Church & Village Scrapbook
The Village Scrapbook (or Log-Book) was started by the then Vicar of St Leonard’s, Revd Frank Conquest Clare in 1923, and was continued until the late 1980s by his successors. It is a unique record of village life over 60 years and a primary source of contemporary history.
In it you can find first-hand accounts of the discovery of the wall paintings in the 1920s, of life during World War Two, the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth, and of the many ambitious fund-raising events of the 1960s to 80s. There are records of everyday life in the village, its regular rhythms across the years including the great festivals of Christmas and Easter, and the exploits of many of the characters who lived here.
Physically it is a foolscap bound volume, (approx. 205 mm wide x 300 mm tall x 70mm thick) of some 270 pages, a few of which are blank. It contains a mix of hand-written entries by seven incumbents (vicars), with pasted-in or otherwise attached newspaper cuttings, event programmes, photographs, letters and other documents.
Digitisation
The Scrapbook has now been scanned almost in full and posted in the Archive section of the Flamstead Heritage website as a series of PDF documents. In addition to the 271 bound pages, the scan has a further 112 pages of those attached items that cannot be read directly on the page, for example from a multi-page booklet or when one item obscures another.
There are also some separate, loose items that were stored with the scrapbook. Some of these are recent.
The author of most entries, in particular the handwritten ones, is assumed to be the incumbent (vicar) at the time. However, this is not always the case. For example, some entries appear to be by churchwardens, e.g. during a vacancy, or possibly by an assistant priest. The last section in the bound book seems to have been compiled by the then virger.
Entries are not always in strict date order, and many are simply undated. Dates can sometimes be worked out from the event described.
To ensure longevity, PDF/A archive format has been used. Text, where typed or printed, is searchable through the use of OCR technology. Page numbers have been added, and a page-by-page contents list has been produced. The bound pages are reproduced at actual size (Foolscap 205mm x 300mm). For convenience the attachments have been scaled to the same size.
Page numbers can be found in bright green in the bottom left-hand corner of each page. Numbers on the bound pages follow Revd. Clare’s original scheme: 1, 2, 3, … Where there are pasted-in (“attached”) items, these have for example the form 125/1, 125/2 etc. for the items attached to page 125.
It has proved challenging to scan and the resulting quality is variable. Some items have not been scanned, specifically a few orders of service, or in a small number of cases where it would have been necessary to unstick items, potentially causing damage to the book.
Copyright
It is a fascinating document and deserves to be published and made available online. However, it is virtually impossible to secure all the necessary publishing rights. Except for the hand-written entries, for most items such as documents or photographs, there are very few indications of the authors.
Justification for Publication
1. The authors must have contributed material such as hand-written notes and photographs intending and expecting them to be made available (although they could hardly have foreseen online publishing).
Indeed, Revd Conquest Clare stated on the very first page
“Note. … I have kept a Memorandum Book of events and discoveries of interest in connection with the parish… This book, which is my personal property, contains letters and notes affecting persons still living and some of the notes etc. are inevitably of a controversial hue (no doubt he was referring to his dispute with Sir Guy Saunders Sebright). … my intention is that it shall belong to this parish church at a future date, … on my death, as happened with the Memorandum of my predecessor, the Revd. W. H. F. Hinde …”
2. Since Revd. Conquest Clare, the book has been the property of the church. Although clergy are considered ”free agents” for this purpose, copyright to material they create as part of their duties is generally considered to pass onto future incumbents. All church-owned material in the scrapbook is published with the full consent of its present (December 2024) owner, i.e. the incumbent.
3. In most cases, the older material will no longer be subject to copyright as it will be more that 70 years since the author’s death.
4. Newspaper cuttings are generally quite brief, a small fraction of the whole edition.
5. Most other “pasted-in” print materials such as event programmes were written for the church and photographs taken for it.
Nonetheless, if there is any material that is sensitive or infringes anyone’s rights, where appropriate we will remove it. Flamstead Heritage’s publishing policies and processes can be found at https://www.flamsteadheritage.org/about/notices/.
Flamstead Heritage, December 2024