The History Alchemist

The History Alchemist. Writer Richard Clements. Exploring overlooked history, folklore, and mysteries of the past. Articles, essays, and long-form storytelling.

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Welcome to The History Alchemist! I'm Richard Clements, a writer dedicated to unearthing historical mysteries, chilling supernatural tales, and the unusual. Follow for my upcoming scripts, stories, and deep-dive content for podcasts & blogs. #HistoricalMystery #WeirdHistory

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

4 June 1940.

Following the evacuation from Dunkirk, Winston Churchill delivered one of the most famous speeches in British history.

"We shall fight on the beaches... we shall never surrender."

Words that have echoed through the decades.

#OnThisDay #WW2 #Churchill #History

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

I've added a new section to The History Alchemist website: The Essex Project.

A home for ongoing fieldwork, local history investigations and explorations of some of the county's overlooked places.

Still very much a work in progress, but the first research trips are already underway.

#Essex #LocalHistory #TheHistoryAlchemist

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Just found this one again while looking for something completely different.

It's an article I wrote a while back about Jack Ketch, probably the most infamous executioner in English history.

I'd forgotten some of the details. The execution of the Duke of Monmouth was every bit as grim as I remembered.

Funny how old pieces turn up from time to time.

#History #BritishHistory #JackKetch #SocialHistory

https://t.co/eDBq63vdrz

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

A stack of old Essex Countryside magazines led me to an article by Hatfield Peverel writer Roger Frith titled When the Devil Came to Essex.

That discovery became a journey through Danbury, Canewdon, church legends, folklore and the Essex landscape itself.

Read more by clicking on the link below.

https://t.co/gOTFxlEY3L

#Essex #Folklore #LocalHistory #EssexHistory #HistoryAlchemist #EnglishFolklore

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Back at Beacon Hill Fort today for the first time in a few years.

The biggest difference? The amount of work the volunteers have done. The site looks great and there's far more to see and understand than I remember.

A fascinating place overlooking the entrance to Harwich Harbour.

#Harwich #EssexHistory #HistoryAlchemist #MilitaryHistory #LocalHistory

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Introducing the latest addition to my research literature collection: Look and Learn magazines.

As much as they're useful for research, they also remind me of a very different age of discovery. Before the internet, curiosity often began with whatever happened to be on the bookshelf, in the library, or on the newsagent's shelf.

I'm thoroughly enjoying working through them.

#LookAndLearn #History #VintageMagazines #SocialHistory #TheHistoryAlchemist

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Going through my growing archive of vintage magazines, I came across this advert and programme schedule for Radio Essex in the November 1966 issue of Essex Countryside.

What surprised me most was how normal it all seemed. Pirate radio remembered today as rebellious and controversial, casually sitting among ordinary county life and local adverts.

Even stranger knowing I was out among the old Thames Estuary sea forts only a few weeks ago researching Sealand and the wartime structures these stations once broadcast from.

#Essex #PirateRadio #RadioEssex #Sealand #History #LocalHistory #ThamesEstuary #VintageMagazines #TheHistoryAlchemist

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Mersea Island is one of those places where the sea never really lets history settle for long.

Looks like archaeologists are going to start excavating the old Tudor blockhouse at Cudmore Grove later this year before more of it is lost to erosion. Henry VIII originally had it built to guard the mouth of the Colne. Strange to think something put there to defend the coastline is now slowly being taken by it instead.

Volunteers will be able to get involved as well, which is probably the best part of projects like this. History feels different when people can actually stand in the trench and uncover it themselves rather than just reading about it afterwards.

#Essex #MerseaIsland #Archaeology #TudorHistory #LocalHistory #EssexHistory #ArchaeologicalDig #CommunityArchaeology #Colchester #History #Heritage #CoastalHistory #TheHistoryAlchemist

https://t.co/bWzLdxPFcd

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Sad news this week with the passing of Eddie Brazil.

Like a lot of people interested in folklore and the paranormal, I first knew Eddie’s name through Borley Rectory. Over the years he became one of those familiar figures connected with the subject, especially here in Essex.

I was lucky enough to meet Eddie twice at his home with friends Kerry Greenaway and Andy Mercer. To be honest, what stayed with me afterwards was not really the paranormal side of things at all, but simply how kind and welcoming both Eddie and his wife were. The sort of people you could sit and talk with for hours over tea without anything feeling forced or performative.

That is increasingly rare.

There was always a very grounded feeling around Eddie despite the subjects he wrote and spoke about. He clearly loved the stories, the history, and the mystery of places like Borley, but he also seemed to value the people around the subject just as much.

David Sanderson has written a very good obituary for Eddie over at Spooky Isles.

A sad loss to the Essex paranormal scene and to those who knew him personally. Rest easy, Eddie.

https://t.co/wnnD7JGr9K

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Currently out on the Explosives Trail at Wat Tyler Country Park here in Essex, not far from the Thames estuary.

Quiet marshland now, but parts of this landscape were once connected to wartime explosives production and industry.

History has a strange way of settling back into the landscape.

#WatTylerPark #EssexHistory #HiddenHistory #IndustrialHeritage #ThamesEstuary #HistoryAlchemist

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Very pleased to share that I’ve officially joined Living Medieval Magazine as a staff writer and regular contributor.

My previous article for the magazine appeared in their December 2025 issue, so it’s great to now be continuing the relationship on a more regular basis.

