We’ve come to the end of June, so read on to hear about what the Archives Revealed project team have been getting up to recently…

Joyce (Project Volunteer)

The Archives Revealed project is making great progress. The documents I am currently working with, Kent Nursing Division Annual Returns and Records, are over halfway completed. As I look at, sort and catalogue these documents, I consider what it is that the properly catalogued archive material could ‘reveal’ and to whom.

The St John Ambulance Brigade forms provide information for researchers on St John membership and Divisional organisation over the years. By researchers, I mean anyone with an interest, not only professional historians. The Archive’s records can be used to research how particular parts of the country and industries were attached to St John, the changing numbers of volunteers, the role of women and development of the youth movement. If family historians know of Divisions that their ancestors were involved with, there might be information about these people they could find.

Comments and correspondence included with the Annual Returns and Records can hint at the wider social context in which St John volunteers were involved. Margate Nursing Division had to cancel its Annual Inspection in 1917 ‘owing to members having left the District through continual air raids’, and in 1956, the members of the Lydd New Romney and District Nursing Division were on duty at Lydd airport meeting Hungarian refugees. On a lighter note, a regular duty for the Lydd New Romney and District Nursing Division was the Romney Revels. I’m not sure what this was, but it sounds like fun!

These are just a few examples I have considered, I’m sure there are a lot more!

Sophie (Archivist)

June is a big milestone for the Archives Revealed team, as our latest six-monthly report has been completed and submitted to the project’s funders, and it’s our last report until we submit our final post-project report. Josie is half-way through her 8-week break (we miss her!), Pat, Joyce, and I have been hard at work with our cataloguing, and one of our exciting project launch projects is in the planning.

Some of the records I have been cataloguing include some foreign language first aid books. These are mostly St John Ambulance Association first aid books which were translated for other countries that had established their own St John Ambulance Association Centres or St John Ambulance Brigade Divisions into the languages spoken in their countries. Examples of these manuals that we have in the collection were translated into Chinese for St John in Hong Kong, Thai for St John in Siam [Thailand], and French for St John in French-speaking areas of Canada.

A photograph of three small hardback books lying on a table. The book on the left has a black cover, the book in the middle has a blue cover, and the book on the right has a red cover. Each book has a title embossed into the cover in gold. — Assorted foreign language first aid manuals

The manuals look very similar in style to St John’s English-language first aid manuals at the time, often utilising the same colour of hardback cover and the same illustrations. Have a look at some examples below.

A photograph of a small first aid manual opened up and being held by an unseen person. The manual shows two pages held in a landscape manner. Both pages have a large illustration on the left-hand side which depicts two different forms of stretcher used to transport an injured person. The remainder of the pages is filled with text in Chinese characters. — A St John Ambulance Association first aid manual translated into Chinese (Archive ref: STJ/SJO/4/3/1)

A photograph of a small first aid manual opened up and being held by an unseen person. The manual shows one pages held in a portrait manner. The page has a large illustration in the middle which an injured person being carried over the shoulder of another person. The remainder of the page is filled with text in Thai. — A St John Ambulance Association first aid manual translated into Thai (Archive ref: STJ/SJO/1/9/1)

We also have an example of a manual in Spanish, written by a member of the Brigade, Samuel Osborn. Like many of St John’s early manuals, this one has a fold-out page at the beginning with some handy illustrations.

A photograph of a small first aid manual opened up on a table. One the left, a long landscape page has been opened up to show an illustration of people wearing bandages in different ways. The right-hand page shows the title page of the manual. The text on this page is in Spanish. — A first aid manual translated into Spanish (Archive ref: STJ/SJO/1/9/1)

I’ve also catalogued a St John Ambulance Association first aid manual created specifically for use in mines. This is a fascinating little book, as it deals with some first aid issues that might not be found in other situations, such as exposure to different kings of gases, and extracting injured persons up a mine shaft. Have a look at some of the pages from this manual below.

A photograph of a small first aid manual lying open on a table. The manual shows two pages. The page on the left contains text; instructions on how to remove injured persons from a min. The page on the right shows an illustration of a person tied into a stretcher used in a mine, called a ‘Lowmoor Jacket’. — Pages from First Aid as Applied to Mines (Archive ref STJ-SJO-7-2-3-1)

A photograph of a small first aid manual lying open on a table. The manual shows two pages. The page on the left shows an illustration of a person tied into a stretcher used in a mine, called a ‘Plank Stretcher’. The page on the right contains text; information on different types of gases which can be found in mines. — A page from First Aid as Applied to Mines (Archive ref STJ-SJO-7-2-3-1)

A photograph of a page from a small first aid manual lying open on a table. The page shows a black and white photograph of a person using oxygen apparatus on another person who is lying on the floor. — A page from First Aid as Applied to Mines (Archive ref STJ-SJO-7-2-3-1)

The introduction to this manual claims that there is probably ‘no calling or pursuit which is more fraught with dangers to life and limb than that of the Miner’, and to be honest, I agree. The manual also identifies the mining community’s duty of self-protection, and the duty of providing the means and facilities for first aid and rescue. The idea of being underground without fresh air and light is, quite, frankly, a little scary to me. But, should I have been in the shoes of a miner, I would have been greatly comforted to know that those of my fellow miners who had undertaken first aid training with their local St John Ambulance Association Centre or who were members of the mine’s St John Ambulance Brigade Division would be knowledgeable in the right treatments and procedures to help.

Pat (Project Volunteer)

In this month’s update, I am pleased to say that we continue to work on the collation of the Annual Returns as Joyce described. The Ambulance Division returns are taking longer than expected, but I am confident they will be complete by the end of July, ready for our launch later this year.

To give you a scale of the work involved with the Divisional records so far, we have documented 114 Ambulance Divisions; their annual returns as well as other documents. A Division typically will have somewhere between 50 – 120 documents, although some have as little as 3 annual returns for each Division, and the time it takes to work through each Division can vary between 30 – 60 minutes.

Some Division names that may be of interest include No. 63 W. H. Smith & Son Ambulance Division, No. 98 Manbre & Garton Limited (later known as Wandsworth & Putney) Ambulance Division, No. 106 Clixwell Ambulance Division, and of course there are the ‘traditional’ Divisions, albeit the records currently are very London centric.

I cannot help but reflect on how the industry at the time (1890s onwards) drove the expansion of the St John Ambulance Brigade, i.e. with railways, gas, and the Post Office, for example. What is also evident is how the (London District) organisation changed; for example the No. 75 Borough of Southend Ambulance Division was part of the London District, where today Southend is recognised as part of Essex.

And finally, my image is of the paper clips and other fastenings that we have been collecting whilst sorting out the Annual Returns. Many of these clips and fastenings date from the early 1900s.

A photograph of a small, clear plastic tub. The tub is filled with old rusting paperclips of different shapes and sizes. — Old rusty paperclips and metal fastenings removed from archival records.

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We will be launching a public-facing catalogue of all the records catalogued as part of the Archives Revealed project in late summer 2025, so keep your eyes peeled over the coming months for more information!