The following list gives details of Surrey Record Society volumes which are still available to purchase. Orders for volumes should be directed to the Honorary Secretary of Surrey Record Society, c/o Surrey History Centre, 130 Goldsworth Road, Woking, Surrey, GU21 6ND (Tel: 01483 518737; Email: shs@surreycc.gov.uk).
A full set of the Society's publications can be consulted at Surrey History Centre.
The prices given in the list below are those payable by non-members, and the publications can be purchased on our online shop. Members receive the most recent volume free with their membership and can purchase older volumes for £2 per volume plus p&p as shown. A number of volumes are now available free of charge to members and non-members alike, as indicated in the list.
Overseas members and customers: Please email shs@surreycc.gov.uk for a quote for postage costs.
Vol XV. Surrey Manorial Accounts edited by H. M. Briggs. Paperback reprint 1968.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £5. Postage and packing £2.50 UK only.
Manorial accounts are a crucial source for rural society, agricultural organisation and economic life in the middle ages. This volume provides a catalogue and index of surviving pre-1300 account rolls for the entire county and prints in full four account rolls for the manors of Malden, 1270-71 and 1300-01, Farley, 1277-78, and Thorncroft in Leatherhead, 1282-83, all of which manors belonged to Merton College, Oxford. The Thorncroft roll includes a parallel translation.
Vol XIX. Surrey Fines, 1509 to 1558 edited by C.A.F. Meekings. Paperback reprint 1968.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £5. Postage and packing £3 UK only.
The enormous series of Feet of Fines in The National Archives, enrolled among the records of the Court of Common Pleas, is a vital source to local and family historians, documenting as it does conveyances and agreements relating to the transfer of land. In 1894 Surrey Archaeological Society, published a volume listing Surrey Fines from the reign of Richard I to that of Henry VII and this volume documents in fuller detail fines of the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI and Mary I. It includes a meticulous introduction by C A F Meekings, the renowned legal historian.
Vol XXV. Wimbledon Vestry Minutes, 1747 to 1788 edited by E.M. Dance, 1964.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £5. Postage and packing £3 UK only.
The responsibilities of parish vestries in the early modern period were many and varied and they constituted the fundamental unit of local government across most of the country. This volume is a calendar of the earliest surviving vestry minute book for the parish of Wimbledon and provides copious evidence for the involvement of the parish in the care of the poor, the upkeep of the church, the maintenance of local roads and the interaction with the county authorities.
Vol XXVII. Mitcham Settlement Examinations 1784 to 1814 edited by B. Berryman, 1973.
Free to members and non-members. Postage and packing £2.50 UK only.
This volume is an edition of three volumes of settlement examinations created by the Mitcham parish overseers, as they grappled with the problem of administering the poor laws and alleviating their impact on the parish. The examinations provide evidence of migration into the parish, of changing attitudes of the parish authorities to the problem of the poor and bear witness to the harsh lives of many unfortunates.
Vol. XXVIII. Kingston upon Thames Register of Apprentices 1563 to 1703 edited by A. Daly, 1974.
Free to members and non-members. Postage and packing £3 UK only.
This volume reproduces the register of apprentices maintained by the Borough of Kingston upon Thames, following the passing of the Statute of Artificers in 1562. It is a fundamental source for the study of the economic life of the town and the tradesmen who sustained it. An appendix reproduces the borough corporation's ordinances governing the trading companies, of 1579/80, 1606 and 1635.
Vol XXIX. Ashley House (Walton-on-Thames) Building Accounts 1602 to 1607 edited by M.E. Blackman, 1977.
Free to members and non-members. Postage and packing £2.50 UK only.
Ashley House, later Ashley Park, in Walton on Thames, was built by Lady Jane Berkeley in 1602-5 and stood, although altered, until around 1925. Lady Berkeley's servant Richard Mason kept a detailed set of accounts recording its erection and later minor building works. These accounts allow a valuable insight into the local building industry, sources of supplies, rates of pay of workmen and quantities of materials required.
