Trustees
Our Trustees are dedicated individuals elected by members of the society during our Annual General Meetings. They represent a wide range of backgrounds and bring valuable skills to the governance of our organization. Actively engaged in the society’s day-to-day operations, our Trustees ensure effective management and oversight. Additionally, every working group and sub-committee benefits from the involvement of at least two trustee members.
We actively encourage new perspectives and ideas, so if you are interested in becoming a trustee, please reach out to the Secretary through the Contact Form located under the Help menu. We look forward to hearing from you!
Nick Prince - Chairman and Newbury Team Leader
Nick recently retired from the civil service after 39 years. He has been researching his family since 2007 and is hoping to do more including overseas.
He is actively involved in Thatcham Baptist Church, Theatre groups and at the Watermill Theatre. He is working on a number of projects both Family History and Theatre based.
Vicki Chesterman - Vice-chairman and Reading Team Leader
Vicki has been involved with Berkshire FHS since 2005, primarily with the Reading team.
She chairs the Education and Events committee and was the editor of the Berkshire Family Historian for 10 years. She also has a keen interest in local history, being a longstanding committee member of the History of Reading Society.
She tries to squeeze in her own family history research, but has not quite achieved this aim for some years now.
Alison Pedley - Secretary
Alison Pedley lives in Wokingham, but her roots are firmly in North-West England, where she was brought up. In 2009, she returned to university, graduating from University of Roehampton in 2012, MA (Historical Research) and in 2020 as a PhD. She is now a Senior Honorary Research Fellow at Roehampton. Alison joined the Berkshire Family Society while she was researching her thesis and subsequent book, about ‘criminal lunatic’ infanticidal mothers in Victorian England committed to Bethlem, Fisherton House and Broadmoor. Alison is well-experienced in the field of family history, having researched her own heritage and, in her academic work, the lives and backgrounds of the various subjects of her case studies.
Andrew Rice - Treasurer
I qualified as a chartered accountant in 1975 and about the same time started to develop an interest in my family history. I had little spare time then, and with no internet, my knowledge expanded very slowly. Workwise I moved into the charity sector in 1982 and have remained working in finance in that sector ever since.
I retired from my paid charity role in 2026 but still volunteer on a regular basis. I was happy to support the Society as Treasurer for the maximum five years in the past and am glad to be back and able to continue to help in a small way. Hopefully I will be able to carry on my own research at the same time!
Sandra Barkwith – Bracknell Team Leader
Sandra joined the Executive Committee in 2012 as the Representative for Bracknell team. She became leader of the team in 2015.
She has been a member of the Society since 1998. Currently, Sandra is Convenor of the Research Zone Committee, and a member of the Local Teams Consultation Group and the Education and Events Group.
Vanessa Chappell
A society member since 2006, Vanessa has served in many roles, including Secretary and Abingdon team leader.
Vanessa has lived in Abingdon and been married to Duncan for 30 years and has two grown up children Robert and Nicole. When not researching her own ancestry in Wales, Birmingham, Gloucestershire and Bedfordshire, or her husband’s Scottish roots, she enjoys creative paper-crafting and working in her garden. Vanessa also helps in her husband’s music business ‘Big Ginger Tom Music’, which promotes live acoustic music and she can be found behind the bar in Harwell Village Hall on gig nights!
Paul Barrett
Paul has been a member of the society since 2017. He is webmaster, convenes the Marketing and Communications group and runs the regular YourTrees workshops. He also the leads the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to reduce the amount of effort required from volunteers in running the society.
Paul's Berkshire ancestors hail from the part of Berkshire that was absorbed into Oxfordshire in the 1974 boundary changes - places such as Fyfield, Cumnor, Tubney, Longworth and Kingston Bagpuize.
He now lives in Hexham, Northumberland, a few miles south of Hadrian's Wall, the northern outpost of the Roman Empire.
John Dunne
John has been researching his Irish family history since the early 1990s, including many trips back to his parent’s family’s homes in both Co. Waterford and Co. Kilkenny. He joined the society around the year 2000 and has been a committee member of the Computer Team for more than 20 years.
Since taking early retirement from his job as a Radiological Engineer in the NHS in January 2008 he has had more time to catch up with his Irish, American and British relatives, his father was one of 15 children and his mother one of four children, he had many aunts and uncles and of course very many cousins to keep track of.
John and his wife Sally moved to the Reading area in 1983, from his previous home in Bracknell where he had lived since 1958 when his family left West London to start a new life in the wonderful new Town as it was then.
He started working in the Civic and Industrial Scale Model Making Industry. From there he moved into the Electrical Industry, and then on to the world of X-Ray Engineering, which took him through to retirement.
Leigh Dworkin - Windsor Team Leader
Leigh Dworkin is a professional genealogist, running “Your Kin by Dworkin” and has been working on his own family tree for about 40 years. Genealogically speaking, he considers himself to be ⅝ Polish, ¼ Lithuanian and ⅛ Belarusian, judging by his great-grandparents’ nationalities, which is far more interesting and exotic than being just an Essex lad.
He has been chairman of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain (JGSGB) since 2016, is a frequent speaker on topics of Jewish genealogy and family history, and has led the Windsor team of the Berkshire FHS since 2019.
He lives in Maidenhead with his wife, whose English ancestry has been traced back to a Saxon thane who owned large tracts of land in Lancashire, called Waldef of Ulverston, at the time of King Henry I and King Stephen in 1135 CE.
He has an MA in Mathematics from Cambridge University and a Postgraduate Diploma in Genealogical, Palaeographic and Heraldic Studies from the University of Strathclyde.
Dave Purling - Abingdon Team Leader
Dave retired as a Substation Engineer after 46 years in engineering. Dave has been married to Ann for 38 years and has twin adult children, James and Emma.
Dave was born in Abingdon, Berkshire and has lived in Didcot all of his life. He and his wife enjoy family history and love going to shows and archives to continue their research. Dave and Ann have been members of Berkshire Family History Society for around 7 years.
Dave is the convenor of the Local Teams Consultation Group.
Vice-President
Mark Stevens
Mark is Berkshire’s county archivist. He grew up in Maidenhead and has a lifelong love of history in the Royal County. He is particularly interested in historic mental health care and the people who received it and is the author of two related books: “Broadmoor Revealed” and “Life in the Victorian Asylum.” He was elected as vice-president of the society for the first time in 2016.
Irene Littleby
Centenarian, Irene Littleby, became a Vice-president of Berkshire Family History Society in 2023. She has been an active volunteer since the 1980s when she began transcribing parish registers for the Society and also for the Berkshire Record Office. Many of our publications from the 1990s through to present, owe their existence in some way to Irene. Irene thrives on a challenge and particularly enjoys tackling the older and more illegible registers, even taking up Latin to extend her knowledge.
President
Currently vacant