Hi Roger Not good news. "Thomas Cromwell first ordered the keeping of parish registers of baptisms, marriages and burials in 1538, though only a very few registers actually date so early. Further instructions were issued in 1598 to keep new parchment registers and copy up the entries from the earlier paper registers, but many were only copied from 1558, the first year of Queen Elizabeth´s reign. Many surviving registers only date from the sixteenth or seventeenth centuries, and where they survive there are often gaps, sometimes of years, especially during the Civil war and Interregnum from 1642 to 1660. Gaps in the registers can sometimes be overcome by consulting copies made from the registers and sent every year (from 1598) to the Bishop in each diocese, called Bishop´s Transcripts. These are now deposited in those county record offices that also act as diocesan record offices. There are, however, gaps in the transcripts as well." But if you can give me specific areas I can check in Phillimore's Atlas & Index of Parish Registers for you. HTH Andy ----- Original Message ----- From: "Roger Young" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Monday, August 03, 2009 7:21 PM Subject: [Isle-of-Thanet] Continuity of Thanet Parish Registers > Can anyone advise as to whether there any notable gaps in the Parish > Registers caused by the 17C Civil War and more importantly the subsequent > Commonwealth, or was there a basic continuity during the period 1642 to > 1660? > I am writing up my family history at the moment and as background want to > assess the extent to which the records reflect the impact of the puritan > movement in Thanet. My impression is that there are no notable gaps, or > obvious insertions of the missing years after the Restoration. But I do > not have copies of all 7 parishes to hand. certainly Lewis writing in the > 1720/30s does not make much of an issue of war and Commonwealt affecting > Thanet. > Many thanks. > Roger Young > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without > the quotes in the subject and the body of the message > >