One-Place Adverts

It’s January 2026 and this month’s blog prompt theme is #OnePlaceAdverts. This got me thinking as up until now I had just searched the newspapers online at FindMyPast and Newspapers.com. Yes that got me results fast but would this method be suitable to get me everything? The short answer is NO! There are many reasons for this too

• Quality of online transcription – no transcription is perfect, these websites don’t have someone reading the papers and typing it up. It’s all OCR/AI that does it, and it makes mistakes.
• Quality of the scanned papers – when you look through the newspapers you may find many quality issues. It may be that part of a page is missing or some of the printed is very faded.
• Placenames – some places may be entered in different ways. For my place the parish of St Mary Bourne you may see any of the following:-
  • St. Mary Bourne
  • Mary Bourne
  • Saint Mary Bourne
  • Bourne

Another issue for me was the fact that as my study is a parish it includes more than one village in the parish and many hamlets. These to get referred to in different ways, you may find just the name of a hamlet such as Binley but you may also find that one of the variations of St Mary Bourne is stated after.

So it was time to think about how I could get around this and create a process for extracting the newspaper data for my place.  I have found that creating a process to manage, name & catalogue all my digital data is something that helps me a lot.

At the start of 2025 I created a way to manage all the document images I had gathered at the archives and all new material is now named and filed according to that process, with older documents being added as I find them. Over the recent Christmas & New Year period I devised a new process to manage all the scanning, naming  & filing of the photographs, negatives & slides in my personal media archive which includes 1000s of images, a similar process will need to be decided upon to manage the hours of video that I need to convert from many different formats too.

Having done all that and already finding it far easier to track down what I’m looking for I knew it would be simple to create a process to extract newspaper data.

First up I needed a simple spreadsheet to list the newspapers I had searched. Super simple just the name of the newspaper and the edition searched.

At a later date I can add any other columns I feel would be helpful, for instance a column to mark that I have added any extracts from that paper to my study website.

All the extracts from the newspapers in this spreadsheet were clipped and saved. From now on I have told myself that if I do look for something for a specific person or farm for instance at the same time I need to search the whole edition of that newspaper and extract any other relevant information and add it to the spreadsheet.

This is not a quick job but it is very straightforward! I decided the first newspaper I would focus on was the Andover Chronicle which ran from 1870-1914 and started at the first edition and have now gone through the first 3 months of the paper. Although it seems daunting at first you soon learn which pages are going to be the ones that have the local information that may include your place. The Andover Chronicle has a number of pages in each edition that relate to country wide news, wars and foreign places. In general these pages can be quickly scanned through looking at the titles to decide if a closer look is needed thus saving you time not having to read every word.

So what do I plan to do next with these extracts, well that’s simple I will catalogue a batch at a time using TAGS this can be done manually or by using software such as digiKAM or Adobe Photoshop Elements Organiser. Adding tags such as ADVERT, AUCTION, CRIME, BMD, NEWS, LETTER, CRICKET or INQUEST etc as well as name tags will help me identify articles that will may be useful when researching a specific topic, farm or person.

It will also be helpful to know whether the particular clipping is repeated in more than one paper or say advertised in more than one edition. This could be done whilst tagging saving the information in the image file or in another spreadsheet, it’s to be decided!

So what did I find after searching 3 months worth of the Andover Chronicle?

Adverts

• The New Patent Elevator

Cricket

• Vernham v St Mary Bourne

Crime

• County Court
• County Bench

News

• Prize list of the Hurstbourne Priors, Tufton & St Mary Bourne Labourers’ Horticultural & Industrial Improvement Society
• Prize list of the Andover Horticultural Society & Industrial Exibition
• Subscription for the ladies’ prizes to the volunteer Rifle Corp, 1870

As far as adverts went just the one but it was in every edition of the newspaper throughout the period, and was advertising a Hay Elevator.

THE NEW PATENT ELEVATOR, FOR RICKING HAY, CORN, STRAW, ETC, BY ONE HORSE POWER;

Also adapted for working with Combined Threshing Machine without the slightest alteration.

A. WATSON, ACRE IRON WORKS, ANDOVER.

Claims the following great advantages over any other:-

1. Great simplicity. Being constructed so that any farm labourer cannot possibly make a mistake; requiring no map of instructions to be sent with the maching.
2. No Gearing whatsoever; consequently great savings in power and wear and tear.
3. Impossibility of chains slipping under any load, and the speed arranged correctly.
4. No trouble unfolding before going to work, or folding up after finishing, an operation at all times complicated and dangerous.
5. Trough made of iron, giving great strength and durability.
6. The least expense of any in England.
7. Requires only two minutes to start work.

Purchasers may easily satisfy themselves that a good, strong, and efficient Implement (to answer the purpose of Carrying Straw from Combined Machine and also General Ricking in Hay-time and Harvest) can be manufactured at a reasonable cost. Reference as to the utility and good workmanship of these machines, may be made to the following well-known gentlemen:

• W. Bound, Hurstbourne, Andover
• Chas. Pain, Westover, Andover
• W. Bracher, Eastaston, Andover
• G. Haig, Clatford, Andover
• S. Wentworth, Enham, Andover
• H. Herbert, Netherton, Berks
• Woodman, Ham, Hungerford
• A. Miles, Vernham, Berks
• G. Miles, Hurstbourne Tarrant
• T. Holdway, Monxton, Andover
• R. Davis, Queenwood College, Hants
• G. Deacon, Fyfield, Hants
• Reeves, Compton House, Kingsomborne
• G. Williams, Countess Farm, Amesbury
• S. Chinnock, Dinton, Wilts
• Meeson, Roxford, Essex
• Hobbs, Winterslow, Wilts
• Taylor, Dorchester
• R. Brook, St. Faith’s, Norfolk
• Wigg, Bullington, Hants
• G. Nutley, Middle Wyke, Andover
• T. Courtney, Worthy, Winchester
• W. Bailey, Britwell, Maidenhead
• W. Milsum, Wonston Manor, Micheldever

PRICE OF ELEVATOR, £80.

A.W. would also call attention to his
NEW GEAR,
The Cheapest and most compact, and easily Portable ONE-HORSE GEAR in England. Adapted for working Elevators, Pumping, &c. Complete with Connecting Bars.
PRICE, £6.
AGENT TO ALL THE MANUFACTURERS.

The reason this advert is of interest to my place is because of the mention of Mr G. Nutley of Middle Wyke, Andover.

Middle Wyke is one of the hamlets in the parish of St Mary Bourne and Mr. Nutley is actually Edward Nutley of Middle Wyke Farm who is described on the 1871 Census as “Farmer of 630 acres also malster employing 15 men 6 boys”. It’s a little piece of the jigsaw that tells me more about the farm and the equipment used there.

Although the image is 60 years later it does give you and idea of what the advert was advertising.

References
British News Paper Library via Findmypast, the extract is from the first available edition of the Andover Chronicle, 1 Jul 1870.

Musuem of English Rural Life (MERL), item reference P DX281 PH3/282, photograph conditions of access and use state available.

1871 Census RG10/1238/7/5 available at Findmypast