Protestation Returns

[Phoenix]

The House of Lords used to have these online. They are (except for Catholics and other recusants) effectively a census of heads of household, where the records survive, in the 1640s.

But the House of Lords have transferred their holding to TNA. TNA appears to be silent on the matter.

FMP says they have a link, but I presume they are still working on indexing the records.

Does anyone have up to date information on what is happening?

[ElizabethHerts]

FMP have them, or at least some of them.

https://search.findmypast.co.uk/sear...urns-1641-1642

75 hits for the surname Andrew.

Cornwall OPC have transcribed the Cornish ones.

[Phoenix]

Thanks, Elizabeth.
Unfortunately, they are only transcripts and don't cover the counties I'm interested in.

My ancestor, John Horne, appears in South Newton, Wilts, but unfortunately his name is poorly written and nobody would recognise him from the return.

[Olde Crone]

No help, but once, when I wasn't looking for any such thing, I found them at the back of a parish register. What astonished me was that nearly every man had signed his name. Even the few who had made their mark had done elaborate Xs, all different. I was enchanted.I

(In my experience, the back of the parish register is a goldmine of all kinds of trivial information).

OC

[Phoenix]

I miss the days of handling original registers. Digitisers have this habit of not photographing what they don't think is important. So much has been lost this way.

[kiterunner]

Originally Posted by Phoenix

I miss the days of handling original registers. Digitisers have this habit of not photographing what they don't think is important. So much has been lost this way.

I thought the people who took the photos were supposed to do every single page, even if it is blank. But it could be people at a later stage deciding that some pages shouldn't be digitised or shouldn't be indexed. Of course the owners of the original documents can also decide what is and isn't to be included.

[Phoenix]

Old registers are often not full before legislation changes, and a new book has to be started. I've come across several where empty pages suggest there is nothing more to be seen and images are omitted or, more worryingly, just the right hand page has been copied. Luckily, if this is presented to an archivist, they'll allow you to look at the original, so I've handled PCC wills registers at TNA (for Merry) and parish registers at a county archive. A friend got to look at an original census return because the relevant page was missing.

[Olde Crone]

In the case of the register I'm thinking of, every page HAD been filmed, by the lds, but not catalogued. A case of (me) not knowing what I didn't know until I saw it. I've since seen others which had wonderful stuff at the back, including things like confirmations, members of the Mothers Union, subscriptions to various causes (sending whole families to the New World) and various bits of parish gossip, in Latin if scurrilous! Weather reports, crop successes and failures.

I no longer go to the familysearch centres of course, which was where I learned the value of browsing the film from beginning to end.

OC

[ElizabethHerts]

OC, I'm doing a timeline for my Barker and Andrew families in Sussex.
I looked at my saved images and I have one that says, "The Dormer Window on the South Side of the Church was set up March 12th 1729 by John Andrew Church Warden".

Just a small snippet, but very pleasing nonetheless.
My ancestor.

[Olde Crone]

Elizabeth

Yes, it's small stuff but it brings them to life again.

My grandfather was accepted into the Congregational church at the age of 21. Unimportant, except that the name of his sponsor solved a long held family mystery! I doubt I would ever have found out any other way. (These records are now transcribed on lan-opc, but again, you have to know about them in order to find them).

OC