Please come along and get involved with your local history!
Ropley History Network & Archive
Exploring – recording – Sharing
Latest Update – January / February 2025
Please find attached our latest newsletter
RHN&Digital Newletter Jan / Feb 2025
RHN&A Digital Newsletter Jan Feb 2025 Final
Meon Valley Railway ‘From Alton to Fareham in a day – perhaps!’
Do please have a read of a new article on our website about the history of the Meon Valley Railway ‘From Alton to Fareham in a day – perhaps’
Opening in 1903, this line served passengers at the Butts Junction, Alton, Farringdon (from 1931) Tisted, Privett, West Meon, Droxford, Wickham and Fareham until 1955. Finally running a last goods train in 1968. Includes information about the construction, route and ‘navigators’.
Thank you to Keith Charman who researched and wrote this piece of local railway history. Go to our home page to read the full article
History of Ropley Manor
As part of our research into historic houses in the local area, we are able to present an up-to-date history of Ropley Manor. Thank you to Hilary Oldham, who has researched and written this in-depth study that includes photographs, old sale particulars and newspaper articles covering the years from 1792 to the present day.
Go to our home page to read it as one of our latest articles
Local Girl Guides – Please help us put names to faces
Local Girl Guides photos.
Can you help name some of the people in the photos on our website? Type Girl Guides into Search and comment on the photos if you can help.
Are you a Budd? Repair permission needed of Budd Tomb
The Tomb remains the responsibility / property of the Budd family and Ropley Church needs permission from them to progress with repair work. The tomb, in memory of some of the Budd family from 1795 to the mid 1800’s, is now in pieces. The chest became unsafe in 2024 and had to be taken apart. It was noted in 2019 that the supporting bricks / stones at the base of the Tomb were crumbling and there was some concern that this was a Health and Safety issue as the structure could just collapse.
Expert advice had been sought from stone masons, Blackwell and Moody from 2019 and in 2024, the tomb was made safe by dismantling the large stones that were above ground level.
Are you part of the Budd family connected to this tomb’s history? If so, Ropley Church have asked that you get in touch with them so that they can discuss the permission that is required for the church to do the repairs.
The photo on our website taken in 2012 shows how it was and the recent photos of the 2 panels of inscription. Type in Budd into search to see all Budd archives.
What’s on locally!
Hampshire Archives https://www.hants.gov.uk/librariesandarchives/archives/events
21 Historic days out in Hampshire https://www.hampshireattractions.co.uk/21-historic-days-out-in-hampshire/
What’s happening on our website – Current and Future Articles search on our homepage
- Life growing up at Fordes –An Article about Doreen Pile and her life in the village
- Meon Valley Railway – history of the short-lived local line serving Alton to Fareham
- Oral History – Our latest interview is due in December, What is this about? Is this about Doreen Pile too? with thanks to Ropley Parish Council for supporting this project.
- Do you live in a Historic Buildings in the area? – we are endeavouring to bring together as much information as possible about many of these buildings that are either historic or have importance in the area. If you have anything that may contribute to this growing collection – documents, images or some oral history other than what is in some of the local publications – please do get in touch
- Ropley History visit to Winchester College and their Archives – Recently some of our Ropley History enthusiasts visited Winchester College and its archives.
- History of Ropley Manor – Article including documents relating the history from 1792 to the present day
- Historic Maps – We are adding new images and sources all the time
- Found anything interesting? Have you found something ancient, rare or just interesting looking? This article tells us this is not a rarity and perhaps what you found is really interesting – if so we can advise what you should do with it, how to register it etc.
- The Old School House on the Petersfield Road. We are bringing together various existing and recently contributed images and documents to build a history of this historic building so if you can add any information about the building as a schoolhouse or later inhabitants – please do get in touch.
- New page development – Hints for helping with tracing you Hampshire Genealogy. We are aiming to introduce a page on our website that gives hints and guidance for tracing your family history in our locality – but we would very much like some assistance with this page, please. If you would like to help us with producing this page – please do get in touch. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
If you think you might be able to contribute some more information to any of the above, please do get in touch and share. To see these and all our other articles, new collections of images of documents, photos and artefacts, please go to our easily found Ropley History website.
What history topics would you like to learn about from us? We try to bring you talks and articles about many subjects of historic interest but we are very happy to hear about any ideas or contacts that could may have that could help us continue to bring local history alive.
Getting involved
Can you offer your time – however much you feel you can give – to help us develop and grow the archive? Any contribution would help us preserve our local history. Do you have any local history documents that you would like to share or need some help with? Please get in touch or come along to our fortnightly archive workshop sessions. Thursdays 2-4pm – in the back Hall or the small hall of the Village Hall.
- January 2nd, 16th and 30th
- February 13th and 27th
- March 13th and 27th
Thank you for your continued interest, involvement and support
Ropley History Network and Archive Steering Group