Old English social life as told by the parish registers

CENTRE
for
REFORMATION
and
RENAISSANCE
STUDIES

VICTORIA
UNIVERSITY

TORONTO

OLD ENGLISH SOCIAL LIFE AS TOLD
BY THE PARISH REGISTERS.

OLD ENGLISH SOCIAL LIFE

AS TOLD BY THE

PARISH REGISTERS.

BY
T. F. THISELTON-DYER, M.A. OxoN.
AUTHOR OF * CHURCH LORE GLEANINGS  ETCo

LONDON :
ELLIOT STOCK, 6z, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.
898.

0

EEl:. & EN.

CONTENTS.

PAGE
INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER I.
PARISH LIFE o - 25
CHAPTER II.
PARSON AND PEOPLE o 47
CHAPTER III.
SUPERSTITIONS AND STRANGE BELIEFS 6 9

CHAPTER IV.

EPIDEMICS - - 81

CHAPTER V.

PARISH SCANDALS AND PUNISHMENTS
CHAPTER VI.
BIRTH AND BAPTISM - -

94

IO 7

vi Contents.

MARRIAGE

CHAPTER VII.

CHAPTER VIII
DEATH AND THE GRAVE
CHAPTEI IX

SOCIAL USAGES

PARISH CUSTOMS

CHAPTER X.

CHAPTER XI.

SOME CHURCH CUSTOMS
CHAPTER XII.
STRANGE NATURAL PHENOMENA
CHAPTER XII I.

STRANGE SIGHTS

LOCAL EVENTS
INDEX

CH \PTER XIV.

I47

7 o

t92

204

220

e37

243
255

Introduction.

Amongst some of the further disasters that
have befallen these ill-used records, we may allude
to their being occasionally sold as waste-paper,
their destruction by fire at the parson's residence,
and their complete loss through being stolen.
In a curious work by Francis Sadler (I738 ,
P- 54), entitled ' Exactions of Parish Fees dis-
covered,' it is recorded how one Philips, late clerk
of Lambeth, ran away with the register-book,
whereby the parish became great sufferers, for no
person born in the parish could have a transcript
of the register to prove himself heir to an estate.
In the Norwich Mercury of August x7, 776,
this notice occurs:
' IUroxham Church.  Whereas in night
between 5th and 6th of this month the Parish
Church of Wroxham was forcibly entered, and
the chest in chancel broken, from whence the
surplice was taken and torn in pieces, and two
books, out of which were torn and carried away
several leaves, containing the register of christen-
ings and burials within the said parish from the
year 1732 to the present time: The minister and
churchwardens and inhabitants of the said parish
offer a reward of twenty-five guineas to any person
who will give information whereby the person or
persons, or any one of them, concerned as above,
may be convicted thereof, which reward of twenty-
five guineas I promise hereby to pay on conviction.
' DANIEL COLLYER, Vicar.'
Some years ago the registers of few, containing
the baptism and marriage of the late Duke of
1--2

4 Social LiJ as Told by Parish Registers.

Kent, the father of her present Majesty, and other
royal births, deaths and marriages, were stolen.
And the following extract from Archdeacon
Musgrave's Charge to his clergy in May, I865, is
a striking proof, if such were necessary, of the sad
havoc which has in the course of past years
befallen these parochial archives : ' In the exercise
of my duty, I had to assist in recovering some
registers carried off to a far-distant part of the
country by a late incumbent, and long detained,
to the great uneasiness and apprehension of the
parish. I might also tell of a missing register--
the one m use immediately before the present
Marriage Act--which, at the cost of much anxious
inquiry, I traced to another riding, and eventually
found among the books and papers of a deceased
incumbent. Or I might advert to a mass of
neglected, mutilated sheets, with no cover, inci-
dentally discovered by myself in an outhouse of a
parsonage in Craven; or, to add but one other
instance, which, if it were not too irreparable a
mischief, might provoke a smile. I have seen the
entries of half a century cut away from a parchment
register by a sacrilegious parish clerk, to subserve
the purpose of his ordinary occupation as a tailor.'
And Mr. T. P. Taswell-Langmead, in the Law
Magazine and Review for May, 1878 , reminds
his readers that 'fire, tempest, burglary,, theft,
damp, mildew, careless or malicious injury,
criminal erasure and interpolation, loss, and all
the other various accidents which have been surely
kut gradually bringing about the destruction of
these registers, are still in active operation.' On

6 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

favoured certain 'goodies' of the village by giving
them the parchment leaves for wrapping their
knitting-pins; and in the Report of the House
of Commons Committee, in 835 , it is recorded
how one sporting parson cut his parchment leaves
into labels for the game which he sent to his friends.
In another parish, the. register was wanting on the
accession of a new vicar, who found that it had
been thrown into the village pond during a parish
dispute; and there is a tradition handed down
that the wife of some parson, rector or curate of
Dean, being angry with her husband, revenged
herself, as she thought, upon him, but in reality
on poor posterity, by throwing a register-book or
books into the fire.
But how registers should have, occasionally,
come to be sold has been a puzzle to many
antiquaries. Thus, the register of Shackerstone,
which extends from the year 558 to the year
x 63% is in the Bodleian Library. It was purchased
from a gentleman at Beverley about March, I873 ,
but how it found its way into Yorkshire does not
appear.* The parish register of Somerby, extend-
ing from I6cI to 175, is preserved in the British
Museum. It was purchased in April, 862, from
Mr. C. Devon, but how it came into his possession
is not told. According to the ournal of the
British -/lrcheological -/lssociation (for March,
882), the register of Papworth-Everard, Cam-
bridgeshire, I565-r69_, was also acquired by the

 See Burn, ' History of Parish Registers,' 86z, pp. 46, 47.
See Notes atzdueries, 6th series, vol. v., p. 331.

bztroduction. 7

British Museum. Many similar instances might
be quoted of registers having been purchased ; the
register, of Stevington and part of that of Nuthurst
being m the British Museum. The register of
marriages, 662-72, of another Cambridgeshire
parish, St. Mary's, Whittlesey, also fell by purchase
into the hands of an antiquarian bookseller, who
returned it to the parish. The register of North
Elmham, from 538 to I63, was taken from the
parish chest some years ago, and was afterwards
purchased by Mr. Robert Fitch, who restored it to
the parish on August 5, 186I.
And, it may be remembered, there was sold at
Messrs. Puttick's auction-room, on April 4, I86O,
' The Original Register of Christenings, Mar-
riages, and Burials of the Parish of Kingston-upon-
Thames, from June, I54 J, to December, I556.' In
the middle of the volume might be seen this entry :
' Mem.--That I, John Bartlett, Clerke, entrynge
to be Curate of thys parishe of Kynston-upon-
Temyse, began myne entrans the 29 day of
September, A.D. I547, to kepe ye boke accordynge
to the ordeynance sett forth for chrystenynges,
weddynges., and bureynges.'
The registers did not wholly escape the sad
effects of the ravages of war; thus, the earlier
register of Lassington, Gloucestershire, contains
this entry : ' The old Register Bookes belonging
to the Parish of Lassington were embezzled and
lost in the late times of confusion, criminell divisions,
and unhappy warts ;' and the leaves of the parish
register of Wimpole, Cambridgeshire, containing
the entries from I6O 4 to the end of 616 were

8 Social Life as 7bid by Parish Registers.

torn out during the civil wars by the Parliamentary
soldiers; and the following memoranduna is found
in the register of Tarporley, Cheshire, in explana-
tion of a break in the entries from I643 to x648 :
'This Intermission hapned by reason of the
Great Wars obliterating memorials, vasting for-
tunes, and slaughtering persons of all sorts.'
Another register remarks that nothing could be
entered during the Civil \Vars, 'as neither
minister nor people could quietly stay at home for
one party or the other ;' and the register of
Rotherby thus notices the disturbed state of the
country an the time of Charles I. : ' x643, Bellum!
644, Bellum ! Interruption, Persecution! . . .
Sequestration by John Mussen Yeoman and John
Yates Taylor! 649, 65c), I65, 652, I653,
x654, Sequestration! Thomas Silverwood in-
truder.'
Similar entries occur in the register of St. Mary's,
Beverley. Under June 3% 643, it is stated:
' Our great scrimage in Beverley, and God gave
us the victory at that tyme, ever blessed be
God ;' and the dangers of war on every side
caused the parson to exclaim, July 3c), I643 :
' All our lives now at ye stake,
Lord deliver us, for Christ His sake.'
Paul Church, Cornwall, was burnt by the Spaniards
in the year x 595, and the registers prior to that event
were destroyed. Indeed, the registers generally
seem to have had a rough time ; and taking also into
account the many other vicissitudes to which they
were exposed, it is a matter of congratulation that

Introductioz. 9

they have survived as well as they have. Another
reason for the registers not being kept is given in
a memorandum in the loughborough register"
' Heare is to be noted and remembered that from
the IO day of April in Anno 554 there was no
Register keepte, by reason of the alteration of
Religion and often chaunginge of Priests in those
times and yeares, until the first yeare of the raigne
of our Soveraigne Ladle the Queen's Majesty
Elizabeth by the Grace of God, Queen of England,
Fraunce and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, and
until the yeare of God, 1558.'
Although, it is true, many registers have been
destroyed owing to causes over which their custodians
had no control, yet it is only too apparent that
culpable negligence and indifference have had a
large share in bringing about the present lament-
able result. A curious instance of this kind is
given by Coventry,' On Evidence' (1832 , p. 49)"
' In a case just laid before the writer, it is stated
that the parson's greyhound had made her nest in
the chest containing the parish registers, and that,
as the reverend gentleman had a greater affection
for the progeny of his companion than the off-
spring of his parishioners, the requisite registers
of baptism, etc., had become obliterated and
partially destroyed.' The early registers of a
parish in Kent have been lost, 'having been kept
at a public-house, to be shown, as they contained
some curious entries as to tythes ;' whereas in
another we are informed that the clerk employed
the leaves of the parish records, amongst other
purposes, for ' singeing a goose.'

Social L,.fe as 7bld by Parish Registers.

persons were stated to have been married on a
particular day, but in the parish register there seemed
to have been an erasure in the exact place corre-
sponding with the entry of the marriage in the copy.'
The Huntingdon peerage case was sorely per-
plexing because many leaves from the books of
Christchurch, Hants, had been used by a curate's
wife to line kettle-holders. There is the case of Miss
Chudleigh, who, for an iniquitous purpose, wished
to conceal her marriage with Lieutenant Hervey.
Accompanied by a female friend, she made a visit
to Laniston, where the marriage had taken place,
and desired to see the register; whilst her friend
engaged the attention of the parish clerk, she cut
out the page containing the marriage entry, and
with that important document returned to London.
By a strange irony of fate, the Lieutenant became
Earl of Bristol. To be plain Mrs. Hervey was
one thing, to be Countess of Bristol another.
The lady, however, was equal to the emergency,
she took another journey to Laniston, and by the
assistance of an attorney, and a bribe to the parish
clerk, she got the abstracted leaf reinserted in its
proper place in the register. In the Leigh peerage
case, in like manner, a baptism which had been
expunged from the parish books of \Vigan was
found in the Bishop's transcript, and by its
presence decided the suit.
In the registers of St. Peter's, Cornhill, under
June 9_5, 673, this entry occurs: 'Osmund
Mordaunt, son of John Lord Mordaunt of Ful-
ham, Midd*., and Mary Bulger of Lurgan, N r.
Gorey in Ireland, were married this day.' In

Introduction.  3

respect of this entry there is preserved in the
register a letter from Sir John Page Wood, Bart.,
Rector of St. Peter's, dated November 3 o, 829,
in which he says : ' On minutely investigating the
register of marriage of one Osmond Mordaunt
with Mary Bulger, dated 673 , I am clearly of
opinion that the said entry of marriage is a gross
and clumsy forgery. My opinion is formed on the
discrepancies which exist between the said entry
and those of the same period before and after it.
Its handwriting is evidently more modern than
those near it; it is not entered like the others,
with a specification as to the ceremony's having
been performed by the authority of banns or
license ; the parchment it is written on is thinner
in substance than the rest of the book, as if an
erasure had been made. The entry is made at the
bottom of the page, and there is no signature
thereon, either of incumbent or churchvarden,
which occurs in every page of that period.' A
pedigree is also given, drawn up by some member
of the Heralds' College, by which it appears that
Osmond Mordaunt was not more than eighteen
years old in 677, and hence would only have
been fourteen at the time of this reputed marriage.
It may be added that in the baptisms under
June 29, 674, is this entry.: 'Peter, the Son of
Osmund and Mary.' But it is in a different hand-
writing to the other entries, is on the last line at
the bottom of the page, and has evidently been
inserted after the page had been signed 'Will
Beveridge,' as one of the figures of the date crosses
that signature, and in every other page a small

14 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

space is left between the last entry and his
signature.
In the abstract of the returns, printed by
authority of Parliament in the year I833 , relative
to the number of volumes, dates, and state of
preservation of the registers, down to the year
18  2, then in possession of the parish priest, some
very interesting facts were given on this point, and
the incumbent of Chickerell thus wrote : ' I have
minutely examined the registers of this parish, and
hope there are no others in the kingdom in which
so little confidence should be placed. There are
only two old books, one of parchment, the other of
paper, the former sadly mutilated and interpolated,
the latter so defective that during nay incumbency
of one year many certificates have been requested
to no purpose, for want of entries. The omissions,
I suspect, may be attributed to carelessness; the
abuses, to frauds which have been committed on
the lord of the manor in favour of the copy-
holders; but to particularize all of them would
be a very unprofitable work.' Another parson,
writing at the same period, tells how the church
of Pinner, Middlesex, was broken open, and part
of the registers destroyed; and of ]3erwick,
Sussex, it is recorded that 'a register of baptisms
[was] taken to Peasmarsh by the former minister,
which has never been recovered,' and a similar cause
for the absence of the register of Althorpe,
Lincolnshire, is given: ' There are two register
books of earlier date, which were taken away by
the Archdeacon in the year 1824.'
It is impossible to say, too, how many a register

Introduction.  5

may have fallen a prey to damp and other ravages
of time, as well as to religious and political
troubles. The early registers of Huish-Champ-
flower, for instance, are described 'as being
mutilated and illegible, occasioned by a storm
unroofing the church and wetting the contents of
the parish chest'; and the return for Belstone
Church, Devonshire, runs thus : ' There are several
registers, the earliest dated t552, but so irregular
and damaged that no correct account can be given ;
about twenty years ago some of the register-books
were burnt.' But occasionally a careful Vicar, as
we learn from this injunction in the parish of
Rodmarton, took care to keep the register from
getting damp: ' If ye will have this book last,
bee sure to aire it art the fire or in the sunne three
or foure times a year, els it will grow dankish and
rott ; therefore look to it. It will not be amisse,
when you find it dankish, to wipe over the leaves
with a dry woollen cloath. This place is very
much subject to dankishness; therefore, I say,
look to it.'
Speaking of fire, it seems that many registers
owe their destruction to this cause, that of West
Lulworth, Dorset, having been burnt in the year
t78o. At St. Bees, a fire broke out one Sunday
morning in 1868, when some of the registers were
destroyed, and the returns already quoted tell how
' the earlier registers of Little Thornham, Suffolk,
were burnt in a fire which consumed the parsonage-
house of a neighbouring parish.' One can only
regret that an old usage in force at Spitalfields is
not equally binding in other parishes. The follow-

I 6 8ocia/ L'fie as Told  Paris/ Registers.

ing statement was made in the year I867, when
an appeal was made by the churchwardens, owing
to the danger to which the registers of that parish
were for a long series of years subjected :. 'By one
of the canons governing .ecclesiastical affairs, the
churchwardens are bound to provide an iron chest
in which to preserve the registers of baptisms,
marriages, and burials, and until last summer it
was on all hands believed that Spitalfields Church
was supplied with a chest of the proper character.
During the recent, restoration, it was discovered
that the supposed iron register-chest was a large
stone box with iron doors; and, if it had ever
been subjected to the action of fire, there is no
doubt that the extremely valuable and interesting
registers of this parish from its creation in 1728
would have inevitably been destroyed.' The
register-chest referred to was probably put up
during the erection of the church, and was entirely
covered with oak framing corresponding with the
oak partitioning in the building.
It is a matter of satisfaction, however, to know
that at last the value of these volumes of social
and domestic history has been realized, and that
in most parishes they are now carefully preserved
as heirlooms of the past. The Harleian Society,
also, taking into account the genealogical interest
attaching to them, has undertaken their publica-
tion, and already the registers of certain City
parishes have been given to the world, and thus
permanently preserved for all generations to come.
But, unfortunately, some of the parish registers
which have been printed by private individuals

Introduction.  7

have not been published in their entirety, but only
such extracts as were, in the opinion of the editor.
worthy of note. As records of genealogical and
historical value, all such imperfect publications
are of comparatively little worth, and are interest-
ing only so far as they illustrate the original
documents.
It may be well here to note that the first orders
for the provision of parochial registers date from
the year I538, and were rendered necessary in
consequence of the dissolution of the religious
houses and the cessation of their registers. The
first was issued by the Vicar-General Cromwell,
in the thirtieth year of Henry VIII., and this order
was continued by fresh injunctions in the succeed-
ing reigns of Edward VI., Elizabeth, and James I.
During the confusion which existed in the reign
of Charles I., parish registers were greatly neg-
lected, and were for the first time regulated by
Act of Parliament. And on Jan. 3, I644-45 an
ordinance was made that'a fair register book ot
velim' should be provided in every parish, and that
the names of all children baptized, and the time of
their birth, and also the names of all persons
married and buried, should be set down therein
by the minister. During the Commonwealth, the
system of leaving parochial registration to the
clergy seems to have failed. Parliament again
interfered, and registrars were appointed. At the
Restoration, the charge of keeping the registers
again devolved on the clergy, and has continued a
part of their duty ever since.
Nothing appears to have been done with regard

I8 Social LiJb as Told by Parish Registers.

to the parish registers in the reign of James II. ;
but in that of William lII., in consequence of a
duty being imposed on the various entries, the
negligent and careless clergy were, for the first
time, exposed to the terror of the common
informer. Many of the registers, therefore, from
this time seem to have been better kept, but as a
great number of the clergy were not fully aware
of the penalties to which they were subject through
non-compliance with the law, in the fourth year of
Queen Anne's reign an Act of Indemnity was
found necessary.
In the year 753 was passed the famous
Marriage Act, called Lord Hardwicke's Act, still
in force. By this Act, any person convicted ot
tampering with or destroying any register of
marriage was to be deemed guilty of felony
without benefit of clergy. In the year x783 the
Stamp Act was passed, which levied a tax upon
every entry in the parish register, but it met with
such opposition that it was repealed in the year
79-1-- By this Act the rich and poor were taxed
alike, and the parson was placed in the invidious
and unpopular light of a tax-gatherer. As the
poor were often either unable or unwilling to
pay the tax imposed u.pon them, the clergyman
not unfrequently paid it out of his own pocket
rather than run the risk of incurring the ill-will
of his parishioners. No change of any material
importance took place until the xear x 8 t 2, when
an Act, commonly known as ose's Act, was
passed for ' the better regulating and preserving
parish and other registers' ; and lastly, in the year

Itrodzction.  9

1836 , a very stringent and salutary law was made,
when it was required that henceforth all future
registers should be kept in books specially provided
for that purpose, and 'according to one uniform
scheme set out in the schedules annexed to the
Act.'
Since the passing of the Registration Act, in
the year 1836 , the value of the parish register as
a public record has greatly diminished. The
registration of births and deaths has superseded,
as far as legal purposes are concerned, that of
baptisms and burials; an:l every quarter a copy
of the marriages is forwarded by the parson to the
Registrar-General; one, too, of the well-known
pair of green books, when filled, being likewise
sent to the Registrar-General.
Such, briefly told, is the history of the parish
register, but it is more especially with its contents
that we are concerned, as illustrating in a variety
of ways the manners and customs of former times.
The present printed forms for the several entries
of baptisms, etc., it must be remembered, preclude
the mention of any other particulars, which abound
in the old registers, and must ever be highly
valuable from their miscellaneous character. It
was a frequent custom to insert occurrences of a
memorable or historical nature ; and, as might be
expected, highly curious as well as quaint, are
many of these entries. \Vhen, as sometimes
happened, the parson was of a witty turn of mind,
the entries almost verge on the ludicrous and
grotesque; and again, from the occasional entries
made in a few pithy words of Latin, the refined
2--2

Introduction.

instance, while the books themselves are splendidly
preserved. The register of Marylebone is a most
voluminous affair, and, like that of Limehouse, is
a model, of. good order. Stepney....which has a
register going back farther than limehouse, is
another commendable example, that of St. Martin's-
in-the-Fields being equally good. Most of our
City churches, too, have full and fair registers,
the evil, we are told, of defective ancl badly kept
registers being most noteworthy in our rural
parishes. At the same time, despite innumerable
mischances which have, at one time or another,
befallen the parish registers, they represent a con-
siderable anaount of documentary evidence, not to
be replaced, relating to the obscure past. Indeed,
whilst invaluable as genealogical records in con-
nection with the rights of property and the
assumption of titles, they further afford us an
insight into the social life of our forefathers not
otherwise obtainable.
And, taking into account the value of the
parish register, it is highly desirable, as it has been
so often urged, that a law should be passed eta-
forcing its future safe government in some public
office, as exists in Scotland. When a system of
registration was introduced into Scotlanl by the
7th and x Sth Vict., c. 8% ' An Act to provide
for the better Registration of Births, Deaths, and
Marriages in Scotland,' passed August 7, x854,
old parochial registers were ordered to be trans-
mitted to the Registrar-General for preservation
in the General Registry Office at Edinburgh.
Very many of the present registers, too, are

Introduction. 2 3

him and likewise delivered into the hands of the
said Thomas Walker the old Register Book
(belonging to the said Parish) bearing date from
the 27th ofAprill 538 to the 3rd of Aprill I597.
In testimony whereof I have hereunder written
my hand the 22nd day of September I653.
'(Signed) EDVCARDE RoBINSOLTX. '
It appears that Thomas \Valker died on Decem-
ber 7, 655, which explains the next memo-
randum :
' Whereas ye above said Thomas \Valker being
deceased and ye parish of Leyland being void of a
Register y Inhabitants of y said parish or y
major part of ym have att a Gen'all Meeting by a
Certificate under yer hands ellected and chosen
Mr. "William Rothvell yeir minister to bee
Register of y parish aforesaid with a provisoe yat
hee shall relinquish itt when y parish or y greater
part yereof shall think fitt to conferr itt upon y
Schoole[master]. These are therefore to certifie
all whom it may concerne that ye said Mr. Roth-
well comeing before mee one of y Justices of
Peace for y said Countie of Lanc r and tendered
ye said Certificate I have allowed of him to be
Register for ye said parish and have tendered and
given him ye oth of A Register according to an
Act of Parliam  of y 24-th August I653 in y
case provided, and hath also deliv a to the safe
keepeing of y said Mr. Rothwell ye old Register
above mentioned.
' Given under my hand att Buckshaw the 25th
Januarie, 1656.'

2 4 Soczal LiJF as Tol, t by Parish Registers.

So far the parson seems to have kept in favour
with his parishioners, but according to the story
given in Walker's 'Sufferings of the Clergy,' he
had to endure much persecution and hardship
between this date and that of the Restoration.
Hence the further memorandum :

' Whereas Mr. Rothwell the late Register being
displaced and y said parishioners of Leyland
meeteing att the P'rish Church of Leyland upon
the first day of May 656 the major part then
prsent did ellecte and choose Robert Abbott of
Leyland above-said yeoman to bee for the tyme
prsent Register for the said p'rish and to execute
that office till the parish with ye approbac6n
of the next Justice of peace should thinke fitt
to conferr ye said office upon some other P'son.
Fhese are therefore to certifie all whom it may
concerne that y said Robert Abbott comeing that
day before mee one of the justices of y peace for
y said Countie I have approved and allowed of
him and hath administered ye oath of a Register
to him accordinge to y Acte of Parliam t in that
case provided and also hath deliu'ed into his safe
keeping the old Register Book menconed in the
first Certificate on ye other side. Given under my
hand att Buckshaw y 2rid May i656.
 EDWARD ROBINSOUN.'

But it will be seen in an ensuing chapter that
Mr. Rothwell's case was far from being an isolated
one, further instances having been given in other
registers.

CHAPTER I.

PARISH LIFE.

HE parish life of one or two centuries ago
was very different from what it is at the
present day. Time has wrought many changes:
old customs have passed away, railways have
linked one village with another, and country life
has gradually assimilated itself in tone and char-
acter with the practices and habits of neighbouring
towns. As formerly, the rural parish is no longer
an isolated little community; and hence it has
thrown ofF, from year to year, those characteristics
of habit and custom which once gave it an indi-
viduality of its own. But, happily, many of these
traits of parish life have been preserved in local
documents--such as the parochial register--which
otherwise would have perished and been lost to
posterity.
An interesting entry relating to the Poor Laws
of Edward VI. and 5 Elizabeth occurs in the
transcript of the register of St. Mary Magdalene,
Canterbury, for the year 565, where, added to

26 Social Life as 7bht by Parish Registers.

the burial on March 6 of' Israel Raynolds s. of
James Raynolds',' this note is given" ' Sol. iiijd.' ;
and in the transcript of St. George's, Canterbury,
under 566, we find that the names of the
collectors for the poor were Christopher Lewys
and Thomas Kyng, and that they collected four-
pence. 'It is hardly necessary,' writes Mr.
Meadows Cowper, * 'to say that so long as the
monasteries stood there was no need and no
thought of a Poor Law ; but when they were
suppressed, the ugly fact stared men in the face
that there were countless poor, and none to
provide for them.' An attempt was made to meet
the difficulty, and in the reign of Elizabeth an
Act was passed 'touching relieving poor and im-
potent persons.' The Act runs thus: ' The poor
and impotent persons of every parish shall be
relieved of that which every person will of their
charity give weekly" and the same relief shall be
gathered m every parish by collectors assigned,
and weekly distributed to the poor; for none of
them shall openly go or sit begging. And if any
parishioner shall obstinately refuse to pay reason-
ably toward the relief of the said poor, or shall
discourage others ; then the Justices of the Peace
at the .Quarter Sessions may tax him to a reasonable
weekly sum; which, if he refuses to pay, they
may commit him to prison.'
And, as Mr. Cowper adds, Christopher Lewys
and Thomas Kyng we.re the ' collectors assigned,'
and if the amount ' iiijd, represents the result of a
year's collection, we need not be surprised that
"* 'Registers of St. George's, Canterbury,' Introduction, v, vi.

