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2024-09-30-accounts

169th ANNUAL REPORT OF COUNCIL FOR THE SUBSCRIPTION YEAR ENDING 30[TH] SEPTEMBER 2024

All five Council meetings held during this year were online via the Zoom platform. The Society’s Committees have continued to function either online via Zoom or have returned to in person meetings in respect of the Historic Buildings and Conservation Committee and the Publications Committee. The joint Working Party continues to look at the Future of LAMAS and ways to increase the Membership.

The Society continues to be represented at meetings of the Southwark and Lambeth Archaeological Excavation Committee and the Council for British Archaeology London.

Lecture meetings (report by Kathryn Stubbs)

The lecture series programme ran from October 2023 - 2024 and included a joint lecture with the Prehistoric Society, and held in conjunction with CBA London Archaeology Group. The lectures are announced in the Newsletter, on the website, social media and the diary page of London Archaeologist . The lectures were hybrid, held in person at the Institute of Archaeology, UCL and the Gallery, Alan Baxter Associates, and on-line. Lectures are recorded, on agreement with the lecturer, and are available on YouTube after the event.

Lectures were well attended and attracted a wide audience including attendees from, and outside London, and from Europe, helping to raise the profile of London’s archaeology and history.

The first lecture, in October, was given by Sadie Watson and Damian Goodburn, MOLA, on ‘Stamped Roman timbers from London and elsewhere: tracing evidence of economy and emperors’. Recent excavations on London’s Roman waterfront revealed many examples of rare branded stamps on the timber quay structures. The stamps are useful evidence of the timber trade that served the port. They were compared with other examples across London and in the western Roman Empire. The lecture drew together this evidence and discussed what the stamps tell us about London, the construction of its quay and its place in the wider Empire. In November, Becky Haslam gave a lecture on ‘A Tale of Two Fords? An alternative model of Roman road infrastructure in Southwark and beyond’ This described evidence for revisions to the current model of Roman road infrastructure to the south of Southwark’s Borough Channel. Discoveries from sites at Brandon House and Harper Road were considered with a reappraisal of the existing corpus of evidence to make a case that the current model is modified, including a revision to the route of Stane Street and a new location for its junction with Watling Street. It is suggested that a hitherto unknown Roman road extended westwards from Watling Street in the direction of modern Vauxhall. The implications of this revised model were discussed with emphasis on the location of the ‘ritual shafts’ of the site at Swan Street and potential regional implications. December’s lecture was given by Dominic Perring, UCL, Institute of Archaeology, entitled ‘The failure of London: the long fourth century’. This talk, based in large part on the concluding chapters of his recent book, London in the Roman World , set the archaeological evidence for later Roman London within its wider historical context. At the end of the third century, London remained a place of considerable importance in the western empire, but this ceased to be the case during the fourth century. Cycles of urban investment, followed by periods of disrepair and redundancy were described, in relation to London’s changing importance to the provincial administration. Why, when and how did this important bastion of Roman power change, and to what extent can this change be characterised as ‘decline and fall’ was discussed. The January lecture was given by Alfred Hawkins, Historic Royal Palaces, on ‘Life, Death and Worship at HM Tower of London’. The lecture discussed the history and archaeology of the Chapel Royal and Royal Peculiar of Saint Peter ad Vincula, the parish church of HM Palace and Fortress of the Tower of London. The talk covered the chronology and development of the church and the impact of its designation of ‘Royal Peculiar’ upon archaeological excavations. The results of excavations in 2019 including analysis of the skeletal remains exhumed, which was funded by a LAMAS Research Grant in 2022/23, was discussed.

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In March, Peter Jones, Brunel Museum, stepping in for the Director, Katherine MacAlpine, gave a lecture on ‘The Thames Tunnel’. The story of the tunnel, which became the world’s first subterranean river crossing and underwater ‘shopping arcade’ was described. Details of Marc Brunel’s engineering designs, and the construction methods were outlined as well as how the tunnel became a train line, still in use today. The lecture in April was given by Bob Cowie on ‘Syon Abbey revisited: reconstructing late medieval England’s wealthiest nunnery’. Syon Abbey was the last great religious house to be built in the London region during the medieval period, and by the time of its closure in 1539 it was the tenth richest in Europe. Founded by Henry V and built by Henry VI, it was home to segregated female and male communities of the Bridgettine order. The lecture outlined how archaeological investigations since the late 1990’s have begun to shed light on the abbey and its long forgotten layout and appearance. The Joint Prehistoric Society and LAMAS lecture was given in May by Dr Matt Pope, UCL, on ‘Paleo-London, Thinking about the Ice Age Archaeology and Environments of the Capital’. The landscape of Greater London preserves a rich record of our Ice Age past, including a large area of Ice Age geology, environmental records of now lost landscapes as well as stone artefacts and bones of now extinct mammalian fauna. From the first recorded discovery of a Palaeolithic tool through to professional commercial excavations, the lecture considered how the London landscape was shaped by ice and water and how early human populations adapted, or not, to cycles of climate change, evidenced in the gravels and clays of the city.

