Towcester and Disctrict Local History Society monthly meetings

The meetings listed below will, until further notice, be hybrid meetings, both live and by Zoom. You can attend either in person face-to-face at the Sawpits Centre, Towcester or remotely via Zoom.

Meetings start at 7.15pm for 7.30pm on the second Wednesday of the month.

Option 1. Join the face-to-face meeting
This will be at the Sawpits Centre, Towcester, which is where the Towcester Library used to be before it moved to its present position at The Forum. The Sawpits Centre is off Richmond Road on a lane called "Towbury Lane". There is some parking, but please leave that for people with limited mobility. There is more parking at the Richmond Road Car Park a short distance away.

Option 2. Join by Zoom
Members are informed how to join each meeting.

Visitors are welcome to join a meeting, for £3.00 per meeting. Annual membership is £10.00.

Wednesday 8 March 2023
The 2023 Annual General Meeting
followed by:
40 Years of Photographs of Towcester
Paul Howard
An illustrated talk seen through the lens of renowned photographer Paul Howard, who will be providing a huge collection of photographed events and places that many residents will be able to remember as they are taken through the past 40 years.

Wednesday 12 April 2023
Northampton and the coming of the Cluniacs
Ruth Thomas
Ruth returns with a talk about St Andrew's Priory in Northampton and the founding of this Cluniac institution by Simon de Senlis I and II.

Wednesday 10 May 2023
Secrets and Scandals of Canons Ashby
Laura Malpass
A light-hearted romp through 1,000 years of the history of Canons Ashby, told through the lives of the people who lived there. This presentation is fully illustrated with original photos and ends with hints at an even earlier past.

Wednesday 14 June 2023
Arms and Armour of the Wars of the Roses
Corin Brearley
Corin is a competent longbow archer who fights with a re-enactment group. He will talk about the weapons used during the Wars of the Roses and will be bringing examples of armour and arms as both props for the talk and for afterwards

Wednesday 12 July 2023
Guided tour of St Lawrence Church – Its hidden history
By kind permission of the Rev. Paula Challen and the Tove Benefice, Society members will meet at St Lawrence Parish Church, Towcester at 7 p.m., to look at some of the features of this fascinating building with a thousand years of history, that stands on the site of Roman Baths.
Please note the earlier than usual starting time.

No meeting in August 2023

Wednesday 13 September 2023
The Towcester Hundred
Tony Howard
Following on from his talk, “Towcester from the Air”, Tony has extended his aerial photography to cover some of the villages around Towcester, in particular, those which comprise the Towcester Hundred.

Wednesday 11 October 2023
Priors Hall Romano-Celtic Site, Corby
Patrick Lambert
This talk presents the results of the nationally significant archaeological excavations undertaken by Oxford Archaeology East on the estate of a large Roman villa near Corby. The incredible well-preserved remains included a Romano-British building site, a temple-mausoleum converted to a tile factory, pottery and lime manufacture and much more. It ranks amongst the most exciting and important Late Romano-British archaeology encountered from Roman Britain.

Wednesday 8 November 2023
The Battle of Edgcote
Graham Evans
Edgcote was the first major battle fought in the second campaign of the Wars of the Roses 1469-1471. Graham, from the Battlefields Society, will tell the story of that grizzly day in July 1469 just 14 miles from Towcester.

Wednesday 13 December 2023 Christmas Meeting
A Great War Christmas
Stuart Macfarlan
A look at why the Christmas truce of 1914 and its famous football match still looms large, via film and in literature, in the public imagination 109 years after it happened.

Wednesday 10 January 2024
Northamptonshire Past in the Winter
Jon-Paul Carr
An illustrated talk by a keen heritage volunteer, local history lecturer and author about the Winter Season, some of the customs, traditions, Christmas and things that happened over the winter months in the past.

Wednesday 14 February 2024
The life and crimes of Agatha Christie
Steve Dimmer
A look at the amazing career of the most popular crime novelist of all times. Steve returns, again, to examine the writer’s life beginning with the creation of Hercule Poirot in 1920, through the golden age of detective fiction, the emergence of Miss Marple until Agatha Christie became the indisputable ‘Queen of Crime’. Along the way, he’ll be looking at the real-life mystery involving the novelist’s actual disappearance and perhaps try to solve this intriguing puzzle.

Wednesday 13 March 2024
The 2024 Annual General Meeting.