
The Railway through Audley End: Lord Braybrooke, W G Gibson and the Line to Cambridge, by Martin Rose
SWHS Publications no 7 (2024), design by Nick Crawley. ISBN 978-1873669-23-5, 64 pages, price £6.00
Why do all fast trains stop at Audley End? Why does the line disappear into the Chalk through two tunnels whose only function is to hide it from the windows of Audley End? Whose is the showy heraldry on the Littlebury tunnel portal? And why is the station at Wendens Ambo called Audley End? This book examines the politics, the pettiness and the engineering of the line built eventually in 1844-45 – a line that is today taken entirely for granted.

One Man’s Saffron Walden by Bruce Munro
SWHS Publications no 6 (2023), ed. Jacqueline Cooper. ISBN 978-1-873669-21-1, 150 pages, price £15
Bruce Munro is a well-known local personality who, until his retirement, worked in Saffron Walden for 60 years as auctioneer, valuer and surveyor. His memoir, illustrated with over 270 photographs, collects the author’s memories of people, streets, buildings and events from the 1950s well into the present century. This unique oral history is a hymn to the world we have lost, recording fond memories of a way of life that is gone forever.

Audley End: Landscape Histories, by Lizzie Sanders
SWHS Publications no 5 (2019), designed by Maggie Town, ed. Jacqueline Cooper, 150 pages, ISBN 978-1873669-20-4, price £12.00
This beautifully illustrated and designed book explores the making of the Audley End estate. Lizzie Sanders uses her skills as local and art historian to uncover the stories of the hamlets, watercourses, mills, bridges and lost roads. She leads the reader through the making of an enchanted kingdom created with much money and the best architects and landscape gardeners, noting the human cost and the aesthetic gains without making a stern balance sheet of them. An essential book about Audley End.

Chepyng Walden – A Late Medieval Small Town: Saffron Walden 1438-1490, by Elizabeth Allen
SWHS Publications no 4 (2015), ed. Jacqueline Cooper, design Nick Crawley. 218 pages, ISBN 978-1-873669-15-0, price £12
A landmark volume offering a detailed portrait of Saffron Walden in the 15th century, when it was still known as Chepyng (or Market) Walden. The author describes the town as it grew and changed almost six centuries ago, leaving a legacy we still enjoy today: this was the dynamic period when the magnificent church was being built, there was a rich cultural life, sophisticated trading patterns and saffron was becoming an important crop. A remarkable scholarly book, fully illustrated with maps, charts and photographs, it has rapidly become a classic reference for everyone with an interest in the history of medieval life in the finest market town in Essex.

Sir Thomas Smith: scholar, statesman and son of Saffron Walden, by Jeremy Collingwood
SWHS Publications no 3 (2012), ed. Jacqueline Cooper, 72 pages. ISBN 978-1-873669-08-2, price £7.50
One of Saffron Walden’s most distinguished sons, Sir Thomas Smith was the first Regius Professor of Civil Law, and Vice-Chancellor, at Cambridge, Provost of Eton, Principal Secretary of State to Edward VI and Elizabeth I, ambassador to France and the Low Countries, Privy Councillor, and – not least – the builder of Hill Hall, one of England’s first great Palladian mansions. He was the author of two of the most important political writings of Tudor times, The Discourse of the Commonweal (1549); and De Republica Anglorum (1562-1565), an authoritative account of the English constitution and legal system. Smith played a part in obtaining the town’s new charter in 1549, re-founding the Almshouses and obtaining a new charter for the grammar school.

The Place Names of Saffron Walden, by Malcolm White
SWHA Publications no 2 (2011), ed. Jacqueline Cooper, 100 pages. ISBN 978-1-873669-04-4, price £8.50
The author, when Saffron Walden Town Clerk, often advised on the naming of new streets, as had another former Town Clerk, Cliff Stacey. The Town Council liked to use old field names as this helped to perpetuate the town’s history. A primary source for the book is the 1758 map of Saffron Walden, as well as the 1843 Tithe Award map and other sources in Saffron Walden Town Library. Gathering all these sources together has resulted in a fascinating guide to the origins of the street names and place names of Saffron Walden, offering an unusual insight into the history of a unique and special place. The book is illustrated by local photographers, Gordon Ridgewell and the late David Campbell.

Land, Agriculture and Industry in North-west Essex: spotlights on a land remembered, by Geoffrey Ball
SWHS Publications no 1 (2009 reprinted 2014), ed Jacqueline Cooper, 86 pages. ISBN 978-1-873669-02-0, price £7.50
Agriculture and its associated industries have been at the centre of life and work in north-west Essex for many centuries. This book examines different examples of farming in the past and the industries processing its main local products (malt and wool). It also contains a chapter on the 19th century plan to construct a canal through Saffron Walden and ends by reviewing changes in farming over the last 40 years and reflecting on the future.