Ptzrish Life. 2 7

other Poor Laws were soon required to prevent
the people from dying of starvation.'
But the condition of many a country parish in
the seventeenth century was lamentable owing to
those days of contest and confusion. As one of
the many instances of the wretched state of parish
life at this period, a writer in the ' Sussex Archae-
ological Collections' (iv. :259 ) mentions the
condition of Wivelsfield. It appears' the tithes,
both great and small, belonged to a Mr. More, of
Morehouse, whose predecessors had received them
by gra,lt from the Crown, on the dissolution of
the Monastery of Lewes, previous to which the
church had been supplied by a lay-reader, who
sometimes on a holiday came over to read a
homily. During the time of the Rebellion and
the Protectorate, the parish, which before had been
supplied by students provided by the family of
Mr. More, had been filled successively by a
Presbyterian jack-maker, a drummer, and a malt-
man.' A memorandum in Mayfield register,
made by the parson, dated I646, and signed by
him, tells much the same tale:
' I being called upon to the Assembly of Divines,
did offer to give up all the tithes due from the
parishioners for the maintenance of a minister, but
through the backwardness of many in not paying
their dues, and it may be by the negligence of some
in not being active to procure a fit man for the
place, and to give him encouragement, there was
no constant minister for some time, and afterwards
divers changes, so that the register was neglected
for divers years.'

2 8 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

Entries of this kind are of frequent occurrence,
and show under what disadvantages parish life
was passed. A memorandum m the register of
Kibworth, Leicestershire, dated I64I, runs thus :
'Know all men that the reason why little or
nothing is registered from this year I64 until
the year 649 , was the Civil Wars between
Charles and his Parliament, which put all into a
confusion till then; and neither minister nor
people could quietly stay at home for one party
or the other.' Indeed, taking into consideration
the many difficulties at this period of our history
that attended the keeping of the parish registers,
it is surprising that they did not fare far worse in
such a time of turmoil.
But turning from the political surroundings of
parish life, it would seem that occasionally disputes,
as at the present day, were the cause of much
vexatious litigation; and whilst the parson was
struggling with more or less success against the
difficulties of his calling, much bitterness and ill-
feeling were often caused by such unhappy dis-
senslons. Thus, it appears that the old register of
the parish of St. Olave, Chester, was lost in a suit
between Hugh Harvey and the parishioners in
the year I666; and a memorandum carefully
inserted in the parish register of Hillingdon, under
the date of December 3o, I67o , gives an interest-
ing account of a lawsuit which arose as to
what parish a certain house belonged. It runs
thus :
'Elizabeth, the daughter of John Franklin and
Grace his wife, at ye house near Ikenham belong-

Parish Li.. 9

ing to this parish, by leave first derived, was
christened there, which house ira the time of nay
immediate Predecessor, Mr. Bourne, occasioned a
very great suit between the two Towns, when at
last after a great deal of money spent, it was
adjudged to belong to Hillingdon, and so hath
been adjudged ever since, without dispute; and
to prevent any for time to come, this memoriall is
now registered.
Four years later we find another entry--this
time relating to a burial difficulty--between the
same two parishes : 'Janry Sth, I674. The wife
of--Beddifont marr at Ikenham and there, by
leave first obtained, buried; and not by any }ust
right to burie there, as formerly pretended, till it
was determined by law after a costly and tedious
suit betwixt the two Townes. Salvo itaque in
omnibus jure exit sus  Hillingdoniensis.' Ira
many cases it would seem that boundary parish
lines were ill-defined, which gave rise to much
dispute; and, as in the case just quoted, there
was oftentimes in a parish an unwritten law, the
real existence of which, when questioned by some
captious or aggrieved parishioner, involved an
expensive lawsuit.
In the Crosby-on-Eden registers there is a
quaint entry which tells its own tale, and from
which it would seem that the parishioners of
Crosby desired to place on record their triumph
over their neighbours of Brampton:
' Whereas the Churchwardens and Overseers of
ye Poor for ye pi.la of Crosby ypon Eden made
 Probably the tithe pig.

Parfsdt Life. 3 

Order soo made by the said Justices to be confirmed
and it is hereby confirmed. Dated the day and
year aforesaid.'
Any infringement of parish rights seems to
have been most obstinately resented, and the
following interesting minute of a meetinglspeci-
ally convened to consider what steps should be
taken to uphold certain privileges belonging to
the parish--is written upon a flyleaf at the com-
mencement of one of the registers of SS. Peter and
Paul, Mitcham :
' It is this day agreed upon by the Inhabitants
above named in the behalfe of the rest of the
Inhabitants that the common fields shall be layd
open so soon as all the come of the said fields
shall be carried out. And then and not before
it shall be lawfull for the said Inhabitants that
have been accustomed and to have benefitt of the
common of the said field to put in their cattle
until St. Luke Day following, and not after any
sheepe or other cattle to be suffered there, but if
any be taken they are to be put in the pound or
to be trespassers upon paine for every horse six-
pence, every cowe four pence, and every hogg
threepence, and every sheepe one penny, and for
every horse cowe hogg or sheepe that shall be
taken in the same field after our Lady Day to
double the said penalty, the benefitt of the said
Pennelty to goe to the field-keeper.
' And likewise it is agreed upon by the said
Inhabitants that all those who have inclosed any
part of the common ffields shall take away their
gates that their severall inclosures may be co/fion

Parish Life. 3 3

agreement be entered into the Church booke and
the towne booke. And in them bothe by all the
present feoffees and other the cheife Inhabitants
subscribed under every one of their hands. Dated
this o 'h June, 65.'
Many memoranda of this kind occur in the
parish registers, and they are interesting as show-
mg that our forefathers were equally jealous of
what they considered their public rights, and were
at all times ready to resist any arbitrary or unjust
curtailment of them--an uncompromising attitude
which even the parson himself was prepared to
maintain, as may be gathered from an entry made
in the register of Little Abington, where 'the
rights of the Vicaridge' are very minutely
corded, a Mr. Colbatch, who compiled the
article, making this conclusion: 'Cursed is he
that removeth his neighbour's landmark.'
But it was not the right of property only which
occasionally gave rise to a parish broil, for the
administration of the poor-law seems at times to
have exercised the mind of the rural parishioner.
In the year x674, it appears from an entry that
there was paid at Eastbourne to a certain 'J. Russell,
for keeping Mary Peeper, two weeks and three
days, six shillings; to Goody Russell, for laying
her out, one shilling; disbursed for bread and
beer at her funeral, two shillings and twopence.'
These items when published created a widespread
feeling of dissatisfaction, and soon afterwards the
parishioners held a meeting in the vestry, and
'declared that great abuses in the administration
of the poor-law had taken place,' and as a mark
3

34 Social LiJb as Told by Parish Registers.

of their displeasure a resolution was passed that
all recipients of relief should wear a badge upon
the right side of their upper garment, and if the
overseer relieved any other than these, no allow-
ance was to be made to him for their account. 
That this was not an isolated case is evident from
a memorandum in Wadhurst register, dated x63o ,
relating to the misappropriation of certain funds
specially intended for the poor:
' Whereas Mr. Thomas Whitefield, of Worth, in
the County of Surrey, Esquire, being well affected
to the parish of Wadhurst, gave, besides the three
almshouses and twelve cordes ofwoode, ten poundes
by the yeare, the said ten pounds was, in 633,
employed to the payment of the general sesse of the
poor, whereby the said money given to be disposed
to the maintenance of the poor was diverted from
the right ends, and served to abate the charge of
the rich assessed in the said sesse. Whereupon
John Hatley, Vicar of Wadhurst, then one of the
feoffees, opposed this Act as ungodly as unjust;
and the writings being showed whereby the ten
pounds annuity was conveyghed, it was found
that the said ten pounds was by them to be
disposed to the extended use of the poor, and not
to serve to the abatement of the charge of the
rich. This the above-named John Hatley thought
fit to set down here, forasmuch as he suffered
many foule words for opposing this wrong ; and
lest any ill-disposed person should attempt to do
it hereafter, or any man not knowing the purport
of the conveighance should ignorantly fall into
the ruine of sacrilege.'
 ' Sussex Arch,'eological Collections,' vol. iv., F. 267.

4 o Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

which relates to a custom that had existed from
time immemorial with respect to payments for
' the use and reparacon of the Church of Prest-
burie,' and which, as far as can be gathered,
appears to have been peculiar to the parish--a ley
or assessment, resembling in some respects the
ordinary church rate, but locally known as serage
or cerage silver, the survival, it has been sug-
gested, of the 'wax-money,' allowed to the Vicar
by the Abbey of St. Werburgh, Chester, in
accordance with an agreement made at about the
end of the thirteenth, or beginning of the four-
teenth century. After reciting ' the duties and
'laudable customs, as of long tyme have been due
and accustomed to be paid,' the order sets forth
the apportionment for each township liable, with
the names of those persons who 'subscrybed did
agree and consent' thereto, as well for themselves
as the rest of the parish.*
The next entry is a copy of a very interesting
kind, of' an old Order taken and of long time used
by the consent of the whole parish of Prestburie,
for the dividing and the better repayringe or
mayntenhinge of the Churchyard.' It seems that
the residents of each township had been granted
a certain portion of the ground in the churchyard,
which they undertook to keep fenced, and n
order, reserved for their exclusive use--a practice
.by no means unusual. Contracts, again, for keep-
xng the church in repair are not unfrequently
recorded in the registers, and an old one, dated 15 7 8,
 ' The Register of Prestbury,' edited by James Croston,
Record Society, t88t : Introduction, p. xiv.

Parzsh Life. 41

is given in the Wragby register, which is a good illus-
tration of agreements of this kind:
' It was agreed, upon the xvi h of[No]vemb anno
1 5 7 8 betwixt the Churchwardens and the rest of the
parish of Wragbie, and Thomas blilner of Wragbie
aforesaid, that he, the said Thomas Milner shall
from the xvi th day of November of his own costes
and charges, maintaine, uphould, and keepe, all the
bells within the Churche of Wragbie with hempe,
lether, and greas, with all their furniture belong-
inge to the said bells, as often as need shall
require ; brass and iron, and wood, for yockes and
wheles excepted, whitche is to be found of the
charges of the Parish. And the same belle (?) to
be so repaired by the said Thomas Milner, as is
aforesaid, during the term and space xx ti yeare,
yff he the said Thomas Milner do live so long,
and continew within the parish of Wragbie, the
Churchwardens for the time being painge unto the
said Thomas Milner vjs. vijd. everye yeare, that
is to say iijs. iijd. at Mychelmes, and iijs. iijd. at
the Nunchation of the blessed Virgin Mary by
even portions.
Indeed, it seems to have been a popular and
long-standing notion that the fact of any kind
of parish agreement being copied into the register
made it all the more binding on the parties
concerned, but the chief reason for this practice
was, that, if by any accident in after-years a
contract should be either mislaid or lost, a copy
of it could be seen in the register of the parish.
By its being entered, too, in the register, any
business transaction had thereby a public lm-

42 Social Life as ToM by Parish Registers.

portance imparted to it, which made it all the
more binding. Thus, we find the Vicar of
Aldingbourne, Sussex, making a note in his register
of the fees for which he was not liable: 'The
Vicarage of Aldingborne is not to pay any pro-
curations to the Archdeacon ; neither was the
glebe lands or the tythes belonging to the
Vicarage ever taxed, within the memory of
man, to any payments saving in the year 635, six
shillings and eightpence to the shipping.'
Agreements of this kind were by no means
uncommon, but occasionally they gave rise to future
litigation. At the conclusion of the old register-
book of Kirk-Leatham is an instance of the
valuable efforts and mediation of the Vicar, the
compact agreed upon long remaining in force:

' Primo die May, Anno Dffni I622.
' Memorandum.--At the direction of Robert
Weemse, then Vicar of Kirkleatham, for the good
of the whole parish, I, Nicholas Kildale, have
inserted this order hereafter following, to remain
ad perpetuam rei memoriam. For after a long suit
and controversy, which was between Kirkleatham
and Wilton, in the Spirituall Court at York, the
matter by the men of Wilton, Lackenby, and
Laisenby, was drawne into the Court of Wards in
ye minority of Phrediric Cornewallis. And was
brought againe from the said Court of Wards
by ye meanes of ye said Robert Weemse ; and at
last, by ye mutuall consent and assent of the
whole parish, as well of Kirkleatham as Wilton, was
finally ordered as hereinafter is specifyed, which

Parish Lff. 45

Westmoreland, are given the fourteen names of
'the sworne men of Orto' anno d'ni 596, '
after which this memorandum is added, another
interesting relic of parish life in olden times :
'[n primis that thes be diligent and careful to see
and provide that the people be . and behave
the'selves honestlie . . . feare of God according
to the Holie Word of God and the Good and
wholesome laws of this land. Secondlie to see
that the Churchwardens be careful and diligent
in executinge their office ioyne with thes in sup-
pressinge of sinne and such as behave the'selves
inordinatlie to reprove and rebuke those wh be
found offenders, and if they will not amend to
pesent the' to be punished. Thirdlie--to se that
the Church and Churchy d be decentlie repaired
and mainteyned. Also we as agreed yt everie
p'sonnis beinge found faultie by the Churchwardens
and p'sented to the sworn me' shall paie xijd. to
the poor ma's box. And that whosoever doth not
come p'sent the'selves lawfull warning being given
either of the xij or Churchwardens to the place
appointed shall loose xi(j)to the poore ma's box
without a sufficient cause to the contrarie whereof
thes are to certifie the rest assembled at...
appointed of their meetinge. Lastly that the
Churchwardes . . and take the sam forfat . . .
p'sent the offenders.'
The clause following the third admonition is
a little obscure, but the meaning, it has been
suggested, is this: ' If any person be deemed by
the churchwardens to be guilty of disorderly or
immoral conduct he shall be presented to the court

4 6 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

of the twelve sworn men--the list given comprises
fourteen names; perhaps the two churchwardens
were included- who shall, if the accused is
unable to clear himself, thereupon inflict a fine of
twelve pence payable to the poor-box, and that if
he fails to attend and answer to the complaint,
being duly summoned either by the twelve or the
churchxvardens, or fails to send sufficient excuse
for absence, the same fine shall be imposed. '
It appears to have been customary in some
parishes to make once a year a list of the in-
habitants of the parish. Such a practice was
observed in the parish of St. Mary Aldermary,
with additional particulars as to their occupation,
religious faith, and the numbers of their respective
families. Two such lists, for the years I733 and
1734, were transcribed in the parish register, and
these are interesting as illustrating the register
itself, and as furnishing details which do not
appear elsewhere.j-
" See Cumberland and Westmoreland Antiquarian and
Archaeological Society, I89I , vol. xi., pp. zSz , z53-
"1" These lists have been reproduced by Dr. j. L. Chester in
his reprint of ' The Parish Registers of St. Mary Aldermary,'
ISSO, pp. z35 and z38.

CHAPTER II.

PARSON AND PEOPLE.

HE relations of the parson with his parish-
ioners, unhappily, have not always been of
the most friendly kind--a circumstance, it would
seem, in some cases owing to his having been
appointed in direct.opposition to the wishes of the
people. The register of Staplehurst gives an
account of a certain Rector who was appointed in
this manner :
' Henricus Kent, Cantab et Socius Collegii .Reglis
rector ecclesia3 parochialis de Staplehurst, mstl-
tutus sexto die novembris, i645 , et ejusdem anni
decimo septimo die Nov riS inductus. Hujusdem
Ecclesia3 possessionem non sine multorum oppo-
sitionibus accepit, sed non- ullorum suffragiis
electus, et suo jure legali sustentatus, per ordinens
parliamenti specialem liberam tandem pra3dicandi
potestatem habuit. O tempora! O mores !'
But Henry Kent lived long enough to gain not
only the affections of his parishioners, but even
the goodwill of his opponents. In the register of

4 8 Social L[/'e as ToM by Parish Registers.

East Lavant, some particulars are given respecting
another parson who, too, was regarded as an
intruder. The entry runs thus : ' 29 'h Oct., 1653.
Richard Batsworth was approved of, and sworn to
be a parish minister for the sayd parish, according
to an Act of Parliament in the case made and
provided.' It is further added that 'he was a
man of low stature, very violent for the rebels,
and a plunderer of the royalists, particularly of
the Morley family. He had some learning, a
great deal of chicanery, though seldom more than
one coat, which for some time he wore the wrong
side out,--its right side was seen only on Sundays
--till it was almost worn out, and then he had a
new one, vhich he used in the same manner.'
On November 15, 649 , it appears that Mr.
Nalton was chosen 'by very full and general
consent to be minister of St. Martin's, .Ludgate
Hill, but he did not accept the appointment,
whereupon it was decided to offer it to Mr.
Warran, minister of Hendon.' Above this state-
ment in the register are written these not very
complimentary lines :
' 'Tvas Jeroboam's practice and his sport
Priests to elect out of the baser sort.'
Another curious memorandum in the register
of Everley, Wilts, dated September 29, I66o,
describes the appointment of one William Eastman,
commonly called Tinker, by occupation a brass
founder, and his expulsion, on the restoration ot
Charles II., and concludes with these amusing lines :
' Exit Tinker, let all men henceforth know
A thorn was planted xvhere a vine should grmv ;

Parson and People.

of the said parsonage, being an impropriation, it is
endowed with a Vicarage, and a Vicar presented
thereunto, he held himself freed in law from any
further charge, and that the said parsonage was
in lease with such other-like excuses, but that
notwithstanding he was contented to procure
them twelve sermons every year ; their Lordships
thought fitting this day to call him to the board,'
and they then reminded him that, ' beside the great
obligations they had as Christians, it behoved
them to press his Lordship, notwithstanding
the former excuses, to have yet a further care of
the teaching so great a multitude--.there being
4,000 people--considering how busy the priests
and jesuits are in these days, especially in these
parts, not only labouring to corrupt his Majesty's
subjects in their religion, but also infecting them
with such damnable positions and doctrine touch-
ing their allegiance unto his Majesty's sacred
person.
'\Vhereupon the said Bishop made offer unto
the board that he would withdraw the Vicar there
now present, and send in his room some learned and
religious pastor who should, as it was desired, weekly
preach, unto the people, and carefully instruct
them m points of faith and religion, of which
their Lordships were pleased to accept for the
present, and accordingly enjoined him to the
performance thereof, and withal ordered that the
said preacher now to be presented, should first be
approved and allowed by the Lord Archbishop of
York in respect of ability and sufficiency.'
In the register of Sandwich, under February 4,
4--2

5 - Social L1]/k as Tol, l by Parish Registers.

i646-47 , is entered the burial of Mr. Samuel
Prichard, minister and preacher of God's Word ;
' and it appears from the books of the Corporation
that in the year 6II the Corporation allowed
thirty pounds to Mr. Richard Marston, preacher
of God's Vord, to be entertained to preach a
weekly lecture in the town'; and in the year
i6I 4 the same sum was allowed 'for a like
service to Mr. Geere, Master of Arts.'
On the other hand, sometimes we find a parson
over-anxious not to give offence to his parishioners.
A memorandum at the end of the register of
Newdigate Church, Surrey, made in the year
I634, by a cautious Rector, to prevent any rights
being compromised by his admitting a parishioner
to receive the Holy Sacrament in his church at
Easter, is worthy of mention: 'An. Dora. I634.
Mart a. Be it known to all men by these
presents that I John Butcher dwellinge in a certain
tenement of which question hath been made many
yeeres whether it lie in Charlewood or Newdigate,
and is not yet decided, upon grant and leave given
me and to my friends.., and to receye ye
Sacrament at Easter next for this one time at ye
parish Church of Newdigate yt y same may not be
prejudicial to ye parish of Newdigate for ye time
to come, and do confesse that I have y said
libertie for this time by leave. And in witness
hereof I have hereunto set mine hand y day and
yeere above written.'
Then follows another note in continuation,
signed and attested as before: 'Also ye said
Ch  Butcher desired leave for himselfe and family

54 Social LiJ as 7bM by Parish Registers.

'Feb. x, 749- The Company of Singers,
by the consent of the Ordinary, were forbidden
to sing any more by the Minister, upon account
of their frequent ill-behaviour in the Chancel,
and their ordering the Carpenter to pull down
part of the Belfry without leave from the Minister
and Churchwardens.'
On another day, March 8: 'The Clerk
gave out the oo th Psalm, and the singers imme-
diately opposed him, and sung the 5 th, and bred
a disturbance. The Clerk then ceased.' And
under x752 it is entered: 'Robert Johnson
buried, and a sermon preached to a noisy con-
gregation.' But these were not the only cases of
insubordination which disturbed the Rector's mind ;
for on one occasion, when the Acton ringers came
over, the churchwarden ordered the belfry door to
be broken open for them to ring, 'contrary to the
Canon and leave of the minister.' The parish, in
truth, seems to have grown more unruly as time
went on; for one day 'the ringers and other
inhabitants disturbed the service from the begin-
ning of prayers to the end of the sermon, by
ringing the bells, and going into the gallery to
spit below ' ; and at another time ' a fellow came
into Church with a pot of beer and a pipe,' and
remained 'smoking in his own pew until the end
of the sermon. '
But however unfortunate the Rector of Hayes
may have been in being subjected to such scandals,
there were equally obstreperous individuals in
- See' Parish Registers in the Uxbridge Deanery': the
_4tiuar', vol. xviii., p. 6 5.

Parson and People.

other parishes. Thus, in Middleham register we
find this strange entry:
'Burials.--October 29 th 792--1 enter under
the head of burials, as spiritually dead, the names
of John Sadler, Clerk to Mr. John Breare,
Attorney-at-law, of this place, and Christopher
Felton, Clerk to Mr. Luke Yarker, Attorney-at-
law, of this place: first, for irrelevant behaviour a
second time after public reproof on a former
occasion of the same sort ; and secondly,
when mildly admonished by me not to repeat the
same, they both made use of the most scandalous
and insolent words concerning myself, for which
I thought proper to pass a public censure upon
them after sermon--though they were wilfully
absent--in the face of the congregation, and enter
the mention of the same in this book, that the
names of those insolent young men may go down
to posterity as void of all reverence to God and
his ministers.'
And under February I2, I6O, it is entered
in the Greystoke registers:
'This daye two Sermons by Mr. p'son one
affore none and the other after none and Edward
Dawson taylyor did openlye conffess before the
Congregation that he had abused the mynister S r
Matthew Gibson upon the Saboth daye at Eaven-
inge prayer.'
Cases of this kind were far from uncommon,
and the Rector of Scotter, Lincolnshire, has
chronicled this note in his register :
' i667-8. Jan. 19. mere. That on Septuagesima
Sunday one Francis Drury, an excommunicate

5 6 Social Lb as Tdd by Parish Registers.

person, came into the Church in time of divine
service in ye morning, and being admonisht by me
to be gon, hee obstinately refused, whereupon ye
whole congregation departed ; and after the same
manner m the afternoon the same day he came
againe, and refusing to againe go out, the whole
cong.regation again went home, so yt little or hoe
service performed that day. I prevented his
further coming in y' manner, as he threatened, by
order from the justice upon the Statute of Queen
Elizabeth concerning the molestation and disturb-
ance of public preachers--O tempora! O mores !'
Another parson seems to have been much
disquieted in his mind on account of the laxity
of the parish clerk in keeping the register, and
was afraid blame might one day be given to him
by his parishioners. Hence the Vicar of Carshalton
thought it his duty to make the following memo-
randum in his register, dated March o, 65I ,
which has the merit of originality :
' Good Reader tread gently :
'For though these vacant yeares may seeme to
make me guilty of thy censure, neither will I
simply excuse myselfe from all blemishe; yet if
thou doe but cast thine eye upon the former pages
and see with what care I have kept the Annalls of
mine owne tyme, and rectifyed sundry errors of
former times, thou wilt begin to think ther is
some reason why he that began to build so well
should not be able to make an ende.
'The truth is that besyde the miserys and
distractions of those ptermitted years which it
may be God in his owne wysedome would not

Parso, and People.

57

suffer to be kept uppon record, the special ground
of that ptermission ought to be imputed to Richard
Finch, the p'ishe Clerke, whose office it was by
long pscrition to gather the ephemeris, or dyary
by the dayly passages, and to exhibit them once a
yeare to be transcribed into this registry; and
though I often called upon him agayne and agayne
to remember his chadge, and he always told me
that he had the accompts lying by him, yet at
last p'ceaving his excuses, and revolving upon
suspicion of his words to put him home to a full
tryall I found to my great griefe that all his
accompts was written in sand, and his words
c6mitted to the empty winds. God is witness to
the truth of this apologie, and that I made it
knowne at some parish meetings before his own
face, who could not deny it, neither do I write it
to blemishe him, but to cleere my own integrity
as far as I may, and to give accompt of this mis-
carryage to after ages by the subscription of my
hand.'
But, it may be added, the country parsons had
often cause to complain of the indiscretions of their
parish clerks, whose conduct at times was far from
what it should be. Thus, in a small work entitled
'The Exaction and Imposition of Parish Fees
Discovered,' by Francis Sadler (738), it is re-
corded how 'one Phillips, Clerk to Lambeth
Parish, ran away with the register book, whereby
the parish became great sufferers; and in such a
case no person that is fifty years old, and born in
the parish, can have a transcript of the Register
to prove themselves heir to an estate.' And Burn

62 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

baptized in this parish Church by an order granted
from Sir John Sedley, Knight and Baronett, Sir
John Rayney, and Sir Isaac Sedley, Knight :
'Whereas complaints have often been made
unto us by many of the principal inhabitants of
the Parish of Brenchley, that they having desired
Mr. Gilbert minister of the said parish to baptize
their Children, and according to the Directorie
offered to present them before the Congregation,
he hath neglected or refused so to do; whereby
divers infants remain unbaptized, some of them
above a year old, expressly contrary to the said
Directorie.
' \Ve do therefore order that the parents of such
children do bring them unto the Parish Church of
East Peckham, whereby we desire that Mr.
Topping, minister of the said Parish, would
baptize them according to the said Directorie,
they acquainting him with the day they intend
to bring them beforehand.'
And in the year  6o 5 a charge was made against
the Vicar of Rochdale, that inter alia he did not ' use
the Cross in baptism.' This explains why, in the
folio.wing year, in several instances, a small cross is
made in the margin of the baptismal register.
In days gone by, it would seem that the parson
was frequently called upon to make wills for his
parishioners, and in one of the Sebergham parish
registers we find a form, is given which was no
doubt the one used for this purpose. Indeed,
that the parson was expected to be the legal
as well as the spiritual adviser of his parish
may be gathered from the register above named,

66 Social LiJk as Told y Parish Registers.

occupied by lists of the renters of pews, with the
sums paid by each person. At the end of each
quarter is added a list of the presents or gratuities
which he received in addition to the 'pewage
money.' Many of these were from occasional
lodgers in the village. In 167c), Sir John Pye
made Mr. Wade a present of' Sinopsis Criticorum,'
which he valued at thirty shillings.
A parson, evidently fond of statistics, makes
two long entries on the tenacity of life evinced by
his female parishioners, and ventures a joke on
the subject. Ten women had buried fifteen
husbands,' and might perhaps have buried more,
if they had had them, but all the men in Worldham
pa.rish, at this time have had buried but three
wives.
A curious facsimile of early shorthand is given
in the register of St. Chad, Saddleworth, Yorkshire.
So far as it has been deciphered, it appears to be
an extract (rom an old ballad, entitled ' The Gallow
Tree Jowrney'; but why it should have been
inserted it is impossible to say; although no doubt
it had, at the time, some local interest. _And then
again, under 1649 , the parson, in the register ot
Rodmarton, has given an item of chit-chat :
' In the Windowe by the doore of the South Isle
adjoyning to the Chancel, was a little picture in
the glasse, of one praying in the habit of a minister
cure baculopastorali, and under written, "Richardus
Exall," which was broken by children, perhaps he
was art the charge of" that window. There is also
upon the west side of Cotes Towre, in stone,
" Orate pro animabus Ricardi Wiat & Ricardi de

Parson and People. 6 7

Rodmerton"; it may bee it was this Richard which
did joyne with the person of Cotes to build that
towre.'
Another little memorandum, preserved in the
register of Woodmansterne, Surrey, is to this
effect :
'Thy whom it may concern are desired to take
notice that the Chimny in the Hall-Chamber of
the Parsonage House hath a Summer not far under
one corner of it, soe that it may safely be used for
any ordinary occasions for a small fire in a chamber,
but it is not fit for soe great fires as the Parlour
Chimney-- 16 7 5 2
Oftentimes, again, the register contains a memo-
randum by the parson of gifts to the church after
the following, which is entered in that of Peckleton,
Leicestershire :
' In the beginning of this register--commencing
in I7t4--that posterity should know how much
it is indebted to the present age, let it be first
recorded, that Thomas Boothby, of Tooley Park,
Esq., who had some time before, at his own
charge, caused very handsome rails to be made
before the Communion table of his parish Church
of Peckleton, did at this time give to the said
Church a very fair silver flagon and cup for the
use of the Lord's table. And whereas before this
there was but three small bells, about thirteen
hundred weight, belonging to the Church: he
caused six--about forty hundred weight--to be
made and new hung up, and the steeple to be
pointed at the same time, at his own sole and
proper expence. He gave five pounds to the
5--2

68 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

rector, to defray the charge of underdrawing the
Chancel.' Such remarks, whilst chronicling acts
of munificence, are pleasing little illustrations of
the liberal interest which the parishioner has
generally taken in his parish church.
We may add that, in some cases, the parson, on
taking leave of his parishioners, has bid them
farewell in a poetical effusion, after the following
fashion:
 To MY PARISHIONERS.
' Farewell, dear flock, my last kind wish receive,
The only tribute that I now can give,
May my past labours claim a just regard ;
Great is the prize, and glorious the reward ;
Transcendent joys, surpassing human thought,
To meet in heaven, whom I on earth had taught.'
These lines occur in the register of Great Easton,
when ' Matthew Tomlinson, curate of this parish,
left, Feb. , I73o.'

