As the informal 'Oldham Historical Research Group', of like-minded people, before the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, we held monthly, free meetings with a presentation from a guest speaker, at which all-comers were welcome.

There were no subscription or meeting charges.

Meetings were held in the Local Studies & Archives, in Oldham, at 7pm on the 3rd Wednesday of each month.

Our interests were in promoting local history through projects, transcriptions and researching topics of personal interest.

Welcome to Oldham Historical Research

In January 2021, the decision was taken to start our meetings, again, online on Zoom. These continued successfully, on the same monthly basis, until February 2023, which was to be our final meeting. Unfortunately, circumstances had changed, and it is now not possible to continue with our meetings either at the Local Studies Library or on zoom on a monthly basis. However, after discussion at our final meeting, it was decided to continue meetings on an ad hoc basis. More details can be found on the News Page

In October 2013 we started a WW1 Memorial Project, on this website, not to glorify war but to remember and honour sacrifice, both at home and on the battlefield, with particular reference to our own Oldham and surrounding district.

Much had already been written and published about those 4 terrible years ... about battle strategy; the politics that drove it; a generation of young men decimated; the famous personages of the time; selfless and heroic deeds. Thanks to the digital age of the computer, and the surge of interest in researching family history on the internet, we can now more easily learn about the lives of our ancestors who fought, and often died, on the battle fields of the 'War to end War'. They weren't always heroes; they were sometimes reluctant conscripts, but they were our family members and it was our mothers and grandmothers who had wept for their fallen husbands and sons.

There are few families, today, that don't have a well-worn photo of a young man, in uniform, who went off to war amidst cheering crowds and didn't return or, if he did return, came back as a very different person. In a small way, our group wanted to try and breathe some life into the memory of those who 'took the king's shilling'; the women who worked tirelessly on the Home Front to support and comfort loved ones away from home; and those men and women who spent the years in battle zones caring for the wounded.

Our aim was to commemorate and honour the men and women, of our wider Oldham district, who were mostly known only to their loved ones. For this purpose we needed to collect copies of the ephemera that still remained. Our hope was to give each of our soldiers a page or pages, that told their story, or just remembered a name, and gave some substance to their memory.

Of course, as time went by, we found there was more and more we wanted to investigate and add. One of the most significant additions was that of Conscientious Objection and the campaigns for peace. Yet another was that of the overlap with the issues of women's suffrage, and the wider role of women in the war. The project began to assume a life of its own and, for some of us, became a labour of love.

There will still be some edits to the pages but now, 5 years later, as 2019 approaches, the project has reached a natural conclusion and we will no longer be asking for your contributions. We wish to thank everyone who has contributed to the pages or sent us messages of appreciation. As the webmistress, it has given me the greatest pleasure and satisfaction to help bring our project to fruition.

Menu page for the Project, HERE