Transportation Update: Back in London and the rental car has been returned. We are now relying on the wonderful world of public transportation to get around. The entire team is relieved.
It was a 30 minute train ride to the National Archives. When we exited the station at Kew it definitely felt like I was no longer in London. The area was predominantly residential.
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When we arrived at the National Archives, I felt like I was entering somewhere very top-secret. I guess that isn't too unusual, since this building contains England's most important documents some dating back about 1000 years.
We were taken into a large, business-like room behind several secure doors. TThree people greeted us: Stuart, who handles public relations, one man who takes care of the documents, and David Thomas, the man who spoke with us about the archives. David is an expert on some of the oldest documents in the repositories.
We learned about preserving documents and how records have changed with the internet and computers. Of course, some Shakespeare-related and Elizabethan Period documents had been pulled especially for our visit, including Shakespeare's famous will.
When it was time to look at the documents, I was given white gloves to wear in case I touched them, as the oils and acids on my fingers could damage the paper. . We looked at a document that showed Shakespeare's name on a list of players (or actors) during the reign of King James I. This one was easy to point out.
We also got to look at Guy Fawkes' confessions in connection with the Gunpowder Plot. On the first document we saw, his signature was still quite legible. But on the second, after being tortured severely, his handwriting was faint and almost unreadable... creepy, huh?
David shared his favorite item from the archives with us. He chose a small book that contained a record of the sums of money that jailed people collected while they were held as prisoners. David told us that he had always loved the book, A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens. One day while he was rummaging in the documents in the archives, David came across a book just like one that is mentioned in A Tale of Two Cities. I thought this was a perfect story to explain why it is his favorite book among the millions of things held at the archives.
I like it when the people we meet share stories that make history so much more personal.
Cheers,
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For Extra Credit:
Learn about one of the men mentioned in Shakespeare's will, Richard Burbage.
Learn about who typically received the majority of the estate of the deceased.
Go to the next day >
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