CHAPTER III.

SUPERSTITIONS AND STRANGE BELIEFS.

OME of the old superstitions connected with
our social life in the past have, from time
to time, been incidentally noticed in the parish
register; and in many instances these have been
made the subject of special mention. As might
be expected, there are numerous allusions to the
great witchcraft movement, the first penal statute
.against this form of credulity having been enacted
in the year 54t, when Cranmer enjoined the
clergy 'to seek for any that use charms, sorcery,
enchantments, witchcraft, soothsaying, or any like
craft invented by the devil.'
An extraordinary occurrence is entered in the
parish register of Brandeston, near Wickham
Market, which at the present day seems scarcely
possible. The facts are stated thus :
' 6th May, 596. John Lowes, Vicar.
' After he had been Vicar here about fifty years,
he xvas executed in the time of the Long Rebellion,
at St. Edmund's Bury, with sixty more, for being

Superstitions and Strange Beliefs. 73

century, persons were supposed to die from the
effects of being bewitched.
In the re.giste.r of Holy Island, Northumberland,
this entry ,s given: '69,. William Cleugh,
bewitched to death, buried 6 July'; and in the
register of Coggeshall, Essex, under December
27th, 699 , the burial of widow Comon is
recorded, 'that was counted a witch.' But one of
the most curious cases recorded is one in the
register of Wells, dated 583, describing the
perishing on the coast of fourteen persons (sea-
men?) coming from Spain, 'whose deaths were
brought to pass by the detestable working of an
execrable witche of King's Ly,m, whose name was
Mother Gabley ; by the boyling, or rather labour-
ing of certayn eggs in a paylefull of colde water.'
In the parish books of Brentford, under
August 3, 634, this entry is given: ' Paid
Robert Warden, the Constable, which he dis-
bursed for carrying away the witches, 6s. ' The
witches of Brentford, it may be remembered, were
notorious at the beginning of the seventeenth
century, and they are alluded to by Mrs. Page in
' The Merry Wives of Windsor' (Act iv., sc. 2) ;
and one of the characters in Dekker and Webster's
'Westward Ho' says: 'I doubt that old hag,
Gillian of Brainford, has bewitched me.' As
recently as December 9, 748, it is recorded in
the register of Monk's Eleigh how 'Alice, the
wife of Thomas Green, labourer, vas swam of
malicious and evil people having raised an ill
report of her being a witch.'
Kindred forms of superstition are also occa-

74 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

sionally duly noticed. In many a country village,
the ' wise-man,' or ' wise-woman,' was an important
individual, having been frequently consulted by
all classes where superior knowledge was required.
In addition to 'casting nativities' such a person
was, at any time, ready to give heads of families
information as to the recovery of stolen property ;
and oftentimes in cases of illness, when medical
aid had failed, his or her assistance was sought as
a last resort. In the register of St. Margaret's,
Durham, we are informed how one 'Christopher
Pattison, vulga dict' ye wise-man,' was buried
March t 4, I724; and some curious particulars
are preserved in the parish of St. Benedict Fink,
London, respecting a certain strange prophetess,
whose death is thus described :
' On the morning after the fire in Sweetings
Alley, July I2, I66O, was buried a strange maid
out of Edward Barbour's house, being daughter
to a prophetess, who named herself Mima Hecres,
but would not declare neither her own right
name, nor the maid's; yet the maid being searched
was found to die of a fever, and so was permitted
to be buried.'
The fortune-teller, who plied a brisk trade in
years gone by, also obtained due mention in the
register, and at Stepney there was buried on
September 24, I628, one commonly known as
'William, a dumb man, who died in Ratcliffe
Highway, a fortune-teller.' And then, as nowa-
days, there was to be met with that kind of con-
venient woman who could turn her hand to any-
thing, her advice and knowledge having been much

Superstitions and Strage Beliefs. 75

in request in any case of emergency. At Attle-
burgh, Norfolk, there was buried on August  I,
625, ' Mary, wife of Gilberte Greene, hoastess of
the Cock, who knew how to gain more by her
trade than any other, and a woman flee and kind
for any in sickness, or voman in her travail or
childbed, and for answering for anyone's child, and
ready to give to anyone's marriage.'
The use of talismans, amulets and charms,
xvhich has generally been a feature of the cunning
contrivances of fortune-tellers and others skilled
in secret arts--through being thought to savour
of the same Satanic influence as witchcraft--
was most severely censured and punished ; and the
register of a Scotch parish has this entry under
November I o, 1716 :
' Christian Lessels being charged and interrogate
up.on threatning mallifice to her neighbour, and
using charming for the recovery of ane child yt
was sick, she acknowledges both these crimes, and
says as to y" threatning she was in a passion and
confesses her guilt y'rin, and as to y charm she
did it simply and ignorantly being advised y'rto
by a north countryman.'
Gipsies, again, as dealing in the black arts, were
specially sought after by the authorities, and as far
back as 22 Henry VIII., there is 'an Act con-
cerning Outlandish People, calling themselves
Egyptians,' 'using no craft or mercha,adize, but
deceiving people, that they by palmistry, bearing
them in hand, can tell men's and women's fortunes,
and so cheat people of their money, and commit
many heinous felonies and robberies.' This Act

8uperstitions and 8trange Beliefs.

A curious case of the burial of a reputed gipsy,
and of the subsequent exhumation of the body, is
entered in the register of Mahnesbury, under
September, x 657 :
' John Buckle, reputed to be a Gypsie, deceased
September 2x, 657, at John Perins house upon
the Fosse, in Shipton Parish, in Gloucestershire,
and was buried in King Athelstone's Chappell, by
King Athdstone & the Ladye Marshall, within
the Abbie Church at Malmsbury. This burial
was September 23 ra I 657" Howbeit hee was
taken up againe--by means of M r Thomas Frye,
esquier, who then lived in the Abbie, C4 by the
desyres and endeavours of others--out of the said
Chappell, and was removed into the Churchyarde,
and there was reburied near the east side of the
Church porch, October 7 th 657 , in the p'sence of
M r Tho s Frye, of the Abbie, Esq. M r Pleade-
well, of Mudgell, esquier, Rich a Whitmore, of
Slaughter, in the Countie of Gloucester, C4 Dr"
(ui, of Malmesbury, with very many others.'
A mode of divination still common among the
lower orders is that designated the ' sieve and the
shears,' instances of which may occasionally be
read in the police-court reports. Accord!ng to
the register of Bedworth, Warwickshire, in the
year 7x5, a woman called Elizabeth Bott was
admonished for 'using curious arts, turning the
sieve.'
And in the year x79, is denounced in the
same register ' the evil of our members going to
be touched by a seventh son in order to cure
diseases, and then wearing the silver he gives

78 8ocia/ I.ilce as bld /a Paris/, _Registers.

them.' This superstition originated in an old
belief-also found to a large extent on the
Continent--that the seventh son was born a
physician, and possessed an intuitive knowledge of
the art of healing all disorders, and even occasion-
ally the faculty of performing wonderful cures by
touching only.
In the Dublin University Magazine for August,
1879, the silver charm alluded to above is thus
described:
' A particular ceremony must be observed at
the moment of the infant's birth, in order to give
him his healing power. The person who receives
him in her arms places in his tiny hands whatever
substance she decides that he shall rub with in
after-life, and she is very careful not to let him
touch anything else until this has been accom-
plished. If silver be the charm, she has provided
a sixpenny or threepenny bit; but as the coinage
of the realm may change possibly during his
lifetime, and thus render his cure valueless,, she
has more likely placed salt or meal on the table
within reach.'
In the 'Diary of Walter Yonge' (Camden
Society), we find this entry, which is a curious
illustration of this strange belief:
' In January, 1606-7, it is reported from London
by credible letters, that a child being the seventh
son of his mother, and no woman child born
between, healeth deaf, blind, and lame; but the
parents of the child are popish, as so many say as
are healed by it. The Bishop of London, Doctor
Vaughan, caused divers to be brought to the child

8o Social L as ToM y Parish Registers.

On the title-page of the register of Alfold,
Surrey, is this memorandum :
'27, ,.7o. I gave a certificate to be touched
for the Evil in these words: Surrey SS. These
are to certify to whom it may concern that James
--son of Henry--Napper bearer hereof is a legal
inhabitant of our parish of _Alford in the County
of Surrey aforesaid, and is supposed to have the
disease commonly called the Evil, and hath
desired this our certificate accordingly.'

CHAPTER IV.

EPIDEMICS.

HE ravages of pestilence from which the
country has at intervals suffered, form the
subject of occasional mention in the parish register,
the terrible mortality caused by such epidemics
having been but rarely specially commented upon.
Indeed, it is to be regretted that we do not
learn more from the registers of the diseases from
which our forefathers died. In the register of
St. Alphage, Canterbury, we read of Richard
Harryse, who 'died of the worms,' and in the
year 784 small-pox is mentioned. And in the
Hawkshead register under November 8, 577,
this memorandum is given: ' A pestilent sickness
was brought into the parish by one George Bar-
wicke and thirty-eight of the inhabitants died.'
The sweating sickness, ' the strange and peculiar
plague of the English nation,' as Mr. Froude de-
scribes it, first showed itself in the year 485,
reappeared in  506, again in  517, and raged
with fatal fury in the year  55 - This epidemic
6

84 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

of St. Peter's, Cornhill, where, under the year 1593,
this memorandum is entered in the margin :

" Thear dyed in London in all- - 25,886
Of them of the plague in all- - 15,003
Within the walles and liberties - 8,598
Without, in & out of liberties - 17,288'

Then follow these two entries:

' Innumeros quamius consumpsit, morbida pestis
Seruait dominus meq' domumq' meam.'

' In a thousand five hundred ninety & three,
The Lord preserved my house and mee.
When of the pestilence theare died
Full maine a thousand els beeside.'

In the year 1594 there was ' the first plague in
Ashborne,' and the following curious memorandum
occurs in the register of Cranbrook, Kent:
' In this year following, 1597, began the great
plague in Cranbrook, the which continued from
April the yr afs a to July 13, 1598. I t, it was
observed that before this infection that God, about
a year or two before, took away by death many
honest and good men and women. _-. That the
judgment of God for sin was much before threat-
ened, especially for that vice of Drunkenness which
abounded that. 3- That this infection was in all
quarters of the Parish except Hartly quarter.
4- That the same begun in the house of one
Brightelling, out of which much theiving was
committed, and that it ended in the House of one
Henry Grynnock, who was a pott companion, and

Epidemics. 8 5

his wife noted much for incontinence, which both
died excommunicated. 5- That this infection
gott almost into all the hms and Suckling Houses
of the Town, places then of much misorder, so
that God did seem to punish that himself which
others did neglect and not regard. 6. Together
with this infection there was a great dirth at the
same time, which was cause also of much wailing
and sorrow. 7- This was most grievous unto me
of all, that this judgment of God did not draw
people unto repentance the more, but many by it
seemed the more hardened in their sin.' And
there is added this note: 'Now also this year
others of the plague were buried near to their
several dwellings, because they could get none
to carry them into the Church, for it was the
beginning of this infection, so that none would
venture themselves. The certain day of their
burials one could not learn.'
A memorandum in the parish register of Lough-
borough informs us that 'the assizes were kept
and held at Loughborough, the 17 'h day of July,
because the plague was in Leicester,' and adds,
' there were eight persons executed and buried the
I9 'h day of July in this year 1654]
Under the year 6o3, it ,_s recorded in the
registers of St. Peter's, Cornhill, that from
December 23, 1602, there were buried in this
parish 58 persons, and 'of them of the plague
87'; and it is added: 'Buried in all this yeare
both without and within the liberties ; and in the
8 out parishes from the I4 th July, 38,2,44: of
them of the plague 31,578.' And the epidemic

86 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

of 16o 3 is denoted in the registers of St. Dunstan's
in the West, London, by a very considerable
increase of interments, and by a total absence of
persons of rank or importance, for all who pos-
sessed means of escape had fled.
In the year 16o4, an entry in the register of
St. Giles, Durham, tells how ' Ann Ourd, wife of
Christopher Ourd, was buried on 25 th Janr,' and
significantly adds,' So all the household dyed in the
vicitacion at this time, and so ye plague ceased.'
The parish register of Nantwich gives the
following account of this terrible epidemic:
'16o4, July. This yeare together with the
former yeare and the year following this Realme
of England was vissited with a contagious plauge
generally: whereof many thousands in London,
and other townes and Cities dyed of the same.
The said plauge begane in our Towne of Nampt-
wich about the :4 th June 16o4, being brought
out of Chester and here dispersed diversly, soe yt
presently our Market was spoyled, the town
abandoned of all the wealthy inhabitants, who
fledd for refuge into dieurs places of the Country
adjoyninge. But of those which remained at
home ther Dyed from the  2ti June till the 2 'a
March followinge about the number of 430 persons
of all deseases. Now seeing God in mercy hath
withdrawn his punishinge hand, and hath quenched
the spark of contagious infection among us, God
graunt that we by Repentaunce may prevent
further punishment  that the remembrance of
this plauge past, may remain in our hearts for that
purpose for ever. Amen.'

Ephtemic. 8 7

Peterborough was in the year 16o6 visited by
the plague, for, according to a marginal memo-
randum, 'Henry Renoulds came from London
where he dwelt, sicke of the plague and died ; so
did his sonne, his daughter, and his servant ; only
his wyfe and her mayde escaped with Soars. The
plague brought by this means to Peterborough
continued there till September following.'
In the year I625 , we learn from the register of
Little Marlow, Bucks, that 'Mary, the wife of
William Borlase, July 18, I625, a gratuitous ladye
she was, dyed of the plague, as did eighteen more,'
showing that the terrible visitation of this year,
which is said to have taken off in London alone
as many as 35,47 persons, extended its ravages
into most parts of the country. The desolation it
caused in Cheshire is evident from the subjoined
entries in the register of Malpas, relating only to
one family"
' I625, Aug. 3- Thomas Dawson of Bradley,
Thomas Jefferies his servant, and Richard Dawson,
his son, were buried in the night. Ralph Dawson,
another son of Thomas, came from London about
the 25 th of July past, and being sick of the plague
died in his father's house, and infected the said
house, and was buried, as was reported, neare unto
his father's house.'
On August  5 Thomas Dawson was buried at
3 a.m. Later on in the same month we have the
harrowing scene of a plague-stricken man digging
his own grave, and knowing that the survivors of
his family would be unable to bury him.
'Aug. 24. Richard Dawson, brother to the

88 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

above-named Thomas Dawson of Bradley, being
sicke of the plague and perceyveing he must die
at yt time, arose out of his bed and made his
grave, and caused his nefew John Dawson to cast
strawe into the grave, w'ch was not far from the
house, and went and lay'd him down in the sayd
grave, and caused clothes to be layd uppon, and
so dep'ted out of this world ; this he did, because
he was a strong man, and heavier than his said
nefew and another vench vere able to bury. He
died about the xxiv th of August. Thus much
was I credibly tould he did.'
A few days later on his son was seized with
the plague, and died in a ditch.
'Aug. 2 9. John Dawson sonne of the above-
mentioned Thomas Dawson, came unto his father
when his father sent for him being sicke, and
haveyng layd him down in a dich, died in the
night.' And on September I5 this entry occurs :
' Rose Smyth, servant of the above-named Thomas
Davson, and the last of y* household, died of
p/ague, and was buryed by W TM Cooke near unto
the said hows.'
The whole household was thus exterminated.
And yet, happily, there seems to have been an
exception to this terrible mortality, for a memor-
andum in the register of Witham, under the
year i625, rnus thus: 'It is remarkable that
in this yeare, being a time of plague and mortality
over the whole kingdom, there was no buriall.
Laus Deo.'
In the register of St. Dunstan's in the West,
London, all who died, or were supposed to die, of

Epidemics. 8 9

the epidemic of I625, are marked with a P, the
first entry so distinguished running thus-
'June 25. P. Isabell Cadman, wid', from the
backeside of the bell.'
It appears that in this visitation as many as 754
persons perished in one parish, part of which was
then fields and gardens, and the whole population
of which in the year 83I was only 3,443-
Scarcely 'any other persons above the untitled
commonalty are to be found in the register ; but
there is a servant of Lady Bret, and a woman
from Sir Robert Rich's? In Nichols''Collectanea
Topographica et Genealogica,' v. 384, the ' whole
career of this tyrant malady' is given, with the
mortality from day to day.
An entry from Isham register, under the year
63o, says that ' this yeare was a great plague at
Cambridge, so that ther was no Stirbryshe Fair
kept, and this was a dear yeare, wheat at eight
shillings a strike, Pease six shillings and Mault at
six shillings & eightpence--Pease at five shillings
never so deare as at this time.' And another
outbreak occurred fourteen years later on, in  644,
at Egglescliffe, Durham, the register containing
this memorandum : ' In this year there died of the
plauge in this towne, one a!ad twenty people;
they are not all buried in the Churchyard, and are
not m the Register.' The circumstances, writes
Burn,* 'of persons being buried in the fields,
who had died of the plague, will, in many cases,
satisfactorily account for the discovery of human
bones in the vicinity of towns and villages. A
-  History of Parish Registers,' p. I I .

Epidemics. 9 

shire, makes this remark on the parish of Wigston :
' I find no mention of any particular disorder having
been in this town, whence it may be concluded to
be a healthful situation. In the year I77I the
disorder mostly complained of was the ague ; and
it was found difficult to cure, chiefiy owing, I
apprehend, to the water being suffered to lay in
the streets, the passages to carry it off not being
properly opened; a real fen, or an artificial one,
having the same effect on the human frame.'
In the year I'O 3 an epidemic of fever seems to
have broken out in the neighbourhood of Coiling-
bourne Ducis, connected with which may be quoted
the subjoined entries :
'William Brown buryed May I% Memdumw
the five last registered died of a feavour which was
very fatall in ys and ye upper parish--Coiling-
bourne Kingston--and nmre especially to such
who were lett bloud in ye time of y sicknesse ;
fifteen died in Collingbourne Kingston within ten
weekes; y distemper probably caused y late
mild winter.
' 1703 . Robert Marshman, of y same distemper
June ye 6 th. By experience it was found y a
c0mon medicine called Decoctum Sacrum was of
excellent use, few dying of yS feavour who made
use of y remedy.'
Similar scraps of folk-medicine are occasionally
entered in the register. Thus, the following
recipe for the plague is given at the end of the
register for burials belonging to St. Swithun's, East
Retford. The writing is much faded, and has

9 . Social Li./} as Told by Parish Registers.

been transcribed in a later hand underneath. The
original runs as follows:
'In ye time of a plague let ye person either
infected or fearfull of ye infection take a penny-
worth of dragon water a pennorth of oyle olive,
methradate I d & treacle I a then take an onion,
 fill it full of pepper w  you scraped it, y roast
it; and after yt put it to y* liquor  strain 
drink it in y* morning, and if you take y* same at
night lay soap and bay salt to your feet  sweat
upon it,  with God's blessing you shall recover.'
In the parish register of Swettenham, Cheshire,
is the following remedy for the bite of a mad dog :
' I7o4--To cure the bite of a mad dog or cat.
'Fake six ounces of rue, small sliced, four ounces of
garlic stampt  pild, four ounces of mithridate or
Venice treacle, four ounces of syruppe, or tilde or
scrapt pure English tin or peawter; boyle these
in 5 pints of old all over a gentle fire for an hour,
then strain it, and keep the liquor in a glass or
close vessel.
' And thus you are to use this medicine:
'To a man that is bit you are to give 8 or 9
spoonfulls warm in a morning fasting, and every
day apply some of the ingredients which remain
after the liquor is strained off" to the wound ; but
give it cold to beasts. To a sheep 3 spoonfulls,
to a dog 4, to a horse or cow between 16 . I 8,
and they must be given 7 or 8 days together after
the bite.
' If you add a handfull of ash-coloured liver-
wort to this receipt, it hath been found an excellent
thing, it grows on all dry grounds.'

E[ddemic s. 9 3

With this curious recipe we may compare an
equally odd one for curing the bite of a mad dog
hung up in Sunninghill Church :
'Six ounces of rue picked from the stalk, and
bruised; four ounces of garlic, bruised; four
ounces of Venice treacle, & four ounces of
scrapings of pewter. These are to be boiled in
two quarts of strong ale over a slow fire, until
reduced to one quart; the liquor then to be
strained off, and kept close corked in a bottle.
Nine spoonfuls, warm, to a man or woman fasting,
for seven mornings successively & six spoonfuls to
a dog. Apply some of the ingredients, warm, to
the bitten part.'
This recipe, it is said, was taken from Gathorp
Church, Lincolnshire, where many persons had
been bitten by a mad dog. Those who used the
medicine recovered; those who did not died mad.

CHAPTER V.

PARISH SCANDALS AND PUNISHMENTS.

