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Unlock the Story of the Cleveland Street Scandal

1889 was the year of the Cleveland Street scandal, in which a male brothel was raided in Cleveland Street, in London’s West End. At the time, sexual acts between men were illegal in Britain, and those who visited the house of assignation on Cleveland Street faced prosecution. However, due to the high social standing of many of the clientele of 19 Cleveland Street, only a few men faced prison time, as the British government were accused of covering up the

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Murder, Mystery and Mayhem On The Railways – 10 Stories From Our Archive

Long before Agatha Christie envisioned murder on the Orient Express, or before she wondered what might have taken place on the 4.50 from Paddington, murder, mystery and mayhem were already well established on the railways of Britain and beyond. The first victim of murder on British railways was 70-year-old Thomas Briggs. In this special blog, we will take a look at his story, as well as nine others sourced from the pages of our newspaper Archive, which tell the strange,

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Our Newspapers & Breaking The News at The British Library

From April this year our long-term partner the British Library has been home to a fantastic exhibition – Breaking the News – which investigates the ‘big questions about the news we consume.’ Exploring how the news shapes the world around us, the exhibition combines different news mediums from five centuries, from radio to television, from pamphlets to newspapers, as well as using objects and artefacts from the British Library’s extensive collection. Book your tickets for the Breaking the News exhibition here And

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We’ve Reached 50 Million Pages – Celebrating 50 Fantastic Things About The Archive

Today we have reached a landmark of 50 million pages all now available to search on the British Newspaper Archive. That’s 50 million pages of news stories that span four centuries, from 1699 to 2009, that come from the United Kingdom and Ireland, and beyond. And we’re not stopping here – we plan to add millions more pages over the coming weeks, months and years. When the British Newspaper Archive was launched in partnership with the British Library in November 2011 a goal of

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Hauntings for Halloween

Haunted

With Halloween approaching, we wanted to see what we could find related to the topic of hauntings in The British Newspaper Archive. Of children and hauntings Often the origins of a haunting myth are rooted in death and loss. Sometimes the myth grows and morphs to such a point where its origin is indeterminate. Other times, the sad truth of its origin is unexpectedly revealed, as with the ‘grim discovery’ at a ‘haunted house’ in 1921, reported in The Scotsman.

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Occupations: 19th century coal miners

Derbyshire Miners Coal-getting at the Bolsover Face. Drawn by D Macpherson

    In the month of August, we have looked at occupations and employment through the newspapers.  To finish our theme this month, we are taking a closer look at coal miners, specifically in the 19th century.  An initial search for miners reveals explosions, accidents, and strikes in the vast amount of mines operating across Great Britain.  We will look at these topics in closer detail. The first coal mine was sunk in Scotland, under the Firth of Forth in

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On this day, an arrest at sea

Dr Crippen

On 31 July 1910, Hawley Harvey Crippen, better known as Dr Crippen, and Ethel Le Neve, his typist-turned-lover, were arrested on board the Montrose while trying to flee west to Canada. On top of being a sensational case and arrest, it was the first example of an arrest aided by wireless telegraphy. A cross-Atlantic chase of a fleeing couple is an apt ending to our July theme of travel and migration. When you ask yourself why your ancestor or the

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The Illustrated Police News: ‘The worst newspaper in England’

A woman was almost buried alive according to the Illustrated Police News

The British Newspaper Archive is packed with weird and wonderful stories of every description. Search the newspapers However, of all the historic titles in this collection, no publication reported the bizarre and the shocking in quite the same way as the Illustrated Police News. The Illustrated Police News was one of Britain’s very first tabloids and one of the first periodicals to tap into the British public’s morbid appetite for crime and sensation. The paper was founded in 1843 and was partly

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Historic #gymspiration from the newspaper archive!

So you’re all set for your morning jog when suddenly you realise that it’s raining. It’s getting cold. You can’t find your trainers and you forgot to charge your iPod. Thinking of giving up and crawling back under the sheets for a few extra minutes in dreamland? Well stop right there! We’ve had a look in the newspapers for our favourite pictures of gymnasiums through the ages, guaranteed to get you back up and running!     But, as always, someone

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Meet the Content Lead of The British Newspaper Archive

Find out what goes on behind the scenes at The British Newspaper Archive in our series of Q&As with the team who work here. We sat down with Content Lead Amy Sell to find out who she is and what she does.   What does your job involve? I help people discover The British Newspaper Archive and understand how amazing the collection is by writing emails and blog posts, managing our Facebook page and Twitter feed and producing handy video

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