One of the many extraordinary things about Alex Moulton is that he rarely threw anything away. He was clearly influenced by his ancestors, as seemingly they didn’t either. As a result, The Hall is stuffed with files and papers; from commercial enterprise in the nineteenth century to household accounts in the twentieth century and indeed up to the present day.

With all this history comes responsibility, and that is why our first Heritage Lottery Fund grant included a programme of scoping the archive (as it was largely unsorted and uncatalogued) and putting into place some measures to ensure that it would be preserved into the future.

We were very fortunate to be able to bring in a team of experts and volunteers from the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre, led by Claire Skinner. After several months of hard work, we now have an initial list of what is in the ‘paper’ archive in The Hall. A good start, and a long way to go!

Trustees and members of the Alex Moulton Charitable Trust Working Group attended a training session at the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre to learn about good practice with regard to archives and how to mitigate risks to different archive materials. All of this will help us to pursue our aim of long-term preservation of, and allowing access to, our unique and varied archive.