Beverley Treasure House: Crown, Colonies and Countrymen

A Tudor lord mayor of , a woman incarcerated in a private asylum and Buffalo Bill all have something in common. The answer can be found in a collection held by East Riding Archives and Local Studies who are pleased to announce that the Calverley-Rudston papers have now been catalogued and are available online.

Dating from the 14th to the 20th Century, they offer a comprehensive representation of a Yorkshire family’s national and international contribution to history. The Calverley-Rudston family is an ancient one and they resided at Hayton, near , for many years.

The funding for the project called ‘Crown, Colonies and Countrymen’ came from the National Cataloguing Grants Scheme which is jointly managed and funded by the Pilgrim Trust and The National Archives. The demand for funding was very competitive so East Riding Archives and Local Studies were very pleased to make a successful bid. This grant has enabled the Calverley-Rudston family archive to take its place with the other highly important landed family papers that the service holds.

The cataloguing project has revealed some vitally important historical treasures. The Irish Warrants are a unique set of orders issued by Thomas Wentworth, Lord Deputy of Ireland in the 1630s. They are all the more important as in 1922, Ireland was in the throes of a civil war and sadly many of its early records were destroyed by fire. The project has enabled the warrants to be brought to the attention of Irish scholars who are currently researching them. The will and inventory of Sir John Rudston, who was Lord Mayor of London in 1528, is another gem within this collection as it is believed that inventories in such detail from this period are rare.

On another note, Ann Rudston suffered mental illness and was placed in a private asylum, from 1805 to 1855, and the letters from the proprietor to her brother touch on aspects of her illness and the care provided to her. Another descendent, George Calverley-Rudston was reputed to have met with ‘Buffalo Bill’ of the American Wild West fame. George was sent out to America in financial disgrace and his letters to his father at Hayton, give an insight into George’s character and life in the Wild West during the early 20th Century.

Joanna Larter, collections officer, said: “This collection has revealed some real human interest stories and hopefully the exhibition will show that archives are about real people from history and that their experiences are really not that different from people today.”

In collaboration with East Riding Museums Service, these wonderful stories will be told in the form of an eight-week exhibition which is scheduled to run from Saturday, 11 February to Saturday, 7 April at the Treasure House, Beverley.

The East Riding has a wonderfully rich and interesting history and it is hoped that when the online catalogue is available in January it will add to the research-potential of this little-known but extremely interesting family. The website is www2.eastriding.gov.uk



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