Sykes Project

The Rev. William Slater Sykes was curate of Holy Trinity Parish from 1895 to 1900. He was a keen antiquarian and member of Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeology Society and wrote nine articles for Transactions:

Here is his Memoriam from Transactions Volume 20, 1950:

The Rev. WILLIAM SLATER SYKES, who died on 2 February 1951 [1950] at the age of 83, had been a member of our Society since 1896. From 1904 onwards he was living outside our district (at first in Hampshire and from 1920 in Birkenhead, where he was for many years chaplain of the hospital), but throughout the long period of his membership he maintained an active interest in the Society's work, giving generous assistance to other students of the history and antiquities of south.west Cumberland, and contributing a number of important articles to our Transactions. He was an exhibitioner of Christ's College, Cambridge, where he graduated in 1886, proceeding to M.A. in 1891; after curacies in Yorkshire he came in 1895 to Millom, as curate of the ancient parish of Holy Trinity, and in 1900 he became vicar of Eskdale, where he remained four years. In both places he devoted his leisure to the study of local history and of ancient sites, and his first three communications to the Society belong to that period : "The pitch-pipes of the rural deanery of Gosforth" (CWz xvi 120-135), "Masons' marks, Millom parish church" (ibidem, 136-137) and "Notes during the restoration of Whicham church" (CWz ii 322-328). Twenty years later his contributions were resumed, with papers on "The parish church of Millom" (CWz xxiv 235-241) and "Notes on Kirksanton `Tenter-runs' and other South Cumberland sites" (ibidem, 242-246), followed by "On the identification of some ancient places in South Cumberland (CW2 xxvi 103-149), "Notes on Corney" (CW2 xxviii 152-156), "The de Boyvils of Millum and Kirksanton" (CW2 xli 15-40) and "Ulf and his descendants" (ibidem, 123-151). But that does not complete the record of his services to the Society. Our honorary member Miss M. C. Fair, who has more than once acknowledged help received from him in her study of the Eskdale district, writes that his work was most patient, thorough and scholarly, and that he was ever ready to give help and advice to other workers appealing to him for aid; and it may be `noted that the late H. S. Cowper, in his paper on "Millom castle and the Hudlestons" (CW2 xxiv 181 f.), was able to make use of a plan and notes put at his disposal by Mr Sykes, and that the recent excavation at Lacra, which the Rev. J. A. Dixon and Miss Clare Fell described in CW2 xlviii 1 f., owed its inception to him. Five years ago he generously presented a considerable series of notes on the Millom area after the Conquest, for deposit at Tullie House (cf. CW2 xlvi 292 f.); and those notes, and his published articles, will be of the greatest value when the time comes for a comprehensive history of south-west Cumberland to be written.

Of his appearance and personality Miss Fair writes as follows : "He was a very slightly built man, with a clean-cut face full of intelligence, alert and keen ‐ even in the last days of his long life, when his eyesight was giving him trouble; but those bright eyes of his missed very little of the sites or the items of archaeological interest which he happened to be examining. He was a most inspiring companion, both in the field and in study or library, and up to the time of his death his critical brain was as capable as ever in dealing with problems over the whole wide range of his special interests. In addition to his qualities as archaeologist and historian he was a skilled gardener, and he left the vicarage garden at Eskdale stocked with choice fruit trees and vegetables."

REV. WILLIAM SLATER SYKES PROJECT

The church wardens at Holy Trinity Church, Millom, hold three notebooks written by Rev Sykes: Two are hand written: "Kirksanton"; "Roads in and through Millom"; and one is typed, "The Place Names of South Cumberland Collected and Annotated."

Project Objectives:

1. Identify all of the note books he wrote about Millom and where they are held.

2. See if can get them scanned.

3. Where necessary transcribe.

4. Bring all the above together and make them available to the public and researchers via Millom and District Local History Society.

We identified three notebooks held at Holy Trinity and another three (or four) at Whitehaven Archives. We then discovered there was another notebook held at Carlisle Library.

Barrow Archives very kindly scanned the three notebooks held at Holy Trinity Church. These have now been transcribed by volunteers and are available below.

The archivist at Whitehaven said the three Sykes notebooks held there were too delicate to be scanned but agreed for us to photograph them. Volunteers Fiona Pervez and Alison Holburn photographed the first 68 pages and Rosanna Cox the remainder of Volume 1. She then photographed volume 2 and 3.

Because of the huge amount that would need transcribing - and because those held at Whitehaven are copies of the original notebooks and are, therefore, easier to read, we gained permission from Cumbria Archives to put the photographs into pdf files and upload them on here.

On completion of the project, Sykes' wish, from 125 years ago, will have come true: his notes will be widely available for those who want to research the history of Millom and Eskdale.

Here is Sykes' introduction which is in volume 1 at Whitehaven archive:

A Millom note book Vol 1

The following notes were commenced when I was curate of the Millom Parish Church 1895-1900 and vicar of Eskdale 1900-1904. Many of them were written before the S Bees Register and the second series of Furness Couchers had been published so that when I lived in Cumberland I had no opportunity of studying on the spot the sites indicated in the charters there. For the identification of places I have had therefore to depend on my note books and recollection aided by ordnance survey maps.

He tells us he left some notebooks at Millom and Eskdale but that one of the ones at Millom was lost and the other one defaced by children; and one of the Eskdale ones was destroyed. He therefore made a copy of them which he sent to CWAAS for safe keeping and by a circuitous route, these ended up at Whitehaven Archives.

