Publications by the St Albans 17th Century Research Group
Publication of St Albans 1650-1700
Our book, St Albans 1650-1700, published in 2003, garnered critical acclaim as an innovative and exemplary study of the social structure of a small town in 17th century England.
One of the benefits arising from this project is our research database which is a directory of names of people living in St Albans in the 17th century. It was developed to help address a key objective, namely to estimate the size of the town’s population at that time.
The methodology for this involved reconstructing the town’s population by drawing up an extensive set of family trees. Each individual has a text file in which information relating to that person is collated as and when it comes to hand.
This bank of information has enabled us to write on a number of topics relating to the social structure of the town at that time. Some of these have been published, others used to give talks to local groups. (See below for details).
Past publications
(Copies of all of these are available in the Society’s Library)
• ‘Growth in the population of St Albans from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries’, N. Alvey, The Local Historian, Volume 30, Issue 3 (August, 2000), pp.150-159
• ‘Identifying Nonconformity in Late-Seventeenth Century St Albans’, P. Howe, Local Population Studies, No. 68, (Spring, 2002), pp.9-25
• St Albans 1650-1700: A thoroughfare town and its people, J.T. Smith & M.A. North (editors), Hertfordshire Publications, (2003)
• The Pemberton Almshouses, C. Ellis & P. Howe, St Albans & Hertfordshire Architectural & Archaeological Society (2004)
• ‘Francis Combe of Hemel Hempstead: New light on a man of learning’, S. Beare & P. Howe, Hertfordshire Past and Present, Series 3, Issue 6, (Autumn 2005), pp.17-23
• ‘Lydia Hope’s inventory of paintings and the art collection of Charles I’, S. Beare, Hertfordshire Past and Present, Series 3, Issue 16, (Spring 2010), pp.3-12
• ‘Social Welfare in St Peter’s, St Albans, 1663-1680’, P. Howe & P. Nellist, Hertfordshire Archaeology and History, Volume 16, (2010), pp.81-96
• ‘Interpreting seventeenth-century probate documents: John Carter, master carpenter in St Albans’, J. Harris & P. Howe, Local Population Studies, No. 86, (Spring 2011), pp.66-83.
• Wills, inventories and probate accounts from St Albans, 1600-1615, P. Howe and J. Harris (eds.), Hertfordshire Record Society (2019)
