Victoria County History (VCH)

Screenshot of VCH website, 25-02-2011Screenshot of VCH website, 25-02-2011 The Victoria County History was founded in 1899 to produce a history of each county and parish in England. Thirteen county histories have been finished so far including the counties of Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire, and work continues on the rest, with Red Book series volumes from Oxfordshire, Essex, Wiltshire and the East Riding of Yorkshire due for publication by the summer of 2012.  Use the VCH's Parish Index to check whether your parish is one of more than 3500 the VCH has covered since 1899.

Thanks to the five year Heritage Lottery funded England's Past for Everyone project, the Victoria County History has expanded its remit to produce paperback studies on individual localities, with 15 published to date and to involve local volunteer groups in the generation of published histories.

In addition to producing county histories and paperback studies, the VCH also organises seminars and lectures to promote the wider discipline of local history, has created the Schools Learning Zone website, which aims to teach Key Stage 1,2 and 3 schoolchildren about their local history, and has developed the VCH Explore site, created as part of the Lottery Funded England's Past for Everyone project.  The Explore site is an interactive repository of research material which can be navigated geographically or by local history theme.

Highlights from the VCH website