19th century

Tenure of real property in the island of Guernsey

22nd September 2015

From The Law Magazine and Law Review, or Quarterly Journal of Jurisprudence, May-August 1859, pp. 23 ff. Probably a comment on the reaction in Government circles to the Commissioners' Report of 1848, it also happens to provide a helpful explanation of the distribution of landed property and rentes in Guernsey. 'When the right and power is preserved among a free people of regulating their own legal and social customs, the habit of self-government thus engendered generally saves their country from the anomaly and inconvenience of the institutions and procedure being immediately at variance with the wants and character of the people.'

Guernsey's Historical and Antiquarian Society

9th September 2015

First annual meeting.

Letters to Edith Carey

26th August 2015

Correspondence on local and family history from the Edith Carey collection.

Rozel Terrace School

6th August 2015

BOARDING AND DAY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES, conducted by Mrs S SPURGEON. From the Comet, February 1853.

Roadside letter-boxes

6th August 2015

From the Comet, February 1853.

On board the Tulloch Castle to Melbourne, 1852

27th July 2015

Journal Francis William Nicolle 1852, Priaulx Library Collection

The 1850s gold rush in Australia attracted thousand of immigrants and would-be prospectors, and Guernsey was by no means immune to gold fever. 18-year old William Francis Nicolle recorded his voyage to Melbourne in the summer of 1852 in his Journal, which was generously donated to the Library by Stephen Foote. Nicolle followed this with an account of his return from Australia in the freezing cold on board the Avon. His Journal also includes a substantial amount of family history material (Nicolle, De Garis, Lainé, Lamble &c.), as well as other accounts of later voyages made on board cargo ships. He was a carpenter by trade, and the book also includes carefully written instructions for calculations, presumably for reference purposes. Finally, his poem in memory of Nicholas de Mouilpied, who died on the voyage out, aged 22.

A stroll through town as it was 70 years ago

23rd July 2015

Commercial Arcade circa 1903, Priaulx library Collection

From the Star, July 1944. Funeral cheese and scarlet eggs, Granny Ogier, and a leopard and a Lamb. The illustration shows the Arcade around 1903; the shops are Roger's the jewellers and Cox's bootmakers.

A m'en Pierro

17th June 2015

Unidentified woman photo Maguire, Priaulx Library Collection

A poem about love, a proposal and marriage, by 'Nannon.' Love conquers all. First published in The Star of June 18, 1881, which provided Guernsey French vocabulary help for readers who might need it. The photograph is a carte de visite style portrait of an unidentified young lady, photographed by Maguire of the Grange, from the Library collection. If you can tell us who this 'Nannon' was, please let us know!

Death of a Waterloo veteran

17th June 2015

From The Star, 18 June 1881.

Les Petites Ecoles

16th June 2015

Advertisment from Aubrey's Business Directory 1913, Priaulx Library Collection

Chapter 47 of Les Soeurs des Saints Coeurs de Jésus et de Marie, by the Abbé A Leroy, Rennes: Simon. The foundation of the first Catholic primary schools in Guernsey. [The boarding school in the 1913 advertisement shown above was in Cordier Hill, but was run by a different order. For the history of this order, the Sisters of Mercy, in Guernsey, founded from Brighton, Sussex, and prominent in the education of islanders, see the Centenary Souvenir (1868-1968), in the Library collection. They acquired Blanchelande in 1956 from the Sisters des Saints Coeurs.]

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