News and Forthcoming Events
NEW Gatehouse Talks and Events Group at the Mill on the Fleet
The 2017 programme of the Gatehouse Talks and Events Group is now available. The first meeting, on 26 April, is a talk by Janet Brennan, Chair, Scottish Castles Association, on Kirkcudbrightshire Castles Past and Present. This is followed by an excursion on 29 April.
Report of the meeting of 25 March 2017
This report is now available online.
Trusty's Hill Book Launch
The launch of The Lost Dark Age of the Kingdom of Rheged took place in the Murray Arms Hotel, Gatehouse of Fleet on Saturday, 21 January 2017. Co-athored by Ronan Toolis and Christopher Bowles (shown here signing copies), it gives an account of the Galloway Picts Project excavations at Trusty's Hill undertaken by the Society in 2012. Over 100 people attended and all of the 40 books supplied by the publisher were sold.
It's publication has created a fair amount of publicity, including items on BBC Scotland and Radio Scotland, a piece in The Scotsman and a two-page centre spread in The National.
The book is published by Oxbow Books and copies can be ordered directly from the publisher's website.
Reports of the meetings of 13 and 27 January 2017
These reports are now available online.
Presentation of the Truckell Prize for 2016
The 2016 Truckell Prize, awarded annually by the Society, has been won by Mr Gary Hutchison, a postgraduate student currently carrying out research for a PhD in the Dept of History, Classics and Archaeology at Edinburgh University. Mr Hutchison attended the Society’s meeting on Friday, 13 January 2017, to receive the award. The Society’s President, Dr Jeremy Brock, presented Mr Hutchison with the prize certificate and a cheque for £500.
Mr Hutchison won the award with a research paper entitled Wigtown Burghs, 1832–1868: A Rotten Burgh District? The Wigtown Burghs parliamentary constituency, comprised the burghs of Wigtown, Stranraer, Whithorn, and New Galloway from 1707 to 1885. Before 1832 it was under the control of the Earls of Galloway. Electoral politics in the constituency were significantly changed by the passing of the First Reform Act in 1832, but research shows that several critical factors continued to influence post-1832 politics locally. This calls into question the assertion that the Reform Act constituted a turning-point in Scottish and British political history. The paper will be published in the next issue of the Society’s Transactions and will be of particular interest to those interested in the political history of Wigtownshire.
TDGNHAS Volume 84 now available on line
Volume 84 of TDGNHAS is now available online.
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