In a message dated 04/04/2007 14:16:41 GMT Daylight Time, [email protected] writes: I have a John RICHARDSON, b. ca 1818 Brancepeth. I look at the LDS film and there is a gap in records 1813-1850s - where are these missing records or can they be held in another parish? Michael: There is no gap in Brancepeth baptisms during the period you mention. The LDS have been known not to film registers for certain periods from certain parishes on the grounds that they do not regard them as bona fide parish registers, and that could be what has happened here. The LDS seem ready to be put off by any little irregularity in the books. At Ryton, for instance, one of the late-18th century marriage volumes is missing but there is a notebook of the parish clerk which is as good as a register by anyone's standards, being the book from which he wrote up the registers. However, the LDS, although they have filmed it, do not include the entries on eg the IGI. You could check on this by enquiring at Durham County Record Office (or, better still, Google for their on-line catalogue), where Brancepeth registers are deposited, or else enquire at Durham University Library, where the BTs should be. The BTs may stop in 1837 but they often continue for several years later than that. Please note that the 19th-century Brancepeth registers were deposited in the Record Office well before the disastrous fire there a few years ago so there is no question of their having been destroyed in the fire. For the period you mention there should be birth certificates for each child born (after 1 July 1837), so even if the baptism registers were missing, which I doubt, it should not prevent your getting all the relevant details. Geoff Nicholson