Andrew Hopper: Fellow of the Society for Army Historical Research

Andrew Hopper, Professor in Local and Social History in the Department of Continuing Education at the University of Oxford (and formerly of the Centre for English Local History at the University of Leicester), has been elected a Fellow of the Society for Army Historical Research (SAHR). The fellowship scheme recognises service to the Society and distinguished research into the history of the Land Forces of the Crown. Andrew has received his election in recognition of the work entailed in masterminding the Civil War Petitions project as an online resource. Dr Ismini Pells, Course Director for the Advanced Diploma in Local History, also played a central role in this project.

The Petitions project website, funded by a generous standard grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (2017–2022), provides photographs and transcriptions of petitions to the state from military veterans and their families for welfare payments as a result of their injuries and bereavement sustained during the English Civil Wars. It aims to share information on the human costs of this devastating series of conflicts, which continued to affect communities long after the fighting was over.

Andrew and Ismini hosted a live webcast in November 2023 for their podcast The World Turned Upside Down, in which a distinguished panel explored the foundations of military welfare in the seventeenth century and the experience of veterans and their families after modern conflicts, and discussed how this brings the past and present together.