Today is the second day of Explore Your Archive, a celebration of archives of all kinds across the nation, organised by the Archives & Records Association for UK & Ireland, and today’s theme is ‘Heroes’. 

My name is Sophie, Archivist at St John, and I have three colleagues who complete the St John Archive: Josie (Project Cataloguer), and Pat and Joyce (Project Volunteers). These three fantastic individuals are the real heroes of the Archive.

Pat and Joyce are long time members of St John Ambulance who both joined as Cadets in the 1970s and 1980s and continue to be a part of the organisation as adults. Today, Joyce is a first aider and a Community Advocate, and Pat is a District Event Lead, responsible for coordinating special events and occasions in London. They both joined the Archive team in November 2023 as Project Volunteers for the Archives Revealed cataloguing project. Their role involves listing, repackaging, and assessing the collection records, identifying records which might need some additional conservation work, and contributing their organisational knowledge to help us to understand the people, organisational procedures and terminology, events, and themes within the collection.

Fun fact: Joyce once set off a bunch of dynamite in a silver mine in Bolivia (don’t worry, she was asked to do it!)

Fun fact: When Pat was a milk delivery boy in his youth, one of the places he delivered to was Decca Studios (where David Bowie recorded his first singles and Fleetwood Mac was formed) and gave milk out to Marc Bolan (of T-Rex fame). 

Pat and Joyce have worked really hard to inventory the records, prepare them for cataloguing, and are now cataloguing some of the important records for Divisions of the St John Ambulance Brigade. They have been in the Archive during the heat of summer and the cold of winter, and they really are heroes.

Josie joined the team last week ago as our new Project Cataloguer for the Archives Revealed cataloguing project, and her role involves cataloguing the founding records of St John Ambulance ready for the publication of the Archive’s catalogue in summer 2025. Before joining St John, Josie had roles as an archivist at Oxford House, SOAS University of London, and the Royal Institute of British Architects. She is also an accomplished artist, and is currently undertaking an MA in Fine Art. Fun fact, Josie is learning to play the accordion!