HE severity with which notorious delinquents
were punished in olden times forms the
subject of many an entry in the parish register.
Prompt and stern measures were taken by local
authorities to restrain those who endangered the
place or created a public scandal, the mode of
punishment adopted occasionally serving as a
wholesome deterrent to others.
Many villages, for instance, had a cucking or
ducking stool, in which off'enders against the
common weal were placed, and at Kingston-on-
Thames we are told how, on Tuesday, August i9,
 570.., the wife of a man named Downing, 'grave-
maker of this parish, was set on a new cukking
stolle made of great hight, and so brought about
the Market place to Temes brydge, and there had
three duckings overhead and eres, because she was
a common scolde and fyghter.' And from the
churchwardens' accounts for the same year we
may presume that the following bill of expenses
were for this cucking-stool :

Paris/ Scandals and Punislnents. 97

beggar xvoman of Slapton' was 'whipt at Ment-
more,' Oxon; and at Brentford, on February 26,
1698, ' Alice and Elizabeth Pickering, wandering
Children, were whipped according to Law and
sent with a Pass to Shrewsbury, the place where
they were born.' The reference here is to the
vagrant laws--in force until the year 1744--which
enacted that any persons found begging 'were, by
the appointment of the head-borough, or tithing-
man, assisted by the advice of the minister of the
parish, to be openly whipped till they were bloody,
and then sent from parish to parish, until they
came to the parish in which they were born.'
To quote further instances, in the register of
Godalming, under April 26, 1658 , this memo-
randum is given :
' Here was taken a vagrant, one Mary Parker,
widow with a child, and she was whipped according
to law, about the age of thirty years, proper of
personage; and she was to go to the place of her
birth that is in Gravesend, in Kent, and she is
limited to iiij days, and to be carried from tithing
to Tything till she comes to the end of the said
journey.'
And at the end of the register belonging to the
Church of St. Mary, at Cerne Abbas, is a copy of
the statute of 39 Elizabeth for the suppression of
rogues, vagabonds and sturdy beggars, the persons
punishable being scholars and wayfaring men,
fencers, etc., who were to be whipped and sent
out ' of the parish.' _And to show the careful
manner in which the law had been carried out,
the subjoined memorandum may be quoted :
7

98 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

' I66I--a registered book for all such rogues
and vagabonds as have been punished according to
law at Cerne Abbas, in Derbyshire. Oct. I I--
James Balden and E. Balden his wife, Thomas
Balden, Robert Balden, and E. Balden, their sons,
and Joseph Dallinger rogues, vagabonds, and
sturdy beggars, weare punished according to law
at Cerne Abbas, and sent with testimoniall from
Constable to Constable to Powell, in Cornwall, the
place of their ordinary abode, there to worke at
hard labour as good subjects ought to do.'
Again, at Wadhurst, Sussex, many cases of
whipping occurred in the year 1633 , the register
having these entries:
' I I th June, Anne Diplock was whipped for a
rogue.'
' IO th Dec. John Palmer and Alice, his wife, were
whipped for rogues.'
' 23 ra. Thomasina Hemming, John Ballard, Mar-
gery Oiles, Robert Spray, and John Sargent whipped.'
How universal the practice of whipping offenders
was in days of old may be gathered from John
Taylor, 'the Water Poet,' who, writing in the
year 63o, says :
' In London, and within a mile, I ween,
There are jails or prisons full eighteen,
And sixty whipping-posts, and stocks and cages.'
The register of Kensington parish contains this
entry: ' William Laughford was punished as a
Roage the 1 t December 1604. William Brewer
and Kathren his wyf were pu'shed eodem.'
The register of Little Brickhill, which contains
the names of flAy-two criminals who were executed

Parka Scandals and Punishments. 99

in this parish between the years 56 and I62o,
also has the following important entry: 'Cecely
Reves was buried the same day, burned.' A
similar entry is given in the registry of All Saints',
Derby, under August t, t556: ' A poor blinde
woman called Joan Waste of this parish, a martyr,
burned in Windmill Pit.' And at Richmond,
Yorkshire, it is recorded how Richard Snell was
burnt, and buried on September 9; and the
following note by Archdeacon Blackburne is ap-
pended to this entry: 'Concerning this matter,
Mr. John Fox, the Martyrologist, writes thus:
" There were two of the Snells taken up for their
religion. One, after his toes were rotted off by
lying in prison, by order of Dakins, the Bishop of
Chester's Commissary, and so went upon crutches,
at last went to mass, having a certain sum of
money given him by the people; but in three or
four days after, drowned himself in a river called
Swail, by Richmond. The other Snell was
burned."'
Under May 6, 64o, a curious and interesting
entry relative to military discipline is to be found
in the registers of St. Andrew's, Newcastle, which
records how two 'sogers for denying the kynges
pay was by a kownsell of war appoynted to be
shot at a pare of galos set up before Tho Malabars
in the byg [-barley] market. They kust lores wich
should dy and the lotes did fall on one Mr. Anthone
Viccars and he was set against a wall and shot at
by six light horsemen, and was bured in owr
churchyard the same day May 6.'
And in the register of St. Mary Magdalene,
7--2

Parka Scandals and Punis/tments. o 3

And, he adds, there used to be a piece of land
in Bilston, as appears from the old rate assessment
books, known as ' No Man's Piece,' where the
bodies of unfortunate persons, who had been
gibbeted, were buried, tip to the last few years
a lane between Bilston and "Volverhampton was
po.pula.rly designated Gibbet Lane, a local tradition
assgmng it as the locality where the gibbet
formerly stood.
Many remarkable cases of penance performed
in the parish church for acts of unchastity have
been preserved, it having been required that
persons guilty of any such scandal should openly
confess the same. Attired in a white sheet, and
carryi.ng a faggot, the offender was placed in some
conspicuous place in the sacred edifice, where, in
the presence of the parishioners, a public acknow-
ledgment of the wrong committed was made in
a prescribed form of words. The register of
Croydon tells us how a certain Margaret Sherioux
did not long survive her disgrace. It appears that
' she was enjoined to stand three market days in
the town and three Sabbath days in the Church ;
in a white sheet, with a paper on her back and
bosom showing her sin. She stood one
Saturday and one Sunday, and died the next.'
\Ve learn from the register of North Aston,
Oxfordshire, that aMr. Cooper sent in a form
of penance by Mr. Wakefield, of Deddington,
that Catherine King should do penance in the
parish Church of North Aston on the sixth day of
March, I74O, and accordingly she did.' But
from the same record it appears that another

Social Life as 7bld by Parish Registers.

person who had become a mother before she was
made a wife left the parish to avoid doing public
penance.
But not infrequently those convicted of creating
a public scandal in the parish tried, as far as
possible, to evade punishment, and accordingly an
entry m the Grindon registers, dated May 23,
I725, runs thus: 'By virtue of a mandate from
the Bishop's Court, James Meakin, Jun r was ex-
communicated for contempt of the said Court, he
being charged with fornication and not appearing
to answer the Charge.' But five years afterwards
he appears to have been in a better frame of
mind, for another entry, dated May I9, I73O ,
informs us that ' James Meakin, Jun r did penance
in this Church and was thereby restored to the
Communion of the Church, pursuant to a mandate,
and absolution taken out of the Bishop's Court,
dated April 23 rd i73o.'
Similarly, two young women, as appears from
the parish register of Wadhurst, acted in a like
manner : ' 677. July I6 'h Eleonora Woodgate
et Sarah Moore n Ecclesia. Parochiali inter
Divinorum solemnia palam publice et solemniter
denunciate et declarate fuerunt pro excommuni-
catis.'
'April 5 'h Eleonora .Woodgate et Sarah Moore
in Ecclesia Parochiali nter Divinorum solemnia
palam publice et solemniter pcenitentiam agebant.'
In the eighteenth century, penance for im-
morality was of frequent occurrence, and instances
are noticed in most old parish documents, a form
of public penance for offenders guilty of fornica-

Parisl Scandals and Punislments. o 5

tion being preserved in the register of Dalton-le-
Dale. At Roxby, l.incolnshire, ' Michael Kirby
and Dixon \Vid had two bastard children, one in
XT:ZS, ye other in I727, for which they did publick
Penance in our Parish Church, Feb. :z 5. 727 for
Adultery ;' and on November 25, I77, at Sutton
Vallence, Kent, the register tells how'Elizabeth
Stace did public penance for ye foul sin of adultery
committed with Tho  Hutchins, Jun T, in Sutton
Vallence Church, as did Anne Hynds fcr ye foul
sin of fornication committed with Tho  Daws.'
But for a lesser offence than adultery it would
seem that a person was required to do penance,
as may be gathered from the parish-books of the
parishes of St. Mary Woolnoth and St. Mary
Woolchurch Haw, in the city of London (I538-
I76o). One entry, for instance, is to this effect :
'Item, payd a certyficate of penaunce done by
Sheppards wyfe and the powlter for openinge there
wyndowes one the Sabbath dale (t59 o) sixteen
pence.' And in some cases the excommunication
of persons for only trivial offences is noticed in our
parish records--an evidence of the severity of
Church discipline in bygone times. An entry in
the register of .Quorndon, Leicestershire, records
'an excommunication against Anne Turlington,
the wife of Thomas Turlington, in not sending
an inventory by order of the Ecclesiastical Court
in Leicester ;' and the register of Shoreditch records
how, on June 7,  619, ' John Edwards, being
excommunicated, was buried the 7 June in the
King's high-waie in Hollywell Laine near the
Curtaine.'

Io6 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

And among further instances of excommunica-
tion may be quoted two or three cases entered in
the register of Stokesley, from which we learn that
'Nicholas Mewburn, of Stokesley, weaver, was
excommunicated the 3 d day of February, I744-5,
for refusing to pay his Easter offerings to the
minister.' On February 22, I746 , May Wemes
was excommunicated for fornication; and on
November I5, i747, Clara Johnson was excorn-
municated for contumacy of the Consistory Court
of St. Peter's, York, in a cause of slander or
defamation with John Heath, of Whitby, gentle-
man. And on a flyleaf at the end of one of the
Aldbrough registers, Yorkshire, there is a memo-
randum to the effect that, in the year 634 , by
order of Dr. Easdall, Michael Gilbert, the Vicar,
excommunicnted about fifty persons. And again
in the year I663 he excommunicated about thirty
more by the order of Dr. Burwell. In both
instances the names are given in full. And then
comes the following :
' MR. GLBErT. If any recusant being excom-
municated shall be buryed in any place but in
Church or Churchyard, his executors shall forfitt
thirtie Pounds by Statute, therefore I conceive you
ought to burie him, but let it be accordinge
to the forme of the Churche of England, these
directions were sent under Dr. Burwell's own hand,
Aug. I8, i643 , when Sir Thomas Tanckred was
to be buried. THOMAS BVrWELL.'

CHAPTER VI.

BIRTH AND BAPTISM.

HE r.eprese.ntative character of the parish
register 1s one of its most remarkable
features, for on its pages are enrolled, side by side,
the names of the high and low, rich and poor,
without distinction. It has been aptly described as
the'World's Great Roll,' for, as some lines in a
Shropshire register tell us :
' No flattery here, where to be born and die
Of rich and poor is all the history ;
Enough, if virtue fill'd the space between--
Prov'd, by the ends of being, to have been.'
And Lord Eldon once remarked that, ' while the
rich had their title-deeds, their parchments, and
their sculptured monuments, there was literally no
record of the poor man>s birth or death except the
parish register, which might not inaptly be called
the Charter of the Poor Man. '
But apart from the mere registration of names,
much curious information is incidentally given,
" Hansard, cxxxii. 576.

Birth and Baptism.  0 9

the clock at night ; the father she knew not, but
the said Alexander by them that brought the child
to be baptized, requested that it might be recorded
in his name.'
The term ' Children of God' or 'Creatura
Christi' was also applied to illegitimate children,
but the phrase would seem also to have been
applied in the sixteenth century to infants baptized
by the midwife, as in the parish register of Staple-
hurst, Kent: 'x547. Ther was baptized by the
mid-wyffe, and so buried, the childe of Thomas
Goldham, called creature.' And in' Piers Plow-
man' we find the word used :
' I conjured him at the laste
If he were Cristes Creature
Anoon me to tellen.
"I am Cristes Creature," quod he ;
" In Cristes Court by knowe wel,
And of his kyn a party."'
Occasionally such children lived to be married,
as another entry in Staplehurst register shows:
' 579- July 9. Marryed John Haffynden,
and Creature Cheseman, young folke.'
Connected with the births of illegitimate children,
may be noticed the oftentimes pathetic and sad
entries relating to foundlings, the naming of
whom, at times, sorely taxed our forefathers. But
one way out of the difficulty was to give the child
the name of the parish in which it was found; and
by the Temple register it appears that from the
year 728 to 755 as many as o4 foundlings
were christened there, all of whom were named
Temple or Templer. And from the register of

Birth and Bptism. I I I

 To name an infant, met our village sires,
Assembled all, as such events requires.
Frequent and full the rural sages sate,
And speakers many urged the long debate.
Some harden'd knave, who rov'd the country round,
Had left a babe within the parish bound.
First, of the fact they questioned, "Was it true ?"
The child xvas brought--xvhat then remained to do ?
"Was't dead or living ?" This xvas fairly proved,
'Twas pinched--it roar'd--and every doubt remov'd.
Then by what name th' umvelcome guest to call
Was long a question, and it pos'd them all.
For he who lent a name to babe unknown,
Censorious men might take it for his own.
They look'd about, they ask'd the name of all,
And not one Richard ansxver'd to the call.
Next they inquir'd the day, vhen, passing by,
Th' unlucky peasant heard the stranger cry ;
This knovn, how food and raiment they might give
Was next debated, for the rogue vould live ;
At last, xvith all their words and xvorks content,
Back to their homes the prudent vestry vent,
And Richard Monday to the workhouse sent.
Long lost to us, our man at last we trace,
Sir Richard Monday died at Monday Place.'
Although many of these poor children did not
long survive their baptism, yet it is fair to presume
that some became founders of families, for, as it
has been pointed out by Mr. Nicholls, the surname
of Dunstan is found in numerous entries in St.
Dunstan's register--among others, Thomas Dun-
stan, Pater of the Rolls, buried I6C3--and still
remains in the parish.
To quote further cases in the register of St.
Peter's, Cornhill, there are entries of a vast number
of foundlings, who, according to a common custom,
were all surnamed Peter, after the saint to whom

Social L[fe as Told by Parish Registers.

the parish church was dedicated; one of them
bears the name of Symon Peter. 
And the following entry is from the transcripts
of St. Mary's, Dover :
' July 24, I7 8. Susanna daughter of Francis
and Margaret Hamilton: this poor woman's maiden
name is Margaret Brown: her child-birth pains fell
upon her at the half-way-house betwixt this and
Canterburie, and she brought her child here to my
house and I christen'd it. She herself [and] her
ancient fither and mother are going to Francis
Hamilton in New England, where they say he is
settl'd in a plantation left him by his deceased
brother who lived there.'
And in the registers of St. Antholin, London,
under January 8, 1618, this quaint entry occurs:
'Margery dau to William Semer, his wife or
quene a vagrant came out from turnebull Street,
& thether went againe, till hit belly bee full, shee
was delivered at Mrs. Smith's doore one Christmas
day, her child was chr 8.'
It is remarkable that, during the four years
from 758 to I76 inclusive, there are about fifty
entries of burials of foundlings in the Twickenham
register, from which it has been inferred that either
a foundling hospital must have existed in the
neighbourhood at that time, or that the exposure
of infants upon the unenclosed lands hereabouts
must have been frightfully common. But the
former conjecture, perhaps, is the more probable,
especially as several interments occur in previous
-* 'Registers of St. Peter's, Cornhill' (Harleian Society),
877. Preface, xiii.

Birth nd Baptism. x  3

years, being described as ' from ye Foundling Hos-
pital.'* And a correspondent of Notes and
(eries baptized a child Benjamin Simon Jude.
On expressing some surprise at the strange con-
junction, he was informed that the child was born
on the festival of St. Simon and St. Jude, and that
it was always considered very unlucky to take the
day from the child.
Among further entries of a similar kind in the
registers of St. Andrew's Church, Newcastle, under
February 3, 634 , this curious one occurs:
' Margaret, sup' d [supposed daughter] to Richard
Richardson. Suerties. Charles Robson, Margaret
Thompson and Margaret Maddison. It was
borne under a wayne before Richard Aplbyes dore
in a morning in a sore frost and shaw it came of a
sudan to us or ells it had p'ished, and wee knew
not whence it so wee had nothing.' And a
menaorandum in Kensington register records how
' a woman child, of the age of one year and a half
or thereabouts, being found in her swadlinge
clothes, layed at the Ladye Cooper's gate, baptized
by the name of Mary .Troovie, x o th October.'
Comical mistakes m the naming of children
often seem to have occurredin most cases made
by the parents, and afterwards laid by some of
them to the parson's charge. In the register of
St. Nicholas' Church, Great Yarmouth, we learn
that on December 2 x, x 8 x 8, a child was baptized
as Susannah Drury B----, the following note
being subsequently added: 'By mistake of the
father baptized as a girl--rebaptized Jany 5,  8  9,
* Cobbett's ' Memorials of Twickenham,' p. 6 9.
8

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

when the names given were Richard Drury B '
But it is not surprising that mistakes of this kind
occasionally happened, for it appears a custom
prevailed in Great Yarmouth at the end of the
last and commencement of the present century to
send the nurse with the infant to the parsonage,
a day or two after its birth, sometimes on the
very day it saw the light, to have it baptized.
One shilling was paid, ostensibly for the trouble
of making the entry in the register-book. This
shilling was not unfrequently a source of tempta-
tion to the bearer, preventing her from reaching
the parsonage, and the infant from receiving bap-
tism. Baptism was then, we are told, very seldom
administered in the church, the parson requiring
a fee of two shilling.s and sixpence for each child
for public baptism m church on a week-day. ":
And in ' Exactions of Parish Fees Discovered,' by
Francis Sadler (x738, p. 54), it is recorded how
in Battersea their late clerk had been detected
registering boys for girls and girls for boys, and
' not one half of the register-book, in his time, was
correct and authentic, as it ought to be.'
But among baptismal blunders in other parishes
we find this strange entry in the register of burials
belonging to Bishop Wearmouth, Durham :
'Robert, daughter of William Thompson, hap.
15 Feb. 173o , the midwife mistaking the sex,
ebrietas dementat'; and an entry in the register
of Hanwell, Middlesex, tells how 'Thomas, son
of Thomas Messenger and Elizabeth his wife, was
 'St. Nicholas' Church, Great Yarmouth,' Edward J,
Lupson, pp. I3Z , I3t.

 6 Social Life as Told b.y Parish Registers.

The register, too, of I-Iorstead Keynes records a
baptism in which the ceremony was performed by
a ' Mr. Griffin, a person unknowne.'
The disturbed state also of politics in the seven-
teenth century gave rise to many irregularities in
baptisms, as entries like the following from the
register of Lowestoft show : ' During the Common-
wealth, and the Restoration of Charles II., no
entries were made in the Parish Register.' The
Rev. Jacob Rous, then Vicar, writes that on
March 24, i643 , himself, with many others, was
carried prisoner by Colonel Cromwell to Cam-
bridge ; so that for some time following there was
neither minister nor clerk in this town, but the
inhabitants were obliged to procure one another
to baptize their children, by which means, he adds,
there was no register kept. ' Only a few were by
myself baptized in those intervals when I enjoyed
nay freedom.'
And in the register of I-Iorley for the year
I649 there is a leaf inserted with this heading:
' These that are regestred in this leaf were not
regestred at the time of their birth, but were
regestred by the directione of ther parentes by
me Henry Shove sworne regester for horley.'
From the year I586 up to the commencement
of the seventeenth century there are repeated
entries in the registers of SS. Peter and Paul,
Mitcham, of ' nurse children,' and in one instance
such a child is described as from ' drewes nursery ';
and under March 25, I595, this entry is given:
' francis Tailor a Comm6 keeper of children was
buried,' after which date the baby-farming in

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

memory of it long lingered in the hearts of the
people, and down to the eighteenth century babes
dying in their innocence were styled chrisoms in
the bills of mortality and m parish registers.
Under the year I687 , this entry occurs m the
register of Westminster Abbey: ' The Princess
Ann's Child, a Chrisome bur. 22 Oct.,' a practice
reminding us of Keble's beautiful words in his
'Lyra Innocentium ' :
' Radiant may be her glance of mirth,
Who wears her chrisom vest,
Pure, as when first at her new birth
It wrapt her tender breast.'
And it may be remembered that in 'Henry V.,'
when the death of Falstaff is announced, Mrs.
Quickly replies:
'Nay, sure, he's not in hell: he's in Arthur's
bosom, if ever man went to Arthur's bosom. A'
made a finer end and went away an it had been
any christom child.'
Bishop Taylor, too, in his 'Holy Living,'
makes use of the word in the following beautiful
passage: 'This day is mine and yours, but ye
know not what shall be on the morrow ; and every
morning creeps out of a dark cloud, leaving
behind it an Ignorance and silence, deep as mid-
night, and undiscerned as are the phantasms that
make a chrisome child to smile. ' In the register
of Richmond, Surrey, as in most others, there
are several entries of chrisom children. Under
August 24, i69_6, the burial of 'a Chrisom Child
 A full account of' Chrisom Child,' by Thomas George
Norris, will be found in the Exeter Diocesan Society Publica-
tions, 1847.

Birth and Baptism. 119

of Reynald Ashen '* is recorded; and under
December 7, I636, that of 'a Crisome of Mr.
Best, of Kew.' Under March I2, I65O, this
entry is given: ' A Chrisome of Sir Harbar
Lunsons buried.' Among further instances of this
custom, we read in Limpsfield register, under
May 29, 629, that 'a Chrysome of Mr. Thomas
Greshame' was buried. And the register of
Bletchingley, under the year 596, states that
'two Chrisomars of Roger Combers, Win. and
Solomon, was buried the xxv of September.'
In the register of Maresfield, Sussex, a very
interesting entry occurs connected with the mode
of baptizing children: 'I644. Baptized Ursula
Morgan, the first child baptized after the new
fashion.'-]- The old custom of baptism was by
immersion, but aspersion, or sprinkling, was
allowed if the child happened to be weak, and the
practice of administering the Sacrament of Bap-
tism m this way 'was gradually introduced by
our divines, when they returned from the Con-
tinent in Queen Elizabeth's reign. During the
latter part of her reign and those of James I.
and Charles I. very few children were dipped
at the font. After the Restoration the old
practice was again gradually introduced, which is
probably that alluded to above.' In the parish
reg!ster of Hillingdon, Middlesex, there is this
curious entry : 'Baptized, Elizabeth, the daughter
" See 'Surrey Archaeological Collections,' vol. ii., pp.
85-88 , and 'London and Middlesex Archaeological Society,'
vol. ii., p. zII.
- ' Sussex Archaeological Collections,' vol. iv., p.

I zz Social Life as 7bld by Parish Registers.

'I539. Samuell, son of Sir ,rilliam Smithe
Clarke, Vicare of Duddly, was born on Friday
morninge, at 4 of the Clock, being the xxviij day
of February, the signe of that day was the middle
of aquaris ,q ; the signe of the monthe -R-- ; the
plenet of that day ? ; plenet of the same ower 
and the morow day whose name hath continued in
Duddly from the Conqueste.'
Occasionally the parson has embellished his
register with poetical effusions, and in the early
part of the register of Ockley, Surrey--which
dates from 1539--the Vicar, William Margesson,
has transcribed the following old lines, which it as
suggested, probably are not original, except in the
spelling :
' The new born infant in the cradle lies, and vhen it sleeps
not, fills
Our ears with cries. Being grovn big with foolish spoorts
(sic) and play,
The first ten years of life are thrown avay; yet he Injoyes
Till those ten years are over, That Innocence (sic) vhich
he must boast no more.
Poor man xhen Three Score Winters he has told now
places all his hops (sic) in
Bags of Gold.'
And in the register of St. Mary Magdalene,
Canterbury, will be found, under the years 1763 .
1764, and 1772 , mention of three children who
were' born in the fore part of the house.' The
families referred to lived most likely on the
northern side of Burgate Street. The houses, it is
said, stand on the boundary dividing the parish of
St. Mary Magdalene, on the south, from the rifle
of Christ Church--the precincts of the cathedral

Birtlz and Baptism.

--on the north. A child born ' in the fore part'
of the house would be born within the city
liberties, and would become a ' freeman'; but it
born in the back part of the house, or over the
border, it would not be ' free.' Hence the im-
portance of distinguishing in which part of the
house a child was born. 
Cases of petty tyranny have occasionally met
with deserved rebuke by being made public for
all time. A memorandum, for instance, in the
Wimbledon register, bearing the date of 723, is
as follows:
'Susannah, daughter of Moses and Mary
Cooper, Travellers, born in Martin [Merton],
and the poor woman being desirous to have
it baptized, though she had lain in but a week,
carried it in her own arms to Martin Church, to
tender it to me to Baptize it there on Sunday last,
being June ye 3Oth. But Justice Meriton being
informed by the Constable of her being in the
Porch with that intention, went out of his seat in
time of service to her, and took hold of her, and
led her to the Court of his house, being over
against the Church, and shut the gate upon her
and her husband, and let them not out till sermon
and service were over and I was gone home, and
made the man's mittimus to send him to the house
of correction if he would not cary his wife and
child out of the parish without being Baptized,
and consequently registered there, which being
forced to comply with, she brought up her child
 'Registers of St. Mary Magdalene, Canterbury,' J. M.
Cmvper. Introduction, ix.

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

to me, to nay house on this day, being Tuesday,
July 91,, complaining of her hard usage, and
passionately desiring me to Baptize it, which I
did by the name above in the presence of her
husband, nay wife, and D r Elir Pitchford. I723 .
EDWARD COLLINS.'

CHAPTER VII.

MARRIAGE.

S an evidence of the altered state of things
after the Reformation, may be quoted the
following extract from the register of Croydon:
'I55I , Oct. 25. Reverend patr Jhos lpus
Wynton duxit Marii- Hammond generosa in ista
Ecclesia Coram multitudine pchianos psente
Revendissimo pre Thoma Cantuar Archiepo cu
multis.' This is a singular entry, for, as it has
been observed, ' the marriage of a bishop who had
himself, in 1549, written a defence of the marriage
of priests,' and the presence, too, of Cranmer, now
twice married, and the words ' cum multitudine'
and ' cure multis,' are no insignificant signs of the
times. Only some twenty years previously poor
Skelton, Poet Laureate, and Rector of Diss, was
found guilty of keeping a concubine, then a far
less crime for a parson than marriage. On his
death-bed the poet declared that he had kept her
as his mistress because he could not marry her,
and they had as religiously kept the marriage as

I-6 Social Life as 7bld by Parish Registers.

though they had been joined man and wife by the
Church.
It is further added that 'nearly all the clergy
were open to the same charge. But the time was
at hand when men were to be freed from that
forced asceticism which is ever the parent of
debauchery.' The clergy, it seems, were very
careful in duly entering the ceremony, lest the
validity might at any time be questioned, as the
subjoined entry in the register of Staplehurst, Kent,
shows :
' I549. The ninth day of June, being Whit-
sunday (wherein the booke of the Common Prayer
and Administration of the Sacraments, and other
Ceremonies and rites of the Churche, after the use
of the Church of England, began to be executed),
there was baptized Marie, the daughter of Richarde,
parsone of this parish churche, born the last
Thursday, of his lawful wife Jane, who were
married the yeare before, and in the first day that
the holy Communion, in the English tongue (after
the order that now is), was then ministered ; they
both with others, most humblie and devoutlie
communicating the same. The parsone christened
his own childe.' The words ' lawful wife' have a
significant meaning, for 'in those days men's
opinions were much divided as to the lawfulness
of a priest's marrying, and the power to do so was
reluctantly given by the legislature; and those
priests who married took special care to declare
their right to do so. '-:
During Cromwell's Protectorate, the Little
 ' Sussex Archamlogical Collections,' vol. iv., pp. z46 , z47.

Parliament of the year  653 declared that marriage
was to be merely a civil contract. Accordingly, it
was enacted that the names of parties intending to
be married were to be proclaimed either ira church
after morning service on three successive Sundays,
or in the market-place on three successive market-
days, according to the wish of the parties. The pro-
clamation was usually made in the market-place
by the bellman, and as an example of the operation
of this new marriage law, it may be mentioned
that the parish registers of Boston, Lincolnshire,
show that during the years 656 , x657 and t658,
.respectively, the numbers of marriages proclaimed
m the market-place were oz, c) 4 and xc)8, and
of those announced in church, 48, 3  and 52.
Cerne register contains entries of the banns
proclaimed in the open market-place. One of
them certifies that a couple, after the banns had been
three times published in the market-place, and there
being no opposition, were, with the consent of
their parents, married at Alton Pancras on May 7,
665. This was signed by a justice of the peace.
In the register of Acton this entry occurs:
'Thursday the 5 th of Aprill, 655. Richard
Meredith Esquire eldest son of S r William Meredith
of Leedes m the County of Kent Baronet was
marryed unto M  Susanna Skippen youngest
daughter to right honourable Major General
Skippen [Traytor] by S t John Thoroughgood
[knave] in the publick congregation within the
Parish Church in Acton in the County of Middle-
sex Mr Philip Nye at the same time praying and
Teaching upon that occasion.'

I28 SOCial Lik as Told, y Paris]2 Registers.

