A Look At Life A Century Ago

Records dating back 100 years have been unsealed at Jersey Archive, giving us a new look into early 20th century life.

They include the meeting minutes of the 'Primary Instruction Committee', which is now the Education Department.

One meeting from June 1923 shows when politicians decided to sack married women from their primary school teaching roles from that November.

It was part of a practice called the 'marriage bar' and was common during the time between the two world wars.

Archives Director, Linda Romeril, says unsealing documents shows us how attitudes have changed over generations.

"1923 was the year that the women's political union was set up in Jersey, so we are at a period where things are starting to change for women.

But obviously, in this particular case, there was still a very long way to go for teachers. They had to make that decision between having a job or being married."

Primary Instruction Committee Meeting Minutes

Prison records from 1931 - 1948 have also been unsealed and uncover information about political prisoners during the Occupation.

It shows the first islander to be arrested and imprisoned by the German Authorities, Gordon Surguy who was tried for 'wilful damage' on 19 August 1940, three weeks after the Nazis invaded.

Records also show well-known resisters of the Occupation, including Canon Clifford John Cohu who was sentenced to 18 months for listening to and sharing news from the BBC using a wireless radio, which was banned by the Germans.

Cohu was later sent to Zoshcen Forced Labour Camp in France where he died.

Linda explains why records of different ages are unsealed.

"We look at how sensitive the data is and then what does it relate to. For example, the Primary Instruction Committee, because there will be information in there about children, that will be closed for the maximum 100 years.

The prison records involve adults, and even though it's still sensitive information, usually we look at opening them up after 75 years."

The practice of storing records away for future generations to look at continues today, with information from government meetings as well as hospital and prison records being sealed up.

However, the archive has had to adapt to the modern digital age now most information is sent through the internet.

"Any transfers of digital records that come to us will go into our digital preservation system and that will keep the digital records safe and secure.

It will monitor to make sure no one can go in and change those records, which is much easier to do with a digital document.

The system will also look for what is called file format obsolescence, which upgrades the file up to the latest viewing copy while also retaining the original. This is important because as you can imagine you wouldn't be able to view a Word document from 20 years ago."

Anyone can go and see the newly unsealed records at Jersey Archive by calling and booking an appointment. 

The team are also giving a talk on the documents at 10 am on Saturday 20 January.