Hampshire folk heritage boosted by new map

The map was officially launched in a reception at Hampshire Record Office in Winchester.

Members of Wickham Morris danced and singer Rob Mills regaled the 40-strong audience with local folk songs.

The map stems from a union of Hampshire County Museums Service and Bournemouth University as part of the Singing Landscapes project.

Over 20,000 copies will be distributed free through Hampshire's libraries, museums, arts and countryside venues.

The map carries detailed historical information about folk song and singers from the county together with details and images of folklore objects in the Hampshire county museums’ collection.

Over the past two years, researchers Yvette Staelens and Chris Bearman, from Bournemouth University, have gathered family histories, music and photographs linked to traditional folk songs and singers.

They have followed the footsteps of folk song collector Dr George Gardiner who travelled Hampshire over a century ago collecting songs and stories just as they were in danger of disappearing forever.

The map also features a comprehensive list of Hampshire singers drawn from a variety of sources. Ms Staelens and Dr Bearman hope the list will encourage descendants to come forward with even more songs, stories and artefacts to add to the story. Names on the list include Moses Blake, a labourer who lived in Lyndhurst, Thomas Cooper, a fisherman from Southampton Itchen and George Macklin, a bricklayer in Basingstoke.

“Many of us have singing ancestors but perhaps do not know it,” said Ms Staelens. “One of the attractions of this project is the opportunity to inspire the public to take part in this research themselves.

“Hampshire and the West Country are key places which people emigrated from to all parts of the world over the years so this project has global implications,” she added. “It’s potentially the biggest distribution of folk song research ever and that makes it very exciting.”