G'day Sally, In a busy city centre church, there could be quite a number of baptisms every day, performed on a production line basis. What the comment "Run Away" means is that after the baptism ceremony, the parents didn't hang around in line waiting for the clerk to record the full details in the register. Regards David Armstrong Maylands, Western Australia ----- Original Message ----- From: sally roberts To: eng-todmorden@rootsweb.com ; eng-liverpool@rootsweb.com ; eng-lan-wigan@rootsweb.com Sent: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 4:29 AM Subject: [ENG-LIV] Comment in Baptismal Records - Help needed Hello everyone, Firstly, apologies for any duplicates of this you get if you're subscribed to more than one mailing list - but I didn't want to miss anyone who may have the answer to this :o) Secondly, the actual question... A friend of mine is currently searching through archives in London and believes he's found his greatx4 grandfather's baptismal entry. The trouble is, there's simply the date of the baptism (19th July 1818), the name of the person being baptised, no parental details, no age or anything else is recorded except the phrase which appears to say Run Away. Given that his Greatx4 grandfather should have been less than a year old at this time, I can't really see that it meant he scarpered from the church :o) This chap's marriage certificate in 1835 gives the name of his father and his occupation, which matches with a couple who are noted as having 3 other children in the area between 1818 - 1823, so we are tentatively hopeful that the entry with no details is still linked to the family. Can anyone shed any light on this? Does it simply mean the family took the child and left the church without any baptism? Regards, Sally