This volume of pamphlets by Henry Layton, author of works on the soul's immortality once belonged to the great philosopher John Locke & is now in the Angus. In a 1702 letter, Layton thanked Locke for the 'easie reception of my book' & Locke notes that the book is the authors gift, ex dono authoris.

We are delighted to announce that the Baptist Times and the Baptist Union Handbooks have now been digitised and are available online at Find My Past www.findmypast.co.uk and the British Newspapers Archive www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk Happy searching!

The Angus Library will close temporarily from January - October 2026 to all visitors & enquirers. Temporary closure will enable us to carry out important tasks & reopen next year providing an even better service & protecting & promoting our amazing collections. theangus.rpc.ox.ac.uk/temporary-cl...

We are proud to hold material relating to the heroes Thomas Burchell, Baptist missionary & builder of Gurney's Mount BC & Sam Sharpe, Baptist Deacon & leader of the 1831 Baptist Uprising www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...

It's not too late to register for the next Friends of the Angus online talk on April 2nd, when Paloma Miravet Llorens will be speaking on gender and agency in colonial societies (Fernando Po, 19th century), in 'We the principal inhabitants of this town'.

You are warmly invited to join us on the 2nd of April, for the next online 'Opening the Angus' seminar when Paloma Miravet Llorens will be giving her talk on gender and agency in colonial societies (Fernando Po, 19th century), 'We the principal inhabitants of this town'.

www.oxfam.org.uk/media/press-... An amazing story about a rare find - the beautiful Bible translated into Chinese by Baptist Missionary Joshua Marshman & the Armenian translator Johannes Lassar, who was fluent in Chinese. What an incredible discovery !

Happy St Patrick's Day! From the libraries at Regent's here's a lovely 'Life of St Patrick' from 1905. We also have a c.1765 poetical works of Jonathon Swift - one of Ireland's best known authors and one time Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin where he is now buried. #StPatricksDay

It's not too late to sign up for our Opening the Angus online seminar, 6th of March @ 7.30 when Zach Williams will talk about Abraham Booth, Baptist minister, author, abolitionist & educationalist in "A 'Capital Part' of Salvation: Abraham Booth on the necessity of Holiness in the Christian Life".

Introducing Radical Roots, a brilliant series of films & an accompanying course from the Baptist Historical Society & Church from Scratch. You'll be able to watch the stories of 5 people who can help us better understand the radical roots of Baptists ! www.baptist.org.uk/Articles/704...

Please join us at our Spring Opening the Angus online seminar, 6th of March @ 7.30 when Zach Williams will talk about Abraham Booth, Baptist minister, author, abolitionist & educationalist in "A 'Capital Part' of Salvation: Abraham Booth on the necessity of Holiness in the Christian Life".

Here's a sweet Valentine letter from Charles Spurgeon to his mother written in 1872. He wishes his parents married bliss & sends a gift of ' favourite French plums for your own special self with lots of love & kisses". He may have been the 'Prince of Preachers' but he still loved his mum & dad 💗

Happy Birthday to George Gordon, Lord #Byron. Here is his signature from 1818, carefully preserved in an autograph album compiled by Rev Dr Joseph Angus, founder of the Angus Library, who was clearly a great admirer of his work.

#Santa 's reindeer must have been have been tired in 1928, as here he is in Dholpur, India riding a magnificent elephant. We wonder if it could fly? Huge thanks to @arascot.bsky.social for running a fantastic #ArchiveAdventCalendar campaign, we have so enjoyed seeing everyone's festive history!

#ArchiveAdvent Day 23 and here is a glowing #star taken from the pages of a sweet little Edwardian book called 'True Comforts' which we have in the library.

#ArchiveAdvent Day 22. For soldiers fighting in WW1, receiving an Xmas #Stocking may have been a far off dream, but the members of Baxter Gate Baptist Church in Loughborough were determined to ensure they received Xmas gifts. Here's a list of items church members could send in parcels to the troops.

A lovely little early C19th edition of Robert Burns’ poem 'The Cottager's Saturday Night - Containing a very pleasing and affecting description of the piety and happiness of a cottager and his family' A very cosy #family scene for the holidays, can you spot their pet dog? #ArchiveAdventCalendar

Just look at these beautiful handmade #Toys ! Using pith, the boys in this 1920s photo created incredible models of the steam boats then seen on the Congo river, as well as an amazing bicyle and plane. #ArchiveAdventCalendar

#ArchiveAdvent #ChristmasSports Today, a photo of the Christmas Swimming race in Bopoto, Upper Congo-now the Democratic Republic of Congo, taken in 1896. A very energetic way to spend the day!

