On Sat, 14 Nov 2015 12:09:04 -0000, eve via <genbrit@rootsweb.com> wrote: > > There SHOULD be parish registers from 1538, but not all the clergy could >be bothered. Most had done something about it by c 1560, but sometimes on >scruffy bits of paper. . However, Elizabeth (I) sent a directive about it, and >ordered all registers to be 'copied on fair parchment' in 1598 'at least from >the beginning of this reign' so again , there SHOULD be registers from >1558. Some are lost, some spoilt by damp, in my parish, they were burnt >every 60 years, so what remains has gaps. There should be Bishops' >Transcript copies from 1598 also. (but not all survive.) > >During the Commonwealth, because of the sloppy register keeping, the work >was appointed to be done by a civil 'Parish Register' (person. from 1653-60. = >If these su4rvive, the actual keeping and amount of detail is mich better. At >the restoration, some clergy burnt the civil register book - and then realised >they had lost all records of the recent parish events. Some went round >collecting group records from family bibles - most didnh't/ And Bishops were >abolisdhed then so no BTs either. This is the commonwealth gap in some >parishes. Add to that the fact that a lot of families refused to come back to >the Church up to around 1680, and the gap widens. In Cheshire, Astbury's earliest extant register starts 1572 and has a Commonweath gap. Sloppiness continued after the Commonwealth. At the end of 1666 "Memorandum: That the cause why the Register for rthe abovesaid yeare is so imperfect both in relation to Christenings Marriages and Burialls was that Thomas Shawe then Clerke of this parish did not Register any neither was there any name Registered but what the Church-wardens and Sidesmen for th'afore named year brought in to be Registered every Church after makeing diligent inquiry in the respective township"