Abstract
Records of local weather events are a neglected resource for historians wanting to explain family events and family patterns. In the UK, the collation of weather reports commenced in 1860, Gordon Manley’s work in the 1950s produced the Central England Temperature series from 1659, and the National Archive and National Meteorological Archive hold many individual records, including over a thousand private weather diaries. The family historian can use documents associated with the parish chest to support the investigative cycle of research, analysis, hypothesis and proof. With that method in place, explanations can be developed from accessible and easily understood sources. The process leads us towards a closer understanding of our ancestors’ relationship with their world – the weather is an experience which we share with them, and a broad awareness of the local climate can provide a means of ‘colouring in’ their lives.
Highlights
There cannot be a local history journal that has not published at least one story of their town or village’s ‘Great Storm’
Flood and gale fall so into folklore that the traditions of any parish can hardly be recited without mention of them. These spectacular events mean that the link between weather and local history has become well established, but few family historians bring the elements fully into play; certainly, weather is not seen as an essential consideration to be covered when piecing together the lives of our ancestors
This article has focused on alerting the genealogist to the degree that weather might have an impact on our understanding of sudden and unexplained changes in the family timelines
Summary
There cannot be a local history journal that has not published at least one story of their town or village’s ‘Great Storm’. Flood and gale fall so into folklore that the traditions of any parish can hardly be recited without mention of them These spectacular events mean that the link between weather and local history has become well established, but few family historians bring the elements fully into play; certainly, weather is not seen as an essential consideration to be covered when piecing together the lives of our ancestors. By exploring this link, this article will add one more worthwhile option to the armoury of the family historian who is seeking to explain family disruption and some of those peculiar comments found in wills, registers and vestry ephemera. Another entry laid out the consequences for the parish of Youlgrave in Derbyshire in 1614:
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