Christmas 1897 in Bopoto, Congo - these missionaries' clothes and all the beautful greenery was certainly #MerryandBright - even if smiling for photographs wasn't in fashion yet! #ArchiveAdventCalendar

Broadmead Baptist Church is on Historic England's 2024 list of remarkable buildings to be given protection. Broadmead, Bristol's 1st dissenting church, dates from the 17thc. The current church was built by R.Sims, opened in 1969. We ❤ its brutalist beauty! www.theguardian.com/culture/2024...

#ArchiveAdvent 17th December, #ChristmasGifts. Our gift today is a Robin, taken from a beautiful Victorian scrapbook that we hold. "Pretty bird! How beautifully dost thou sit and sing" wrote Bishop Joseph Hall in his 'Meditation on a Robin Red-breast' singing at his window.

'Kitty, take these three books to the library, get Mr Brown to change them - tell him I'm fond of the ROMANTIC' A charming C19th little pencil sketch of a library-loving lady and her little cat by a #WarmFire, found in a Victorian scrapbook. #ArchiveAdventCalendar

#FestiveTraditions Here is a woodblock illustration of the Three Wise Men from William Hone's book 'Ancient Mysteries Described'(1823). This rough but charming woodcut would have been printed on Christmas carol 'sheets' which were very popular at the time. #ArchiveAdventCalendar

A beautiful camel in 1920s India — looks like it was parked in the town square while the Three Wise Men went gift shopping! 🐪✨ #ArchiveAdventCalendar

For a #ChristmasCracker here's 'Cracke me a Nut' a gloriously mad pamphlet from 1589 by 'one who dares call a dog, a dog'. Part of the Puritan vs Anglican Martin Marprelate pamphlet war, it is 'a sound boxe of the eare, for the idiot Martin to hold his peace'. #ArchiveAdventCalendar

These ladies are ready for Christmas party season in their gorgeous #FestiveClothes! Found in a Victorian scrapbook, the colour on these prints is still amazingly vivid. We're glad to live in a era of less elaborate hairstyles, though. #ArchiveAdventCalendar

A beautiful #WinterWonderland from 1926, at the Women's Institute at Taiyuan, Shansi in China, with a very kind gentleman clearing a path through the snow. #ArchiveAdventCalendar

A slightly different #ChristmasCard sent by missionaries Allan and Lily Palmer in the 1910s. Instead of snowy scenes and robins they created a collage of photos from their life in Yalemba, Congo. Not unlike the family newsletters we get in cards today! #ArchiveAdventCalendar

A little #ChristmasSparkle from this incredible hand painted card found in a Victorian scrapbook. The note reads ‘From ‘Auguste’ – now the Rev. Mother Prioress of the Carmelite Convent’ – nice to know that even prioresses sent Christmas cards! #ArchiveAdventCalendar

Some wonderful photos from a #Nativity play put on in 1936 at Kibokolo, Angola. The scenes show the (very dramatic) appearance of the angel to the shepherds, and the adoration of the magi! #ArchiveAdventCalendar

Some #ChristmasCharity in 1913 for today's #ArchiveAdventCalendar. From the Annual Report of Baptist Deaconesses, this photo of Father Christmas visiting children at Berger Hall, East London is a snapshot of the support the deaconesses offered to poverty stricken, vulnerable and ill in society.

'William Black the #Chimney Sweeper' is an early 1800s pious chapbook. Raised in a workhouse, 'friendless, uninstructed and depraved', he falls off a roof, breaks his arm, becomes a Christian and lives a clean and godly life in a cellar with his wife and 3 children. Cheerful! #ArchiveAdventCalendar

Have you got your Christmas #Tree up yet? Here is ours at Regent's Park College with toys ready for the Salvation Army present appeal (www.salvationarmy.org.uk/christmas-pr... ), and one from Yakusu, Congo all the way back in the 1920s! #ArchiveAdventCalendar

A beautiful harvest of fruit and vegetables in the Congo, all the way back in 1897! Produce like this would have been a part of this later photo of a #FestiveFeast in Kibokolo 1936, showing the Christmas feast of the local day school children. #ArchiveAdventCalendar

Day 3’s #ArchiveAdventCalendar is an ‘Eastern sheep drawing his fatt tayle in a cart’ from 1705. The fat tailed #sheep is a real breed and appears twice in the Bible (Exo. 29:22 + Lev 3:9) so may well have been the kind watched by the Bethlehem shepherds! Though they probably didn’t have tail carts.

Day 2 of the #ArchiveAdventCalendar takes us to Bhiwani, India in 1928, which was then home to a large Baptist Missionary hospital specialising in treatment for women and eye conditions. Their chapel had some beautiful Christmas #Decorations, look at that tinsel!

Welcome to our #ArchiveAdventCalendar ! In the 1820s Jens and Karina Holm, their child and reindeer were very far from their home in Lapland. Working as a living exhibit in London they displayed their traditional Sami dress and ways of life in front of a painted panorama of the North Cape, Norway.