Document of the Month, January 2018: Ruggles-Brise visitors book

Ruth Costello, Archivist

As many of us return from visiting family and friends over the Christmas and New Year period, it’s interesting to look at a document from a recent deposit of records to see how one family recorded their visits to and from relatives.

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These pages are from an album which was used as a combination of an autograph book and a visitors’ book and belonged to one of the Ruggles-Brise family of Finchingfield (Accession A14635 box 19).  It seems to have been taken with the family on visits, as well as being used at the family home of Spains Hall.

The left hand page shows a photograph of Keswick Hall in Norfolk (the home of Agatha Gurney, who later became Agatha Ruggles-Brise).  Members of the family clearly stayed there in January 1903, but remained at Spains Hall in January 1904.  Most of the signatures are by members of the Ruggles-Brise family, including the then owner of Spains Hall, Archibald Weyland, his wife Mabel, some of their children, his brother Harold and sister in law Dorothea.

Does this sketch of ‘The Cake Walk’ show a dance move done by the guests at Keswick Hall celebrating over New Year in 1903?

It’s not clear who is the rider shown falling head first off her horse in the rather alarming sketch.  The self-portrait of a Guardsman is signed as Alan G. Tritton, who we know lived nearby at Lyons Hall, Great Leighs.  It is sobering to see this, knowing that the author of the jokey little drawing was killed in action ten years later in 1914.

A self-portrait sketch showing a rider falling off her horse

Self-portrait sketch by Alan G. Tritton, who was later killed in action during the First World War

This accession is one of just over 200 received by the Essex Record Office last year.  Some may consist of a single photograph and are available promptly to order via our online catalogue; others (like this deposit) may run to a large number of boxes. Work is currently underway to identify, list and box the records, and when this work is complete it will be made available to researchers.

The autograph book will be on display in the ERO Searchroom throughout January 2018.