Common Cause: Through Our Ancestors’ Eyes
Lead Partner
What has been achieved?
Twenty commoning families have recorded their memories and given photographs to a new collection of Forest history.
The archive of commoning, forestry and agriculture in the New Forest, has been created to ensure the history of the Forest is saved and made available to future generations.
The archive includes:
- 782 scanned photographs from 20 commoning families.
- 14 oral recordings of people, which have been transcribed and linked to 500 of the photographs.
All the photographs, audio files and transcripts are stored at the Christopher Tower Library at the New Forest Heritage Centre, Lyndhurst.
Much of the collection is now searchable on the New Forest Knowledge website.
Legacy
The ‘commoning collection’ will continue to be expanded and where possible the collection will be publicly accessible and maintained as an important record of the history of commoning in the New Forest. It will be used to educate current and future generations about the importance of commoning.
Contact details
Charlotte Lines – New Forest Commoners Defence Association
Email: charlotte@realnewforest.org
