggs was born July 24th 1848

Robert Son of Robert & Mary Riggs was born July 20th was born May 14th 1851

Albert [illegible] Son of Robert & Mary Riggs was born Feb 14th 1855

May the Lord bless & keep you well for life Amen

Louis Riggs Born September 27 1836

died January 3 1877

Albert Charles Riggs Was Born Fe 14 1855

A. C. Riggs died May 30 Aged 27 1882

Jane Squibb wife of Fred Squibb died 4th =5 of July 1909

Solomon Squibb of Alln? died 10th of May 1917 buried Blandford Cemetery – 14th May 1917

Robert Riggs from the the Baron Hambro Jany 1874

“Search the Scriptures” “More Precious than Gold”

Jesse Chaffey Son William & Jane Chaffey died of wound april 10th 1918 In Battle

Miss Rolls teacher Hilton School died April 21st 1918

Please contact us if you would like images of the writing or the Bible itself.

Thanks to one of our members, Alistair Bond, we now have an additional 20 books. These are on all topics Dorset, and a starting point for research.

They will be available for members to borrow and are listed on the Members Section of this website.

Our new season of meetings starts on Wednesday 6 Oct in the Reading Rooms, Milton Abbas. For our more distant members, we will also be using ZOOM.

We have had several trial runs and spent many hours researching how best to run a ‘hybrid’ meeting. We are in the process of buying more equipment such as speakers, webcam and microphone, with the additional cost of a ZOOM subscription. Hopefully it will all work on the night!

However, all this takes time to set up and relies on one or two members to sort it all out. Our meetings WILL START AT 19:30 GMT+1. We also need some members to arrive early and set out the chairs and tables and put them away at the end of the meeting.

We ask all our members to please bear with us. We will be audio recording and video recording and the reports and presentations will be available later on the Member’s Section of our website.

Our Old Town Project group have been busy researching our rural Dorset village over the past few years. We have found out the things that you won’t find in the history books – forget mad King George and his profligate and dissolute son, find out how the vast majority of people lived and worked and struggled for justice. Why were six MIlton Abbas men sentenced to two months hard labour by the notorious James Frampton, 30 years before he sentenced the Tolpuddle Martyrs? What had they done, and how did they break the law? This is such an important part of our nation’s culture and heritage that the story of the Milton Abbas Martyrs should be more widely known and appreciated.

Come and find out more at our major new exhibition 28 – 30 August in the Reading Rooms and St James Church Milton Abbas.

We can’t wait to share our research with you!

Do you know how people lived in Georgian Britain? Most of them didn’t go to Bath to take the waters, nor live in towns. Most of them, 80%, worked on the land, were very poorly paid and lived in crowded and dilapidated cottages. All Dorset villages were like this. We have found some bills which show just what the farm labourers were being paid, their names, and what work they were doing throughout the year.

If you would like to know more about them come along to our new major exhibition 28 – 30 August in the Reading Rooms and St James Church Milton Abbas. The farming year is just one of the many features that we will be showing.

To find out more click here.

We very much look forward to discussing all our recent findings with you.