MVP Newsletter Jun 2025

Our group continues to flourish, with very good attendance and interest at our monthly meetings (on the third Tuesday of the month at the Methodist Church Hall). Our January meeting was the annual Christmas party, held at Mortimer West End village hall, with a free ‘bar’ provided by the committee, and a sumptuous spread provided by members. We enjoyed a quiz, part local history, part general knowledge, and part lateral thinking! In February we were delighted to welcome Dave Stubbs, a retired police officer and volunteer at the Thames Valley Police Museum in Sulhampstead, and he gave us a very informative and entertaining talk, with artefacts from the museum. One of our members has done a lot of research into the Nickless family in the 19th century, and the far flung adventures of some of the siblings, and so in our March meeting we learnt about what she had discovered, and were very pleased that three members of the 21st century family were able to join us. In April we looked back at some recent Mortimer, national and international history in the form of photos from Mortimer’s lockdown in 2020, and many of us had forgotten some of the poignant details of that time. Because of the lockdown we were unable to celebrate the 75th anniversary of VE Day in the usual style, but villagers were encouraged to decorate their houses, and have a tea party in their front gardens, and again all this was documented in photos. The Berkshire Family History Society is holding its 50th anniversary conference at Wokefield Place on the theme of the Victorians, and has invited us to have a stall. We’ll exhibit display boards about our 19th century drinking establishments, churches, schools and station, and the boards will have a second outing at the Fun Day on 5th July.