David George Watts (14 May 1931 – 14 October 2016), known as George Watts, was an English

local historian The British Association for Local History (BALH) is a membership organisation that exists to promote the advancement of public education through the study of local history and to encourage and assist the study of local history throughout Great Bri ...

closely associated with the work of the ''

Victoria County History The Victoria History of the Counties of England, commonly known as the Victoria County History or the VCH, is an English history project which began in 1899 with the aim of creating an encyclopaedic history of each of the historic counties of En ...

'' (VCH) and the history of

Titchfield Titchfield is a village in southern Hampshire, by the River Meon. The village has a history stretching back to the 6th century. During the medieval period, the village operated a small port and market. Near to the village are the ruins of Titch ...

, Hampshire.

Early life

David Watts was born on 14 May 1931, at the Old Inn House, West Street,

, Hampshire. His family were strawberry growers which was an important local industry. In a local history talk he recalled that as a boy he could walk from Titchfield to

Warsash Warsash is a village in southern Hampshire, England, situated at the mouth of the River Hamble, west of the area known as Locks Heath. Boating plays an important part in the village's economy, and the village has a sailing club. It is also home ...

alongside strawberry fields the whole distance. His family aimed to harvest their first crop by mid-May and the berries were sold as far away as Glasgow. Watts was educated locally and then at Price's School in Fareham and at

University College In a number of countries, a university college is a college institution that provides tertiary education but does not have full or independent university status. A university college is often part of a larger university. The precise usage varies ...

, University of Oxford, where he took a first class degree in history. He subsequently completed a B.Litt in 1957 with a thesis on "The Estates of Titchfield Abbey c.1245 to c.1380".

Career

Watts joined the VCH in 1956, working under Robert (R.B.) Pugh who was then the general editor of the work. Watts's first published contribution to the history was the entry for the parish of Wilsford in the Wiltshire volume (1962). He worked with Christopher Elrington on Warwickshire including Birmingham, Coventry, and the Borough of Warwick. In 1959 he left the VCH to take up a lectureship in general studies at High Wycombe College. He was responsible for the establishment of the

Open University The Open University (OU) is a British public research university and the largest university in the United Kingdom by number of students. The majority of the OU's undergraduate students are based in the United Kingdom and principally study off- ...

in Hampshire and contributed to the creation of the

University of the Third Age The University of the Third Age (U3A) is an international movement whose aims are the education and stimulation of mainly retired members of the community—those in their third 'age' of life. There is no universally accepted model for the U3A. It ...

in Solent. His book ''The Learning of History'' (1972) was positively reviewed in the ''McGill Journal of Education'' and the ''

British Journal of Educational Studies ''British Journal of Educational Studies'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal of educational studies established in 1952. The journal is published by Taylor & Francis on behalf of the Society for Educational Studies. The editor-in-chief iGary Mc ...

'' for its thoughtful approach to criticisms of the teaching of history that were current at the time.Review: ''The Learning of History'', D.G. Watts
Evelyn E. Cowie, ''

'', Vol. 21, No. 2 (June 1973), p. 237. It was reprinted in 2016 in the Routledge Library Editions: Historiography series. Watts wrote for the proceedings of the Hampshire Field Club and in the journal ''

The Economic History Review ''The Economic History Review'' is a peer-reviewed history journal published quarterly by Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the Economic History Society. It was established in 1927 by Eileen Power and is currently edited by Sara Horrell, Jaime Reis and ...

''. His research interests included the effect of the

black death The Black Death (also known as the Pestilence, the Great Mortality or the Plague) was a bubonic plague pandemic occurring in Western Eurasia and North Africa from 1346 to 1353. It is the most fatal pandemic recorded in human history, causi ...

on Hampshire – in which he examined the speed with which the plague travelled using the evidence of court records and the payment of

heriot Heriot, from Old English ''heregeat'' ("war-gear"), was originally a death-duty in late Anglo-Saxon England, which required that at death, a nobleman provided to his king a given set of military equipment, often including horses, swords, shields ...

s – and the Hampshire strawberry-growing industry. He wrote the history of Titchfield in 1982, and at the time of his death was president of the Titchfield History Society.A Tribute to George Watts, Our Past President.
Colin Wilton-Smith, Titchfield History Society. Retrieved 25 September 2017.

Death and legacy

Watts died on 14 October 2016. He was buried at the Woodland Cemetery, Eling, alongside his wife. A memorial service was held afterwards at St Peter's church. He was survived by two children.

Selected publications

"A Model for the Early Fourteenth Century"
''

'', New Series, Vol. 20, No. 3 (December 1967), pp. 543–547. * ''Environmental Studies''. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1969. * ''The Learning of History''. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1972. (Reprinted 2016) * ''Titchfield: A History''. Titchfield History Society, Titchfield, 1982. * "The Black Death in Dorset and Hampshire" in T.B. James (Ed.) ''The Black Death in Wessex'', The Hatcher Review, v. No. 46 (1998).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Watts, David 1931 births 2016 deaths People from Titchfield English local historians Alumni of University College, Oxford Contributors to the Victoria County History History of Hampshire Academics of the Open University Titchfield