Vol XXXI. The 1235 Surrey Eyre. Part I Introduction and Biographia edited by C.A.F Meekings and prepared for press by D. Crook, 1979.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £10.00 (see XXXVII for Special Offer). Postage and packing £3 UK only.
Vol XXXII. The 1235 Surrey Eyre. Part II Text and Translation edited by C.A.F. Meekings and prepared for press by D. Crook, 1983.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £10.00 (see XXXVII for Special Offer). Postage and packing £3.50 UK only.
Vol XXXVII. Index to the 1235 Surrey Eyre prepared by S. Neal and edited by D. Robinson, 2002.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £10. Postage and packing £2.50 UK only.
(Special Offer Vols XXXI, XXXII & XXXVII all for £10 plus £7.50 p & p)
This edition of the only surviving plea roll from the Surrey Eyre of 1234-6 provides a full text and translation of the earliest extant roll from any Surrey Eyre. It is a major source for the county, its government, the administration of civil and criminal justice, and for hundreds of persons and places within the shire at a period for which evidence is sparse. In the first part, C.A.F Meekings' introduction and biographical essays provide an authoritative analysis of the roll and the legal processes its records and also collects together most of the surviving evidence for many of the leading men of the shire. In the second, the transcription of the Latin text is provided together with a parallel translation by David Crook.
Vol XXXIII. Minutes of the Board of Directors of the Reading, Guildford and Reigate Railway Company edited by E. Course, 1988.
Free to members and non-members. Postage and packing £5.50 UK only.
The coming of the railway to Surrey permanently transformed the county in the mid 19th century. This volume records the minutes of the Board of Directors of the Reading, Guildford and Reigate Railway Company from 1845 when the line was first proposed, through the cutting of the first sod in 1847, the opening of the line in 1849, and the company's amalgamation with the South Eastern Railway Company in 1852. The financing, tendering process, construction of the railway and the interaction of the company with the local populace and with other local transport undertakings are chronicled in the minutes.
Vol XXXIV. Parson and Parish in Eighteenth Century Surrey: Replies to the Bishops' Visitations edited by W.R. Ward, 1994.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £5. Postage and packing £3 UK only.
This volume collects together the surviving responses provided by the parish clergy of the Archdeaconry of Surrey to the visitations of the Bishops of Winchester in 1725, 1764 and 1788. The returns allow a valuable insight into the condition of the church, the population of the parish, the provision of services, the number of Catholics and dissenters, and the incidence of local charities and schools. An appendix reproduces the responses to the Archbishop of Canterbury's visitations of his Surrey peculiars in 1717, 1720, 1758 and 1788.
Vol XXXV. The 1851 Religious Census: Surrey transcribed by C. Webb and edited by D. Robinson, 1997.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £5. Postage and packing £3.50 UK only.
The Census of Religious Worship, 1851, was the first and last official religious census on the mainland of Britain. Prompted in part by a concern that dissent was flourishing and Anglican attendance declining, in part by a Victorian passion for statistical dissection, the returns provide crucial evidence for numbers of sittings, congregational sizes, frequency of services, endowments and provision of Sunday Schools. The introduction by Dr David Robinson evaluates the census and the accuracy of the picture it presents of religious behaviour in mid-Victorian Surrey.
Vol XXXVI. Gunpowder Mills: Documents of the 17th and 18th Centuries edited by A.G. Crocker, G.M. Crocker, K.R. Fairclough and M.J. Wilks, 2000.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £5. Postage and packing £3 UK only.
By the 1540s, England had begun domestic production of gunpowder at Rotherhithe on the Thames. Surrey remained a prominent county for its manufacture and in the late 17th century the powder mills at Chilworth were by far the largest in the country. This volume reproduces a deed of sale and inventory of Carshalton Gunpowder Mills, 1661, an inventory of William Buckler, 1678, detailing his powdermills at East Molesey, Wandsworth and Faversham, an inventory of Thomas Pearse and Company, 1753, relating to the mills at Chilworth and Faversham, and a letter book of William Tinkler, 1790-91, the then owner of the Chilworth mills. The introduction provides a brief history of the manufacture of gunpowder to the end of the 18th century and a detailed, illustrated, description of the manufacturing process.