The words' Traytor ' and ' knave '--here placed
in brackets--were inserted by Dr. Bruno Ryves,
who came in as Rector after the Commonwealth.
But there are in the register of Maidstone,
Kent, memoranda of two exceptions to marriages,
one of which is as follows:
' Abraham Hawkes, of East Farleigh, servant to
Thomas Scultup of the same Free Mason, and
Mary Emoett of Boughton Monchalsey, was
published in the market-place in Maidstone upon
May 4 th, the j Ith, and the I8 th 1654. See an
exception page y 8th. '
'Page 8. Lambard Godfrey Esq ' doth make
exception to the proceedinge of the marriage of
Abraham Hawkes and Mary Emyott, for that the
said Mary Emyott doth seem to be not of com-
petent understanding to dispose of herself in
marriage.'
' The exception made by Lbert Godfrey Esq TM
against the proceeding to marriage of Abraham
Hawkes and Mary Emeot above said being heard
before Lambert Godfrey aforesaid, George Duke
Richard Beale Esq rs and Justices of the Peace of
this County, is satisfied and discharged, and the
marriage of the said Abraham Hawkes and Mary
Emeot afores a was solenmized before the Justices
aforesaid the sixth day of July, 1654.'
But we must not omit to quote a curious and
amusing case of breach of promise noted in the
register of Malmesbury, Wiltshire, in which the
banns were forbidden, although, it seems, the
parties were married afterwards. The memo-
randum gives the facts thus :

130 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

' The weeke following M r George Joyce and
Will Shute, both Justices of the Peace, mett at the
White Lion in Malmesbury, and desyring to make
an end of the differences, sent for the parties, viz.
William Waite and Alice Webbe, and heard the
whole business debated, Mr Edmond Waite, John
Goldney, Richard and Robert Webbe being then
present, but noe end could be made. I asked the
Justices whether the exception put in by Alice
Webbe was sufficient to hinder Will Waites pro-
ceedings or noe, they answered, it was not sufficient,
for that the said Alice had not inserted any cause
in p'ticular in that deniel of hers; whereupon I
proceeded to publish the said Will. and Mary, the
last time being June 27 t657 , at wh time of
publication, Richard Webbe of Malmsbury, brother
to the said Alice, in the behalfe of his said
sister, delivered mee a note to be read at the same
place forbidding the said publication; this was
done in the p'sence of Richard Goffe, Thomas
Waters, Tho Baker, Robert Fry and many others.
A true coppie of the note here followeth :
'" M R ROBERT HaRpy.R, I Alce Webb of
Malmesbury, in the count of Wiltes, doe forbid
the publicat  of marridge between Will. Waite and
Mary Hobbes, by reason that Will Waight is my
lawful husband by pr'mise. Witness my hand the
6 June, 657.
'" The Mark X of ALcv. Wv.B."
'Hereupon Will Waite, by the advice of Simon
Gawen, summoned Alice Webb to appear at the
uarter Sessions, held at Warminster, but shee

Life as ToM by Parish Registers.

whom it may concerne that, according to the late
Act of Parliament, entuytled an Act touching
marriages, and the registering thereof etc. Publi-
cation was made in the publique meeting-place, in
the Parish Church of the Parish of Martins in the
Fields in the County of Middlesex, upon three
several Lord's Days, at the Close of the morning
exercise, namely, upon the xxv day of October
MDCLVII, as also upon the i and viii day of
November following, of a marriage agreed upon
between the Honb le Robert Rich of Andrew's
Holborne, and the Right Honorable the Lady
Frances Cromwell, of Martins in the Fields in the
County of Middlesex. All which was fully per-
formed according to the Act, without exception.'
And a further entry adds that they were
' Married xi. November, MDCLVII, in the pre-
sence of his highness the Lord Protector, the Right
Honb le the Earls of Warwick and Newport--
Robert Rich and Mountjoy Blount--the Lord
Strickland, and many others.'
This form of marriage ceremony is further
exemplified in Elvetham register, Hants, where this
record is given:
' I654 , I, A. B. do here in the presence of God,
the searcher of all hearts, take thee C. D. for my
wedded wife, and doe, also, in the presence of
God, promise unto thee to be a loving and a faith-
ful husband. Thomas Patrick of Hartley Witney,
and Lucie Watts of Elvetham, were married before
Robert Reynolds Esq TM in the presence of Ambrose
Iver and Thomas Townsend. March I6 th, I654 ,
Robert Reynolds, Justice of the Peace.'

Marriage.  3 5

ceremony being regarded invalid ; and, by a kind
of compromise, it became customary for marriages
to be solemnized before the Mayor and minister of
the parish conjointly. Some idea of what the
clergy felt at this violation of the Church's sacred
rite may be gathered from an entry made by the
parson in Elwick register, Durham : ' Maryinge
by justices, election of registers by parishioners,
and the use of ruling elders, first came into fashion
in the time of the Rebellion under that monster of
nature and bludy tyrant, Oliver Cromwell.' And
a further strange abuse is mentioned by Burn, who
says that 'the marriages in the Parish of Dale
Abbey were, till a few years previous to the
Marriage Act, solemnized by the Clerk of the
parish, at one shilling each, there being no
minister.'
Turning from the civil to the clerical side of
the marrmge ceremony, it would appear that in
olden times the discipline of the Church was
somewhat severe, marriages having been prohibited
during Advent, Lent, and Whitsuntide, as the
following lines--of which there are more than one
version--in the register of Everton, Notts, show :
'Advent marriages doth deny,
But Hilary gives the liberty ;
Septuagesima says thee nay,
Eight days from Easter says you may ;
Rogation bids thee to contain,
But Trinity sets thee free again.'
And in a register belonging to Cottenham, this
direction is given as to when matrimony should be
solemnized :

Social Life as 7bM by Parish Registers.

' Conjugiu Adventus phibet, Hilariq relaxat ;
Septuagena vetat, sed pasche octava remitter,
Rogamen vetitat, concedit Trina potestas.'
Many of the old almanacks give directions for
marrying, and in one published for the year 1642
are these restrictions:

' Times prohibiting marriage this yeer.
' From the 2 7 of November till January  3.
' From Februarie 6 untill April 18.
'From May 16 until June 5-'
And in the Twickenham register it is recorded,
under the year 165, that 'Christopher Mitchell
and Anne Colcott [were] married June 4, by per-
mission of Sir Richard Chaworth, it being within
the octaves of Pentecost.'
A most important preliminary of marriage in
bygone times was the betrothal or nuptial con-
tract, termed 'sponsalia,' which generally took
place before a priest, and was always confirmed by
gifts, several allusions to which have been given
by Shakespeare. In 'Twelfth Night' (Act IV.,
Scene 3)we have a minute description of such a
ceremonial, for when Olivia is hastily espoused to
Sebastian, she says:
' Now go with me, and with this holy man,
Into the chantry by: there, before him,
And underneath that consecrated roof,
Plight me the full assurance of your faith.'
Although it has not been usual 'to keep a
register of espousals contracted in facie ecclesi,e,
one entry of them has been discovered in the

I 3 8 Social Life as ToM by Parish Registers.

band. Therefore I do now vowe and promise, in
the sight, of God and this Companie, to take
thee agame as mine owne, and will not onelie
forgive thee, but also dwell with thee, and do
all other duties unto thee as I promised at our
marriage."
' The Woman's Speech : " Ralphe, nay beloved
husband, I am right sorie that I have in thy
absence taken another man to be nay husband;
but here, before God and this Companie, I do
renounce and forsake him, and do promise to kepe
nay sealfe onelie unto thee duringe life, and to
perform all duties which I first promised unto thee
m our marriage."
' The Prayer : " Almightie God, we beseech
Thee to pardon our offences, and give us grace
ever hereafter to live together in Thy feare, and
to perform the holie duties of manage one to
another, accordinge as we are taught in thy holie
word, for thy deare Son's sake, Jesus. Amen."
'I Aug. i6o 4. Ralphe Goodchilde of the
parish of Barkinge in Thames Street, and Eliza-
beth his wife, were agreed to live together, and
thereupon gave their hands one to another, making
either of them a solemn vowe so to do, etc.'
According to Hilton register, Dorsetshire, celi-
bacy was apparently punished in the last century,
for under the year i739 this entry is gwen:
' Ordered that all young unmarried persons above
seventeen years of age do forthwith go to service,
or be proceeded against according to law.' And
Hawstead register tells how a certain William
Caustone, on account of his marriage, ' is liable to

Marriage. 1 4 1

hearte, and holdinge up his handes toward heaven.
And to show his continuance to dwell with her till
his lyres etude, he did it by closing his eyes, and
digging out of earth with his foote, and pulling
as though he would ri,g a bell.'
And another memorandum in the register of
St. Botolph, Aldgate, tells us how' Thomas Speller,
a dumb person, by trade a Smith, of Hatfield
Broadoake, in the county of Essex, and Sarah
Earle, daughter to one John Earle, of Great
Paringdon, in the same county, yeoman, were
married by licence, granted by Dr. Edwards,
Chancellor of the Diocese of London, the seventh
day of November, Anno Dni I618, which licence
aforesaid was granted at the request of Sir Francis
Barrington, Knight, and others of the place above-
named, who by their letters certified Mr. Chan-
cellor that the parents of either of them had given
their consents to the said marriage, and the said
Thomas Speller the dumb parties willingness to
have the same performed, appeared, by taking the
Book of Common Prayer and his licence in one
hand and his bride in the other, and coming to
Mr. John Briggs, our minister and preacher, and
made the best signs he could to show that he was
willing to be married, which was then performed
accordinglie. And also the said Lord Chief
Justice of the King's Bench, as Mr. Briggs was
informed, was made acquainted with the said
marriage before it was solemnized, and allowed to
be lawful. This marriage is set down at large,
because we never had the like before.'
Again, not the least curious feature of the

Marriage.  4 

Vicar from the year x654 to x659. Thus, an
entry under November 29, x659 , records the
marriage of a Mr. Roland Ingrain, of St. Martin's,
Ludgate, and Mrs. Ann Gorst, of Tottenham,
' their intention of marriage having been first
published in the said Parish Church on 3 Lord's
days, no exception being made against the said
marriage on any of the said times of publishing.'
From the Serbergham registers, it would seem
that the consent of parents was required, even
when the bride was over twenty-one, in cases of
marriage by licence. To quote an instance of
this custom, we read that :
'John Hodgson, of the Parish of St. Mary's in
the City of Carlisle, Surgeon, aged 32 , and Esther
Simpson, of this Parish, Spinster, aged 2 t, were
married in this Church by License, with consent
of John Simpson, Esquire, Father of the said
Esther, this twelfth Day of December, in the year
I7767
Under x 787 this curious entry occurs :
' Thomas Furnace, of this Parish, aged --, and
Margaret Wood, of this Parish, likewise aged --,
were married in this Church by license (with con-
sent of Mary McKie, her mother, formerly married
to Daniel Wood deceased) in this Church by 
License could not be procured for this couple, as
the girl was a minor, and the Lord High Chan-
cellor her guardian.'
The above was inserted too prematurely; for
although the ' Lord High Chancellor' may well
have objected, the marriage took place .:
'I787 . Thomas Furnace, of this Parish,

Marrfage.  4 5

plentifully poured upon them. The new-married
couple, to consummate their marriage, were at
length put to bed, to the side of which that well-
polished and civilised company were admitted; the
stocking was thrown, the posset drank, and the
whole concluded with all the decorum, decency
and order imaginable.'
It seems that the bride did not live many days
after her marriage, for the subjoined parag-aph is
dated for the same month--January, 1753 :
' We are informed that last Sunday died at
Sheldon, near Bakewell, the old gentlewoman who
was married the 6th instant to a young lad, aged
about fourteen. Her corpse was brought to Bake-
well Church on Tuesday last, where she was hand-
somely interred, and a funeral sermon preached on
the occasion to a numerous and crowded audience
by the rev. gentleman who had so lately performed
the nuptial ceremony.'
But sometimes it would seem that the aspirants
to matrimony not only disregarded the law, but
caused the parson to do the same, as the following
entry from one of the Glaisdale registers shows:
' David Morley and Mary Fenwick m a October
8, I753 . June 7, 754: then received of the
Rev. M r Robinson, Curate of Glaisdale, the sum
of ten shillings as an acknowledgment for his
having infringed upon the Parish Church of
Danby, marrying the said David Morley, though
by a surrogate's license, in the said Chapel of
Glaisdale, without leave or a Certificate first
obtained from the Curate of the Parish of Danby
aforesaid. I say, received by me--James Deason,
IO

CHAPTER VIII.

DEATH AND THE GRAVE.

PART from its importance as recording the
deaths ' of all sorts and conditions' of men,
the parish register illustrates in a unique manner
the historical lore associated with man's exit from
the world. Little incidents, too, and fragments of
gossip relating to the burial usages of the past are
here briefly chronicled, oftentimes throwing light
on the domestic life of the past.
Thus, amongst some of the many curious scenes
witnessed at funerals, ,are are told in the register
of Christchurch, Hants, how a certain Christina
Steevens was 'buried by women' on April 4,
6o4,' for she was a papishe'; and at Bishop
Middleham, Durham, 'a Scotsman and soldier,
dying at Cornforth, the soldiers themselves buried
him without any minister, or any prayers over
him, on the 4 th November, I644.' Entries of this
kind are by no means infrequent, and those
relating to the interment of excommunicated
persons are equally strange. In an appendix, for
10--2

Death and the Grae. t 5 

the jury " Non compos mentis."' Shakespeare
speaks of this law in the case of poor Ophelia-

' Laertes. What ceremony else ?
Priest. Her obsequies have been as far enlarged
As we have warranty: her death was doubtful ;
And, that but great command o'ersways the order,
She should in ground unsanctified have lodged
Till the last trumpet ; for charitable prayers,
Shards, flints, and pebbles, should be thrown on her,
Yet here she is allowed her virgin crants,
Her maiden strewnments, and the bringing home
Of bell and burial.
Laertes. Must there no more be done ?
Priest. No more be done !
We should profane the service of the dead,
To sing a requiem, and such rest to her,
As to peace parted souls.'

In the register of Blatchington it is recorded
that in the year 653 'Sarah Reynolds, servant,
came to an untimely end, as it was thought, May
the I t at night, for from that time she was not
seen living, and she was then found in a pond at
the lower end of the parish; she was laid in the
ground the 5 th June.' And a similar case happened
at Newhaven, when a mother, whose child had
died and was buried, drowned herself two days
afterwards in the harbour, and was refused Christian
burial.
But the register of Wadhurst informs us that
occasionally the rites of burial were forfeited on
account of the person dying of some infectious
disease, as happened on November I, I674, when
a woman named Damaris, the wife of Robert
Gower, was buried, ' Sine exequiis non ob malum

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

morale sed ob infectionem morbillorum '--a good
Christian. 
In the reign of Elizabeth it was customary to
bury merely in a winding.sheet, without any coffin.
The register of Poynings, Sussex, tells us how on
'the eighteenth day of April, 6o8, was buried
John Skerry, a poore man, that died in the
place stable, and being brought half naked with
his face bare, the parson would not bury him so,
but first he gave a sheete, and caused him to be
sacked therein, and they buried him more Christian-
like, being much grieved to see him brought so
unto the grave ; and at this time did one Thatcher
dwell at the place.' The parson's indignation was
probably roused not because the body was brought
in a winding-sheet, but on account of the insuffi-
ciency of it.
In the re.giste.r of Great and Little Abingdon
this entry s gwen, a curious combination of
business and sentiment :
' Burial without a coffin, s; for a grave in the
church, 6 S 8'; in the chancel, 3  4 *. But the
most honourable Grave of any man whatsoever is
in the Churchyard, because that shows most honour
to God's house. The great first Christian Emperor
Constantine, and many of his successors, were
buried in the Churchyard.'
On the other hand, the register of St. Michael's,
Lichfield, in 63z states, as something worthy of
note, ' that Andrew, the sonne of William Burnes,
was buried with a coffin.'
Then there were the so-called ' solemn burials,'
" ' Sussex Archaeological Collections,' vol. iv., p. 277.

Death and the Grave. 15 3

which seem to have been attended with much
pomp and ceremony, and oftentimes the prepara-
tions were so extensive that the funeral had to be
postponed for several weeks after the interment.
In the parish of Iselham, Cambridge, under the
year S9 o, this entry occurs: 'Mr. Robert
Peyton, Esquier, died 19 Oct., and was solemnly
buried i2 Nov. next morning." Such ' solemn
burials' no doubt consisted of the funeral sermon,
with a display of the hearse, adorned with armorial
ensigns, etc. ; at the same time the wine, wafers,
gloves, and rosemary were probably distributed.
A memorandum in the register of Stock Har-
ward, Essex, under  642 , runs thus :
' That vertuous : religious : humble : and trulie
Charitable Gentlewoman, M rs Juliet Coo, the wife
of William Coo Esquire, departed this mortal life
in the Cittie of London on Wednesday May I8.
And was from thence conveyed in a coach to this
towne where she dwelt; and was there solemnly
interred (as beseemed her ranke), in the Chancell
belonging to this Parish Church on Friday
May 2% where her worth and eminent vertues
(to her eternall memory) were both elegantlie and
trulie related in a learned-funerall-sermon, by that
Reverend man of God Mr. William Pindar, rector
there.'
And, to quote another case, the register of St.
Bartholomew, Broad Street, records under I58
the burial of Mr. Francis Bowyer, Alderman, in
St. Michael's Church ; but, it adds, the ' solemnities
of his funeral were ministered in this, the 7 th of
August.'

 54 Social Life as ToM by Parish Registers.

And a memorandum in the register of Cople,
Bedfordshire, tells how Nicholas Luke, who died
on July 4, I63, 'att Rouney, was buried the 5 tb
July m the north Chauncell of Cople, whose
funerall was kepte w th great solemnitie the 4 tb
day of August ensueinge.'
When a person of distinction died, the funeral
service was frequently performed--with an effigy
of the deceased--in the various churches with
which he had been connected, and such a funeral
was entered in the parish register; and when
persons of rank died in one parish and were buried
in another, it was the usual custom to record the
burial in the registers of both parishes.
Again., the following interesting entry in Hilling-
don registers throws some light on the burial
usages of the past :
'Anno. x663. July. 6. This day the Hearse of
the late Archbishop of Canterbury, some time
Lord High Tresurer of England, going to Oxford,
where he was to be interred, had Buriall here
offered by mee, meeting it at the Church gate
with the service book, a surplice and hood,
attended with the Clark, and the great bell
solemnly tolling all the while, according to the
ancient and laudable custom in like cases.'
As it has been observed,  'we might suppose
that the vicar intended to pay special reverence to
the body of the Archbishop--better known as
Bishop--Juxon, the loyal and devout prelate who
performed the last religious offices for Charles I.
on the scaffold. But the words used, " according
" The .4ntifuary, vol. xviii., pp. 64, 65.

Social Life as 7bld by Parish Registers.

thus referred to: ' And one man child brought up
in the town which no man could show who ought
him buried.'
The law of Edward VI. for enforcing the removal
of the aged poor to the place of their birth, or last
residence--an act which was sometimes attended
with fatal results--is noticed in the register of
Staplehurst :
'I578 , There was comytted to the earth the
body of one Johan Longley, who died in the
highway as she was carried on horseback to have
been conveyed from officer to officer, till she should
have corn to the parish Rayershe.'
Then there was the mortuary fee, an arbitrary
exaction forbidden by 2I Henry VIII., and which
was actually at times levied on those who at death
had no property in goods or chattels. But although
the levying of these mortuaries or corse presents
' from travelling or wayfaring men in the places
where they fortuned to die' was expressly for-
bidden by statute, the law seems oftentimes to
have been disregarded. Thus, the Rector of Ripe,
Sussex, tells us how on February 22, i634 , he
buried one Alice Whitesides, 'who, being but one
xveeke in the parishe of Ripe, died as a stranger,
for whose mortuary, I, John Goffe, had a gown of
Elizabeth her daughter, price t os. '
On another occasion the same parson has made
this entry :
' qlliam Wade, who died as a stranger, for
whose mortuary, I, John Goffe, Parson of Rype,
had his upper garment, which was an old coate,
and I receaved for the same 6s. '

Social Lik as ToM by Parish Registers.

the Church of England, these directions were sent
under Doctor Burwell's own hand, Aug. zS, z663,
when S r Thomas Tanckird was to bee buried.'
During the reign of Charles II. a singular Act
was passed, which has left a conspicuous mark on
parish records. The object of this Act was to
'lessen the importation of linen from beyond the
seas, and to encourage the woollen manufacture of
this kingdom'; and on this account it provided
that the dead should be buried in woollen only.
Compliance with its requirements was often noted
in the registers;and a prejudice still existing
among the lower classes in favour of shrouds made
of flannel is no doubt an outgrowth from the now
obsolete compulsory usage of two hundred years
ago.* But the higher classes disliked the ,act,
and tried as much as possible to evade the law, a
fact which is notified m many of the parish
registers. Pope, it may be remembered, wrote of
Mrs. Oldfield, who was buried in Westminster
Abbey in a Brussels lace headdress, a holland shift
with tucker, and double ruffles of the same lace,
and a pair of new kid gloves, these lines :
' " Odious ! in voollen ! 'twould a saint provoke !"
(Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke) ;
" No, let a charrning chintz and Brussels lace
Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face."'
In the register of St. Mary le Bow, Durham, it
is entered that ' Christopher Bell, Gent., was lapped
in linen, contrary to the late Act, Dec., t678 ';
and numerous entries to the same effect occur
 See Cornhill Magazine, ' The Story of the Registers,'
,879, vol. xl., p. 3zo.

Death and the Grave. 15 9

elsewhere. At Harmondsworth, in 726, it is
noted that six guineas and fifty shillings were given
to the poor for a burial in linen ; and at Hayes that
an informer--who would have half the fine--gave
sworn information of one who had been buried in
a coffin with velvet; of another, that she left in
her will that she should be buried in linen, and
had her desire. And in the register of Aldborough,
Yorkshire, under i716, is this entry : ' The In-
formation of Margaret Robinson, made on Oath
before M r Thomas Wilkinson, her grandchild,
that she the said M TM Eliz: Wilkinson was
buryed in Linning on the fifth day of Feb: x7x7,
contrary to the Act of Parliament for bureying in
woolen.'
On the other hand, there are frequently found
in parish registers' lists of the affidavits brought,
in pursuance of the Act, to the clergyman on the
burial of individuals of their being shrouded in
linen; and these often afford information not to
be met with in the registers themselves.'* A
specimen of one of these affidavits we quote below :
'Dec. 2o, 768, recd this affidavit. Com.
Lanc. Manchester, Dec. 2o,  7 I8, which day Ann
wife of Sam  Hampson of Stretford, in the parish
of Manchester, Thatcher made oath yt the body
of Sarah wife of Tho. Tipping, of the township
and parish aforesaid, Husbandman, lately deceased
(December I4), was interr'd according to the Act
of Parliament for burying in wollen.'J-
And the following form of oath taken on such
 Burn, ' History of Parish Registers,' p. z 9.
f Reliquary, vol. lxxiii., p. 93.

Social Lfe as Told by Parish Registers.

an occasion is duly registered in the church books
of Frant :
'John Beale, of the parish of Frant, labourer,
maketh oath that the corps of a child of his, lately
deceased, was not putt in, wrapt, or wound up, or
buried, in any shirt, shift, sheet, or shroud, made
or mingled with flax, hemp, silk, or hair, gold, or
silver, or other than what is made of sheep's wool,
nor in any coffin lined or cased with any cloth,
stuff, or any other thing whatsoever made or
mingled with flax, hemp, silk, hair, gold or silver,
or any other material but sheep's wool only.
x678.'
The custom of taking out the heart of the
deceased and burying it apart from the body has
prevailed even up to recent times. Oftentimes,
too, when it was desired to remove the body to a
great distance for burial, it was considered neces-
sary to deprive it of its internals, which were
generally buried where the person happened to die.
In the register of Norton, Durham, this memo-
randum is given under March 22, 756: 'Bur:
the heart and bowells of the right honorable James
Earl of Wemyss. The remains were buried with
his ancestors at Wemys Castle, in Scotland, the
8 th day of April.' An entry in the register of
St. Mary's, Reading, under t63 , records the death
of Sir Edward Clarke, Knight, Steward of Reading,
and adds, 'his bowells interred in St. Marie's,
his body carried to Dorchester, in Oxfordshire,
Jan.  t.' It is said that Henry Spencer, Earl of"
Sunderland, who received his death wound at the
fatal Battle of Newbury, ' was buried in the Church

Death and the Grave.  6 t

at Brington, which is the parish of Althorp, the
family seat. This, however, does not appear to be
at all certain, as there is no entry in the register
.recording the fact; but a leaden drum deposited
m a vault in the church is supposed to contain his
heart. This case has no inscription, or even date,
upon it. 'e The register of Denham informs us
that the heart of Sir Robert Peckham, Knight,
was ' buried in the vault under the chappell.'
In pursuance of the same fashion, it is recorded
in the Richmond register, Surrey, under November
I2, I599, that ' M r8 Elizabeth Ratcliff one of the
maids of honor died, and her bowells buried in
the Chancell at Richmond.' In the register, again,
of St. Bridget, Farringdon Without, under
April 20, 16o8, it is recorded that ' the bowells of
the right hon. lord treasurer, Thomas Sackville,
Earl of Dorset were interred.' Another entry in
the register of St. Dunstan's-in-the-West states
that on December 8, 65I, 'the bowells of the
Right Hon. Elizabeth Countess of Kent was buried
at the upper end of the Chancel, who died ye 7 h
of this month.' And under July 24 , 16oo, this
entry occurs : ' Sir Anthony Paulet, Knight, died
at Kew, whose bowells were interred at Rich-
mounte.' Sir Anthony Poulet was made Governor
of the Isle of Jersey on the death of his father,
September 26, 1588, and was Captain of the Guard
to (ueen Elizabeth, who conferred the honour of
knighthood upon him.
* 'Enshrined Hearts of Warriors and Illustrious People,'
Emily Sophia Hartshorne, p. z9z.
r See Surrey Archa:ological Society's Proceedings,' 1864,
vol. ii., p. 84.
II

 62 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

In many registers great care was taken to give
the exact position of the person buried, a practice
which gave rise to such entries being made in a
somewhat quaint fashion. Thus, under March 25,
172o , the Greensted register informs us that 'John
Pool of Sayers was buryed in woollen June 13 th
172o under the seats near the Isle on the north
side of the Church his feet lye to the head of
M r Glascock his father whoge feet reach within a
foot of the Desk.' And under 1721 it is stated
that 'Nicholas son of John Clarke Esq TM aged
about 2I months was buryed in woollen as p.
affidavit, Dec rye 21st i721 his corpse was set upon
the feet of his mother's in the new vault, who dyed
in childbed of this son as above the time buryed.'
Likewise, oftentimes full particulars are given as
to the kind of grave in which the person was
interred. In the same parish, for instance, ' M r
Thomas Wragg Clerk was buryed in woollen
Sepr the lO h I723 at the East End of the
Churcyard w  in 5 foot of the Pales over ag st the
Chancell window. The grave work't up with
Brick 3 foot high then covered with Plank and
Earth upon it.' Notices of this kind are very
common, and are interesting as illustrating n-
dividual eccentricities.
In. the registers of St. Mary-on-the-Hill, Chester,
'it is noteworthy that in the burials the exact
situation in the church or churchyard in which the
interments were made is carefully set out ';e and in
a measure this also applies to some of the burial
* ' Notes on the Ancient Parish Books of the Church of
St. Mary-on the-Hill,' J. P. Earwaker, I887.

 6 4 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

have been made in the handwriting of the Rev.
Purchas Deuchfield, who was presented to the
living in I742 , and died in i774. It is said, too,
that his widow was buried in a similar manner.
Burials in gardens, however, have occurred from
time to time, and the register of Toddington,
Berkshire, has this entry: 'I658. Nov. I4.
Thomas Matthew, died the  2th day of November
and was buried the 4 th day of November
I658 in his garden late taken out of his orchard.'
It may be noted that the first grave of the cele--
brated John Wilkinson, known in his day as ' the
great ironmaster and the Father of the Iron trade,'
was in his own garden at Castlehead, and his last
in the quiet little churchyard at Lendal-in-Cartmel.
In giving an account of Dr. xVilliam Bentley, a
celebrated physician, who died September 3,
I68O, and was buried at Northwich, Ormerod's
' History of Cheshire' mentions that ' the body of
Dr. Bentley is interred in a vault at the summit of
the garden, where his tomb was discovered in taking
down a summer-house built over it.'
In St. Peter's. Cornhill, under October 0_3, 1594,
this memorandum is given:
' William Ashboold, soune of M r William Ash-
boold, Parson of this Church, a toward young
child, and nay scholler, he lieth buried in the
Chauncell under a small blewish stone, hard by
the South dore: whose death wroong from me
these suddain verses:

' My sweet and little boy, my lif, nay joyful sight ;
Thou wast thy father's earthly joy, and mother's chief
delight !

