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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

we do have a slightly bigger version of this

Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

aforementioned 'Spreadsheet' is lurking in this photo from inside Revolution 250. no spoilers - but it features an inordinate amount of rum, and also a few hatpins. need to know more? watch the film - or visit the (free!) exhibition here in Kew!

Documents on display in The National Archives' revolution 250 exhibition.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

the team at R4 are very professional and kind - which is lucky, because this image sums up the experience at my end

Andy from TV show Parks and Rec diagnoses you with ‘internet connectivity problems’

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 25/06/2026

At Chalke History Festival today, talking about ‘Revolution 250’ with my colleague and co-curator Sean Cunningham. (Weird moment as, exactly 10 years ago in VERY different weather, I was part if the volunteer team at this same festival!) Thanks to everyone who braved the heat to hear us today!

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

TODAY: the first day of our exhibition, ‘REVOLUTION 250’. It tells the story of the American Revolution through the British archive. We also look beyond the 250th anniversary of the US Declaration to encompass further stories, including Indigenous nations and Black Loyalists.

Display cases at Revolution 250 exhibition and vertical design incorporating elements of UK and US flags in red white and blue.

1784 map of North America on display in Revolution 250, alongside projected interview with experts and members of Indigenous nations.

US Declaration of Independence on display at Revolution 250.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

1768: Fort Stanwix, NY. The British and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy were negotiating the final portion of a new boundary line that would extend colonial settlement west into Indigenous nations' territory. The line was supposed to bring peace to North America. Instead, it heralded a Revolution.

A map of the Fort Stanwix boundary line. Copied from an original map drawn at Fort Stanwix, by Guy Johnson, as part of treaty negotiations with the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, October 1768. It shows a boundary line extending from Fort Stanwix to Harts Rock on the Ohio River. Catalogue reference: WO 78/302

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 23/05/2026

Feeding time at the greater-spotted woodpecker nest! (Shameless plug - am always posting more like this over on Instagram @ moore_birb)

Greater-spotted woodpecker feeding its Large Child, whose head is poking out of a hole in an oak branch.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 22/05/2026

Throughout the 1700s, the Mohegan nation appealed to the British legal system to defend their land rights against claims by Connecticut colonists. This map was used in the initial 1705 case & again in 1743. It shows Mohegan lands along the Quinnebaug River, & phonetic translations. [MPG 1/398]

Details from map, showing both English and (phonetic) Mohegan place-names.

Map showing Mohegan lands near Canterbury CT.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 17/05/2026

close encounters of the fox kind

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

And so, despite the complainants’ attempted bollocking, the Cerne Abbas giant lives on. Local legend says that sleeping overnight atop the giant bestows fertility. (More explicit local legends suggest that couples should visit the giant together, with less sleep involved.) I just think he’s neat.

The Giant from a distance, with fencing up to facilitate repair work.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

In fact, the 50s and 60s saw a spate of attempts to rejuvenate Britain’s ancient monumental sites (with mixed results). Overgrown and eroded by weather (and errant cattle), the Giant’s lines were recut in 1957. This particular chap is standing proud by two telltale mounds at the giant’s ‘centre’.

Man stands in the Cerne Abbas giant - as yet uncut.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

HO was loathe to deface the ancient chalk monument (or cover up his, er, monument). ‘What does the complainant want us to do?’ they asked. ‘Plant a small grove of fig trees […] in a strategic location?’ The National Trust, ever a members’ organisation, also declined to conceal the giant.

Home Office memo offering unhelpful solutions to their Giant Problem.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

CAUSE FOR CONCERN(E) In 1952, the Home Office received this complaint about the Cerne Abbas giant. The complainant reminded that ‘If this sketch offends’, the real giant was some ‘27,000 times life size, facing the main road from Dorchester to Sherborne’ (maths may not be accurate)

HO 45/18033. Complaint to Home Offce feat sketch of Cerne Abbas giant (appropriately appendaged).
Home Office internal responses noted that the sketch was quite good, but the real giant was a bit more detailed and slightly differently proportioned…

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

Devonposting will continue until morale improves. Here, deposed in the High Court of Admiralty’s ‘examinations on commission’ (HCA 13/227), is one Jacob Churchward from my own small home of Stoke Gabriel. Returning from Newfoundland in 1617, he had narrowly escaped corsairs in the Med.