Vol XXXVIII. The 1258 to 1259 Special Eyre of Surrey and Kent edited with an introduction by Andrew Hershey, 2004.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £10. Postage and packing £3.50 UK only.
In 1258-9 the recently appointed justiciar of England, Hugh Bigod, visited Surrey and Kent to hear the complaints and pleas brought to him by commissions of knights appointed in each county. Bigod's appointment was a key part of the enforcement of the proposals for the reform of Henry III's government, the Provisions of Oxford, which the king was obliged to accept in June 1258. The surviving plea roll, transcribed and translated here, allows researchers access to a key source for the quality of local government during the personal rule of Henry III and the grievances against local officials and royal favourites which had fed this crisis in the king's reign.
Vol XXXIX. Surrey Probate Inventories 1558 to 1603 transcribed by Marion Herridge, 2005.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £15. Postage and packing £5.50 UK only.
For any student of the domestic interior, levels of wealth, the circulation of goods, the tools and utensils of various trades, indeed of the material surroundings in which people from all sections of society lived out their lives, probate inventories are a fundamental source. The inventories and valuations of domestic goods were drawn up after a person's death as part of the process of proving the will and this volume brings together transcripts of surviving inventories from the reign of Elizabeth I. Together they provide a fascinating window on the way people lived, from the bustle of Southwark to the remote rural areas in the south of the county.
Vol XL The 1263 Surrey Eyre edited with an introduction by Susan Stewart, 2006.
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £15. Postage and packing £6 UK only.
The Eyre, a judicial visitation by centrally appointed justices, was one of the chief instruments through which royal power was brought to bear in the localities and through which the people of the shires hope to find satisfaction and justice in their complaints and grievances against their neighbours and local officers. The 1263 Eyre, the third to be published by the Society, followed Henry III's reassertion of royal authority after the crisis that had erupted in 1258. The records of the Eyre, covering both civil and criminal pleas, throw considerable light on the life and government of the county and on crime and criminal justice in the middle ages. In her introduction, the editor pays particular attention to the role of women in the Eyre, as evidence for their legal and social status.
Vol XLI Surrey Gaol and Session House, 1791 to 1824 ed. Christopher Chalklin, 2009
Price to members £2. Price to non-members £10. Postage and packing £2.50 UK only.
In 1790, the Surrey justices determined to build a new county gaol and session house in Horsemonger Lane in Newington. Between 1791 and 1824, a group of trustees appointed from the justices, oversaw the construction of the new prison, session house and house of correction and the repayment of the mortgages of the county rates to cover cost. The new gaol opened in 1798, the house of correction in 1800. This volume includes a calendar of the two minute books and the account book of the trustees; together they are a rare survival in the detail they provide of the construction, furnishing and financing of a major public building of this period.
Vols XLII & XLIII The Register of John de Stratford, Bishop of Winchester, 1323 to 1333 ed. Roy Martin Haines, 2010-2011
Price to members £4. Price to non-members £25 (2 volumes). Postage and packing £9.50 UK only.
John de Stratford, Bishop of Winchester, 1323-1333, and Archbishop of Canterbury, 1333-48, was one of the most significant English prelates of the first half of the fourteenth century. He was appointed to Winchester by the Pope against the will of King Edward II, was later involved in the deposition of that monarch and also fell out with Edward III while chancellor for his alleged failure to provide adequate support for the King's campaign in Flanders in 1340. His register includes entries reflecting the political engagement of the papacy as well as the affairs of church and state in England and, in particular, church and social life across Surrey and Hampshire. The editor of this two volume edition is Professor Roy Haines, biographer of both Stratford and Edward II, and author of many notable works on the medieval church.
Vol XLIV Warriors at Home, 1940 to 1942: Three Surrey Diarists ed. Patricia and Robert Malcolmson, 2012
£2 to members. Price to non-members £25. Postage and packing £2.50 UK only.
