MEMORABILIA of three monarchs emerged from a wardrobe during a spring clean.

Kathleen Richardson, 89, was sorting out items in her Stratton home when she found an Adver Silver Jubilee supplement from 1977, a North Wilts Herald 1937 coronation souvenir and a prayer sheet dedicated to the memory of Queen Victoria.

She said: “My mother had them before me – she saved them and then when she died I had them. They’ve been sitting in the wardrobe ever since.”

Other artefacts in the house include a photograph of a Victorian actor, Seymour Hicks, in a role in Swindon.

Mrs Richardson didn’t know what to do with the papers so her son, Michael, decided to visit the Adver and share them with our readers.

“Mum has had this in the wardrobe for years,” said Mr Richardson, a retired coach driver who lives in Kingsdown. “She had a turn-out, like you do, and she was going to throw these things out but I said I’d sooner keep them.

“One of my brothers said, ‘Why don’t you call in at the Adver offices?’”

The oldest item is a large prayer sheet, seemingly intended for home use or small prayer meetings. It is headed: “In Memory of Our late Beloved and Most Gracious Queen Victoria Of the United Kingdom, Ireland, The Colonies and Empress of India.” There are quotations from the Old and New Testaments and a list of commandments.

Queen Victoria died in 1901, but the sheet is dated September 8, 1908 and priced at a halfpenny.

A short note in the bottom right hand corner says: “Dear Christian friends, Ought not God’s Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer and the above texts of Scripture, to be in every Christian household in these times? At death my hope is to be with Christ. Who will kindly help to circulate these?”

The note is signed by an LF Simeon Maberly of Kensington Place in Bristol, who was almost certainly Livesey Francis Simeon Maberly, an obscure Victorian evangelist who would have been 77 or 78 when he printed the sheet.

The North Wilts Herald Coronation Souvenir celebrates the crowning of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth – later the Queen Mother – on May 12, 1937.

There are plenty of familiar photographs, including images of our present Queen as a child, but the real interest lies in the adverts.

“Made up to a standard – not down to a price,” proclaims one for Garrard’s turntables and clocks, anticipating the Stella Artois “reassuringly expensive” concept by a good 50 years.

A Swindon Shop called Teesdale and Jones promises “A Royal Reception of Coronation Broadcasts” on radios with names such as The Philco Empire Four All-Wave Superhet.

Duck, Son & Pinker offer “The Pianoforte of To-morrow” for up to 42 guineas, or £44.10p in decimal currency.

Morse’s in Regent Street, meanwhile, was offering bedroom suites for a little under £18, three-piece suites for a little under £12 and dining room suites for a little under £16.

Fast forward another 40 years and the King’s elder daughter celebrated her Silver Jubilee, prompting nationwide parties and other commemorations.

The Adver’s souvenir tribute included plenty of stories of local people’s devotion to the monarch. Loyal subjects included a former soldier called John Elmer, who had created a huge Coronaton proclamation of whitewashed stones on a Korean hillside during war service in 1953. In Whiteman Street, senior citizen brother and sister rug-making team Maude and William Barrow created two special pieces for the occasion.

Perhaps those rugs still exist and whoever has them will let us take some up-to-date photographs. We hope so.