The Clacton VCH Group comprises a team of local history volunteers working in collaboration with the Victoria County History of Essex (VCH Essex) project at the University of Essex. To learn more about VCH Essex click here.
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Project Launch, Parade Hotel, Clacton, 12/07/05. L to R: Cindy Rowland (Clacton VCH Group), Cllr Terry Allen (Tendring District Council), Roger Kennell (Chair, Clacton VCH Group), Chris Thornton (University of Essex) |
The current members of the group are:
- Roger Kennell (Chairman)
- Colin Preen (Treasurer)
- Hazel Beckham
- Elizabeth Austin (Secretary)
- Cindy Rowland
- Tim Underwood
- George Hardwick
- Karen Rogers
Clacton at War, 1939-45
The Group's first project was a popular and well-illustrated book on the history of Clacton-on-Sea in the Second World War. This book is still in print and available from the Group. It combines the history of Clacton-on-Sea during the Second World War from documentary evidence with the story of ordinary people living through an extraordinary period. In peacetime Clacton was a town whose economy was largely based on providing seaside holidays to thousands of people, but in wartime the holiday trade had to be suspended. Instead, the people who remained in the town came to feel that Clacton, because of its coastal situation, represented part of the ‘front line' in the struggle to defend their country against the enemy. The transitory population was no longer holidaymakers, but members of the armed services.
ISBN: 0-9546458-0-4
Published 25 Nov 2003 . Now at lower price: £5.00
Copies are available in person from Clacton and District Local History Society at Clacton Library,
Or:
by post in the UK at £5.00 + £1 postage and packing (total £6.00) from Mr. Colin Preen, 14 Highview Avenue, Clacton-on-Sea, Essex, CO15 4DY. Cheques payable to "Clacton VCH Group".
For overseas orders please e-mail: vchistory@essex.ac.uk
Wartime Life in Clacton
This website represents the Group's second project, which was launched with the support of the Big Lottery Fund on 12th July 2005. For fuller details, click this paragraph.
This project has created an on-line educational resource pack for local schools relating to WWII. Our primary objective has been to help local schools deliver teaching on WWII for Key Stage I and II pupils, around the topic of ‘What was it like for children during the Second World War'.
In developing this website we have received much help from VCH Essex, from the Essex record Office (Essex County Council) and from Cann Hall Primary School, Clacton.
Volunteering
Much of the material for the new project is being contributed by veterans living in Clacton and neighbouring communities. By bringing together the schoolchildren with veterans from the period, gathering veterans' memories, and collecting documents, newspaper accounts, maps, artefacts, and photographs, we hope to ensure that future generations will more fully understand the significance of the war effort to the local community.
The Group particularly wishes to contact more WWII veterans from Clacton and neighbourhood, and would also like to hear from anyone else who has memories to share or would like to help or participate in activities.
For further details please contact:
Roger Kennell, Chairman, Clacton VCH Group, 01473 823299; RogerBKennell@aol.com.
