Joan Wake

Joan Wake (1884–1974) is best known as a historian who led a successful campaign to save Delapré Abbey from destruction.

Background

Joan Wake was born at Courteenhall on 29 February 1884, a daughter of Sir Hereward Wake, the 12th baronet, and his wife Catherine St Aubyn.

Historian and activist^[1]

Whilst studying at the London School of Economics and Political Science, she developed contacts with the historians Eileen Power, Frank Stenton and Doris Mary Stenton. Her own earliest major historical project was the full transcription of hundreds of medieval charters in the Hesketh Collection at Easton Neston.

In 1918, she became a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and two years later was one of the founders of the Northamptonshire Record Society. Her activities during the rest of her life focussed on promoting the preservation, safe custody and publication of the records of Northamptonshire.

As well as the research and writing activities usually associated with historians, she was an activist who personally visited 36 solicitors’ firms during the Second World War to ensure that archives in their care were not destroyed as part of the current “salvage” campaigns.

By the 1950s, Delapré Abbey, a short distance south of the centre of Northampton, was owned by Northampton Corporation, disused and under threat of demolition. Through successful fundraising and political pressure, Joan Wake and the Record Society brought about a change of policy so that the building was saved; in 1959 it was officially opened as the Northamptonshire Record Office with accommodation for the Record Society’s library. In the following year, she was made a C.B.E. in recognition of her achievements.

Publications

Between 1911 and 1973, a total of over 80 works by Joan Wake were published, the majority of which related to various aspects of the history of Northamptonshire.^[2]

As General Editor of the volumes of historical texts published by the Northamptonshire Record Society 1924-1964, she composed prefaces or indexes to eight of those volumes.

References

1. Isham, Gyles (1975). "Joan Wake". Northamptonshire Past & Present (Northampton: Northamptonshire Record Society) 5: 157–160.
2. Eady, Rosemary (1975). "The Published Works of Joan Wake". Northamptonshire Past & Present (Northampton: Northamptonshire Record Society) 5: 162–165.