The AGM and Presidential Address was held in February. Our President, Vanessa Harding, Emeritus Professor of London History, Birkbeck, University of London gave a talk on ‘Mapping medieval London’, exploring mapping the medieval city with special reference to the Historic Towns Trust’s map of London c 1300 published in 2019. The talk described how new historical and archaeological research, was brought together and designed to illustrate London at this time. The map gives a fascinating insight to the character, buildings, street plan, churches and religious houses of London, some of which are still evident in the modern city.

LAMAS Lates (report by Jane Sidell)

We held several Late events this year starting with a visit to the Vine Street Roman Wall in December, led by Jane Sidell and Kathryn Stubbs, viewing the wonderful new presentation of the wall and hearing about the development. Additionally, the exceptional finds display was seen, and the cafe was patronised! This was followed in April by a walk around the Northern elements of London Wall, including the S-N Noble Street stretch from the corner turret up to Bastion 12, via the Fort Gate, recently conserved. In May a small group visited the Mithraeum, In June, our President Vanessa Harding led a wonderful tour of medieval London, looking at surviving existing fabric, the street layout and sites of many key elements of medieval London. The Lates season ended in August at West Norwood, with Robert Stephenson continuing our tradition of visiting one of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries.

Newsletter, Website and Publicity (report by Jane Wheeler and Karen Thomas)

Three editions of the LAMAS Newsletter were published in 2024. All editions were wellreceived by our members – the majority of whom now received an electronic colour PDF version. However, a small proportion of members still received black and white printed A5 size versions. It is hoped that the numbers of printed and posted Newsletter will gradually reduce over the next 23 months due to rising printing and postage costs. The usual information regarding LAMAS events from both archaeology and local history branches of the organisation, along with lectures, Lates, on-going threats to historic building/planning etc., along with articles of interest covering a multitude of disciplines under the umbrella of LAMAS, awards, details of grants, book reviews, and exhibitions, were disseminated. This includes a youth section subsuming the Young Archaeologists Club. Affiliated society details and their events are also included in the 3-yearly Newsletter.

Our YouTube channel continues to attract both members and non-members to view our conference talks and lectures after the event. Work on revamping our website is coming along

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well with the help of designers Link Digital and input from Jane Sidell and John Shemilt from the Working Party team.

Our Social Media platforms (Facebook, Twitter (X) and Instagram are all still helping to bring LAMAS and London’s history and archaeology to a larger audience. If anyone would be interested in helping us with our Facebook page we would love to hear from you!

Membership report by John Shemilt.

The increase in membership reported last year has continued for the year 2023/24. Historic practice has been to count members who paid the previous year but have not paid for the current year as defaulting members and include them in the membership figures. The table below gives the membership figures using both methods:

LAMAS year 2021/22 2022/23 2023/24
Paid-up 408 488 496
% change 19.6% 1.6%
Inc defaulters 471 513 535
% change 8.2% 4.1%

The large increase in paid up members for 2022/23 was partially due to a number of members not paying for 2021/22. The number of personal members consenting to Gift Aid being collected on their subscription has increased from 199 to 214.

65 members who had not paid their 23/24 subscriptions by the 1[st] November and had provided contact email addresses were sent reminder emails. This resulted in 41 membership renewals.

Council approved the development of a new website following the March meeting, which will include a membership area. This will allow members to update their contact details, as well as access to the last three years volumes of Transactions online.

At the beginning of September, emails were sent to all members who have provided contact email addresses with details of their membership. This resulted in some 50+ members renewing their membership before 1[st] October for 2024/25 year.

Working Party on the Future of LAMAS (report by John Schofield and Kathryn Stubbs, Chairs)

The working party met several times. The Speaking Out policy for the society was refined and finished. Jane Sidell of the group is managing the redesign of the LAMAS website. The Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) policy of the society is also finished. Links with students at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London, are being explored, and how to widen the involvement of historians in the work of the society discussed. Another priority is to be reconsideration of the membership subscription rates and related initiatives to increase membership.

Research Fund (report by Karen Thomas)

The Society has not awarded a Research Grant for this year but instead is looking to update its terms and conditions and expand the committee with the aim of attracting more applications in the coming years.

Publications Committee (report by John Schofield, Chair, and committee members)

The Committee is now meeting twice a year, as it conducts most of its business by email. Volume 73 of Transactions was published in November 2023. It has 336 pages and a very striking photograph of the Mercers’ sculpture of the dead Christ on the cover. It contains nine articles and reviews; the subjects range from Early Neolithic pits at Shoreditch to examples of iconoclasm and

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the concealment of religious goods in London during the Reformation. The amount of colour photography in the journal is notable and no doubt standard for the future.

