Ian Yearsley


Ian Yearsley is a local historian and author of numerous books regarding the history of Essex.

History

Ian Yearsley was born in Ingatestone, Essex in 1965, moving to Southend-on-Sea, Essex in 1972. He started out as a journalist with the Leigh Times in 1988 before producing historical books on Essex, as well as poetry and fiction titles based on the county's history.
His first book, "Islands of Essex", was published in 1994 and he has gone on to write eleven books on the history of Essex, four works of fiction, three poetry books and the introductions to four historic maps, all based on Essex. Throughout the 1990s Yearsley wrote for various magazines, including Essex Countryside and This Month in Essex, and he has been a regular commentator for local newspapers. In 2011 he achieved an MA with distinction in history from the University of Essex, where he won an award for his dissertation on population migration in the Rochford Hundred in the late 19th century. Ian has created historic tours of Essex and Suffolk for iPhone and has worked on a project to uncover the history of a lost Jacobean manor at Marks Hall near Coggeshall. He has also worked at Tilbury Fort for English Heritage.