Dr Lucy-Anne Taylor gave members of the Henley Archaeological & Historical Group a fascinating presentation on early sound and musical instruments, with recordings and practical demonstrations, on 3rd February. There is archaeological evidence for musical instruments dating back tens of thousands of years, but Lucy-Anne concentrated on wind instruments of the 9th to the 11th

On 6th January, Tim Healey returned to Henley to give an entertaining and informative talk to members of the Henley Archaeological and Historical Group about the droving of cattle, sheep and other animals. Droving has been carried out from ancient times until the 19th century to bring animals from Wales to market in London, often through Oxfordshire,

On 2nd December, Adrian Cox, an archaeologist with the National Trust, spoke to members of the Henley  Archaeological and Historical Group about the recent work to restore  the White Horse of Uffington in association with members of the local community, and  on on his  excavations this summer  at Greys Court. These excavations took place on the Oval Lawn, formerly

On 4th November the social and postal historian John Rogers spoke to members of the Henley Archaeological and Historical Group on ‘Kings, Boxes and Dots’, a brief history of the Post Office. Nationally, the post office network grew along the roads radiating from London. Delivery charges (paid by the recipient) depended on the distance ridden along

The season of regular meetings of the Henley Archaeological and Historical Group got off to a start on 7th October with a lecture by Mark Stevens of the Royal Berkshire Archives on the History of Reading Prison from Georgian Times to the First World War. The first prison was built by the County in 1785 on

This year’s special lecture of the Henley Archaeological and Historical Group (joined by members of the Henley Society) was given on 10th September by the historian Helen Carr on Sceptred Isle: A New History of the Fourteenth Century.  She retold the history of the dramatic and transformative century, focusing on the characters and psychologies of

The latest meeting of the Henley Archaeological and Historical Group on 3rd June featured a talk by Heather Adams of the Marlow Museum on the lives of Percy Bysshe Shelley and Mary Woolstonecraft and their connection with the town of Marlow. Percy was born in 1792 into a family of the minor nobility. After unhappy schooldays,

Liz Woolley spoke to the Henley Archaeological and Historical Group on 6th May about Children and War, describing their experiences in Oxfordshire during the Second World War. This was extremely timely, given Henley’s celebration of the 80th anniversary of VE Day, and supplied useful wider context for the Group’s own research on what life was like in

The speaker at the latest Henley Archaeological and Historical Group meeting on 1st April was Dr Wendy Morrison, Heritage and Archaeology Manager at Chilterns National Landscape. Wendy told us about the follow-up from the ‘Beacons of the Past’ project. This project used Lidar laser mapping of the landscape, which showed the shapes of archaeological features