St Mary's archive


Archive

We are beginning to go through the church's archives with a vierw to publishing as much as possible which might be of interest to local historians and family history researchers on this website.  Our first major project is the digitisation of parish magazine copies from 1899 to 1914.  Also underway is a survey of the churchyard  and we hope to publish a register of gravestone inscriptions in due course.  Please check back here form time to time to see our progress.  if you have any specific enquiries - please contact our family history off

A biography of Revd. G. Bruce Rhind - Vicar 1898-1926

George Bruce Rhind - Vicar of Haddenham 1898-1926 - was born in 1845 in Liverpool, the second son of the principal teacher in a school for the deaf and dumb.

Historic photographs

We have secured permission from English Heritage to reproduce historic photographs of St. Mary's Church taken in August 1903 and part of the collection of negatives from the Alfred Newton collection.  These are a wonderful companion to the parish magazine reproductions from the same period - a project which continues albeit slowly!

Newton Collection

Photographs from the Alfred Newton Collection.

Sydney Walter Alfred Newton (born 1875) was an English photographer.  Sydney Newton joined the family photographic firm; Alfred Newton & Son in the early 1890s. When the work on the Great Central Railway (GCR) began in 1894, Sydney recorded the work in progress.  He was not an official photographer for the GCR but created a photographic archive out of his own enthusiasm for the work; recording the London Extension of the GCR as the work progressed, capturing every aspect of its creation.  Significantly, in addition to photographing the railway and its associated features, Newton also recorded the navvy community and rural life in the villages along the course of the line.

Parish Magazines 1899 - 1909
During the summer of 1898 the vicar of Haddenham for over 40 years, Revd. Henry Meeres, tendered his resignation and left the parish vacant in late September.Church Monthly CoverThe patron of the parish, the Dean and Chapter of Rochester Cathedral subequently presented Revd. G. Bruce Rhind MA, 56, senior curate in the parish of St Pauls, Deptford to the Bishop of Oxford for licensing as the new vicar of Haddenham. He moved here with his daughter Marion aged 22 and was admitted to the living on October 25th 1898.  Within 2 months, in January 1899, Revd. Rhind published the first edition of a new monthly parish magazine.