National Registers
Parish records
The Value of Parish Records
Parish registers date from 1538, though many of the earliest records have not survived. Each parish kept a record of baptisms, marriages and burials; sometimes in separate registers, sometimes in the same one. Great, you may think, let’s start searching. The problem is that the information in these registers is often sparse, to say the least. It all depends on how conscientious the people who were charged with keeping the records actually were. If the vicar, rector, churchwarden or clerk was a diligent, conscientious worker, the records you find may be of immense help in your search. If the same person was a shirker or a drunk, your search may be depressingly unproductive. Some lazy clerks might not have updated the register until the end of the year, and simply recorded the number of people who were baptized, married or buried, and no more. There were some 11,000 parishes in England and Wales, so the usefulness of the genealogical information you encounter will be a matter of potluck. Click here to view a Parish Baptism register from 1668.
Some registers carry detailed information; others don’t. A baptism entry may only record the date of the christening, the child’s name and the father’s name, and not the mother’s name. Before 1837 marriage entries did give the names of the bride and groom’s fathers; and burial entries usually gave only the names of the deceased, and perhaps their age. The records were often inaccurate, for the reasons already mentioned. Also bear in mind that, so far as the entries for baptism and burial are concerned, both events can take place several days or weeks after an actual birth or death (though one hopes that in the latter case it took place as quickly as possible). Do not despair, though. Entries get better and more detailed – and are also more likely to have survived – as the years passed, so working backwards from 1837 is easier to do at first and gets progressively harder the further you go back in time.
Locating Your Ancestor
Locating the right register is another conundrum. Most of them are held at local record offices, though a few are still held in the possession of parish churches. You will have to find the one that contains the details of your ancestors, which means you will need to know where they lived and in what parish. Maps showing the ancient parish system are usually also available at your local record office. It is worth consulting ‘The Phillimore Atlas and Index to Parish Registers’, by Cecil Humphrey-Smith, to find where registers are held. Your local library may have a copy. Don’t worry if you think you have the right register and there are no details about the people you are searching for. They may be in the records of a nearby parish. Once again, patience is essential.
If you live in the same area as your ancestors did, visits to your local record office will be easy. If you need to travel a long way, it is best to amass as much information as you can beforehand, to make your visit as fruitful as possible. Check on the International Genealogical Index (The International Genealogical Index or IGI was compiled by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City, Utah. It includes millions of names entered from parish registers, though these relate only to christenings and marriages. It is by no means complete and is often inaccurate, but it can be extremely useful in pointing you in the right direction), at www.familysearch.org.uk, and consult the census returns going back to 1841 to ascertain exactly where your family was based. It may be that you are unable to travel to a local record office. If so, it is possible to get in touch with a local Family History society, who may be able to search the records on your behalf, for a fee.
A number of registers have been transcribed. The venerable Society of Genealogists (SOG) is the resource for the largest collection. Go to their website www.sog.org.uk for more details, or pay them a visit (find details here). They are near the Family Records Centre in London, and if you are not a member, it will cost you £3 an hour to use the library, £8 for a half day. The SOG possesses Boyd’s Marriage Index, which is said to include one in eight of all marriages that took place between 1838 and 1837. This is in the process of being put online at www.englishorgins.net where it can be searched (a fee will be charged).
It is worth knowing that before 1751 Britain followed the Julian calendar: the Church year began on 25 March, Lady Day, and ended on 24 March. The Gregorian calendar was then introduced, with 1 January the first day of the year and 31 December the last. To catch up with these alterations there were only nine months in the year 1751: 25 March was the first day and 31 December the last. In 1752 the year started on 1 January and ended on 31 December. The old calendar was 11 days out by this time, so it was decreed that 14 September should follow 3 September.
All the problems you may encounter with parish registers, such as sparse entries or difficulties finding the person you are searching for, pale into insignificance when it comes to reading registers from the registers from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But do not abandon hope when you are faced with illegible squiggles or the odd bit of Latin. In the latter case, it is quite simple: common phrases you may come across are baptizatus serat, nupti erat and sepultus erat, which refer to baptism, marriage and burial respectively. If you are totally flummoxed, seek help. The same goes for illegible handwriting.
While the FRC has a deciphering service, local record offices don’t, but the staff may be well versed in reading old documents or there may be a leaflet to help you out. You will find that the more old handwriting you read, the better you will get at deciphering it.