World War II made a massive impact on life in Surrey. The diaries of Helen Lloyd of Albury and Viola Bawtree and Leonard Adamson of Sutton show its effects not only on the three diarists but on residents of rural and urban Surrey, including those, mainly from London, who found themselves in the county through a variety of voluntary and involuntary circumstances. Helen Lloyd's and Leonard Adamson's diaries also show the massive commitment of civilians in response to the demands of wartime, Helen Lloyd as Centre Organiser for Women's Voluntary Services in Guildford Rural District and Leonard Adamson as Air Raid Precautions Post Warden in Belmont. The diaries bring to life the impact of rationing, refugees, evacuees and, above all, the threat and actuality of bombing but also the reactions of the diarists and their friends, neighbours and relations to the challenging time in which they lived.
Vol XLV Royal Justice in Surrey, 1258 to 1269 ed. Susan Stewart, 2013
£2 to members. Price to non-members £25. Postage and packing £2.50 UK only.
The Eyre 'de terris datis' of 1268 was established in order to restore peace and rehabilitate those who had been implicated in the political disorder which had convulsed England up to and beyond Simon de Montfort's defeat at Evesham in 1265. The record of this eyre along with the Forest Regard Roll of c.1258 and the Forest Eyre roll of 1269 complement and extend the insights into the history of Surrey in the later years of Henry III provided by the Society's recent publications of 'The 1258-9 Special Eyre of Surrey and Kent' and 'The 1263 Surrey Eyre'. They throw considerable light on life in Surrey in an age of political tension and turmoil.
In each case a transcription of the Latin of the original document is followed by a full English translation.
Vol XLVI The Accounts for the Manor of Esher in the Winchester Pipe Rolls, 1235 to 1376 ed. David Stone, 2017
£4 to members. Price to non-members £30. Postage and packing £3.50 UK only.
The Winchester Pipe Rolls are the most famous series of estate accounts that survive for medieval England, particularly because of their early start date and astonishing level of detail. In the early 1230s, the bishopric of Winchester bought the Surrey manor of Esher and the accounts for the manor in the Pipe Rolls record a prodigious amount of information about the development and management of the manor and the lives of the people who lived and worked there. The accounts reveal how this elite landscape was laid out and its agricultural resources exploited and also provide glimpses of the fortunes of the local peasantry through a period of climate change, periodic famine, livestock disease and, notoriously, the Black Death.
The volume contains annotated translations of forty-four of Esher's surviving accounts, supported by a comprehensive introduction and statistical analysis by Dr Stone, a specialist in the history of medieval agriculture.
Vol XLVII Surrey Census of Nomads ed. Alan Wright, 2020
£2 to members. Price to non-members £20. Postage and packing £3.50 UK only.
In 1913 Surrey County Council organised two 'censuses of nomads' in the county. These provide a remarkably detailed survey of the itinerant population in Surrey at the time. Although individuals are not identified, the censuses identify the different kinds of people travelling within Surrey simply in search of work or as Gypsies and others for whom a travelling lifestyle was part of their culture, including showmen, hawkers, fruit pickers, charcoal burners, general labourers and tramps. The number of men, women and children in each encampment on the day of the census is recorded along with the type of dwelling they occupied, including tents, vans, caravans, sheds, barns and stables.
This groundbreaking volume publishes transcripts of the census returns in full, along with a selection of correspondence from County Council and private archives over the preceding fifteen years, relating to the relationship between the travelling and settled communities and the planning and implementation of the census.
Vol XLVIII Loving and Obedient? Family Correspondence of the Mores of Loseley Park, 1537 to 1686 ed. Eliza Wheaton, 2023
Free to members. Price to non-members £25. Postage and packing £3.50 UK only.
The archive of the More-Molyneux family of Loseley Park is rich in correspondence of the members of the More family in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This volume presents the lives and preoccupations of the women of the family through their letters and related documents. They needed to perform the vital role of running their own households and also to hold together and protect the family network and they possessed their own channels of political news and influence. There was thus an inherent contradiction at the heart of the image of the perfect gentlewoman. She should be submissive and modest, but also educated, competent, and capable of wielding authority. Above all this correspondence throws light on many subjects which loom large in personal life in all ages but are not well documented in the surviving records of past centuries.
