Settle Chronicle
The Settle Chronicle and North Ribblesdale Advertiser
[Settle, printed and published on the first of every month by John Wildman, bookseller,
Chronicle Office, Duke Street. February 1854 — December 1866]
The only known complete run of The Settle Chronicle and North Ribblesdale Advertiser has been digitised from the two-volume set held by the Museum of North Craven Life, originally from the library of the Yorkshire historian Thomas Brayshaw (1856–1931).
Explore the collection
PDFs for all issues in a given year can be viewed using the indexes below. These large files may take some time to load. The text is fully searchable using the Find or Search function in your pdf reader.
Volume 1:
1854 | 1855 | 1856 | 1857 | 1858 | 1859
Volume 2:
1860 | 1861 | 1862 | 1863 | 1864 | 1865 | 1866
Settle Chronicle by North Craven Building Preservation Trust is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
North Craven Building Preservation Trust Ltd (NCBPT) makes these files available for non-commercial use via a Creative Commons Licence. Please acknowledge the Museum of North Craven Life/NCBPT if you copy and share any of the files provided on this site.
History
Published monthly, each issue usually comprised 4 or 8 pages (occasionally 12) with a
typical mixture of local news, advertisements for local businesses, agricultural reports,
railway timetables and letters to the editor, as well as national news (Royal Family, Crimean War, syndicated novels, emigration to the Australian colonies, poetry, etc).
The newspaper was successively edited by John Wildman (1854–1858), John Battersby (1858–1865), and finally Margaret and William Wildman. Circulation at launch was 700 copies, later 1000, and “occasionally” 1400, but this proved insufficient to make it a paying concern, and after thirteen years the paper closed with its final issue in December, 1866. John Wildman gives the reader his view of the role of The Settle Chronicle in his first editorial, entitled Address to Our Friends:
“On the occasion of presenting our little periodical to the public, a brief notice as to our
views and intentions will not be out of place. The growing commercial importance of the country, and the constantly augmenting business transactions of the age, render a vast amount of advertisements and of mediums for advertising more and more necessary; and it is now generally acknowledged that the outlay of capital in this respect is ultimately a positive source of profit.
Our pages will be enriched with gems of literature of a miscellaneous, but instructive and entertaining character; and with the thoughts and sayings of great men will be given, from time to time, columns of entirely original and valuable matter. The elevation of the masses, and the amelioration of their condition, it is true, has been the avowed promise and pursuit of a large number of the periodicals which constantly appear and disappear with every succeeding month. But the proposed mission than which none can be more admirable has too often failed, not because there is no need of such attempts, but because political, rather than social evils, have been arrayed and inquired into. Reform, and the secret of its ultimate success, lies with ourselves at our own hearths with the education of our own minds.
All that relates to home comfort and domestic economy, or which tends to promote the
happiness of the fireside, will be fully treated of and considered: matters which we
confidently hope will meet with a cordial reception by our readers”.
Acknowledgements
Digitisation was carried out as part of a Young Roots project funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, in conjunction with Settle Stories. Scanning services were provided by North Yorkshire County Record Office.