Archaeology Committee (report by Jon Cotton, Secretary)

The Committee met remotely via Zoom four times during the year, in October, January, April and July. Reports on fieldwork and other matters were regularly received from MOLA, PreConstruct Archaeology Ltd, the AOC Archaeology Group, and from GLAAS.

Issues of concern to the Committee over the year include the future of the London Archaeological Archive. Initial meetings have been held to address the situation. Another issue exercising the Committee is how best to reach out to the 40 or more affiliated societies (and other non-affiliated societies) across London.

Finally, the Committee organised the 60th Annual Archaeology Conference staged as a hybrid event at the Museum in Docklands on March 23rd. Clearly, many people were pleased to be able to attend a live event once again, although there were also a significant number who chose the remote option.

The 2023 Ralph Merrifield Award was presented to John Schofield in recognition of his long service to the capital’s built and buried heritage, initially through the Museum’s Department of Urban Archaeology and latterly via the City of London Archaeological Trust.

Following this the morning session contained presentations on Landmark Court, Southwark; the former GPO site in Newgate Street; 67-71 Tanner Street, Southwark; Stationer’s Hall; and the Greater London Historic Environment Record.

The afternoon session was devoted to a celebration of the work of the DUA and the DGLA on their 50th and 40th anniversaries, respectively. This was addressed by senior former members of staff: John Schofield, Dominic Perring and Gustav Milne of the DUA; and Robert Cowie and Harvey Sheldon of the DGLA.

Local History Committee (report by John Price, Chair)

The Committee met on two occasions, January 2024 and June 2024 at 11 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3RE. The members of the Committee are John Price (Chair), Maggie Bolton, Pat Gough, Oliver Harris, Mike Marriott, and Lorraine Woodleigh.

The Annual Local History Conference took place at the Docklands, Museum of London in November 2023 on the theme of ‘The London Menagerie: Animals in London History’. Papers presented were as follows:

The winners of the 2023 Local History Publication awards were presented during the annual conference and were as follows:

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Historic Buildings and Conservation Committee (report by John Ricketts, HBCC representative to LAMAS Council)

During the 12-month period HBCC submitted 46 responses to local planning authorities in relation to planning applications reviewed by the Committee, representing around 8% of applications reviewed. These applications relate mainly to the proposed alteration to individual listed buildings or their settings in the Greater London area, although we are also concerned with the impact of larger development schemes on the settings of listed buildings and/or conservation areas.

We had particular concerns over two large high-profile planning applications during the

year:

The planning application for the redevelopment of Liverpool Street station, which we reported on last year, finally went live in October 2023. HBCC and LAMAS issued a joint letter of objection to the proposed scheme, which would have caused serious harm to nearby listed buildings, the surrounding conservation areas and protected views, particularly from St Paul's. We were but one of over 2,000 objectors to the scheme and in May 2024, the developers announced they would be making some major, at that time unspecified changes to the scheme in light of the volume of objections. As at the end of September 2024 there was no further news, though there have been major changes to the scheme and the project team since then. LAMAS remains a member of the Liverpool Street Campaign (LISSCA) which is leading the campaign against the current proposals.

In August 2024 HBCC submitted an objection to the proposed redevelopment of the Royal Mint Court complex near the Tower of London into a new Chinese embassy. A previous, essentially identical application had been refused by the London Borough of Tower Hamlets (LBTH) in early 2023 and this new application, submitted in July 2024, argued that the decision to refuse had been flawed. We supported LBTH's 2023 refusal on the grounds of the adverse impact on heritage assets flowing from the effect of potential protests, acts of terrorism and related security mitigation measures. The application has since (October 2023) been called in by the Secretary of State.

Other applications which we objected to included the proposal to make a six-storey addition to the Grade II listed former Saville Theatre building in Shaftesbury Avenue; and the proposal to add a 'contemporary' saw-toothed black metal roof extension to the former Whitbread Brewery in Chiswell Street, EC1, which would lead to a major loss of significance to a number of Grade II and Grade II* listed buildings on the site.

HBCC took part in several consultations in the City of London during the year - plans for a new Creechurch Conservation Area in October 2023, when we argued strongly for a specific, appropriate boundary to be adopted; and the draft City of London 2040 Plan in June 2024, when we argued that the provisions for the protection of heritage assets were insufficiently robust.

In February 2024 we welcomed onto the Committee a new member, Alice Shackleton, who has proved an admirable addition to the team. We remain on the look-out for additional new members who have an interest in some of the London boroughs where our coverage is thin, so would be pleased to hear from anyone interested in joining us.

