Rachel Winchcombe

Rachel Winchcombe is a Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of Manchester's History (L5) department. Her research focuses on colonial health, environmental change, and Indigenous-colonist relationships in early America. She holds a PhD from the University of Manchester (2017) and has held roles including Research Associate on the AHRC-funded 'How we Used to Sleep' project (2017–2020), ISSF Wellcome Research Fellow at Leeds (2020–2021), and Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Manchester (2021–2022).

Her monograph Encountering Early America (2021) redefined 16th-century English colonial efforts as pivotal rather than inconsequential. Current research explores diet, environment, and emotion in early Anglo-American colonies (1570–1660), adopting interdisciplinary methods.

Winchcombe's work engages with UN SDGs related to sustainable communities and environmental stewardship. She has received the Arthur Miller Journal Article Prize (2022) and contributes to media such as BBC Radio 4 and Microscopic Records blog. She advises PhD students and holds grants from Leverhulme and Wellcome Trusts.