Whether your interest in history is personal, academic, or just a more general desire to find out how our forebears lived, the Linton and District History Society offers a friendly welcome and helpful advice.
We meet on the first Wednesday of every month except January, 7 for 7:30 p.m., in Linton Village Hall. Tea and coffee are available at the start of the meeting. Annual membership is £20, and speaker meetings are free to members. Visitors are always welcome, and pay £5 per meeting.
Our programmes aim to cover local, national and international history – there is something for all interests, and we welcome suggestions for topics.
For all enquiries, contact the Society’s Secretary, Mrs Teresa Squires sec.lintonhistsoc@gmail.com
Our October meeting is the Founders Lecture, and this year we are honoured to be visited by Professor Ron Hutton. Prof Hutton will be talking to us about Oliver Cromwell – Saint or Sinner. Cromwell remains a controversial figure; to some the hero of the common man against Royalist tyranny, to others the ultimate traitor who oversaw the execution of an anointed King.
Programme 2026
| 7th October | Professor Ron Hutton | FOUNDERS’ LECTURE: Oliver Cromwell: Saint or Sinner? |
| 4th November | Michael Fass | Wellington’s Warehouse: The great military depot at Weedon Bec |
| 2nd December | Fiona Morison | A summer in colonial Simla |
Programme 2027
| January 2027 | NO LECTURE | |
| 3rd February | Neil Thornton | Henry Hook VC: A Rorke’s Drift Hero |
| 3rd March | Roger Davies | CHAIRMAN’S LECTURE: Defending Herefordshire in WW2 |
| 7th April | Andy Tatchell | AGM and speaker The Restoration of Mordiford Mill |
Review of our September meeting
Well-known local author Bill Laws provided LDHS members with a spirited talk on The Herefordshire Pomona. This is the title of his new book published by Logaston Press. The speaker relayed details of the long history in this county that surrounded the creation of a Pomona and its importance in giving names to all the varieties of apples and pears growing in the area. Early on it was John Knight of Wormsley who promoted the need for a Pomona to be succeeded in the mid-19th century by Dr Henry Bull based in Hereford. Dr Bull was a President of the Woolhope Club. With co-editor Robert Hogg, he produced the now famous two-volume work, The Herefordshire Pomona published in seven parts between 1876 and 1885.It contained full descriptions and paintings of 423 varieties of apples and pears. The key illustrators were both female, being Dr Bull’s sister Edith and the water-colourist Alice Ellis. Members were intrigued to know that Linton vicar, Reverend Edward Palin (d.1903) had been a member of the Woolhope Club and his daughter, Fanny, living at The Vicarage in Linton had been in regular correspondence with Alice Ellis. The sad demise of Herefordshire orchards since 1900 was also highlighted. Where once our orchard acreage had exceeded all other counties in England put together now only 16% of land use in the county is classified as “orchard”. Launched as no more than a collection of ‘coloured figures and descriptions of the most esteemed kinds of Apples and Pears,’ The Herefordshire Pomona is clearly a remarkable book and it is considered by many as a landmark in British publishing.
Family history
We have transferred the main part of our Archive to the Herefordshire Archive and Record Centre, which is also the main port of call for those researching family history. Some of our parish records can be accessed via this link
Committee members :
Roger Davies (Chairman)
Teresa Squires (Secretary)
Nic Walker (Treasurer)
Pamela Bruce
Dick Fowler