Death and the Grave. 16 7

appeared in evidence that the deceased, having
been for some time indisposed, had received proper
medical advice, and had at last succumbed to her
disease. Further, that a gentleman with whom
she had lived, being forced to leave for the Conti-
nent, was desirous of seeing her previously interred.
That it was at her own request the pin was inserted
by her medical adviser after the body had been
piaced in the coffin, to prevent the possibility of
her being buried alive. These facts having been
proved, the coroner's jury returned a verdict,' Died
by the visitation of God.'
In the register of Bowes, Yorkshire, it is recorded
how' Rodger Wrightson, j un., and Martha Railton,
both of Bowes,' were ' buried in one grave on t 5 th
March, i714. He died in a fever, and upon
.tolling his passing bell, she cryed out, " My heart
is broke," and in a few hours expired, purely, as
was supposed, from love, aged about twenty years
each.' The melancholy fate of these lovers is
immortalized in Mallet's ballad of' Edwin and
Emma '

' I feel, I feel, this breaking heart
Beat high against my side ;
From her white arm down sunk her head,
She shivering, sighed and died.'

In Arlingham register, under t763, there is a
singular entry of burial :
'Stephen Aldridge, who was suffocated by a
flat-fish, which he unadvisedly put betwixt his
teeth when taken out of the net ; but by a sudden
spring it made into his throat, and killed him in

Death and the Grave. x 6 9

Redivivum' (iv. 358), 'may serve as an useful
hint to some surgical or medical reader, who may
learn from it that their predecessors disposed of the
remains of a fellow-creature in a decent and proper
way.' It is as follows:' t 6 t 5- Feb. 28. was buried
an anatomy from the College of Physicians.' And
we may quote here an entry from Croydon parish
register, dated June 21, I615, which is quaint:
'Thomas Afworth, gent., wounded the xvii day
of May, lay long languishinge under the handes of
surgeons unto the xx day of June and then dyed,
and was buried the xxi day, t6t 5, in the middle
chancell in Croydon Churche.' And a further
entry from the same register tells how 'James
Mersh pulled ye eagle in ye church upon him, and
curt his hand, and blead to death, about 8 yeares
old, and [was] buried ye II. June, 729 .'
Under May 2, I6II, the register of Saffron
Walden tells how ' Martha Warde, a young mayd
coming from Chelmsford on a carte, was over-
whelmed and smothered with certayn clothes which
were in the carte, and was buried here '; and under
September 4, t623, ' buryed a poore man brought
by the Little Chesterford constables to be examined
by the justice ; the justice being a hunting, the
poore man died betire his coming home from
hunting.' It has been suggested that perhaps the
squire had a longer run than usual with the hounds
on this occasion. And under November  8, x 7 t6,
it is recorded that ' the oulde girle from the work-
house was buried.'

CHAPTER IX.

SOCIAL USAGES.

ANY of the social usages of bygone cen-
turies which have long ago fallen into
disuse, and may be reckoned amongst the for-
gotten things of the past, have been preserved in
our parish registers. An important personage,
who by his absurd antics and comic behaviour
excited merriment, not only in the houses of the
wealthy, but even at Court, was the domestic fool,
allusions to whose wit and humour are frequently
to be found in the literature of the period. In
the register of St. Anne's, Blackfriars, under
March 2I, I580 , the death is recorded of
'William, fool to nay Lady Jerningham.' And
another en.try in the register of Chester-le-Street,
Durham, is to this effect: 'Ellis Thompson,
Insipiens, Gul Lambton Militis, bu r. 26 April,
I627.' It may be noted, however, that this
eccentric individual had not always a very happy
time, for, we are told, ' if he was too dull, he was
sent away; if too witty, he was sent to the porter

7 2 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

That fools should be so deep contemplative ;
And I did laugh, sans intermission,
An hour by his dial.'*

An entry in the register of St. Giles', Cripple-
gate, under February 9, I6O4, records the burial
of one 'William Fox, son of William Fox,
mynstrell.' Numbers of minstrels lived in this
parish ; they were incorporated by King Edward IV.,
and were frequently admitted to the houses of the
great.
It was formerly customary also for the upper
servants m great households to be 'persons of
gentle blood and slender fortune,' an instance of
which occurs in the register of Allhallows, London
Wall :
' x598, July 2o. M r Randall Crew, Counsellor
at the Law in Lincoln's Inn, and M TM Julian
Clipsbie, gentlewoman attending on my Lady of
Shrewsbury, of this parish, were married.'
Mr. Chester Warters, in his ' Parish Registers,'
amongst instances of this usage quotes that of
Catharine, wife of John Willson, who addressed
a petition in the year x634 to Lord Cottington,
the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in which she
states:
' I am the daughter of George Dyer, late of
Grove Park, Warwickshire, who was brother to
your Lordship's brother. After nay father's death
I was for a while brought up by nay uncle, George
Dyer, and by him put to service to a Mistress,
who by a blow struck on nay nose dejected my

"As You Like It,' Act II., Scene 7.

Social Usages. 173

fortunes in marriage. Ever since I have been
enforced to take hard pains for nay living, as nay
poor husband does for his.'
And speaking of servants, it would seem that
a bond of apprenticeship xvas thought worthy of
insertion in the parish register. At Frantfield, as
early as the year I6o4, a case was entered of a
servant in husbandry as below :
' I6o4, 2o July. George Job, with his mother's
consent, put himself apprentice to Thomas Page,
of Frantfield, for seven years following, being
bound with seven single pence. The said Thomas
is to teach the said George the full knowledge of
husbandry, and to find him sufficient meat, drink,
and cloth, linen and woollen, hose and shoes, good
lodging, and all things needful for such an appren-
tice, both in sickness and in health, and to double
apparel at the end of his years, and also to give
the said George fourpence every quarter; and to
this end the said Thomas hath received of widow
Job two good sheep and ten shillings in money.
Also the said George is faithfully, honestly, and
truly to perform the duties of such servant, in
doing his master's business, in keeping his secrets
lawful to be kept, in not using to ale-houses, nor
unlawful games without his master's consent, and
all other duties needful for such a servant, and
not to marry without his master's consent.'
And in the register of Elstead, Surrey, is a
memorandum, dated I558, probably made by a
son of one of the churchwardens for the time :
'Be it knone that I Rycharde Grover have
fully passed out of my yerse of prentyst wyth nay

Social Usages. r 75

the said John Callcock, otherwise than to be
humble petitioners unto Almighty God for the
health of our said dear son, and the prosperity of
John Callcock his said master. And in witness
of the truth unto these premises we have put our
hands the day and year above said,' etc.
In the register of St. Mary Magdalene, Canter-
bury, is a fragment of an entry relating apparently
to an agreement to pay half a crown, ' beeginning
November the 28, and to continue to the day
I696 '; and a further memorandum runs thus:
' November the  8  692 : then John Wingate and
Thomas Smith hatter agreed by the yeare that
Thomas Smith is to find him in hatts for twenty
shillings the yeare during life.' This bargain was
most likely made at the alehouse, and the parish
clerk, being present, undertook to register the
agreement.
It is noteworthy that many occupations and
trades, some of which have long ceased to exist,
are preserved in the parish register. Thus, in
that of St. Oswald, Durham, this entry is given :
'Ann, daughter of Thomas Forcer, virginall
master, bap. Feb. I4 th, I64o.' The term ' virginal
master' is now an obsolete term. The virginal
was an instrument of the spinet kind, made quite
rectangular, like a small pianoforte, probably so
called from being used by young girls. In an old
play the instrument is thus alluded to: ' This was
her schoolmaster, and taught her to .play the
virginals. ''x" And an entry m the registers of
St. Andrew's, Newcastle, records the burial on
 ' Honest Whore,' iii., 359.

Social Usages.  77

Pannyer-man of the Middle Temple.' Then we
meet with, in the year 599, a 'dreaman,' and in
6oo with an' ale-bruer.' An entry in the year
6o8 speaks of a ' woodmonger,' and reference is
made to a ' tomb-maker.'
'The Writer of the Court Letter' was the
designation of a scrivener prior to the grant of the
royal charter in the year 66, an allusion to
which occurs in the registers of St. Mary Wool-
noth ; and amongst the many other obsolete terms
found in this register may be mentioned ' pasteler,'
gfa '
' gon truer, and ' pryntagger.'
Another personage who was by virtue of his
trade somewhat notorious in the seventeenth
century was the saltpetre-man, the burial of a man
of this description being recorded in the register of
St. Nicholas', Durham: 'John Haward, Saltpetre-
man, bur. 9 Sept., 6ou.' ' Before the discovery
and importation of Indian nitre, saltpetre was
manufactured from earth impregnated with animal
matter, and, being the chief ingredient of gun-
powder, was claimed in most countries as a State
monopoly. Patents for making saltpetre were
expressly exempted in 6u 4 from the statute
against monopolies, and the saltpetre-man was
empowered to break open all premises, and to dig
up the floors of stables, and even dwelling-houses.'
But this vexatious prerogative of the Crown was
annulled in 656, when it xvas enacted that no
saltpetre-man should dig within any houses or
lands without previously obtaining the leave of the
owner.
Then we find 'lutenists,'' f idlers,' and ' musi-
I2

I78 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

tians' spoken of ; and in one register the burial of
'a singing man' is mentioned, and in the register
of St. Mary-le-Bow, Durham, there is entered the
burial of' Mr. Thomas Edlin, a strainger, one
which taught to dance.' Occasionally the anti-
quated mode of spelling is noticeable, such as ' up-
holster,' ' pictor-maker,' and ' aquavity-man,' or
seller of drams. In days past the term 'aqua-
vita3' was in use as a general phrase for ardent
spirits, and as such occurs in ' Twelfth Night'
(Act II., Scene 5), where Maria asks,' Does it work
upon him ?' to which Sir Toby replies, ' Like aqua-
vita3 with a midwife.' According to Fosbroke,
aqua-vite was made and sold by barbers and
barber-surgeons. Ben Jonson speaks of selling
' the dole beer to aqua-vite men,' and in Beau-
mont and Fletcher's 'Beggar's Bush' the cry of
the aqua-vita3 man is, 'Buy any brand wine, buy
any brand wine.' It is such a person who is indi-
cated in the following entry from the register of
St. Giles's, Cripplegate, where on June 8, 67,
the burial is recorded of' the daughter of Richard
Michell, aquavity-man.' According to Malcolm,
several aqua-vita3 dealers lived in this parish, and
he adds that the nature of this beverage may be
imagined from the following' Reasons for the
Grauntes unto Mr. Drake, for the making of
aquavite, aqua composita, berevinger, beereeger,
and alliger.
' That whereas dyversse of greedye and covetous
myndes, for their owne lucre and gainelw'hout
the dew regarde of the health and wellfayre of our
subjects, or the p'fit and benefit w  may grow to

Social Usages. x79

us and our Comonwealth, by the trew and right
making of the same of trew and wholsome lyquor
--have, do use make the foresayde drynkes and
sauces of most corrupt, noysom, and lothsom stuff;
viz., the washing tonnes, colebacks, laggedragge,
tylts, and droppings of tappes, and such other
noysom stuff used in tymes past to feed swyne.'
Mention is made in the Nantwich registers of
a resident jockey, dancing-masters, and comedians,
which is interesting, associated as they were with
the gaieties and amusements of the town in former
days ; and in the same registers early notices occur
of the Post-Office, such entries as the following
occurring :
' t62. March 3. Thomas Cheshire, a letter
bearer.' [Buried.]
' t622. Ap. I-_. Mr. Roger Mainwaring, Post
maister.' [Buried.]
' x635. Feb. 9- Elizabeth, wife of Mathew
Alvaston, foote-post.' [Buried.]
The way in which our forefathers occasionally
settled their local differences in days of old is
certainly worthy of imitation nowadays. An
entry in the Twlckenham register, dated April 3,
568, tells us how' in the presence of the hole
paryshe of Twycknam was agreement made betwyxt
M r Packer and his wyffe, and Hewe Rytte and
Sicylye Daye upon the aforesaid Mr. Packer '; and
another entry, of April I c of the same year,
records a similar agreement made between Thomas
Whytt and James Herne, who 'have consented
that whosoever geveth occasion of the breaking of
Christian love and charyty betwixt them, to forfeit
I2-2

Social Usages.

Wharton, knights, who were both slaine at that
time.' But Islington seems to have been remark-
ably fatal to the duellists of that day, for the
following year, under April 2z, i6io, an entry
informs us that John Egerton, son of Sir John
Egerton, Knight, was buried. Mr. Egerton was
killed in a duel on April 20, and is said to have
been slain'basely by his antagonist one Edward
Morgan who was himself sorely hurt.'*
A singular duel is described in the register of
Tottenham. It appears that on Thursday, being
November 8,'there was a meeting of the neigh-
bouts to warme M r John Syms, his house, the
Signe of the Swanne at High Cross, among
whom came John Nelham and John Whiston, who
having some grudge or quarrell between them,
dinner being done, they two did use sore private
speches within themselves; taking leave of the
company, went to their houses, either of them
taking his pickstafe in their handes, mett in a field
behinde M r Edward Barkham's house, commonly
caull'd or knowne by the name of Baldwin's, theare
they two fought till John Nelham receyed a wound
by John Whiston in his throate, fell down dead,
and never spake word after; so the coroner, upon
the Saturdie next sate upon him; was burried the
same dale being the IO th of November, 161o.'
In the register of St. Mary Magdalene, Canter-
bury, under March 8, 696, this entry occurs:
' Then M r Fiche Rooke and a Ensigne his name
was Antho Buckeredg they fought a duell in the
 Nelson's 'History and Antiquities of Islington,' 823,
PP- 334, 335.

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

North Homlbes and boath dyed in the ffield :
Colonel name he be : longue to was Marques
Depusaw.'
On this entry Mr. Joseph Meadows Cowper
writes - ' " Anthony Buckeridge, an Ensigne," was
buried in St. Alphage churchyard, March 9, 1696-7,
and Finch Rooke was buried at St. Paul's. In
neither case is any reference made to the cause of
death; and the sole memorial that remains is a
small stone in the wall by the North Holmes.
This stone, much defaced, is near the eastern jamb
of a bricked-up gateway, by which egress was
obtainable from the orchard--now Major Plum-
mer's--to the footpath leading from St. Martin's
Church to St. Gregory's. The inscription on the
stone, as I read it, is as under:

July
ROOKE
Died I696
Bucker[idge].
'So far, I have failed to find any record or
otherwise of the duel. I have been referred to
"Tales of a Cabin," but the story as therein
related is absurdly wrong and utterly valueless,
unless we accept as traditionary the statement that
two men fought in the night and without seconds,
and that nothing was known until their dead
bodies were discovered in the early morning. '*
The following extract from a letter which
appeared in the Standard is of interest, as referring
"  Registers of St. Mary Magdalene, Canterbury.' Intro-
duction, pp. iv, v.

Social Usages. I 8 3

to a duel, and to the disappearance of the old
register in which it was recorded :
' In the days of Charles I., Giles Nanfan, who
then resided at the old manor-house of Bistmorton
Court, in this neighbourhood, fought a duel with
the lover of his sister Bridget, and slew him. We
know the "Bloody Meadow" where the duel was
.fought, and how the unfortunate lover was buried
in the Berrow Churchyard, the parish in which he
was killed, and Bridget Nanfan left a charge upon
the "Bloody Meadow" by will, for the preaching
of a sermon by after incumbents against the sin of
duelling. But we did not know the name of the
lover who was killed, or the time when the duel
took place. Some years ago I went, accompanied
by Sir William Guise, to examine the parish
registers respecting the name and the date of the
burial of Bridget Nanfan's lover. We found the
entry, and I made a copy, which was lost. Years
after . . again I went with Sir Win. Guise to
examine the registers of the period, but the book
had disappeared altogether, and was nowhere to be
found.'
Much valuable matter treating of the social life
of the sixteenth century, as far as the poor were
concerned, is found in parish documents. Here,
for instance, is a picture of London life taken from
the registers of St. Dunstan's-in-the-West :
' x573. Jan. 5- a poore man buryed out of the
pride.'
' 586. Feb. 9 a maide buried out of the fielde.'
 1589" March 18 a poor maide that died in the
fielde.'

Social Usages. x 8 5

and under March 27, I623, it is recorded, ' the
same daye buried a poore hunger sterven begor
child Dorothie the daughter of Henry Patterson,
Miller.' And another entry in the same register,
dated March, 583, is to this effect: ' Tewsday,
the xii day was buried one ppofer Buckbarrow
w ch went about for god sake.' The same phrase
occurs again in the year x6o2, applied to a ' poore
woman'; both were, m all probability, licensed
beggars.
Pensioners, both male and female, occasionally
occur in St. Dunstan's registers, and an almshouse
was established in the Friars, which is mentioned
in the entries below:
' 593- June . Agnes Grandige, one of the
sisters of the fryers.'
' x6o8. July 30. Joane Dennys, vidowe, out of
the alines house in the Friers.'
' 6o 3. March 23. Anne Pilsworth, one of the
7 sisters in the Fryers.'
It may be noted that the Friars--sometimes
designated the White Friars--was the site of the
house of the Carmelites, placed on the south side
of Fleet Street. As a sanctuary for debtors, and
the consequent resort of dissolute characters, it
subsequently became notorious, and under the
slang name of Alsatia its fame has been widely
spread by Sir Walter Scott's ' Fortunes of Nigel.'
It was not, however, entirely given up to the lower
classes ; for, as Stowe says, ' in place of this Friers
Church, bee now many faire houses builded,
lodgings for noblemen and others.'
Another locality inhabited by very poor persons,

z86 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

but not as almsfolk, was called St. Dunstan's Hall.
Thus, on September 4, 593, one John Miller
was buryed out of St. Dunstan's Hall; and on
August I 8, 16o3, 'Roger Brooke, Waterman, out
of St. Dunstan's Hall. ':
Occasionally, when any deserving case that
seemed worthy of support was brought under the
parson's notice, he made a memorandum of the
same in his register. Thus, in one of the Knares-
borough registers there is entered an appeal to the
benevolent from one Richard Coates, which is
couched in the following terms:
'The bearer Richard Coates, a taylor by his
trade, but being overcharged by a great many
children was forced to take up another method to
get his Bread. Which is so publickly known it
needs no further demonstration. In which way,
for ease and readinesse of going to the adjoing
markets, he kept a little Horse which was stoln
from him about ---- months ago, and not finding
him, by all enquiry he can make, has brought the
Justice of Peace to give him Leave to begg the
Charitable Constitution of this neighbourhood only
to help to gett another. And if you please to
grant this Favour, he, as in duty bound, shall hold
himself under great obligation,' etc.
But in the same register we find an application
to the Commissioners of H.M. Revenue duly
entered, which is a somewhat unique memorandum.
It runs thus: ' To the Hon ue Corn rs and Gov TM of
his Ma ties Revenues of Excise of Beer & Malt &c.
 Nichols, 'Collectanea Topographica et Genealogica,'
vol. v., pp. 3, 4.

Social Usages.  8 7

' These are to certifye that Joseph Leeming in
the pish of Knaresburgh in the County of York,
is a likely man to make a good officer, is a Brisk
healthy man, not incumbered with debts, a young
man, unmarried, about one-and-twenty years of
age, of a good family, sober life and conversation,
well affected to the pres t Goven t, of the Com-
munion of ye Church of England & bred a grocer.
Proposeth for his securities M" James Collins and
M r W TM Broadbett of Knar. afors a" He desires
to be instructed by Bernard Calvert, officer of
Knaresborough.
' These are to Certifye, whom it may concern
that Joseph, son of Joseph Leeming, was Baptized
at Knar. in Yorkshire ye   day of June I686. '"
The number of persons, again, slain in brawls
at inns and taverns, and in the streets, in olden
days, is noteworthy. Thus, referring once more
to the register of St. Dunstan's-in-the-Vest, we
find entries of this kind :
'x572. Aug. 22. Luce, which was slain at
hearnes the Cooke in Chancery Lane.'
' x579- June 20. M r Marten which was slain
at Lyons Inne.'
'x59. April x 9. Will'm Gifford slaine in
Symon Canon's house.'
And on January 5, x595, according to the
registers of St. Mary 'vVoolnoth, rilliam Backe,
'one of her Majesty's servauntes of the Guarde
was slaine in the Taverne called by the name of
the Bishopp's Head.'
"* See ' Yorkshire Registers,' the tntifuar)', 88z, vol. vi.,
pp. 9 o, 9 .

88 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

Under 16 IO the register of St. Gregory-by-
Paul's gives this entry: 'John Fitzwilliams,
servant to Sir Edward Dymmocke, Knight, slain
in a Tavern, buried 14 February, 16 o.'
And after this fashion the entries in our London
registers proceed, proving how powerless was the
arm of the law. Drink is also mentioned as an
evil in the seventeenth century, and the register of
St. Benedict Fink has a curious memorandum, dated
April 23, 1673, concerning the death of ' Mr.
Thomas Sharrow, clothworker, late Churchwarden
of this parish, killed by an accidental fall in a vault,
in London "vVall, Amen Corner, by Paternoster
Row, and who it was supposed had lain there eleven
days and nights before anyone could tell where he
was. Let all who read this take heed of drink.'
We may compare, too, an entry in the register of
Newington Butts: ' 1689, John A,ais and Derwick
Farlin in one grave, being both Dutch soldiers;
one killed the other drinking brandy, buried
[Nov. It. ' And at Rye, under December 2, 656 ,
a memorandum informs us how Francis Gill and
William Grogervill, two soldiers o,a guard at Strand-
gate, broke open a cellar, and drank so much
strong waters as made six men dead drunk.
Grogervill never came to himself, and Gill, the
corporal, going his rounds, fell down and broke
his skull. They were buried together in one
grave, no shot fired over them, and no one attend-
ing but the bearers. These men, by thus bringing
themselves to a disgraceful end, were thus buried
' without those honours usually paid to meritorious
soldiers.' Another case is entered in the registers

x9 o Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

nor never did knowe anybody though many came
to see him and soe he died.'
It does honour to the memory of Thomas
Percy, the author of' Reliques of English Poetry,'
to find him usefully employed in preserving the
humble annals of his parish for the benefit of those
that should come after him. The title-page to
the registers bears the following inscription in his
own hand: ' These old registers were rescued
from destruction, and for their further preservation
gathered into this volume in 767 ;' and at the
end of the volume is a fragment of an ancient book
of rates, which was thought a curiosity that deserved
to be preserved:

' Memorandum.

' Feb. 25 th I767. This day I transcribed into
the three following Leaves of Parchment all the
Articles of Births, Baptisms, and Burials, during
the years I756-I766 (inclusive) which I found
entered in a Paper Register of the Baptisms and
Burials of this parish of Wilbye, viz.--all that
happened since I have been Rector of this Parish ;
and after a very exact collation of this copy with
the said originals, I hereby declare it to be very
correct and perfect.'

The 'fragment' of the ' ancient book of rates'
contains many curious and interesting entries
relating to the period when the Court of Charles I.
took up its abode at Wellingborough, in order
that the Queen might drink the chalybeate water
of the' red well.' And it appears from them--

Social Usages.  91

some of which we quote below--that the adjoining
parish of Wilby was laid under contribution for
the supplies of Her Majesty's household:

' A levy made for the 6 th July, 627, for
her Majesties household, at xij a yard
land--sum total - - - xxxiij S xi d
627. Layings out for her Majesties house.
Sc. Payd for carrying six chicken and
a capon to Wellingborougge iiij d
It. Payd for carring four strikes ofxvheat
to ye Courte - - vj d
It. Payd for six chickens and a capon iiij s
It. Payd to Thomas Hericke for driving
a load of Charcole to the Courte - xij d
It. Payd for twenty pound of butter vj s viii d
It. Payd for the caridge of the same iiij d.
It. Payd to the Ringer when her Majestie
went through the town to Northton vj d
It. Payd to sx women for gatheringe
rushes (?) - xij d
It. Payd for tow quarter of oates xxi s iiij d
It. Payd for a load of wood for the
Courte - - - viij d
To the men to load the wood, and goinge
to Wellingborough w th it - viii d

Sum totl xliij iiii a'

CHAPTER X.

PARISH CUSTOMS.

HE old custom of ringing the curfew-bell,
which Milton has gracefully described-
' On a plat of rising ground,
I hear the far-off curfew sound,
Over some wide, watered shore,
Swinging slow, with solemn roar'--
is still kept up in a few villages. For many years
past the practice has been kept u.p at St. Margaret's-
at-Cliffe, Kent, during the winter months, with
regard.to the due ringing of which there is an
entry In the register, the minute of a vestry
meeting held in the month of September, I696:
'Whereas there has been, and is at this time a
parcel of land in this parish, called by the name of
the " Curfew Land," consisting of five rods more
or less ; which for some time since hath been given
by a shepherd, who one night fell over the Cliff,
yet lived so long as to make the said bequest
for ringing of a Curfew-bell at Eight of the Clock
every night for the Winter half-yeare, viz., from

Parish Customs.  93

Michaelmas Day to Lady Day; and now, finding
the great neglect for some yeares past in the due
ringing thereof, and to prevent, for the future, any
danger which may ensue to travellers and others
being so near the Cliffe, for want of the due and
constant ringing, if possible the like sad Providence
may not befall any others,--we the Minister,
Churchwardens, and others, the Parishioners, whose
names are underwritten, in reference to the per-
formance of the donor's good intent, do hereby order
and decree that the said Curfew Bell be hereafter
rung--as at the neighbouring parishes it is--con-
stantly every night in the week, all the aforesaid
winter half-yeare, the full time of a quarter of an
hour at the least, without any exceptions of
Sunday nights or Holy-day nights, and he that
rings is to have and receive the benefit and profit
of the said Curfew-Land, provided that he whoever
is or shall be Clerk of the Parish shall have the
refusal of it before any other, if he will accord-
ingly perform the contents above specified. But,
if not, then it shall be at the Minister's and
Churchwardens' disposal to let any other have it,
who will ring it accordingly. And in case it shall
not be constantly rung, as is afore specified, it shall
be lawful for the said Minister and Churchwardens
to receive the rent from him who occupies the
said land, and to deduct out of it, for every night
it shall not be rung, two pence for any commission
which shall be given to the poor that come con-
stantly to Church.'
There are numerous traditions to the same
purport, and one current at Barton, Lincolnshire,
, I3

 94 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

tells how an old lady, being accidentally benighted
on the wolds, was directed on her journey by the
ringing of the evening bell of St. Peter's Church.
Out of gratitude for arriving at her destination in
safety, she gave a certain piece of land to the
parish clerk, on condition that he should ring
one of the church bells from seven to eight every
evening, except Sundays, commencing on the day
of the carrying of the first load of barley in every
year, till Shrove Tuesday next ensuing inclusive.
A curious little incident connected with the
ringing of the curfew is recorded in the register of
Penn, Staffordshire :
'i75o, March 25. Mary Penn, foundling,
bapt. The child was found tied up in a cloth,
and hung to the ring upon the south door of
Penn Church, about eight o'clock p.m. by William
Baker, as he was coming out of church after the
ringing of the Curfew Bell.'
And in connection with bell-ringing, may be
quoted a memorandum in the Leyland registers,
relative to the fees of ringers, similar regulations
occasionally occurring in other registers :
' November the 4 th  664.
 It is concluded upon by Mr. Rothwell Vicar
and the Churchwardens now in being that the
ringers appointed by them shall obserue to ringe
in due time on Sundaies and take the benefit of
ringing at Burialls and other times to bee diuided
amongst them by equall portions and received and
distributed by Peter Tootell Clarke or Robert
Sargeant and hereunto the ringers doe subscribe
their names the day and year aboue written.'

