Community

Hertfordshire Archives & Local Studies

This is a value that highlights the importance of sharing, mutual obligations and relationships. Friends have historically expressed this in mental health and prison reform, social inclusion, fair trade, ethical investment, environmental health, and other concerns.

Women’s Meeting poor relief account book, 1789-1802. The Quakers have a long tradition of caring for the poor within their own community. Poor relief, as it was known, had always been generous and well thought out with each monthly meeting responsible for its own paupers.
HALS (ref NQ2/5H/4)
Share certificate for the Bank of the United States, 1839. This certificate is among the business papers of Frederic Seebohm, who was a member of one the prominent Hertfordshire Quaker families. Frederic married Mary Ann Exton in 1857 and became a junior partner in the Hitchin Bank, Sharples and Company where his father-in-law was a senior partner. As a close knit community, Quakers both supported each other and acted as critical friends. Quaker values of truth and equality were borne out in their business dealings, where they earned a reputation for honesty and fairness.
HALS (ref DE/So/B2)
Correspondence regarding the maintenance of a Quaker school and workhouse in London, 1817-1823. This is letter is one of a series of letters sent to William Lucas Jr, a member of the Hitchin Meeting, which was supporting the Quaker school and workhouse in Clerkenwell, established in 1702. Originally solely a workhouse for around 50 ‘decayed Friends and orphans’, the children’s quarters later evolved into a boarding school.
HALS (ref NQ2/5I/2/4b)
Apprenticeship indenture of John Thorn of Ashwell, 1800. Another way that Quakers cared for their poor was by arranging apprenticeships. Here we see an agreement for John Thorn of Ashwell to be apprenticed to Ambrose Everard, a cordwainer (shoemaker).
HALS (ref NQ2/5G/3)
Letter from Robert Berry asking fellow Friends for financial assistance to help Mathen Harwood who has lost everything in a fire, Hertford 1693
HALS (ref NQ2/8B/4)
List of Members and Attendees of the Bedfordshire Quarterly Meeting, 1916
HALS (ref NQ1/5A/5)
This page was added on 17/08/2020.

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