28 Mr. E. Freshjield [Feb. 4, 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 



FricLay, February 4, 1887. 



Henry Pollock, Esq. Treasurer and Vice-President, in the Chair. 



Edwin Freshfield, Esq. LL.D. V.P.S.A. 



Some TJiifuhlislied Records of the City of London. 



In the records of the 113 parishes within the City of London, and 

 the 17 out-parishes, there are materials for a parochial and social 

 history unrivalled in the world. 



These records which, commencing with the 15th century, extend to 

 the present time in a more or less comj)lete state, consist of books of 

 records, vestry minutes, and account books and registers. These 

 books contain lists of the parish property, sanitary orders made by 

 the various parishes, their regulations for self-government, and 

 evidences of the great destruction of valuable works of art which took 

 place in King Edward VI.'s reign, at the Reformation. The particular 

 books from which extracts have been selected, are those of St. 

 Margaret's, Lothbury, St. Stephen's, Coleman Street, St. Bartholomew 

 by the Exchange, and St. Christopher-le-Stocks. The minutes of 

 the vestries describe accurately the relations of the clergy to the 

 parishioners during the sixteenth and early part of the seventeenth 

 century, the causes which led to the complete break between the 

 clergy and laity which took place at the commencement of the 

 Great Eebellion in 1642. These also show the working of the 

 sanitary arrangements during the same period, particularly those 

 having reference to the various epidemics of the plague. That 

 which is in some respects the most interesting portion of these books, 

 is the history of the Great Eebellion, the Commonwealth, the Pro- 

 tectorate, and the Restoration. In order to illustrate this, the history 

 of the parish of St. Bartholomew by the Exchange, as displayed in 

 the parish books, has been supplemented by extracts from the books 

 of the adjoining parishes during a corresponding period. 



At the outbreak of the Great Eebellion, the rector of St. Bar- 

 tholomew's — Dr. Grant — was an easy-going Chm-chman, who had 

 rendered himself liable to sequestration for refusing to sign the 

 " solemn league and covenant." The parishioners, numbering among 

 them Sir Harbottle Grimstone, Mr. Justice Peter Pheasant, and 

 Dr. Zouch, came to an arrangement with him — which is embodied in 

 the vestry minutes — whereby, in exchange for a pension, he sur- 

 rendered the parsonage house, and the right to officiate in the church 

 during his life, conferring the right of nominating a locum tenens upon 

 the parishioners. This right they exercised from the year 1644 until 

 Dr. Grant's death in 1658. During this period, the living was held 