Parish Customs.  95

Among the old entries in church books, reference
is occasionally made to the parish bull, a charge
having been levied upon the parson for keeping
a bull for the use of his parishioners. As the
Rector was entitled to the tithe of calves, it was to
his interest to promote increase of tithable produce.
A correspondent of Notes and Queries (sth S.,
x. 334), says that, 'by custom of the parish of
(uarley, Hants, the parson was bound to keep
a public boar and bull for the use of the parish
This he had neglected to do, whereupon his
parishioners refused to give him the tithe of
milk.' A memorandum dated April, I683, at
St. Nicholas', Durham, affirms that ' it is ordered
that Simors Lackenby is to keep in lieu of his
Entercommon ground, one sufficient Bull for the
use of the City and Borough kyne, for three years
next ensuing ; and to give ten shillings towards a
silver plate for a Course.' From a copy of a Court
Roll of the Manor of Isleworth Syon, dated
September 29, 675, it appears that Thomas Cole
surrendered four acres and one rood of customary
land lying in several places in the fields of
Twickenham, called the Parish Land, anciently
belonging to the inhabitants of Twickenham, for
keeping a bull for the common use of the inhabi-
tants in trust for the use of the said inhabitants,
for keeping and maintaining a sufficient bull for
the use aforesaid.*
The baiting of a lion, too, was an event not to
be despised, and in the register of St. Mary
Magdalene, Canterbury, this entry is gven:
 See Edwards, 'Remarkable Charities,' p. 66.

I96 Social Life as "IbM by Parish Registers.

' December the : 6 : 1687- Then the lion was baited
to death in the White Hart Yarde with dogges.'
Great attention was paid, in days gone by, to
preserving the parish boundaries, disputes relating
to which were not of infrequent occurrence.
Hence, the custom of beating the parish bounds is
occasionally noticed in church-books, the subjoined
memorandum occurring in the register of Arling-
ham :
' Mem.--that I, Henry Childe, Vicar of Arling-
ham, went in perambulation with some of my
parishioners, on Rogation Monday and Tuesday,
16o6. Upon the Tuesday I went to the utmost
confines of our parish, eastward and from north to
south, not for any superstitious sake, but to see the
bounds of the parish.'
And we may also quote 'a true account of the
bownds of the parish ofRingmer , taken by M r John
Lillie, Vicar, with several of the parishioners in
rogation week, being the I4 th 1 5 th and 16 tla dayes
of May 168.3.' The procession was as follows :
' Monday ye i4th of May, after divine service at
our parish church, we went from thence along the
King's highway, to a place called Stone Street
* * * And over the hedge at a Crab Tree. * * *
From thence we went to the house of M r Henry
Plummer, where both men and boys were worthily
entertained at a plentiful good dinner, and thus
ended our first day's perambulation.'
The second day they ended at the house of
Lady Springett, 'where there was a collation
provided for the parishioners, and soe ended the
second day's perambulation.'

Parish Customs. 197

The close of the third day, it seems, brought
them back to the Crab Tree, at which place 'wee
sange a psalm, and our Minister read the Epistle
and Gospel, to request and supplicate the blessing
of God upon the fruites of the Earth. There did
M r Richard Gunn, by reason of his building a new
apartment to his house at Middleham, invite all
the company to the Clerk's house, where he
expended at his own charge a barrell of beer,
besides a plentiful supply of provisions brought
from his own house ; and so ended our third and
last day's perambulation.'
The register of Radipole, Dorchester, contains
an account of the perambulations made by the
parish officers periodically for the purpose of
ascertaining the bounds of the parish; and on
Ascension Day, 1747 , 'after morning prayer at
Turnworth Church [Dorset], was made a publick
Perambulation of ye bounds of ye parish of Turn-
worth by one Richd. Cobbe, Vicar, W m Northover,
Churchwarden, Henry Sillers and Richard Mullen,
Overseers, and others, with 4 boys; beginning at
the Church Hatch and cutting a great "I" on the
most principal parts of the bounds. Whipping y
boys by way of remembrance, and stopping their
cry with some half-pence; he returned to church
again, which Perambulation and Possessioning had
not been made for 25 years last past.'
On May 14, 1706, the parson of Collingbourne
Ducis duly attended the beating of the parish
boundaries, and has made in his register the
following memorandum on the event :
' I made a perambulation round my parish,

198 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

where we renewed ye old bounds and sett our
land marks according to ye directions of some of
ye oldest inhabitants who were present. We
observed yt y bridge over ye brooke between
Sunton Collingborn and us stands within ye limits
of our parish, but this is only upon leave given,
and ye inhabitants of Sunton are obliged to renew
and repair ye s a bridge whenever it wants either
repairing or reneval. Ira est. Guil. Sherwin.
Rector.'
Occasionally interesting details are given re-
specting old parish charities. At Wilmington,
Kent, a copy of a terrier is entered in the register,
wherein it is stated that from the establishment
of the Dean and Chapter of Rochester, in the
time of Henry VIII., in their leases of the parson-
ages of Sutton and Wilmington, their lessees had
covenanted to deliver to the parishioners of Sutton
and Wilmington a certain quantity of wheat and
grain at Eastertide annually, to be distributed by
the churchwardens of these parishes to the needy
persons within the same; and that in their lease
of the said rectories, granted November 25, 1772,
the lessee covenanted to deliver twenty bushels
of peas to be distributed amongst the most needy
persons in Sutton, and twelve bushels of peas
amongst the like persons in Wilmington; and
also to deliver three bushels of wheat, to be
distributed amongst the poor of Sutton and
Wilmington; and it is added that the usage had
been for the poor of Wilmington to receive only
one out of the three bushels of wheat.*
" See Edwards, 'Remarkable Charities,' I842 , p. 32.

Parish Customs.  99

It is stated in the register of Harlington,
Middlesex, under the year x683, that half an
acre of land was given by some person, whose
name was forgotten. But, it adds, it has always
been understood that this piece of land was given
for the benefit of the bell-ringers of the parish, to
provide them with a leg of pork on November 5-
The ground is known as the Pork Acre, and
used to be let for fifty shillings a year, which was
paid by the parish officers to the bell-ringers.
Similarly, the old register of Bushey, Hertford-
shire, informs us that a ' M " Gale gave a Haber-
dine fish [barrelled cod, so called from Aberdeen,
which was formerly famous for curing this kind
of fish] & half a peck of blue peas, to twenty
widows and widowers o,ace a year. Half a peck
loaf and two pounds of cheese to each person are
given instead.' In the Parliamentary Report on
Charities, made some years ago, it was stated that
the owner of a field, consisting of about five acres,
lying in the parish of Bushey, vas in the habit
of distributing annually, some time in Lent, forty
quartern loaves and forty pounds of cheese among
twenty widows and twenty widowers of the parish
selected by the Rector.
And in one of the Hayton parish registers this
memorandum is given :
'John Hall of the Head's Nook, by his last
will and testament, left to the Parishioners of
Head's Nook, Faugh, and Moss (Know?) the
sum of five pounds, the use whereof was to be
I-d. the pound yearly, and to defray the charges
of church repairs for the three townships afore-

Parish Customs. o 3

cause sometimes to visit here; they are humbly
hereby intreated, that they will be pleased to visit
the school also, and to be favourable to good
scholars which shall be trained up here ; and shall
be found fit to be perfected, and want means and
friends for their preferment.
'A deed from the right honble lord Stanhope,
lord of the manor to twelve inhabitants of this
town, concerning liberty to build a school house
there, is depo.s'ed in a box inthe Chest of this
Chapel, and is registered in the Guildhall, in
London, and to be registered in Christ Church
in Oxford, in the eighth year of the reign of
King James. Those that shall survive are to be
remembered to convey their interest to other
inhabitants, and like to continue dwellers in the
Town, when the number shall by death or other-
wise come to four, or sooner if they shall find
cause. Those who shall survey and direct the
building are entreated to be careful that it be
strong and plain, and that the main bearing posts
be set upon stone, somewhat above the ground,
and the windows all clear stories. It is conceived
that thirty-six feet for the length, and eighteen
feet for the breadth, will be a sufficient proportion.'

CHAPTER XI.

SOME CHURCH CUSTOMS.

N olden times stage plays were performed on a
Sunday, not only in the churches, but in the
theatres, references to which are frequently made
in many old church-account books. The Bewdley
chapel-warden's accounts, for instance, give this
entry: ' Paid unto the queenes plaiers m the
Church, six shillings and eightpence.' And the
register of Syston, under the year I6O2, contains
this item, ' Paid to Lord Morden's players because
they should not play in the Church, xijd.,'thus show-
ing that the players claimed a sort of prescriptive
right to use the house of God for their performances.
But prior to this period several attempts had
been made to check this abuse, and Bonner Bishop
of London, issued in the year 542 a proclama-
tion to his clergy, prohibiting all manner of
common plays, games, or interludes to be played,
set forth, or declared within their churches or
chapels.  And the author of a tract published in
 See Kelly's 'Notices of Leicester,' pp. I-2 5.

Some Church Customs. 2o 5

the year I572 also censures in severe terms the
practice of the clergy neglecting their duties, and
encouraging, stage-plays in churches :
' He again posteth it over as fast as he can
gallop; for he either hath two places to serve, or
else there are some games to be played in the
afternoon, as lying the whetstone, heathenish
dancing of the ring, a beare or bull to be baited,
or else jack-an-apes to ryde on horseback, or an
interlude to be played, and if no place else can be
gotten, it must be done in the church.'
A writer in the North British Review for
February, 1863 (t94), remarks that even in
Scotland, 'long after the Reformation, such plays
were performed, and sometimes still upon a Sunday,
for the people saw no harm in this, and petitioned
the National Assembly that it might be allowed.
But the Reformed Ministers had now begun to
entertain stricter notions of the day of rest, and
forbade on that day the performance of plays.'
It may be added that many curious particulars
illustrative of the performance of plays in churches,
consisting of extracts fr6m the accounts of
St. Margaret's Church, Southwark, will be found
in the Shakespeare Society Papers (III.), contri-
buted by Mr. J. Payne Collier, who also com-
municates a note that 'on June 7th, 1483, the
citizens of Lincoln had leave to perform a play in
the nave of the cathedral, as had been their custom
upon the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.'
And from Hayes register it appears that in the
eighteenth century the favourite anausement during
Divine service was cock-throwing in the church-

206 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

yard, once, as it is noted, ' in spite of the justice,
minister, parish-officers, and constables.' But two
years later things grew far more serious, for the
justice gave up the matter. The Rev. C. Manning
writes :
' Feb. 27 th 1754. Being Shrove Tuesday, Divine
service was performed in the afternoon, and no
care was taken to prevent the throwing at cocks,
rioting, and swearing In the churchyard, at the
same tmle ; though I gave previous notice of the
same to the churchwardens and the magistrate,
and desired that it might be prevented for the
honour of God and a public good; but his answer
was this :--" I know no law against throwing at
cocks, even in the churchyard."'
And from a parish-book belonging to St. Mary's,
Shrewsbury, we learn that in the year 1584 the
inhabitants of Astley were complained against for
playing at bowls on a Sunday. It was ordered
that'they shall adorn and repair their chapel at
their own expence, as a commutation.'
But church life was not the same in all parishes,
for there is a memorandum, dated 1613, in Buxted
register, of the combination of the parishioners for
the better observance of the Sabbath. It runs
thus :
'Because God hath commanded us to have a
care that the Sabbath daye be kept holy, both by
ourselves and others, as farre as we are able, there-
fore, upon consideration that the Lord's Day hath
been many and divers ways profaned by unlawful
meetings and feastings for manie years past, we,
whose names are undersigned, doe give our con-

Social LiJb as To/d by Paris/, Registers.

in pietie and true Religion both in Publique &
private.
' 2 it is ordered and agreed if any butcher wthin
this pish shall, by himselfe or any other, kill any
beast or sell any victualls on the Lords day, he
shall pay vj s viij a for every such offence.
' 3 if any p'son shall exercise or be p'sent at any
wrastlings, bowlings, frechings, ringerings . or
any . . whatever . the like, if he be [over]
fifteen years he shall pay. for every such
ofence, and [if he be under] that age his maister
or his parents shall pay twelve pence.
'4 and if any p'son be on the Lord's day in
any hm . . . alehouse or dwellinge house, except
for Lodgeinge or for some other ocasion Mowed
by the Justice, or if he shall be found drinkeinge
or p'phaining by swearinge or Raileringe in any of
these houses he shall pay lO 8 and they yt . .
him shall pay IO s,
'5-if any man shall grind or cause to be
ground any corne in the mill upon the Lord's day
except in case of nessessitie, shall pay IO 8 for every
such offence.
' Item that all head oficers and inferior oficers
make diligent search to find out and punish the
sev'all ofenders against the several Acts made for
the observation of the Lord's day.
'IL Concern abuses.I it is ordered
and agreed that if all p'sons shall demean them-
selves decently and Reverently in the church.
'2 it s ordered and agreed that if any p'son
shall abuse or . . a dead corps in the church or
church yard issuing after the interment, for the

Some Church Customs. o 9

same he shall be ordered at the next sessions
following and shall suffer punishment according to
Law.
'3 it is ordered and agreed that if any shall
Ringe bells for pleasure, on the Lord's day he
shall surer according to Law.
'4 if any man shall Ringe the bells upon
ordinarie dales without the consent of ye minister
or churchwardeners he shall be indicted for the
ofence at the next Sessions following.
'5- it is ordered and agreed that if any man
shall send for stronge drinke to tipple in the
Church or take to... he shall be complaned
and surer punishment for the misdemeanor.
' 6. [llegible].'

Then follow the signatures of the Rector,
churchwardens, and twenty-five of the parishioners. 
And, speaking of the observance of the Sabbath,
a curious accident, which brought a somewhat
severe and uncharitable stricture from the parson,
is recorded on a loose leaf in one of the registers
of Kirkandrews-upon-Esk :
'Upon Nov. I. 696 yet happened a very sad
accident 28 people were drowned at Canabie Boat
as yY were passing yt water from church. Six
persons come to years of discretion went from
own church to Canaby. Every soul of y" was
drowned. These six lived in nay parish. There
happened in ye company, two boys of 9 and
years old. They were xn ye midst of y pool
 See 'Yorkshire Parish Registers,' the It, tiquary, 88-,
vol. vi., p. 9 z.
t4

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

over head and ears in water w  ye rest of ye people
yt were drowned and yet by a distinguishing
privilege yss two only got out of y water safe.
Surely God Almighty thereby showed his dis-
pleasure to these persons who being of age passed
by yr own parish Church to Canaby, but shewed
his mercy to y boys, who knew not w t yeX did but
went for company sake. In suffering persons of
age yt were of my parish to be drowned and in
.preserving y two lads safe even in as great danger
in all human probability as y rest. This is so
distinguishing a evidence yt everyone ought to
take notice of it, and take heed how they run
from yeir own parish Church.'
Another strange accident is incidentally alluded
to in the register of burials of St. Anne's, Black-
friars, under October 28, 623: 'Dorothy, wife
of Mathew Sommers. She was slain at a priest's
sermon. Mary Clement, waiting-woman to the
said Dorothy, slain with her mistress.'
'The horrid accident thus noticed,' writes
Malcolm in his' Londinium Redivivum' (ii. 372),
'occasioned a number of pamphlets, intolerant
and bigoted in the extreme ; amongst which was,
"Something written by occasion of that fatal and
memorable accident in the Black Friers on Sunday,
being the 26 th of October, 623, 8tilo antiquo, and
the 5 th November, Stilo r, ovo, or Roman, i623."'
It appears that a certain Father Drury, ,a member
of the Society of Jesuits, and in priest s orders,
had the reputation of being a fervent preacher,
and hence drew large congregations, by no means
confined to Roman Catholics. One account of the

Some Church Customs. -I I

disaster informs us that over the gateway of the
hotel of the French Ambassador, in Blackfriars,
which was of stone and brick, was a gallery, or
attic story, of 40 feet in length and 17 feet in
width, the third in height from the ground.
There were two passages to this room, one from
the street, the other from the Ambassador's with-
drawing-room. The lower floor had a vault of
stone. Twelve feet were taken from the length
of the gallery by a deal partition, and this
apartment served as a vestry-room for the priest ;
so that an auditory of near 300 persons were
compressed within a space but 28 feet in length
and t7 feet in breadth. As the architect who
erected this building could never have supposed
so many people would have assembled in it, he
had taken no precautions calculated to sustain so
great a weight; on the contrary, it was found
that the principal beam of the floor had been
almost severed by two mortices facing each other
in the centre, leaving little more than 3 inches of
solid wood.
A few chairs were occupied by the superior
classes of the congregation before the priest, who
had a table near him, but the remainder stood
literally wedged together. Drury made his appear-
ance, and took his text from the parable of the
servant and ten thousand talents, and scarcely half
an hour had elapsed when the dreadful catastrophe
occurred, which in an instant precipitated the whole
mass of unfortunate listeners through a floor beneath
them, ' where they were engulphed in a torrent of
timber, laths, and dust, after a descent of twenty-
I4--2

Some Church Customs. 2  3

us that in the year I6I 8 a license was granted to
Lady Barbara Hastings 'to eat flesh in Lent on
account of her great age.'
The same license is granted more formally in
the following case recorded in the parish register
of Staplehurst :
' Be it known unto all men by these presents,
that I, James Bowyer, Clarke, and Curate of the
Churche of Staplehurst, in the County of Kent,
have licensed, and by these presents do license,
William Tanner, yeoman, being at this tyme sicke
and visited by the mighty hand of God, to eate
fleshe, and to use such meates as shall seem best
to him for the recovery of his health.'
The register of Wolverton tells us how Sir
Thomas Temple had to pay thirteen shillings and
fourpence for a license to eat flesh on days pro-
hibited, and a further case may be quoted from
the last page of the Bampton register :
' Whereas the Right \Vorshp n Sir Thomas
Hood knight and his worthy lady, having upon
undeniable evidence made it appear that they are
not in bodily health, and therefore according to
the lawe m that case provided have obtained a
licence to eat flesh during the time of their Indis-
position of bodies; But since the Date of eight
dayes allowed by the Statute is expired, and they
are still in a sickly condition, upon their request the
said licence is longer indulged them to dress Flesh
and accordingly registered. March I8, I66O.'
In spite, however, of the severity of the law,
it was not always observed; for in the'History
of Henley' (1861) a list of persons is given who

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

were presented (38 Eliz.) for eating flesh in
Lent :
' Robt. Chamberlin for roasting a pigg in his
house the xxiij, day Marche, w ch was spent at
Thomas Seywell's house, the cobbler.
'Henry Wanlar for seething ij p'ce of bacon.'
Turning to Easter, we find from a memorandum
in the Tottenham register, dated 1577, that 'the
vestry resolved that every parishioner, rich or
poor, should at Easter pay quartera.ge for the
Church, and providing bread and wine at the
Communion seven-pence, and every person having
one or more houses to pay the same for every
empty house, and to the Clark's wages such
sum or sums according to ancient collection';
and as illustrating Church life in the seventeenth
century, we may incidentally quote the subjoined
notice from the parish rate-books at Hampsthwaite,
published in the year 1786 by the parson for the
information of his parishioners as to his arrange-
ments for Eastertide :
' I give notice to all the Parishioners within
ye p'ishe of Hampsthwaite that I intend (God
willing) to administer ye Blessed Com. on those
days following, viz., Palm Sunday, Good Friday,
Easter Even, Easter day m the [church], and
here will be sermons and homelys on Good Friday
and Easter Even by myselfe or some other, and
I pray do not drive all till last day. On Tuesday
in Passion Week at Thornthwaite Chapel. On
Monday morning after Palme Sunday to ye sicke
& lame of Holme Sinders Hills.
'On Tuesday morning, before I begin at

Some Church Customs. z 15

Chappell, to the sick and lame people of Thorn-
thwaite & Padside.
'On Wednesday morning to ye sick of ye
Hamblett of Birtsw th and felicliffe, and on Thurs-
day morning to ye Hamb t of Hamp. ye Church-
wardens are to give notice ye night before to attend
in y Hambletts.
' I desire all ye pihioners of this p'ish to take
notice & others not of" y p'ish y are concerned,
that they come and reckone and pay yr compts
betwixt [now] and Easter day to me or some
other I shall appoint. The reck will be taken
in y Church.
' I shall be at home or in ye Church every day
after now until Easter except Monday and Tues-
day in Passion Week, when I am to be at
Lawrence Buck's to reteine y reck & compts
of" all persons that live within the compasse of"
Sinders Hills.
' I desire the Church wardens will take notice,
as much as in them lyes, of those persons that do
willfully absent ymselves from Sacrament, y are
above  6 years of age. I give notice I will take
no recks: nor any for me, on Sunday morn:
nor on Good Friday morning nor on Saturday
morning.
' The Church wardens are to provide bread and
wine ag t those days I have appointed, at y charge
of y p'ish. If any person be able to go or ride
to Church or Chappell let them not expect me
at their houses.
' A great Sickness I fear this ensuing year. I
pray God's Blessing from plag: & pestilnssis--L d

Some Church Customs. z 17

records that seven shillings and sixpence was paid
'for dogs wipping' xn 78, whereas from the
Castleton parish records we learn that the salary
of the sluggard-waker in 722 was ten shillings.
Apropos of this custom, Mr. J. c. Cox informs
us that in the church of Baslow, Derbyshire, there
still remains the weapon of the ancient parish
functionary, the dog-whipper. It was his duty
to whip the dogs out of church, and generally to
look after the orderly behaviour of both bipeds
and qua.drup.eds during Divine service. The whip
in questxon xs a stout lash, some 3 feet in length,
fastened to a short ash stick, with leather bound
round the handle. We believe it to be a unique
curiosity, as we cannot hear of another parish in
which the whip is still extant.
There is said, also, to be still in existence in the
church of Clynnog Vawr, in North Wales, an
instrument for .dragging dogs out of church, which
has a long pair of curiously shaped tongs with
sharp spikes fixed at the ends--an interesting relic
of the church discipline of the past.
Similarly, many bequests were made in years
gone by for the strewing the church with rushes,
a custom which was, it may be remembered, in
many country parishes attended with all kinds of
festive formalities. In the parish register of
Kirkham, Lancashire, are entries to this effect:
'16o4. Rushes to strew the church cost this
year nine shillings and sixpence.' And under the
year 63 : ' Paid for carrying the rushes out of
the church in sickness time five shillings.' But
after the year  634 disbursements for rushes never

Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

appear in the Kirkham register, when the church
was flagged for the first time. In the parish
account-books of Hailsham, Sussex, charges occur
for strewing the church floor with straw or rushes;
and, in accordance with an old bequest, it has
been customary for the Mayor to go to St. Mary
Redcliffe Church, Bristol, on Whir Sunday, when
the church is strewn with rushes.
The alteration of the Style of the Calendar is
noticed in one of the registers of Kirkandrews-
upon-Esk :
' Whereas our old English Stile, or year of our
Lord, did not commence till the 25 t day of March
w c was attend'd with great many Inconveniencys :
But by our Act passed in the 24 t year of the
Reign of King George the Second, and in the year
of our Lord 75. This old Stile ceased; and
for the future the first day of January is to be
taken deem'd and accounted the first Day of every
year. Andbvthes aAct  days in the month of
7 br were annihilated and then the new stile took
place. N.B. The   days were dropt betwixt 2 na
and  4 h of 7 br  752?
And apropos of this change in the calendar, a
curious entry occurs in one of the Glaisdale register
books:
' Sept. 2. The new style, or Gregorian account,
took place by Act of parliament; so eleven days
were cut off or annihilated, and the 2 a of
September,  752, was reckoned the  3 th, the next
day the 4 th, and so on. This was well enough
till Christmas came, when some would--yea, a
great many--keep old Christmas, and some the

CHAPTER XII.

STRANGE NATURAL PHENOMENA.

