HAARG
Hastings Area Archaeological Research Group Registered Charity No.294989
HOMENEWSLETTER - JANUARY 2004
ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTIONS ARE NOW DUE, and a renewal
form is enclosed which please return to the Treasurer as soon as possible -
unless you are among those who have already paid. The rate is unchanged for
a third year, at £8 for ordinary membership, or £9 for one household
or family where only one copy of each publication is required. For those who
are retired, or full-time students, the individual rate is reduced to £7.
THE GIFT-AID SCHEME is bringing several hundred
pounds of extra income, without which subscriptions would probably have had
to be increased to cover our running costs. Forms already signed are valid until
further notice or until you tell us to cancel yours. If anyone who pays income
tax (even at the lowest rate) would like to join our scheme, please contact
the Treasurer for a form.
EXCAVATIONS AT GLOSSAMS PLACE, BECKLEY: will resume
from Saturday 8 May to Sunday 16 May, and again from Saturday 18 September to
Sunday 26 September. All those who have taken part in recent years will receive
the usual notice and booking form nearer the dates; anyone else who would like
to join in should contact Mike Greenhalgh. Anyone not wishing to dig is also
welcome to come along and watch; the grid reference is TQ854215. There is a
padlocked metal gate into Forestry Commission woodland which is open to pedestrians
at all times. We open the gate for cars between 0945 and 10.00 each morning,
otherwise there is a ten-minute walk to the site, marked by HAARG signs at junctions
- keep straight ahead, ignoring turnings to right and left. Last September we enjoyed a successful nine days on site, in perfect weather. We excavated further in trench 2 around the second garderobe chute, but there is more to be unravelled here. Trench 4 in an area of high resistivity was enlarged, and may prove to be an area where slates were prepared, but there are other features as well. Nearby a section was cut across the small western ditch - it is not large enough now to be called part of the moat, but below it a larger ditch on a different alignment was exposed which we cannot interpret yet; work will also continue here.
THE ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING OF HAARG
will be on Wednesday 25 February 2004, at
7.30pm at the same place as the last two years: Clive Vale United Reformed Church,
Edwin Road, Hastings. Anyone who needs a location plan should contact any officer.
A copy of the Agenda is enclosed for members, also the annual reports and accounts
and the Minutes of last year's meeting. Please bring these with you if attending.
THIS WILL BE OUR THIRTIETH A.G.M.; in the last Newsletter
I enquired whether anyone else recalls being present at the first one, on 21
February 1974 - some 21 months after HAARG was formed. Our President, Anne Scott,
was elected Secretary (not Treasurer, as I wrote previously) that night, and
shortly afterwards produced our first-ever Newsletter on a duplicator. Pam Haines
- a founder member - was on the committee; Alan Scott (our other founder member)
had just stood down as Chairman, and I was thanked for having led HAARG's first
walk - round Castleham factory site, then being cleared for development! John
Manwaring Baines had just retired as Museum curator, and brought as a guest
his successor, David Devenish, who has in recent years become a member himself.
One other member has responded with her recollections of that evening in the
former Library Extension: Rona Cooke, who reminded me that in those days we
had a flourishing junior section with their own representative on the committee.
GUEST SPEAKER AT THIS YEAR'S AGM will be Liz Wilson recently appointed as Finds Liaison Officer for Sussex under the Portable Antiquities Scheme. We invited her to take space in this Newsletter to explain her new post, and her response follows below. She will also be at Hastings Museum on the first Friday of each month from 2.0pm to 4.0pm: 6 February, 5 March, 2 April, and 7 May.
