Collection: Mary Hickmott Churchyard Collection
- Date:
- 1986 - 2007
- Reference:
- MXH01
- Type:
- Collection Containing Photographic, Electronic And Textual Material
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Description
This material has not yet been fully catalogued. Copyright, date, and quantity information for this record may be incomplete or inaccurate.
The collection contains 35mm slides, photographic prints, notes and index cards relating to churchyards in England, Scotland and Wales.
The collection was created by Mrs. Mary Hickmott between 1986 and 2007 during visits to churchyards. Her main interest, and therefore the strength of the collection, lies in headstones up until about 1840. She did, however, record later stones where they were attractive, hand crafted and unusual. There are also images of some table and chest tombs, Celtic crosses, and anything that Mrs. Hickmott considered unusual in a churchyard. Examples of the latter include sheep grazing (slide nos. 579 and 3675), a cattle grid (3903), headstones where mistakes had been made in the carving (284 and 729), and inscriptions record unusual deaths (315 and print number 527).
Mrs. Hickmott's interest in headstones was primarily decorative: the design and craftsmanship of the carving and the style of the lettering. Any inscriptions recorded are incidental to this and would not provide a useful resource for identifying the names of people buried in particular churchyards.
Most of the collection is on 35mm slides but since 2005, Mrs. Hickmott began taking digital photographs and these are stored on CD and provided as prints in the collection. For all of her images she made handwritten notes including her general comment on the level of interest to her in a particular churchyard and the condition of the headstones themselves. To the notes she sometimes added printed items (such as church guide books), and further photographs.
There are also two surveys of headstones in the churchyard of Holy Trinity church in High Littleton, Somerset; some 35mm negative strips of some of the images in the collection; and a card index to locations, types of carvings and headstones, and dates which provides access to the collection.
A handlist to the collection is available.
Archival History
The collection was given to the NMR by Mrs. Hickmott in 2008.
Rights
Contact Historic England Archive