New exhibition explores stories of emigration

An exhibition that focuses on the historical stories of people who left a county to emigrate abroad has opened.

Departures will be showcased at the Suffolk Archives building in Ipswich and follows a previous exhibit about immigration stories called Arrivals.

The project tells the stories of emigrants from Suffolk, such as colonists arriving on the US east coast, people leaving for the Australian and Californian gold rushes and GI brides departing for the US after World War Two.

Emily Shepperson, exhibition and interpretation officer at the Suffolk Archives, said: "A lot of emigration leads back to the [British] Empire, and we've obviously been talking about that a lot recently."

She added: "We've had periods in the past where we've been very proud of the Empire, whereas now we talk about it much more critically, looking at what did Empire mean for people":[]}