2»4 S. VI. 155., Dec. 18. '58.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 



509 



portation for fourteen years, and directs the rector 

 of every parish, before the 1st of June, 1813, to 

 . transmit to the registrar of the diocese a list of 

 all registers which were then in the parish, stating 

 the periods at which they respectively commenced 

 and terminated, the periods (if any) for which 

 they were deficient, and the places where they 

 were deposited. 



By the 6th .&. 7th William IV. cap. 86., en- 

 titled " An Act for registering Births, Deaths, and 

 Marriages in England," passed 17th August, 1836, 

 so much of the 52nd Geo. III., and of the 4th 

 Geo. IV. c. 76., "An Act for amending the Laws 

 respecting the Solemnisation of Marriages in Eng- 

 land," as related to registration of marriages was 

 repealed. The Act then provides for the esta- 

 blishment of the General Register Office in Lon- 

 don, the establishment of district Registrars, &c. 

 (see the Act.) At the General Register Office, 

 Somerset House, indices are kept of all the mar- 

 riages, births, and deaths which have taken place 

 in England since 1836. A general search can be 

 made for IZ., a particular search for Is., and a 



» certified copy of any entry may be obtained for 

 2s. 6d., which certified copy " shall be received 

 as evidence of the birth, death, or marriage to 

 which the same relates, without any farther or 

 other proof of such entry." 



From the above sketch of the origin of parish 

 registers, and the principal Acts relating to them, 

 it is certain they do not belong to the incumbents, 

 nor to the churchwardens, but would rather ap- 

 pear to have been ab initio, and to have been 

 always treated as national property belonging to 

 the public ; and as such would necessarily recpiire 

 an Act of Parliament to efiect the change in their 

 custody which I advocated in (2°"^ S. vi. 379.). 



Mr. Hutchissox " scarcely knows what to think 

 of the plan of sending them all to the Record Office 

 in Chancery Lane ; " and suggests that, " the ori- 

 ginals would be safe in a parish chest, especially 

 if of iron, kept in a dry place and under three 

 locks, the vicar and the churchwardens each keep- 

 ing a key." To which he inclines " from the fact 

 that documents are more intei-esting in the places 

 to which they refer than anywhere else." But I 

 think when we peruse the various Injunctions and 

 Acts of Parliament, and find that these pre- 

 cautions have been continually reiterated from 

 the first institution of parish registers, and then 

 look at their present .state, we shall hardly coincide 

 with his opinion. 



The plan of collecting them all at the Record 

 Office, London, presents several advantages un- 

 attainable by other means, and which, 1 think, 

 outbalance the loss of interest they may sustain 

 by absence from the places to which they respec- 

 tively refer. They would be deposited in a place 

 built especially with a view to guard our public 

 records from destruction by fire or otherwise. 



Attested copies would be left in the respective 

 parishes, and other copies would be made for ordi- 

 nary inspection in London, by which means the 

 originals would be saved from the repeated fric- 

 tion of the hand in turning them over, which many 

 of them will ill bear ; they would also be protected 

 from falsification and erasure, as a special order 

 should be necessary to view the originals, and 

 then only under the supervision of an officer of 

 the establishment. As they are at present kept 

 it is not difficult for an evil-disposed person to 

 falsify or obliterate them with impunity. The 

 Registers would be handy for production as 

 evidence in peerage cases : and last, but not least, 

 the facility of reference to them would be an in- 

 estimable boon to historians, genealogists, and in 

 fact almost everyone, for but few have not occa- 

 sion at some time or other to refer to a parish 

 register. A General Index could be made on the 

 plan of that at the General Register Office, and 

 subject to the same fees for inspection ; and thus 

 it could be ascertained by one general search 

 whether the entry sought for existed or not. 



The bishop's transcripts, though so often ordered 

 to be sent in, are very defective ; still a great 

 number remain, and these should be collated with 

 the parish registers, and any variations noted in 

 the margin of the copies to be made. 



It is greatly to be wished that many other gen- 

 tlemen would follow the worthy example of Mr. 

 Hutchinson, by examining and arranging the 

 contents of their parish chests. The documents 

 therein contained are usually of a purely local 

 character, and rest upon c[uite a different footing 

 to parish registers. There is consequently not so 

 great an objection to their remaining in the cus- 

 tody of the parish. In the case of the Attorney- 

 General V. Oldham, Lord Chief Justice Best, in 

 his charge to the jury, remarked that, " all the 

 property in this country, or a large part of it, 

 depends on registers ; " and Baron Garrow, in the 

 same case, said, " From what I have had occasion 

 to observe, I conceive there is nothing of more 

 importance than the endeavouring to deposit in 

 some secure place the registers of births, baptisms, 

 and funerals." T. P. Langmead. 



13 Dec. 1858. 



The proposition lately put forward in your 

 pages, that all the parish registers of the kingdom 

 should be removed from their present insecure 

 custody and deposited in the Public Record Of- 

 fice, London, is well worthy of attention, and I 

 should be exceedingly sorry if the interest which 

 has arisen on this point should be allowed to flag. 

 There are, however, on the threshold slight dif- 

 ficulties which will have to be overcome before so 

 desirable an object can be effected ; a special Act 

 of Parliament will be required, and the question 

 of compensation to the clergy will have to be 



