Parish Records
Church records for your research
Parish records record the three major events in a persons life, according to the church. Birth is not so important to the church, compared to baptism. Then there is marriage, and finally, after death there is burial. These were all recorded by the church, long before the state got interested.
Most parish records go back to the 1600's, but a few survive from the 1500's. Henry VIII's helped set up the register through his chief minister, Thomas Cromwell - an ancestor of Oliver Cromwell. This was primarily for taxation purposes, as the later intervention of the state undoubtedly was too.
Nowadays, you will usually find the parish registers at the local County Record office and maybe at a major town library. Now with the Internet, you could also try looking for parish registers at the nearest Genealogical library of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
The turmoil of the English Civil War led to many of the registers being poorly maintained, and with a purge on the clergy many records were lost. Civil marriages were allowed and recorded in civil registers. The fees charged in the middle 1600's were as follows:
- Baptism - 4d
- Marriage - 12d
- Burial - 4d
The registers that had survived were returned to many churches on the restoration of the Monarchy in 1660.
These registrations were then taxed thirty years later to help fund the war against France.
- Baptism - 2s (or 24d)
- Marriage - 4s (or 48d)
- Burial - 2s (or 24d)
There were also fines for not reporting the birth of child, and for not christening children. Registers until 1733 were often written in Latin, but a law then forbade Latin.
If you have trouble finding the parish records, try looking for the Bishop's transcripts