>In a message dated 1/23/2000 7:59:50 AM Pacific Standard Time, >[email protected] writes: > ><< parish records were carefully made (unless you were > Roman Catholic, which can be a problem). >> > >Liz, > >Why? I've used them in Portugal (I had to learn to read "old" Portuguese) to >trace my foreign lines back to the 1500s. I found them quite easy to use. > Portugal is (or was) primarily a Catholic nation, so no problem. England was most definitely NOT for much of its history, and Roman Catholics were at varying times killed outright, imprisoned or at least harrassed. Many RC families had their children baptised in the local C of E church as well as in their own church, and many RC churches were cautious about keeping records in case those records were used against their people. What you want, as a genealogist, is for your people to have been Presbyterian - they kept the best records of any denomination I've seen so far <g>. Mine were all C of E, so I've at least got the father's name and the mother's first name. Liz