Looking forward to exploring more unusual corners of medieval history, folklore, belief, and landscape in future pieces.

#LivingMedieval #MedievalHistory #Folklore #History

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

The people living through the Middle Ages did not think they were trapped in a “Dark Age.”

A cathedral builder in the thirteenth century saw towering new architecture, expanding universities, new tools, and a rapidly changing world around him. As far as he was concerned, he was already living in the present age.

My latest article explores how medieval people understood history, progress, religion, and time itself very differently from the way we often do today.

To read the full article, click on the link below.

https://t.co/BI4JN2mOQm

#MedievalHistory #MiddleAges #DarkAges #History #HistoricalPerspective #TheHistoryAlchemist

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Picked up a stack of Essex Countryside magazines from the 1960s.

Exactly the sort of material I love digging through. Forgotten local stories, vanished buildings, folklore, archaeology, village life, strange little details that rarely survive elsewhere.

Research gold dust.

#Essex #LocalHistory #Folklore #TheHistoryAlchemist

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

One of the stranger historical trails I’ve followed recently.

After the American Civil War, some veterans eventually returned to England and quietly disappeared back into ordinary life. By 1910, a small group of former Union veterans were even meeting together in Bermondsey, South London.

My latest piece for The Archive explores this largely forgotten story.

To read the full article, click on the link below.

https://t.co/INrNmPPSRY

#CivilWar #History #AmericanHistory #HiddenHistory #TheHistoryAlchemist

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Very pleased to have made my BBC Essex debut this afternoon with Jake Peach discussing The History Alchemist, overlooked Essex history, folklore, strange landscapes, and some of the places and stories that continue to fascinate me across the county.

A big thank you to Jake and the BBC Essex team for making me feel so welcome and relaxed throughout the afternoon. A genuinely enjoyable experience from start to finish.

Hopefully, the first of many conversations to come.

#BBCEssex #TheHistoryAlchemist #EssexHistory #LocalHistory #Folklore #Broadcasting #RadioInterview #HiddenHistory #Essex #Storytelling

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

I spent much of Saturday following the Essex and Suffolk stretch of the River Stour with friends, moving between villages, churches, woodland tracks, and old back roads. It is an area I keep returning to because the landscape feels noticeably different once you get up into that northern edge of Essex.

The Stour itself seems to act as more than just a county boundary. A lot of the old stories and traditions of the area appear to collect around it somehow. Within a fairly short distance you move between places connected with the witch trials around Manningtree and Mistley, concentrations of ancient sarsen stones, strange local legends, isolated churches, and bits of folklore that still survive in fragments.

I have often thought that border landscapes tend to hold onto stories longer than other places. Perhaps it is because rivers were once barriers as much as routes of travel. Either way, the Stour Valley has a very particular atmosphere to it that is difficult to properly explain until you spend time wandering through it.

By the end of the day, standing beneath Old Knobbly as the last stop of the trip, it felt like a fitting way to finish a journey that had followed the river and its surrounding landscape for most of the afternoon.

#RiverStour #Essex #Suffolk #Folklore #EssexHistory #TheHistoryAlchemist #LandscapeHistory #FieldResearch #Manningtree #Mistley #SarsenStones #AncientSites #LiminalPlaces #HistoricEssex

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Before we ended our north Essex road trip on Saturday at Old Knobbly, we stopped off at St Barnabas Church in Alphamstone. I have been there a few times before, but it was one of those places I wanted Darryl, Kerry Ann, and Laura to see for themselves.

What keeps drawing me back is the number of sarsen stones around the church. In most Essex churchyards you might spot one tucked away somewhere if you are lucky. At Alphamstone they seem to turn up everywhere you look. Some sit out in the churchyard, while others are actually built into the church walls themselves.

The church happened to be open this time, which was a bonus. I managed to get a couple of photographs of the two large stones at the base of the west wall that I had wanted proper shots of for a while. Seeing them sitting there beneath the later masonry does make you stop and wonder about the history of the site before the church was ever built.

The usual explanation is that the stones were left in the area by glaciers a very long time ago, which is accepted enough. What interests me more is why so many ended up gathered here in one place. Bronze Age burials have been found nearby, and there has long been speculation that the hill may have been important long before the medieval church appeared.

I am not fully convinced by the stone circle idea, but at the same time Alphamstone does not feel like a completely ordinary churchyard either. It is one of those places where the landscape itself seems to hint at an older story, even if nobody can now say exactly what that story was.

#Alphamstone #SarsenStones #Essex #EssexHistory #AncientSites #HistoricEssex #TheHistoryAlchemist #LandscapeHistory #FieldTrip #ChurchHistory #AncientBritain #Folklore

[The History Alchemist @HisAlchemist]

Our final stop on Saturday’s field trip across the north of Essex was Old Knobbly.

Old Knobbly sits within what is clearly very old woodland, and the setting suits it perfectly. From a distance it does not immediately stand out, but standing beneath the branches and looking up, the age and scale of the tree become much more apparent. It is the sort of place that encourages you to stop for a few quiet minutes and simply take it in properly.

A very good day out exploring with Darryl Barry, Kerry Ann, and Laura-jayne Howe. One of those trips where the locations, conversations, and atmosphere all came together rather naturally by the end of the day.

#OldKnobbly #Essex #AncientTree #EssexHistory #FieldTrip #TheHistoryAlchemist #Folklore #LandscapeHistory #ExploringEssex #HistoricEssex #AncientBritain #RuralEngland