Research Group
The Research Group members usually work in pairs or alone for a couple of hours each week. We meet up for coffee once a month to keep in contact with each other to discuss our activities and discoveries. Let us know if you have any proposals for research projects, or wish to join the group. We are curently transcribing the Abergavenny Town Improvements Commissioners minutes and looking at a possible Pen-y-fal Hospital project.
ALHS has a 40 year history of undertaking research projects. The St Mary’s Research Group was formed in 1978 to record all available sources of information about the History of St Mary’s Priory. Their notes can be downloaded from the Downloads page. In the 1980s the group researched information for the Abergavenny Street Survey leading its publication in 1989, copies of which are available in Abergavenny Library. A Town Remembers: Memories of Wartime Abergavenny 1939-1945 was published in 2003 as a result of the Society's Oral History Project conducted by a team of volunteers and edited by Richard Davies.
In 2010 the Castle Research Group was set up to discover the History of Abergavenny Castle between 1818, when Castle House was built on the site of the old keep, to the 1950s when the Museum was established there. This work made a material contribution to the Castle House 200th anniversary exhibition at the Museum in 2019.
In 2015 three members of the group transcribed the Abergavenny Vestry Book, covering the period from the 1704 to1807 on behalf of Gwent Archives. This document man be downloaded from the Downloads page.
The group updated the Abergavenny Street Survey and put all the data on to a website - www.abergavennystreetsurvey.co.uk which went online in 2017. Recently the history of Gunter Mansion has been collated on behalf of the Welsh Georgian Trust. (Any additional information about recusants in Abergavenny and the surrounding area in the 17th & 18th centuries is still welcome.) A recent project has been The Home Front in WW1 in Abergavenny which has contributed to two publications and a display which has appeared in the pop-up space at Gunter Mansion, Newport Cathedral and other places.
Some members of the group spent 3 years undertaking a Survey of the Headstones in the Old Hereford Road Cemetery. The DVD with the transcription of the Abergavenny Burial book, plus all our headstone information and over 700 photographs is now published. Please see Books and Leaflets for more information. In April 2021 Monmouthshire County Council cleared the overgrown areas in the Old Cemetery, making many more headstones accessible, so we will update our database when all the new information has been gathered.
A WW2 project and a Tourism in Abergavenny project have also been completed. We are currently completing the transcription of the St Mary's parish records from the 1650s to the 1800s. Those we have completed so far can be downloaded from the St Mary's Church page.
Over the years members of the Research Group have contributed articles for inclusion in the Newsletters, but our most recent achievement has been to publish the first edition of the Society's very own journal, the Gobannium Gazette, so we are now looking for articles for the second edition. We are also adding to our trans cription of The Abergavenny Improvements Commissioners Minute Book 1794-1822.
The Gwent Local History Journal publish many articles researched by the group or with their support. Copies of the journals can be obtained from strong@btinternet.com for £5 + £1 p&p. Group members have also contributed many articles to the Summer Newsletters. A list of recent articles can be found here: Articles in the Gwent Local History Journal. An annual subscription to Gwent County History Association (email strong@btinternet.com) for £10 will make sure you don't miss any articles!