Treasure trove of Great War archives in Bury is unveiled

A unique project to keep the memories of Bury and the First World War alive is unveiled to the public next week.

Council staff and community volunteers are creating a huge and unprecedented archive to show what life was like in this borough during the Great War.

The first fruits of their labour will go on show at The Met on Saturday 7 November (11am to 3pm), and everyone is welcome to attend.

The initiative started one year ago when the Centre for Cultural Collections (CfCC), formerly Bury Archives and Family History Service, received a Heritage Lottery Grant of £60,800 for a project called 'Bury Remembers the First World War'.

It looked at the extensive records held by several local newspapers which were in print during the First World War. Staff have now compiled more than 10,000 articles from 1914-1916 including local poetry, soldiers letters, adverts, photographs, and much more. They have also gathered around 1,400 soldiers’ face images and obituaries, which will all be available online next year.

The Met event on 7 November will feature poetry/story readings, an art exhibition, free project packs and reproduced war newspapers, refreshments inspired by a First World War recipe book, and much more.

Next year the Centre will focus on 1917-1918 and it has been working with The Bury Collective, a group of passionate local artists, to create unique pieces of art inspired by the content found in the local war newspapers.

Councillor Paddy Heneghan, cabinet member for children, families and culture, said: “The aim of this incredible project is to make all this fascinating information accessible to the people of Bury and beyond on our website. This will include a searchable database of all the Bury soldiers who fell during the First World War, including their photograph and full obituary. We will also be creating an app to map where each fallen soldier lived in Bury so that everyone will have the opportunity to see where these soldiers came from.

“The newspapers for 1914 to 1919 no longer exist as hard copies and are not currently available online, which means that the work of this project will provide unique access to a wealth of local history for the very first time.

“We are now at a stage in the project where we can start to throw a spotlight on what has been extracted so far and the amazing things that have been done with this previously unseen content.”

The CfCC has also made school packs for local schools to help enthuse and educate young people about how the First World War affected their town.

It is also producing two publications based on the content from 1914-1916. The first will be a poetry book with a selection of poems by local people which were submitted to the newspapers at the time of the First World War. It will also contain artwork from The Bury Collective which was inspired by the poetry. The second publication will be a timeline book showing what was happening in the Bury area and to the residents living there throughout 1914-1916 in the form of newspaper articles.

ENDS

Press release issued: 27 October 2015.

Note to editors:

The Centre for Cultural Collections

The Centre for Cultural Collections is the new name for Bury Archives Service and Bury Local and Family History Service. Our new title reflects the amalgamation of both services and positions us firmly within the thriving and dynamic cultural quarter of Bury’s town centre.

The renaming coincides with plans to redevelop our material into ‘special collections’ such as The Archives Collection, The Lancashire Collection, The Borough Collection and The Text Art Archive. We hope to complement these by creating new collections such as The Oral History Collection and The Genealogy/Pedigree Collection.

By amalgamating the various different collections currently held in both parts of the service we will be able to offer our customers a more comprehensive, intuitive and fulfilling visitor experience. Visitors can research their family history using our extensive collection of parish records, local newspaper archives and online resources as well as viewing unique and irreplaceable historical documents.

The Heritage Lottery Fund

From the archaeology under our feet to the historic parks and buildings we love, from precious memories and collections to rare wildlife, we use National Lottery players' money to help people across the UK explore, enjoy and protect the heritage they care about. www.hlf.org.uk”

HLF has invested more than £60million to over 1,000 projects across the UK marking the Centenary of the First World War.Ithas committed at least £6million to 2019 to its First World War: then and now programme which is providing grants between £3,000 and £10,000 to local communities looking to explore and understand their First World War heritage.Larger grants for First World War projects are also available through HLF’s open programmes www.hlf.org.uk/firstworldwar