Acknowledgements

My special thanks to Helen Burton of the Special Collections and Archives at Keele University for her invaluable assistance with my research into the Sneyd Archive, also for permission to take and publish photographs from this archive.

My thanks also to Thea Randall and her staff at the Stafford County Records Office for their help and permission to photograph the Wolstanton Parish Registers.

My thanks also to the Reverend Jonathan Eades, Rector of Wolstanton Parish Church, for his interest in this project, his generous time and his permission to publish photographs of the Wolstanton Parish Registers. Also to Richard Ayling of the Wolstanton Churchyard Restoration Project for his time and help.

Thanks also to the Reverend Michael Harding, for many years the Vicar of St Paul’s in Newcastle-u-Lyme where I sang as a chorister, for his fascinating insight into the management of church burial grounds.

My thanks also to Mr Twigg, the current owner of Bradwell Hall, for his time and his interesting insights.

My thanks also to Sandra Burgess for her pioneering four-volume history of the Sneyd family, “A study of an Ancient Staffordshire Gentry Family - the Family of Ralph Sneyd Esq. (1723-1793) of Keele, Staffordshire - with a Survey of its pre-history.” submitted as an MA thesis in 1990. Particularly useful are Sandra’s clear charts of a very complex genealogy.

Finally, my thanks and gratitude to Betty Pyatt, Nick & Jo, Niel Dingley, Martina Seidel, Mac and Mandy Austin, Phil Barrett, Steve Brock, Richard Swigg, Dean Brindley and my family for their enthusiastic interest in this remarkable story and their invaluable help in this project.

Copyright 2006 Jeremy Crick