Norah Gurney

Norah Kathleen May Gurney ( Dewar) (1921 – 5 February 1974) was a British archivist and Director of the Borthwick Institute of Historical Research.

Biography Norah Dewar was born in London in 1921 and studied modern history at St Hugh's College, Oxford. During the Second World War she worked in naval intelligence. In 1942 she married 2nd lieutenant Gerald D. Gurney. In 1946, after the end of her marriage, she joined Sheffield County Library and worked in the local history and archives department. In 1956 she became assistant archivist to Canon J. S. Purvis as at the Borthwick Institute of Historical Research, eventually succeeding him as Archivist-in-Charge from 1963. She was subsequently appointed Director in 1971, a post she held until her death in 1974.

Gurney served on the Council of the British Records Association and on the British sub-committee of the Commission Internationale d’Histoire Ecclésiastique Comparée. She served on the committees of several text publication and local history societies: as treasurer of the Canterbury and York Society, as vice-president of the Surtees Society, and Chair of the Yorkshire Archaeological Society.

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