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Paul Howson William Booth (born 4 April 1946) is a historian specialising in the history of medieval Cheshire and in local history of the North-West of England. He currently holds the title of Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the University of Keele after having been awarded a degree in Medieval and Modern History from the University of Sheffield (1967), a PGCE from the University of London King’s College (1968), and an MA by thesis from the University of Liverpool, where he studied under the late Professor A. R. Meyers. He is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society and in 2011 was awarded a Doctorate of Letters from the University of Liverpool. The University of Liverpool controversially terminated his honorary fellowship in 2012 following inappropriate remarks allegedly made by Booth, who maintains that he made justifiable criticisms of the University.

Career Lecturer in History, University of Liverpool 1972 to 2010 (Senior Lecturer from 1983). Honorary Senior Research Fellow from 2010 to 2011. Until 1995, he taught on University CE courses, and after that medieval history to undergraduates, as well as trained Archives students in medieval palaeography and diplomatic. He has acted as external adviser to Toronto University Press and the Irish Research Council, and as a peer reviewer to the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council.

Research His main research project at present is on Anglo-Aquitainian history, which he has approached through his research into the history of Cheshire in the fourteenth century, i.e. from the ground up. Cheshire men, particularly archers, played a significant role in the first phase of the Hundred Years War, were prominent leaders of Free Companies (Sir Hugh Calveley and Sir Robert Knolles) and in the administration of the duchy (Sir John Wettenhall). Because Edward the Black Prince was ruling earl of Chester from 1346 to 1376, and because the records of the earldom are a source of unique richness, it is possible to look in great detail at how the war with France was conducted and financed from the perspective of the local communities in Cheshire who had to furnish both money and soldiers. In addition, he has considerable experience in working with adult groups, and training them in the reading Medieval Latin and techniques of palaeography, as well as editing texts. Together with Malcolm Vale of St John’s College, Oxford, he was the recipient, in 2008 of a research grant of £720,000 entitled ‘The Gascon Rolls, 1317-1468’.

Précis of work published and Conspectus of research For the first half his academic career, he taught in the University of Liverpool’s Continuing Education section. His research has fallen into two parts, therefore: the history of Cheshire in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and, secondly, research into aspects of the local history of the North-West in later periods which was undertaken for, and with, members of Continuing Education classes. Five of his classes for the general public have set up societies which, as one of their aims, research into original sources. This has led to a number of substantial books including Burton in Wirral: a History (1984), A History of Warton with Lindeth: Communications and Industry (1984), Neston 1840-1940 (1996), Neston at War, 1939-45 (1999), Probate Records of Four Cheshire Parishes (4 vols) (2002-2008), Churchwardens’ Accounts of Walton on the Hill Parish, 1627-1667 (2005), Probate Records of the Parish of Malpas (2 vols) (2005, 2008). In addition, he was for thirteen years general editor of the Chetham Society, the premier publishing society for the history of North-west England, and as such edited and published nine volumes: Alan Crosby, History of the Chetham Society (1993); Geoffrey Place, The Rise and Fall of Parkgate, Passenger Port for Ireland, 1686-1815 (1994); Michael Turner, The Making of a Middle-Class Liberalism in Manchester, c. 1815-32 (1995); J. R. Dickinson, The Lordship of Man under the Stanleys: Government and Economy in the Isle of Man, 1580-1704 (1996); Andrew Tonkinson, Macclesfield in the Later Fourteenth Century: Communities of Town and Forest (1999); Peter Shapely, Charity and Power in Victorian Manchester (2000); C. Ford, Pastors and Polemicists: the Character of Popular Anglicanism in South-East Lancashire, 1847-1914 (2002); S. J. Guscott, Humphrey Chetham: Fortune, Politics and Mercantile Culture in 17th Century England (2003); and P.H.W.Booth, ed., Life, Love and Death in North-east Lancashire (2006).

His research into all aspects of medieval Cheshire began when he was a research student under Professor A.R. Myers in the late 1960s, and is still continuing. Cheshire was a county palatine in the Middle Ages, which meant that it had its own system of government based in Chester castle. From the second half of the thirteenth century the earls of Chester were the eldest sons of the kings of England and, as earl, they were rulers of both Cheshire and Flintshire. The records of the earls’ governance were originally kept at Chester castle (they are now in London) and make up a very large corpus of judicial and administrative records that have no parallel anywhere else in England or Wales. From 1346 to 1376 the county was ruled by Edward the Black Prince, and so his research has come to be bound up with the international politics and military history of what is now termed ‘The Hundred Years War’. This culminated in the award of the AHRC grant to Dr Malcolm Vale and himself in 2008.

His lifetime’s work has transformed our knowledge of the history of Cheshire in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. When he began, it was thought that Cheshire was an economically backward county, largely because of its geographical position. As it was on the wrong (the wetter) side of the Pennines, corn could not be grown successfully there, and so the agrarian economy of the county had always been dominated by cattle-keeping, dairying and cheese-making. Secondly, it was on the border of Wales, and was therefore a place of endemic disorder, exacerbated by the county’s involvement in the royal wars in Wales, Scotland and France. As far as its political history went, the period of the Black Prince’s rule was a disaster, and it was so oppressive that the county was provoked into rebellion in 1353 (for which see May McKisack’s Oxford History of England, 14th century volume). Careful research into the financial and legal records of the county palatine show that not one of these conclusions can be maintained. Perhaps most striking of all it is now clear beyond all doubt that the ‘great rebellion of 1353’ (thus called by Geoffrey Barraclough, second professor of Medieval History at Liverpool) did not happen, but is an invention that has been perpetuated by the tendency of academic historians to take the work of their predecessors too much on trust.

His work has influenced other medieval historians; for example his study of the Black Prince’s state visit to Cheshire in 1353 (shorn of the ‘rebellion’) enabled Professor Thorlac Turville-Petre to demonstrate that the Middle English alliterative poem Winner and Waster was based on the events of that year in Cheshire. Similarly, Professor C. Given-Wilson has stated that my research on the detailed working of the mechanism of Cheshire’s government in the 1350s and 1360s has made clear the unique roles of the prince’s two successive business-managers, Sir John Wingfield and Sir John Delves. His own research students have taken the work further. See, for example, Andrew Tonkinson’s monograph on Macclesfield in the later fourteenth century : communities of town and forest (1999) and the late Mrs Phyllis Hill’s edition of the ‘County Court of Chester Indictment roll, 1354 to 1377’ (1996), which he is currently preparing for publication. In addition, 50 or so former adult students who were taught medieval Latin and medieval palaeography by himself and his colleague, John Harrop, have formed themselves into the Ranulf Higden Society www.ranulfhigden.org.uk The society hosts lectures by distinguished medieval historians, and also organises members into a number of research groups which are working on publishing medieval documents. The first volume of these appeared in Life, Love and Death in North East Lancashire 1510 to 1537 (edited translation of the Act Book of the Ecclesiastical Court of Whalley). Current projects include an edition of the Cheshire forest eyre rolls for 1357, the Lancashire assize roll for 1350, the Lancashire poll tax returns for 1379, the Legh of Lyme Survey 1466 (complete and awaiting publication), with all of which he has had substantial involvement. In 2004 the society was commissioned by Liverpool city council to research the records of the courts of West Derby manor-hundred, in connection with the refurbishment of the sixteenth-century court house that was taking place. This was done under his direction, it earned £4,000 for the society’s charitable purposes, and the results have been deposited with Liverpool city record office. Finally, the society was a partner in the successful Oxford-Liverpool bid to the AHRC for the Gascon Rolls Project grant.