[email protected] wrote: > I have several times come across a note in the side of the record. "P.B." > Am I right in presuming this means privately baptised or private baptism? Yes, you are :)) It's also known as a half baptism. > I have also come across the comment "received into the Church" and it gives > a date - later than the baptism. What does this mean? It sometimes > appears when there has been a private baptism. A private baptism is usually where a child is poorly at birth and not expected to survive. In order to prevent the child's soul being put at risk, anyone could conduct an emergency (private) baptism, be it the child's father or another relative, the midwife, a family friend, the parish clerk, the incumbent. If the child survived, the baptism was completed by being publically received into the church. Sometimes private baptisms are noted in the register, sometimes not which is why you find will find, as you have, the receiving date without the private baptism. Sometimes it's entered but not annotated as a private baptism. Sometimes both halves of the baptism are noted but neither is annotated causing confusion to us researchers as it could also mean one child baptised twice (which shouldn't happen, in theory at least) or that there were two children with the same name and the first one had died or they might have been cousins. -- Charani (UK) OPC for Walton, Greinton and Clutton, SOM Asst OPC for Ashcott and Shapwick, SOM http://wsom-opc.org.uk http://www.savethegurkhas.co.uk/