Touring the British Isles Online: 18th-19th Century Travel Accounts

Darris G. Williams, AG®

Itinerary

• Introduction

• Find a guidebook

• People’s Collection Wales

• Geograph

• Google Maps

Introduction

• Gerald of Wales wrote of his travels in 1188

• Geographic, historical, and social context

• Each travel account offers tidbits of detail

• Start your online journey with a guidebook

Find a Guidebook

• Search online sources first

– Vision of Britain

– Google Books

– Family History Library Catalog

Vision of Britain

• Gerald of Wales (1188)

• Paul Hentzer (1590s)

• Celia Fiennes (1690s)

• Daniel Defoe (1720s)

• Charles Wesley (1736-56)

• Samuel Johnson (1773)

• Thomas Pennant (1780)

• William Cobbett (1821-6)

• George Borrow (1854)

Vision of Britain

• Search by place-name from the home page

• Select an author from the gallery to learn more, and to read their book

• Click on place-names to learn more about the places they visited

Here I saw ye way of makeing Runnet as they do in Cheshire-they take ye Reed bag and Curd and haveing washed it Clean, salt it and breake ye Curd small about ye bag, so drye them, being stretch'd out with sticks like a glove, and so hang them in a Chimney till you need it, then Cut a piece off this as big as halfe a Crown and boyle it in a little water wch water will turn ye milke better than any made runnet and its freshe.

The Cambrian Tourist; or, Post-Chaise Companion Through Wales, 1828 (Google

Books)

Long before you reach Merthyr, the blackened atmosphere points out the site; but when immediately upon it, you are obliged to inquire where it is, and the way to it:

The Cambrian Tourist; or, Post-Chaise Companion Through Wales, 1828 (Google Books)

P.S. One thing I must tell you, for it made us laugh fit to kill ourselves two whole days.

You must know, the women go barefoot, and wear stockings that reach just down to the ancle, and no lower; but the strangest part of all is, that these stockings are fastened round their great toes by a long thread.

They walk over the roads, and make nothing of it, though all rough and stony.

MAPS

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The road branches