News - Help uncover family’s history (Barnsley)

VOLUNTEERS are being sought to help bring the history of a Barnsley family to life.


Barnsley Archives and Local Studies is looking for members of the public to help catalogue documents and photographs belonging to the Spencer-Stanhope family, who owned Cannon Hall.

Volunteers use their research to compile a history of the well-known South Yorkshire family and their properties.

To sign up for the project, email archives@barnsley.gov.uk or call 01226 773950.

From: http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/help-uncover-family-s-history-1-4525351

News - Museum to sell off large furniture (Cannon Hall Museum)

A SOUTH Yorkshire museum is disposing of 22 items from its stored furniture collection.

The items will be offloaded by Cannon Hall Museum, Barnsley, after approval by the council’s ruling cabinet.

Councillors received a report which informed them the storage areas at Cannon Hall are inadequate and very cramped - meaning quite large pieces of furniture are poorly stored and unlikely to be displayed again.

The collections have been assessed by museum staff and it was proposed pieces of furniture will first be offered to other museums for display.

If other museums do not wish to house the items, they will be auctioned.

Money raised will be earmarked to improve storage conditions at Cannon Hall Museum.

From: http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/hall_to_sell_off_large_furniture_1_3835222

News - Precious Crimean War medals come back home (Barnsley)

A UNIQUE collection of medals honouring the heroism of the last surviving officer of the Charge of the Light Brigade is to find a new home in a South Yorkshire museum.


Tony Kent, a former RAF reconnaissance pilot who moved to the United States in 1946, had considered keeping his great grandfather’s military decorations and personal papers in Virginia.

But fearing the collection of Crimean medals might eventually be split up and sold to US collectors, he has returned to England to hand them over to his ancestor’s regimental museum, Cannon Hall in Barnsley.
Tony’s great-grandfather Captain Percy Shawe-Smith was a lieutenant and acting adjutant in the 13 Light Dragoons, which took part in the infamous charge in 1854.

Shawe-Smith’s regiment suffered devastating casualties but his job was to keep his dragoons moving forward.

He was the only one to bring his original horse back and he was on parade the next day. Only 20 members of the 13 Light Dragoons emerged from the Valley of Death.

There were not enough survivors to sustain the regiment, which was disbanded.

Mr Kent, now in his 80s, said: “I feel very proud to have handed the medals over and I know my great grandfather would be very happy to have everything back home.”

From: http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/local/precious_crimean_war_medals_come_back_home_1_3824839