AN OPEN day was held at Calstock Parish Archive recently to offer people an opportunity to find out more about the history of their community.

Now firmly settled in its new home at the Tamar Valley Centre at Drakewalls, the archive boasts a wide selection of material dating from the 13th Century to the present.

On display during the open day was a collection of photographs of all villages and settlements in the parish, giving an insight into life in Calstock parish over more than 100 years.

Visitors could see the unique medieval landholding and court records that have been translated from the original legal Latin in which they were written.

This included information about the medieval silver mines over the river at Bere Alston from where ore was brought to Calstock for smelting.

A number of new projects have been started thanks to a number of new volunteers and some are still ongoing.

A new parish-wide family history is underway — the Hunn family has already been traced back to the mid 1500s and there will be a project working with maps, checking field names and field walking to identify landscape features.

Work is continuing on cataloguing all material donated or collected at the archive.

The next event for the archive is the 'Take Flight' exhibition on November 7 and 8 where aerial photographs taken from a kite flying over Calstock will be among the exhibits.

The issue of emigration from the Calstock area will be covered, particularly among the mining population who spread to America, South Africa, Australia and other parts of the world in their hunt for work after mines closed down here.

Memories of family members who stayed at home form part of the archive's collection of oral history interviews and there are a number of photographs sent back home from mining fields across the world.

Volunteer Lynda Harman said: 'It has been fascinating looking up the information for the exhibition.

'As always it is the individual stories that make it so interesting, although some are quite sad.

'Ivy Rogers told us about her father Montague Allen going to work in the States. She and her mother and brother were on the verge of leaving Latchley to join them when they received the news that he and his brother had both been killed in an explosion underground.

'Her mother was left with no source of income, taking on cleaning jobs and laundry to keep the family.

'We also have some great pictures where the miners have smartened themselves up in their best clothes to impress those back home.'