Bibliography - Daniel Waley
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Lewes in the Boer War, 1899-1902, by Daniel Waley, published 1994 in Sussex Archæological Collections (vol. 132, article, pp.173-192) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 12979] & The Keep [LIB/500294] & S.A.S. library

Lewes Library Society: the early years, 1785-1831, by Daniel Waley and Jeremy Goring, published 2000 in Sussex Archæological Collections (vol. 138, article, pp.153-164) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 14509] & The Keep [LIB/500298] & S.A.S. library   View Online

In 1785 a small group of Lewesians, led by a surgeon, Joseph Ridge, founded a Library Society to acquire serious books. Members numbered 28 in 1786, 60 by 1792 and 90 by the early 19th century. A marked dissenting and radical connection - particularly with the Westgate Presbyterian Meeting - is detectable among the early members. The Society's holdings numbered about 1000 volumes by 1794 and over 3000 by 1827, in the earliest surviving catalogue. A volume recording loans in 1786 is a rare and important survival in the Society's archive (in the East Sussex Record Office) and makes it possible to compare the Society's tastes in reading with those of a contemporary Library Society in Bristol. The initial policy of purchasing serious works was continued. This applied to works on political, social, religious, philosophical, economic, legal and scientific topics, though these were leavened with writings on travel, poetry and some fiction and lighter fare.

The Lewes Library Society in the Victorian Period, 1831-97, by Daniel Waley, published 2001 in Sussex Archæological Collections (vol. 139, article, pp.187-190) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 14916] & The Keep [LIB/500292] & S.A.S. library   View Online

This article is a continuation of D. Waley and J. Goring, 'Lewes Library Society: the early years, 1785-1831', Sussex Archaeological Collections 138 (2000), 153-64. The Society encountered some financial difficulties in this period and slowly and reluctantly certain organizational changes were achieved, the principal one being the installation of a newsroom in 1857. In 1863 the Library moved as tenant to the newly built Fitzroy Memorial Library. In 1897 the Society was dissolved and the books were transferred to the corporation of Lewes under the terms of the Public Library Acts. This development was typical; except in a few major cities, subscription libraries no longer had a role since they had been superseded by municipal, commercial and academic libraries.

Simon de Montfort and the historians, by Daniel Waley, published 2002 in Sussex Archæological Collections (vol. 140, article, pp.65-70) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 15109] & The Keep [LIB/500299] & S.A.S. library   View Online

The career and personality of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester (c. 1208- 1265), the leader of the baronial revolt against King Henry III, provides a striking exemplar of the malleability of historiographical opinion. Montfort has been treated as hero and villain and (misleadingly) as 'the founder of the House of Commons'. The attitudes of the writers discussed in this article should be interpreted in the light of their own times ? for instance, the English Civil War, the Jacobite risings, the French Revolution and nineteenth-century Liberalism. The emphasis in the article is on the importance to the historian of his historical background rather than on his exploitation of new sources.