Here are the chapter headings:

I A commencement of Annals of Millom.

II Notes on the families of de Boyvil and de Coupland.

III The Manor Roll of Austhwaite.

IV References to local Customarys and admissions.

V Two appeals: Whitbeck and Millom and some extracts from two Acts of Parliament.

VI Millom church accounts and other notes.

VII Eskdale notes.

VIII The xxiv Book of Eskdale and Miterdale?

IX Gossip and scraps.

X Index of Place Names. (This seems to be the same as the one transcribed below: THE PLACE NAMES OF SOUTH CUMBERLAND COLLECTED AND ANNOTATED BY REV. W.S. SYKES).

Whilst Sykes says he made a copy of them all and it is assumed these are the three volumes at Whitehaven, there is different information in the original ones we have transcribed from Millom and the first six chapters from the books at Whitehaven which cover Millom.

As if that is not enough to try and get one's head around, in the third book at Whitehaven, which he says is a copy of his notes about Eskdale he sent to Mary Fair, he includes this list of contents:

The problem now is that we have photographed all of the pages in the three books held at Whitehaven and the ones from the third book only go up to page 144 so there are clearly many other pages to find. Enquiries are currently being made.

Other Sykes Documents

Whitehaven Archives tell us Carlisle Library holds two volumes of Sykes' notes at reference 1B ESK9, containing Genealogical- related notes on the descent of members of various families, of the Lordship of Egremont, and of manors in the area (Austhwaite to Workington), and on clergy of Millom and neighbourhood and on the abbots of Calder, and notes taken from Churchwardens' Accounts late 17th century to 1777; notes on the Marshall family (17th to early 19th centuries); English text of Hadrian's Address to his Soul; miscellaneous notes on Addison and Tyson family members; and notes on Ulpha (churchwardens, vicars, etc.).

Carlisle Library is closed for refurbishment so we cannot access the files:

Our Volunteer Transcribers

A HUGE thank you to Barrow Archives for scanning the original documents!

And an even BIGGER thanks go to our transcibers for the books held at Holy Trinity church, Millom (it was a lot of quite monotonous work - not least understanding Rev. Sykes handwriting) his writing in the notebooks at Whitehaven are much more legible:

Jan Bridget

Susan Cawthorne

Alison Holburn Nicholson

Liz North

Fiona Pervez

Jean Jones

Tina Pentney

And others.

More thank yous to Alison Holburn and Fiona Perves for photographing some of the pages of Volume 1 and to Rosanna Cos for photographing the rest of Volume 1, plus Volume 2 and Volume 3.

THE THREE BOOKS FROM HOLY TRINITY CHURCH, MILLOM

The difference between the documents is that you can search the transcribed versions.

Original KIRKSANTON notebook.

TRANSCRIPTION notebook, transcribed by Susan Cawthorne.

Original THE PLACE NAMES OF SOUTH CUMBERLAND COLLECTED AND ANNOTATED BY REV. W.S. SYKES, M.A.

TRANSCRIPTION notebook, transcribed by Fiona Pervez and Jan Bridget.

Original ROADS IN AND THROUGH MILLOM

TRANSCRIPTION notebook, transcribed by Alison Holburn with help from Susan Cawthorne and Jan Bridget.

THE THREE BOOKS HELD AT WHITEHAVEN ARCHIVES

The first part of Volume 1, which volunteers transcribed, held at Whitehaven Archives - with their kind permission. The remainder are photographs of the original.

Chapter I: A Commencement of Annals of Millom 1058-1781.

Chapter II:Notes on the Families of de Boyvil and de Coupland.

Chapter III:The Manor Roll of Austhwaite.

Chapter IV:References to local Customarys and Admissions.

Chapter V:Two Appeals: Whitbeck and Millom and some extracts from two Acts of Parliament.

Chapter VI:Millom Church Accounts and other Notes.

Chapter VII:Eskdale Notes.

Chapter VIII:The xxiv Book of Eskdale and Mitredale.

Chapter IX:Gossip and Scraps.

Chapter X:Index of Place Names.

OTHER AREAS

We know that wherever the Rev. Sykes went he conducted similar research and contributed to the local History Society. We have heard from Milford-on-Sea Historical Record Society who have provided the following information:

Rev Sykes was a very early member between 1910 and 1919 while he lived in Southampton serving as chaplain to the Royal South Hampshire and Southampton Hospital.

He wrote five articles for our Occasional Magazine:

Rev W S Sykes 'Notes from Mr Birkett's Diaries' Milford-on-Sea Historical Record Society Occasional Magazine 2, 1 (May 1914) 20-28

Rev W S Sykes 'The threatened Invasion by the French in 1794-8' Milford-on-Sea Historical Record Society Occasional Magazine 2, 1 (May 1914) 44-48

Rev W S Sykes 'A List of the Principal Inhabitants of Milford A D 1680-90' Milford-on-Sea Historical Record Society Occasional Magazine 2, 2 (January 1916) 35-75

Rev W S Sykes 'The Reference to Milford Church in Domesday Book' Milford-on-Sea Historical Record Society Occasional Magazine 2, 3 (April 1917) 33-45

Rev W S Sykes 'Place Names of the ancient Parish of Milford' Milford-on-Sea Historical Record Society Occasional Magazine 2, 6 (September 1921) 3-87

Copies of these articles are downloadable here.