BY DIRECTION OF COUNCIL Harvey Sheldon Karen Thomas Chairman of Council Honorary Secretary

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LONDON AND MIDDLESEX ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY

STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES FOR THE YEAR ENDING 30 SEPTEMBER 2024

_2023_Incoming Resources
£
_10,182_Subscriptions
_2,100_Gift Aid
_221_Sale ofPublications
_81_Royaltiesand Licensing
_19,110_Grantsfor LAMASTransactions
_1,080_Archaeology Conference
_1,683_Local History Conference
_362_LectureSeriesIncome
_1,456_Interest
_55_Donations
_36,330_TotalIncoming Resources
_7,979_NetIncoming Resources
28,351		 2024
£
10,399
1,080
140
256
15,895
2,690
730
458
2,524
65
34,237
3,326
30,911		 _2023_Resources Expended
£
Publications:
20,414- LAMASTransactions
2,072- Newsletter
_1,521_Archaeology Conference
_1,991_Local History Conference
_150_Publication Awards
_0_Research Grants
_327_LectureSeries Expenses
_673_Postage,Printing andStationery
_185_BankCharges
_0_Ralph Merrifield Award
_888_Computing
_130_Miscellaneous Costs
28,351
Total Resources Expended		 2024
£
18,828
1,102
1,848
1,988
300
0
459
214
774
100
5,146
152
30,911

BALANCE SHEET AS AT 30 SEPTEMBER 2024

2023
£
14,094
95,649
1,500
111,243
1,987
3,385
3,964
20,726
30,062
81,181
ASSETS
Bank and Cash Balances
SavingsAccounts
Paymentsin advance
Total Assets
Less: LIABILITIES
Subscriptionsin advance
Creditors
FuturePublications
Research Grants2
Total Liabilities
**Total Net Assets **		 2024
£
5,965
101,154
0
107,119
2,283
3,385
3,964
12,980
22,612
84,507		 _2023_FUNDS OF THESOCIETY
£
Restricted Funds
7,105
PublicationsFund3
Unrestricted Funds
_66,097_Funds broughtforward
_7,979_Funds movementforthe
period
74,076
Total Unrestricted Funds
81,181
Total Funds		 2024
£
7,105
74,076
3,326
77,402
84,507

Notes to the Accounts:

  1. The Statement of Financial Activities and Balance Sheet have been prepared using the ‘natural classification’ as permitted by the Charities Act 2011.

  2. Research Grants represent amounts set aside to promote non-corporate members' research interests, and at 30th September 2024 grants of £12,980 had been allocated but not yet paid pending completion of outstanding projects.

  3. Use of the Publications Fund requires the sanction of the donor, Historic England.

Signed: H. L. Sheldon Chairman

Signed D. C. Gordon Hon. Treasurer

23[rd] January 2025

FINANCIAL REVIEW .

The state of the finances at the end of the LAMAS year 1st October 2023 – 30th September 2024 was healthy. We ended the year with a surplus of £3,326 of incoming resources over expenditure. The comparable figure for the LAMAS year 2021-22 was a surplus of £7,979. The surplus was lower this year largely the result of expenditure on a new website.

The Society’s current net assets of £84,507 are sufficient to cover expenditure presently envisaged, including production of the Society’s Transactions, current and prospective research grants, further expenditure on information technology and the (restricted) publications fund. There is also a largely predictable income from Members’ subscriptions. As a result the Society does not currently hold designated reserves.

David Gordon (Honorary Treasurer).

Independent Examiner’s Report to the Trustees of the London and Middlesex Archaeological Society (Registered Charity No. 267552)

I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of London & Middlesex Archaeological Society (‘the Trust”) for the year ended 30 September 2024.

As the charity's trustees, you are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (‘the Act”).

I report in respect of my examination of the Trust's accounts carried out under section 145 of the Act and in carrying out my examination, I have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.

I have completed my examination. | confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination which gives me cause to believe that in, any material respect:

I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.

Signed: Edward Lee-Smith

Date: 25[th] January 2025

19 Lawrie Park Crescent London SE26 8HH

I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of London & Middlesex Archaeological Society (Yhe Trust") for the year ended 30 September 2024.set out on pages . .and..... As the charity's trustees, you are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordan￿ with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 ('the Act") I report in respect of my examination of the Trust's accounts carried out under section 145 of the Act and in Garying out my examination, I have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under sedion 145{5){b) of the Act. I have completed my examination. I confimi that no Material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination which gives me cause to believe that in. any matenal respect.. the accounting records were not kept in accordance with section 130 of the Chartties Act.. or the accounts did not accord with the accounting records.. or the accounts did not comply with the applicable requirements concerning the form and content of accounts set out in the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 other than any requirement that the accounts give a 'lrue and fair, view which is not a matter considered as part of an independent examination. I have no Concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached. Signed: Date: Edward Lee-Smf(h 19 Lawrie Park Crescent, London SE26 6HH IER Oct 2018