2011 so far...

I have been working on various things so far this year, writing my report for the Winston Churchill Trust, visiting the Museum of North Devon and Barnstaple to talk to curator Ruth Spires about their collection and adding to my own collection.

I spoke to Ruth before Christmas about my fellowship trip and what I discovered in Virginia and North Carolina. Ruth told me that someone studying for a Phd (Alice Forward of Cardiff University) was visiting from Wales in January so I arranged to come back again at the same time so we could exchange information, finds and notes. I actually visited the Museum on February 3rd – when I arrived Alice was in the covered yard at the Museum with David Dawson, who has 40 years experience of identifying pottery. They both had their heads buried in boxes of sherds and it was quite a sight as there are rows and rows of boxes and boxes of finds. Ruth told me that a lot are from an archaeological dig in the 80’s when the new library site in Barnstaple was being developed.

We all went into the main Museum and compared sherds – I shared some recent finds from the North Devon Coast and Alice had some wonderful pieces of sgrafitto ware from the Valley between Swansea and Cardiff. David identified a couple of my sgraffito pieces as being 17th Century.

It was fascinating talking to him as he can identify a pot’s form and size from a relatively small piece.

I will return to the Museum some time soon and take a look at their collection. I will need a few hours to spare as it is so large but it is quite a significant collection of pottery from Barnstaple and Bideford and area.