Mr Steven Hobbs writes: Personal accounts of the lives of working people are extremely rare in any century, and one of a painter and glazier in 19th century Salisbury, in two volumes running to 736 closely written pages, caused much interest in Wiltshire.
In 1881 William Small sat down and wrote about his life, his family and acquaintances, and his home city. These subjects were embellished with poetry and items of interest gleaned from the national press, together with historical notes on Salisbury from published works. Although these account for quite a large part of the books, nevertheless there is much of considerable interest to local and family historians. As well as writing about people he gives much useful information about houses, many of which he worked on. Harnham house we are told was built in 1831 and its owner and tenants for the next 15 years are named.
Small's historical interests led him to include new items of news from the years 1737-1738 which must come from the Salisbury and Winchester Journal. Since no complete file for this year is available in the U.K. it is possible that some of the snippets have come from papers not ready accessible to researchers today.
Reading through the Memoir it is impossible not to appreciate the melancholic nature of the author. By 1881 he appears to have outlived all his family and he expresses his sense of loneliness and emptiness over many pages. To modern taste he appears over-sentimental and maudlin, but the Victorians' preoccupation with death, all too present in their lives, is well documented and we should not be surprised in the tone of the writing. This adds another dimension to the Memoir in what it reveals about the writer's thoughts and beliefs.