Start of an HCA deposition by Jacob Churchward of Stoke Gabriel, Devon.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

This delightful map of Dartmoor (showing Ashburton to Buckland-in-the-Moor, featuring Ausewell Rocks) was part of an Exchequer case in 1605, for settling the bounds of Ashburton manor: discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C3... [MPB 1/7]

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 25/04/2026

Great details on this exploratory chart showing observations by Halley, Bouvet, Cook, etc. Reads like a birdwatchers’ guide to the Atlantic. Here be albatrosses! [MPI 1/400]

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

‘Repentant Avis’ - truly a top-notch early modern name. one (1) like and I will name my firstborn child ‘Repentant Avis’* *for reasons of my personal safety, this is a joke [TNA, HCA 13/227/7]

High Court of Admiralty deposition (1616) by one Repentant Avis, merchant, of Shoreham.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 28/11/2025

‘so what illuminations are you going to put on this manuscript?’ ‘bear with me’ TNA, E 36/274

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 24/06/2025

The National Archives is full of old fossils. No, not the staff/visitors - I mean this report of mastodon remains found along the Ohio River, included as a brief annotation in this map of lands ceded in 1768 Fort Stanwix treaty. Either that or a REALLY big bison. #MastodonPosting CO 700/Virginia18

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 17/03/2025

enjoying this devious polar bear today, in John Seller’s Atlas Maritimus (1698) [TNA, FO 925/4111]

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 03/03/2025

this pigeon is also going to The National Archives today

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

Discovery descriptions to the rescue, & your suspicions confirmed! (My thanks, as always, to TNA’s intrepid volunteers who likely contributed to this)

Discovery entry for PRO 30/24/30/59, a mill in a boat endorsed by Locke.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

Would have to get the original set of papers (PRO 30/24/30) up to check the context - unfortunately this is all that’s in MPI 1 (extracted maps etc). I only came across the mill by accident - had called the piece up to look at these delightful sketches of London’s wharves.

Watercolour showing London’s wharves, up to Dowgate.

Watercolour showing London’s wharves, including Queenhithe.

Watercolour showing London’s wharves, and Barnard Castle.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

Hey, you! Tired of trekking all the way to the mill? Introducing ‘Mill in a Boat’ - the mill that comes to you! Mill in a Boat’s patented floating technology means you can #grind whatever the water level. Mill in a Boat: for bakers who rise to the occasion! MPI 1/386

Diagram of mill in a boat or ship mill, early 1600s.

Diagram of internal mechanism for ship mill.

Title of document, stating ‘mill in a boat 74’.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

What shall we call this high bit of land, that always stays above water? Hmmm.. How about “High Land of Neversunk”?

Area of chart showing New Jersey, near Sandy Hook, annotated as High Land of Neversunk.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

When I teach sailing, the kids always tell me the boats I draw on the whiteboard ‘don’t look like boats’ - so it’s nice to know that Admiralty officers in 1779 shared my artistic vision. This map shows a proposed fleet formation for defending the entrance to New York at Sandy Hook. [MPI 1/100]

Archival document; chart of New York harbour entrance with ships and points of sail.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

These rather Tolkienesque descriptions from deepest darkest Pennsylvania: ‘Endless Mountains’, ‘The Great Swamp’ [CO 700/NewYork37]

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

Some particularly good trees [CO 700/Florida56]

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

Enjoying these alligators today, adorning maps of colonial America - with a Bonus Beaver [TNA, CO 700/AmericaNorthAndSouth35, 42]

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 15/11/2024

Pleased to report that I had a Very Good First Week in my new job as an 18th Century Researcher at TNA. Thanks to the TNA Team for making me feel welcome! Interesting 1776-related things are in the works - watch this space…

Exterior photograph of The National Archives building in Kew, London.

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 06/11/2023

Favourite exchange thus far from Kew Gardens' record books. In August 1796, Kew sent a small shipment of decorative plants to George Spencer-Churchill in Berkshire. Later notation added, in an indignant (and rare) aside: 'but Lord Blandford never added any Plant to the Royal Collection!'

Image shows handwritten page from Kew Record Book, dated August 1796, showing plants sent from Royal Botanical Gardens Kew to the Marquess Blandford. Below, an additional note in a different hand shows further plants (pond-lilies) sent to Blandford, with the note that Blandford 'never added any plants to the Royal Collection!'

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Graham Moore @mooregraham.bsky.social · 02/11/2023

Spent today diving into Trinity House records at the London Met Archives. Historical highlights include lists of seafarers’ wages, like this one from a 1608 voyage to the Americas. [LMA, CLC/526/30045/1]

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