Publications

The Society publishes an annual Journal and periodic books and booklets. Our books in print appear on this page, most recent first.  Payment can be made securely on-line by PayPal or credit / debit card (if paying by card, select “Pay by Debit or Credit Card” when you get to the PayPal logon screen), or by cheque payable to “Huddersfield Local History Society” and sent to HLHS, 24 Sunnybank Rd, Huddersfield HD3 3DE; terms and conditions are here.

UK postage and packing for printed items is currently:

  • £2.50 for 1 item
  • £3.00 for 2 items
  • £3.50 for 3 items
  • £4.00 for 4 or more items

If paying by cheque, remember to include the relevant P&P costs.

For overseas shipping, please send a message via the contact form before ordering, and we will advise the appropriate postage cost.

Our books are also usually available to purchase at our monthly evening talks.


‘Meet me at Harold Wilson’: Stories from St George’s Square

So many things have taken place in Huddersfield’s premier public space.  Music, sport, politics, religion and war have all played their part in its history and for many people, whether they are coming to start a new life or just passing through, the Square is the first thing they see. This fully illustrated 164-page paperback brings together memories shared with us and tales from the archives to tell the story of the Square, in words and pictures, from its creation in the 1850s to the present day.

£5.00Add to basket


Issue #34 (2023/24) of the Huddersfield Local History Society’s Journal is now available to purchase, either as a paperback (£5) or as a PDF to download (£4). The full list of contents can be found here.

 

Paperback (excluding postage)

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PDF Download

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Nature’s Missionary: Seth Lister Mosley – Naturalist, Museum Curator And Mystic 1848-1929 by Alan Brooke. Paperback, 264 pages [inc. 16 pages of full-colour plates]. ISBN 9780992984151. Published November 2022. Reviewed in The Local Historian journal.

Seth Lister Mosley is an influential and until now underexplored figure in British social and cultural history. He made important contributions to museology, to the popularisation of science and science education, and to the study of natural history. He was a pioneer in the development of notions of ecology and eco-systems as well as an early exponent of environmentalism. His reputation as a taxidermist, illustrator, naturalist, journal editor, and newspaper columnist extended far beyond his home town of Huddersfield but it was there that his life-long ‘mission’ to establish a museum was realised with his appointment as its first Curator in 1920.

£15.00Add to basket


"Briarcourt: The Story of a House with a Heart" Briarcourt: The Story of a House with a Heart.

Briarcourt in Lindley is a key work of the celebrated Arts & Crafts architect Edgar Wood, who collaborated with skilful artists and craftsmen to create a total work of art. Built in the 1890s as a family home, for 70 years it was in institutional use, successively meeting the needs of vulnerable children, older people, and young people with special needs. Published on behalf of the Edgar Wood Heritage Group (Yorkshire), this new book celebrates its art and architecture and evokes the lives of its varied residents.

£10.00Add to basket


"Colne Valley: A History of a Pennine Landscape" by Rob Vincent Colne Valley: A History of a Pennine Landscape by Rob Vincent.

This 104-page paperback book is a tribute to the visual strengths of the Colne Valley’s landscape and a narrative of its development. Colour throughout with 90 photos and maps.

£11.95Add to basket


This newly revised 2020 edition of Pamela Cooksey’s Public Lives: The Woodheads – A Notable Family of Huddersfield is available to download as a 74-page PDF. The contents can be viewed here.

PDF Download

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Names, Places & People: a selection of articles from Old West Riding, edited by Cyril Pearce. Paperback, 160 pages, contents page. ISBN 9780992984120.

Old West Riding published 23 editions from 1981 to 1995. It was a joint venture by three local historians – Jennifer Stead, George Redmonds and Cyril Pearce. This collection of over a dozen articles is dedicated to George Redmonds, who died in August 2018.

£6.95Add to basket


Making Up for Lost Time: The Pioneering Years of Huddersfield Corporation, edited by David Griffiths. Launched on 7th July 2018 to coincide with the 150th anniversary of the incorporation of Huddersfield as a borough. Paperback, 128 pages. ISBN 9780992984113.

Huddersfield became a Municipal Borough in 1868, two decades after many of its neighbours, but rapidly became a champion of civic enterprise. This new book explains the delay, describes the town as it was on the eve of incorporation, and explores the priorities, the politics and the personalities of the new Corporation’s first half century.

£8.95Add to basket


The Charter Our Right! Huddersfield Chartism Re-Considered, edited by John A. Hargreaves. The book is an edited collection of essays by Alan Brooke, Matthew Roberts, Malcolm Chase and John Halstead which explore Chartism and popular radicalism in Huddersfield. This illustrated 126-page paperback book retails at £9.95. ISBN 9780992984106.

£9.95Add to basket


YFE_-FRONT-COVER-LOW-RES ‘Yours for Eternity’ – A Romance of the Great War, by John Rumsby, was published in October 2014 to mark the centenary of the First World War, which it examines through the experiences of a local young couple.  The book is based on an extraordinary collection of 150 letters found in a tin box in the attic of a house in the town – written by Henry Coulter, in 1914 a clerk with Huddersfield Corporation Tramways, and by his sweetheart Lucy Townend, who worked in a shoe-shop.  Henry and Lucy’s letters express the activities and aspirations of two young  people separated by war. Poignantly, they include the very last one Lucy wrote to him on 22 October 1916. Henry never saw it: he had died of his wounds three days earlier.  Extensively illustrated, the 168-page book is available at £5.00.

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brook front cover imageJoseph Brook of Greenhead: ‘Father of the Town’, by David Griffiths, was published in October 2013.  Joseph Brook JP (1787-1858) was one of the men who shaped Huddersfield in the first half of the 19th century.  A wool merchant by trade, he was a leading figure in new institutions of the time, such as the Huddersfield Banking Co, the Waterworks  and the Improvement Commissioners.  Centrally involved in bringing the railway to Huddersfield, he took a big part in creating Edgerton Cemetery, where his memorial stands proud today.   The 96-page biography retails at £6.00.

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liberty or death cover

Published in 2012 to mark the Luddite bi-centenary was a fully revised edition of Liberty or Death: Radicals, Republicans and Luddites, 1793-1823, by Alan Brooke and Lesley Kipling, a 160-page book retailing at £8.00 (reviewed here).  It has been praised by The Local Historian as “well produced and well written, and a worthy successor to E P Thompson’s The Making of the English Working Class”. The Society also published a Luddite trail leaflet, William Horsfall’s Last Journey.

£8.00Add to basket


Huddersfield in the 1820s
by Edward J. Law
ISBN 9780950913452

£6.00Add to basket


Pioneers or Partisans? – Governing Huddersfield, 1820-48
by David Griffiths
ISBN 978095091344

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Queen Street Chapel and Mission Huddersfield
by Edward Royle
ISBN 9780950913421

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Joseph Kaye, Builder of Huddersfield, c.1779-1858
by Edward J. Law
ISBN 0950913413

£4.00Add to basket


John Benson Pritchett: First Medical Officer of Health for Huddersfield
by J.B. Eagles
ISBN 0950913505

£1.50Add to basket