ANY unusual events connected with our
physical and natural history are recorded
in the parish register. Indeed, the allusions to
storms, earthquakes, meteors, floods, frosts,
droughts, and such-like occurrences, constitute
one of the most unique and authentic sources of
information. Such entries, too, often give the
most graphic details of the fearful havoc and
destruction caused by these, as they were com-
monly called,' visitations of Providence.' Thus,
in August, 577, an alarming thunderstorm,
chronicled in the register, occurred at Bungay one
Sunday at prayer-time, causing the death of two
men in the belfry--an event which gave rise to
the wonderful legend of the 'blacke dogge of
Bungay,' or the ' divel in such a likenesse,' that ran
down the body of St. Mary's with great swiftnesse
and incredible haste, ' and wrung the necks of two
men.' According to the register of Holy Trinity,
Dorchester, on August 22, 65I, 'at night there

Strange Natural P]enonena 9_9_ I

was great thunder and lightning, such as had not
been known by any living in this age, and there
fell with it a great storm of hail, some of the
stones of which were seven inches about, with
abundance of rain, and it continued all night and
great part of next morning till eight or nine of the
clock.'
Under July 6, 666, an entry in Lambeth
parish register records the burial of John \Yard,
who'was killed with a thunderbolt.' It appears
that on July I2, I787, in the same parish, another
death of a similar kind occurred, which is thus
described in the Gentleman's lagazine :
'July x 9., died at his house, near the Bishop's
Palace, Lambeth, at about a quarter before six in
the evening, by a flash of lightning, Mr. Bacon,
Clerk to the Salt Office. At the beginning of the
storm he was drinking tea with his wife ; the back
windows of the one pair of stairs to the south
having been open all day, he went up for the
purpose of shutting them, and in the action of
lifting up his right arm received the stroke, which
tore his coat eight inches in length, and four in
breadth; whence it entered his right side, nearly
opposite his heart, went through his body, and out
at the left hip, and down his left leg to his buckle
--which melted--and tore the upper leather of
the shoe from the sole. His dog being at that
foot, was also struck dead ; after which the light-
ning penetrated the wainscot and floor of the o,ae
pair of stairs, and made its way into the front
parlour, north, where it tore the wainscot in a
singular manner, and went off with an explosion

Strange Natural P]enomena. - -3

never seene in these parts by hoe man liveinge ;
for it did throw downe some houses and mills and
tooke away severall briggs... The water did
run through houses and did much hurte to houses;
besydes the water washt upp greate trees by the
roots, and the becks and gills carried them with
other greate trees, stocks and greate stones a greate
way off and layd them on men's ground; yea
further the water did so fiercely run dow,le the
bye-wayes and made such deepe holes and ditches
in them that att severall places neither horse nor
foote could passe, and besydes the becks and rivers
did soe breake out of their waves as they brought
spreadinge greate sand beds into men's ground art
many places which did greate hurte the never like
was known. I pray God of His greate mercy
grant that none which is now living may never see
the like againe.'
It is remarkable how frequently destructive
storms of this kind are reported to have occurred,
producing floods which may well have filled our
forefathers with dismay. Thus, the register of
Arlingham describes a flood that took place
Tuesday in the forenoon, on January 2o, 6o6- 7 :
' There was an exceeding great fludd, and the
greater by reason of the south west winde, so hye
that one might have morde a boate at Thomas
Kinges gate; when many lost their sheepe and
other cattle and their goods, Horsecroft and New-
bridge being then sowde with wheat, and all over-
flowde ; and had it not been for the C---- boate,
which was commonly used upon IO th daye, and in
the Tenure of M r Robert Yate and Thomas

224 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

manye about the number of twenty, had lost their
lives, or, at the least, binne greatly endangered to
be pined or starved to death. M r Thomas Yate
and his eldest son, M r Richard Yate, were then
hemm'd in upon Glass Cliffe with the water. I
say it is an admirable memorandum, because it
exceeded the fludd that was about forty-six years
before a foot and a half at the least higher than it
was then. Cursed be the hand that raseth this
memorable Recorde out of this Booke. Upon
the same day M r Anne,-- who then was not
churched,--for feare of the waters, was with
M r Childe, then Vicar, and his familie, fain to be
hurried over with the boate from the Vicaridge.
And this day was just three weekes after Elizabeth
Childe was born. ''a-
Another flood on Tuesday, November 4, 628,
is described in a lengthy memorandum: 'Flood
over . yard high in Vicarage Barn'; and one in
the following year, February 3, I629, 'ranne not
into Vicarage.'
' Thrice have I seen a fearful inundation
Within the space of two-and-twentie years,
As few of my coate have in all their station ;
Which when it comes (as't will) into men's eared,
What hart so hard that can abstain from teares ?
But woe is me that I am first to dwell
Where seas, enradge with windes, so Froudlie swell!
God knows who shall survive to see the next--
To be, as I have binne, with feare perplext.'
In June, I645, a memorandum in the parish
register of Loughborough informs us that ' there
fell a strange storm in that part of Leicestershire
 See ' Gloucestershire Notes and ueries,' vol. i., p. z46.

Strange IVatural Phenomena.

both, it being on the Market Day Thursday.
The brooks from the Forest came down with
such violence that in the space of an hour ran
through all the houses on the left hand the Malt
Mill Lane over the Door Thresholds and thro'
the yards down to the Shambles. And both
streams meeting at the end of the Shambles ran
over the highest place on the Conwall ; and thro
all the houses Gats places and low Rooms on the
West side of the Market Place insomuch that the
waters stood up to their Bed sides in their Parlers
and floated their vessels in the cellars, and would
take a Horse up to the Belly ; and at the bottom
of the Swan Street up to the Saddle, and ran over
the walls of the Bridge going into the Rushes, and
burst down a garden wall on the right hand the
Bridge, and so got more Liberty and then speedily
abated to the astonishment of all the Spectatours:
which might say with the Psalmist, 'Oh come hither
and behold the Works of the Lord what Destruction
He hath brought upon the .earth and likewise-
' Thou art a God that doth foreshow thy wonders every Hour
And so doth make the Pcople know thy virtue and thy
Power
The Clouds that were both thick and Black did rain most
plentiously
The Thunder in the air did crack his shafts abroad did
to conclude from Lightning and Tempest from
Plague Pestilence and Famine from battel and
Murder and from Sudden Death Good Lord deliver
us. Amen.'
Perhaps one of the most extraordinary storms

228 Social Life as ToM by Parish Registers.

recorded is the great snow-storm of January I6,
t6t4-I5, one of the many accounts of which is
preserved i,1 the parish register of Youlgrave,
Derbyshire, under the heading' A Memoriall of
the Great Snow Storm.'
' It covered,' runs the narrative, ' the earth five
quarters deep upon the plain, and for heaps or
drifts of snow, they were very deep, so that
passengers, both horse and foot, passed over gates,
hedges and walls. It fell at ten several times, and
the last was the greatest, to the great admiration
and fear of all the land, for it came from the four
pts of the world, so that all the c'ntryes were full,
yea, the South p'te as well as these mountaynes.
It continued by daily encreasing until the I 2 th day
of March (without the sight of any earth, eyther
upon hilles or villeges) uppon w ch daye, being the
Lorries Day it began to decrease ; and so by little
and little consumed and wasted away, till the
eight and twentieth day of May, for then all the
heapes or drifts of snow were consumed, except
one upon KinderLScout, w ch lay till Witson Week.'
And the Croydon register, under February i4,
1614-I 5, says : ' This was the day of the terrible
snow, and the Sunday following a greater.'
It seems that this storm was followed by a
drought, and from the same source we learn that
' there was no rayne fell uppon the earth from the
25 t day of March till the 2 na day of May, and
then there was but one shower, after which there
fell none tyll the 18 ' day of June, and then there
fell another ; after yt there fell none at all till the
4 t day of August, after which tyme there was

Strange Natural Phenomena.

Another great frost was that of 683-84. It
was of eight weeks' duration, and is made the
subject of a memorandum in the register of Holy
Rood Church, Southampton"
' This yeare was a great Frost, which began
before Cristmasse, so that ye 3ra & 4,h dayes of
this month of February ye river of Southampton
was frossen all over and covered with ice from
Calshott Castle to Redbridge and Tho: Martaine
ma r of a vessell went upon ye ice from Berry near
Matchwood to Milbrook Point. And y river
at Ichen Ferry was so frossen over that severall
persons went from Beauvois Mill to Bittern Farme
forwarde & backwards."
On the other hand, occasional reference is made
to the excessive heat. The register of Lough-
borough, for instance, records the great heat of
the summer of the year I8(Z8, and adds that on
I "th the heat was so intense
' \Vednesday, July o ,
that n consequence thereof many People died,
especially they that were at work in the fields,
also a great number of Horses, particularly coach-
horses drawing stage-coaches. The thermometer
as high as 9z. ' And according to the Arlingham
register just two centuries beforehand, ' there was
a most extreame hott son-ier, in so much that
many died with heat.'
But, as nowadays, the weather in most years
has varied, and an entry in the parish register of
Mayfield, Sussex, gives some interesting particulars
respecting the season of I626:
' In the former part of this summer there was
an extraordinary great fall of raine, and apparent

Strange Natural Phenomena.

And so, with dread forebo.dings, was penned
the following memorandum xn the register of
Nantwich :
'This yeare last past, 618, in the month of
November many times there appeared eastward
a Blazing Starr, betokenninge godds judgements
towards us for Sine. the lord xn mercye be
mercifull unto us.'
The arrival in the year 1680 of another comet
seems to have caused some excitement, an event
which was considered worthy of being registered
by the parson of Crowhurst, Sussex, who has left
this memorandum :
'A blazing starre appeared in ye kgdom in ye
yeare 168o: it did first shew itself o th December
yt yeare 80 which did stream from y south west
to y middle of y heaven broader yn that a Raine
Bow by farre, and continued till y latter end of
February.'
_At Collumpton, Devon, on March 19, 7t9,
'in the evening between seven and eight a great
light was seen'; and a similar one is recorded as
occurring at Huddlesceugh, Cumberland, in x 653.
On March 30, 716, 'a strange sort of light in
the aire' is noted in the parish register of Chapel-
en-le-Frith, which was, no doubt, an unusually
brilliant appearance of the [Northern Lights.
The same night on which this appearance was
noted at Chapel-enTle-F.rith it also caused con-
siderable consternatmn m other Peak villages.
_At Hartington, along with a similar appearance
which was noticed on the 6th of the same month,
it was so vivid and caused so much alarm as to

Strange Natural P]enomena. 2 3 5

In the register, too, of Langtree, Devon, we
find this entry :
' March ye 19, 17 t 8, ab  8 in ye evening a
great amazing meteor Light was seen m ye air;
after yis an uncommon Thunder was heard; and
y Light separating ab  y middle soon disap-
peared.'
Earthquakes, again, are noticed. Thus a quaint
entry in the Nantwich register speaks of an earth-
quake in I612-I 3 thus:
' This same yeare on the I8 tu March chaunced
a terrible earthquake between 7 and 8 of the
Clocke in the forenoone w c came with a most
fearfull noyse and horrible shakeinge, the space
of 3 minutes, w c is noe doubt a sure signe that
the cominge of Christ is at hand, and even at the
Dores.'
A memorandum in the Aylestone registers, under
June I, I684, chronicles a collection made for
Runswick, in the North Riding of Yorkshire,
'the town sunk by earthquake, and the in-
habitants loss besides houses, above twelve hundred
pounds.' The sum collected amounted to six
shillings and sixpence.
In the register of St. Mary Magdalene, Canter-
bury, the following entry has been crossed out:
' The great shake of y earth was September ye 8,
69.' After it comes an entry relating to one
Richard Kingnorth, who was hanged for ' stealeing
a hors,' and then follows: 'The greate shake of
the earth was September the 8 : 69.'
But, as it has been pointed out, the wrong date
is given for this earthquake. The event was

CHAPTER XIII.

STRANGE SIGHTS.

HE love of the marvellous has never failed
to attract attention, and at all times sensa-
tional shows have proved a lucrative venture. At
the same time, one would scarcely expect to find
instances of these recorded in the parish register,
amongst matters of serious and religious import.
But oftentimes the parson jotted down anything
that peculiarly interested him, and which had
come under his observation in the course of the
week.
Thus, the register of St. Nicholas', Durham,
has this curious entry:
' x568. Mere. That a certaine Italian brought
into the Cittie of Durham the eleventh day of
June, in the year above sayd a very strange C4
monstrous serpent in length sixteene feet, in
quantitie and dimensions greater than a horse;
which was taken and killed by speciall pollicie
in (Ethiopia within the Turkes Dominions. But
before it was killed it had devoured--as it is

Social Life as ToM by Parish Registers.

credibly thought--more than one thousand per-
sons, and destroyed a whole country.'
Shows of the Barnum type were very common
in days gone by, bands of travelling conjurers
and showmen going from town to town with their
highly sensational bills of fare. An entry in
Loughborough register records how in the year
579 a man was slain by a lioness 'which was
brought into the towne to be seen of such as
would give money to see her. He was sore
wounded in sundry places, and was buried on the
26 th day of August.' The stories, too, are very
varied in their character, but, from whatever
source derived, they savour strongly of the mar-
vellous. Thus, according to the statement of the
parish clerk of Firmingley, Notts, the following
extraordinary occurrence happened in July, 7o7,
of which he was himself an eye-witness:
'Zachariah Bolton, riding with his gun on
M r Barnardiston's bay horse into "Auckley Colt
Field," found five stags herded about two hundred
yards west from ye bottom of the "Long Hedge."
He fired amongst them, and disabled one in the
hinder parts; then quitting his horse, he caught
the stag by the hind leg, and called to Jarah
Wood and myself, who were not far off, for help,
but the stag struggling and braying, the horse
took him by the neck, and beat him with his
fore-foot till he lay still, then we took him alive,
laid him on the horse and carried him to the
parsonage house at Firmingley, into the little
court-yard before the kitchen door, where he was
killed and drest, by the order of John Harvey

Strange Sights. z 39

Esq TM of Ickwell Bury, who was there present, and
had before given us an order to go about the said
transaction. The truth of this I am ready to
attest upon oath if so required.'
A gruesome and highly strange occurrence is
recorded in Baunton parish register as having
taken place in the year 646, which we quote
below :
'In this parish of Baunton, in the Clarkes
House--one Richard Syfolly--upon St. Matthias
Day, 1646 , about eleven of the Clock in the
forenoon there rose out of an old dry table bord
of birch,won which bord I Henry Topp minister
there now wright these words Aug st 94th being
St. Bartholomew's Day--a water, reddish of the
colour of blood, and so continued till rising and
runninge alonge and downe the Table, all that
afternoone, and the nighte followinge till the next
day, and about the hour when it first began, and
so ceased. That same day, St. Matthias (I re-
member) I read prayers in the chaple but was not
called to be an eye witness of this strange sight,
and was informed of it by the eye witnesses the
very next Lordes Day when I came to officiat in
the Chapell. Many of the neighbours heard their
reports as well as my selfe Henry Topp who have
it avered under their said hands and marks. '*
Equally curious is a ghost story which forms
the subject of a memorandum in the register of
Brisley, Norfolk, and which is deserving of
notice :
 See 'Gloucestershire Notes and Queries,' 887, vol. ii.,
P. 7-

24o Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

'Dec. % x7o6. I, Robert Withers, M.A.
Vicar of Gately, do insert here a story which I
had from undoubted hands, for I have all the
moral certainty of the truth of it possible :--
' Mr. Grove went to see Mr. Shaw on the
2 a of August last. As they sat talking in the
evening, says Mr. Shaw, "On the 2I st Of
the last month as I was smoking my pipe and
reading in nay study between eleven and twelve
at night, in comes Mr. Naylor--formerly Fellow
of St. John's College, but had been dead full
four years. When I saw him I was not
much affi'ighted, and I asked him to sit down,
which accordingly he did for about two hours,
and we talked together. I asked him how it
fared with him. He said, 'Very well.' ' Were
any of our old acquaintances with him.' ' No'
(at which I was much concerned); 'but Mr.
Orchard will be with me soon, and yourself not
long after.' As he was going away I asked
him if he would not stay a little longer, but he
refused. I asked him if he would call again,
'No; he had but three days' leave of absence,
and he had other business.'"
' N.B. Mr. Orchard died soon after. Mr. Shaw
is now dead. He was formerly fellow of St. John's
College, an ingenuous good man. I knew him
there, but at his death he had a college living in
Oxfordshire, and here he saw the apparition.'
A correspondence which passed between the
Rev. John Hughes, of Jesus College, Cambridge,
and the Rev. Mr. Bonwicke, very shortly after
the event referred to took place, was subsequently

4  Social Life as ToM by Parish Registers.

impost, an impost, and so died. A most sad storm
of wind immediately ensued.'
An entry in the Croydon register records 'a
description of a monstrous birth, born of the body
of Rose Easterman, wife of John Easterman, being
a child with two heads, four arms, four legs, one
body, one navel, and distinction of two male
children, and was born the 27  of January,
I72I-2.'
And among the burials of the register of
Trinity Church, Chester, this memorandum is
given :
'John Brookes Mason who poynted the Steple
i6io and made many showes and pastymes on
the Steple of Trinity, and also on the toppe of
St. Peter's Steple as many thousands did witnesse,
dyed o July and bur  : July in the Church Yard
(614) broke his necke going down a payre of
stayres by the Church.'

CHAPTER XIV.

LOCAL EVENTS.

N many parishes the register served as a kind
of note-book for the parson, and oftentimes
contains miscellaneous memoranda of local interest
--' brief but pregnant notes on passing events,
and the ever-varying circumstances of parochial
life.'*
Dr. Kennett, Bishop of Peterborough
i728), in his first Visitation to his clergy,
marked on this subject : ' One more thing I would
intimate to you, that you are not only obliged
to enter the day and year of every christening,
wedding, and burial, but it is left to your dis-
cretion to enter down any notable incident of
times and seasons, especially relating to your own
parish and the neighbourhood of it.. If such
memorable things were fairly entered, your parish
registers would become chronicles of many strange
occurrences that would not otherwise be known,
-'The Registers of Prestbury,' Record Society, 188I.
Introduction, pp. xii, xiii.

z44 Social Life as Told by Parish Registers.

and would be of great use and service for posterity
to know.'
Some parsons seem to have acted on this prin-
ciple, and to have entered even the most ordinary
and trivial occurrences.
Church robberies are occasionally noticed. An
entry in Hackney register, dated October, I689,
runs thus :
' Stolen out of the vestry of St. John, Hackney,
on the 23 rd inst, one new green bible, two sur-
plices, an old gown, a green velvet Case for the
pulpit Cushion, the hearse Cloth, one green pulpit
Cloth, and a small sum of money.'
And under the year I633 , the following curious
entry occurs in the parish register of North Wing-
field :
' Upon the first day of August or there aboute
their was a great clock plum stolen out of the
steeple, which was eight or nine stone weight,
sum strong body did steal yt or else it could not
have been carried away for I could not lift it with
one hand, at the same time there was a kaye left
in at Booth (?) Savage house which did unlock
the Chapple door when they pleased to goe and
ringe when I was out . . . And manie times the
Churche doores was left open when I never did
know of it by this means allso by going into the
Chappell window & breaking the . . . door into
the Chancell. At there pleasure the Church was
made common and doores left open alnight manie
times.'
vVe may also quote another curious entry which

Local Events. 245

occurs in the register of Bexley, under the year
I683:
' Fhat in the week before Palm Sunday about
the I8 th March, I Benjamin Huntington, Vicar
of Bexley, in the County of Kent, for ye discharge
of my duty and conscience, did certifie to the
Churchwardens of the parish aforesaid, that there
were severall pieces of plate, vizt two Silver
Flagons and Silver Almes Dish (a Bason) alienated
from the use of the Church, to which they were
given by pious and generous benefacto TM and had
been ever mnce the times of the late horrid
Rebellion. And did then likewise according to the
best Information acquaint them yt they were de-
posited by M r Nicholas Franckwell, sometime
Vicar, in the hands of M TM Anne Grymes.'
A fire, as nowadays, occasionally caused no
small excitement in village life, as may be gathere.d
from the following memorandum, recorded in
Mayfield register under the year 1611 :
'Upon the Saboath daye, being the 15 th daye
of Maye, about 8 o'clock in the night arose a
great fire in the house of Thos. Stephen, at the
west end of Mayfield towne, and burnt downe
both his house and the next house adjoining, and
sett on fire another house and also a barne. The
fire by God's providence was put out, the whole
towne being n great danger, by reason of the
violence of the wind, which then was towards the
west.'
And a memorandum in the Nantwich register
relates how 'upon Thursday, the 29 th October in
this yeare [1629], about 12 of the Clocke in the

Local 1Events. z 5 

the entries in the parish registers that his father,
John Russell, had three daughters and two sons--
William, born in 668, and Thomas in 672 ;
and it is probable that the above person (com-
monly known as 'Betsy the Doctress') was one
of these. Lysons tells that, in the course of his
wanderings, this eccentric individual 'attached
himself to itinerant quacks, learned their remedies,
practised their calling, and that this knowledge,
combined with his great experience, gained for
him the reputation of being a most infalfible
doctress.' In his disguise he was a very convivial
old.lady, it being his practice to treat his com-
pamons at the village ale-house.
_A similar case bearing on our subject is reported
to have happened early in the present century.
The person who acted as parish clerk, and was
always dressed as a man, and had, moreover, been
married to a woman some time before her death,
was found at her decease to be a woman. _And
in the register of St. Bodolph, Aldgate, under
July 17,  655, we find this entry :
' William Clark, son of John Clark, a soldier,
and Thomasine, his wife, who herself went for a
souldier, and was billetted at the Three Hammers,
in East Smithfield, about seven months, and after
was delivered of this child She had been a
souldier by her own confession, about five years,
and was some time Drummer to the Company.'
On the fly-leaf of one of the Bampton registers
is this memorandum:
' The origin of the name of Mount-Owen was
as follows: Some persons were passing by, when

Social Limb as Toht by Parish Registers.

the cottage at the top of the hill was in building ;
anaong whom was an eccentric old shoe-maker
named John Neal, and he was asked to give it
a title. He said it must be called Mount-Owen,
the Rev. Hugh Owen being Vicar of one of the
portions of Bampton at that time.'
To quote another entry in which the eccen-
tricity of woman is further illustrated, we find in
the register of Chapel-en-le-Frith, under March I a,
1717, the following strange adventure of a young
girl narrated. It appears she was about thirteen
years of age, and her name was .Alice Phenix.
She 'came to this town to a shop for half a stone
of towe for her master, being an apprentice to
W TM \Vard of the Peak Forest. She went from
this town in the evening and called at Peter
Downs house, who lived then at Laneside. They
sent her away in good time to have gone home.
She turned again and was found at the house when
they were going to bed. Peter called her in and
sent her to bed with his daughter, next morning
calling her up very soon he sent her away, but as
they were going to plough found her again, and
his son did chide her very ill, and she seemed
then to make best haste home, but sitting down
between two ruts in George Bouden's Part on
Paislow, sat there that day and next, and Friday,
Saturday, Sunday, and Monday till noon. Two
of which days, the I5 th and I6 th was the most
severe snowing and driving that had been seen in
the memory of man. This girl was found about
one o'clock on Monday, by William Jackson, of
Sparrowpit, and rilliam Longden, her neighbour

Local Events. 2 5 3

in the Fforest. They carried her to the same
house back again, to Peter Downe's house, and
after she had got some refreshment, a little warm
milk, could warm herself at the fire afterwards,
and could turn her & move her legs, with her
hands, and after was carried to her master's house
that night, & is now--March 25, 77--quite
well, but a little stiff in her limbs. This was the
Lord's doings.'
According to the State Papers, dated June 3 o,
1631 , special measures were adopted for the relief
of the poor in the hundred of Nantwich, with
the result that in the following year the principal
owners of property in the town signed an agree-
ment, which was entered in the burial register as
follows :
' Mem'--It is covenanted, promised and agreed
by us the gentlemen and others the inhabitants of
this Towne whose names are subscribed. That
by reason our Tovne is greatly oppressed with
Inmates and Strangers continually cominge to
reside anaongst us without any restraynt, in regard
whereof our own poore cannot so well be re-
sieuved [received] as otherwise they might. That
from henceforward, wee will not sett or let any
of our houses or cottages to strangers dwellinge
out of our Towne except they shall be such as
shall be able to secure the Towne, by bond to the
Churchwardens, for the time beinge, from any
change that they or their ffamilies might draw
upon ytt.'
An interesting memorandum in the second
register-book of Mildenhall informs us that ' there

INDEX..

ACC)T, fatal, at Blackfriars,
212, 2I 3
Advent marriages, I35
Adventure, strange, of a young
girl, 252
Agreements inserted in registers,
4-43,
Ale-bruer, I  7
Almanacks, rules for marrying in,
I36
Apparition, curious, 24o,
Apprenticeship, 89, I9o
Aquavity-man, 78
Astrology, I2I, 122, 241

Baby-farming, tI6, II7,
Banns of marriage proclaimed in
market-place, I27, I28
Barber-surgeon, 76
Base-gotten children, Io8
Bastards, o8
Beggars, rules relating to, 97
Bell-ringing customs, I94
Bet, curious, I89, I9o
Betrothal ceremonies, 36
Bloody Meadow, duel fought at
the, I83
Boat accident, 2o 9
Boundaries, parish, beating of,
I96, 97
Bowels, burial of, 6I
Bowls on Sunday, 2o6

Brawls, fatal, 87
Bridal couple, putting of, to bed,
I44, 45
Briefs, 36-39
Bull, parish, I95
Bungay, black dog ol r, 22o
Burial at midnight, 48, 49
 by soldiers, I47, 48
-- by women, 47
-- fees, I55
-- gardens, I64
-- in woollen, 58-6o
--of suicides, I5o , 15I
-- solemn, I52-54
-- usages, I47
Bye-blow, illegitimate child, lO8

Calendar, change of style,
Cat, cure for bite of, 92
Caul, superstition relating to,
121
Charities, parish, I98 , 99
Charms, 75
Children, illegitimate, Io8, IO 9
-- of God,
--wrongly named, 3, x4
Chrisoms, 7,
Church, backside of, 48
-- customs, 2o4-219
--robberies, 3, 244
Civil marriages, I33
Cock-throwing, 2o5, 2o6

Index.

Coffin, burial without a, 152
Comedians, t79
Comets, 232
Commonwealth, registers during
the, 133
Contracts entered in registers,
40, 41
Creatura Christi, IO9
Crom eli's daughter, marriage
I32
Croydon almshouses, 200, 2oi
Court letter writer, I77
Curfew-bell, I92-I94
Curfew-land, 193
Dancing-masters, I79
Deaf and dumb, marriages of, I4 o
Death and the grave, I47-I69
Deaths, strange, I65, I66
]Debtors. sanctuary for, 185
Disputes, how settled, I79-I8I
Dog-whippers, 216. 217
Dog-whippers' Marsh, 216
Dreaman, a, I77
Drink, fatal effects of, I86, I87
Drought, great, 228
Duels, fatal, I83, 184
Earthquakes, 235
Easter dues, 214, 215
Eclipses, 233
Epidemics, 81-93
Excommunicated, burial of the,
I48, 49
Excommunication, Io 5 , lO6
Fewters, idle people, 184
Fields, burial in the, 89
Fires, some disastrous, 24_5
Folk medicine, 91
Fools and jesters,
Fortune-tellers, 74
Foundlings, lO9-111
-- hospital for, II 3
Frosts, great, 229-23 I
Garden, burial in, I64
Ghost story, 239
Gipsies, 75-77
Gowrie plot, 249
Graves, position of, I6Z, I63

Hardwicke's _Act. Lord, I8
Heart burial, I6o, I6I
-- death from broken, I67
Heat, great, 231
Hunt, royal, 248, 249
Illegitimate children, Io8, Io9
Jockeys, I79
Jolly rant, the plague so called, 83
Lent, meat in, 212, 2I 3
Light, strange, seen, 233
Lightning, death from, 22I, 222
Lion, baiting of, I95, 196
Lutenist, I77
Mad dog, cure for bite of, 92
Market-place, banns declared in,
I27, I28
Marriage, I24- I46
-- by justice of peace, I3I
-- contracts, I37
-- tax, I39
-Merry-begotten, illegitimate chil-
dren so called, IO8
Meteors, 233-235
Midnight burials, I48-I9I
Midwife, baptism by, IO 9
Military discipline, 99
Mistakes, comical, in registers, 113
Moles, 254
Mortuary fees, 56, 157
Nativities, casting of, 74
Natural phenomena, 220
No Man's Piece, land so called,
lO 3
Nuptial contracts, I36
Nurse children, II6
Occurrence, mysterious, at Baun.
ton, 239
Orchard, burial in, I63
Palmistry, 75
Pannyer-man, I77
Parish broils, 33-36
-- clerks, 56-58
--- customs, I92-2o 3
 fees, 58-6o

Index. 257

Parish lands, 35
-- life, 25-46
-- pews, 60-63
-- rights, 3 o, 3 I
--scandals and punishments,
94-IO6
Parson and people, 49-65
Pewage money, 66
Pictor-man, x75
Plays in church, 2o 5
Poor Laws, 25-27, 33
Pork Acre, I99
Posting sickness, plague so called,

-Rates, old, I9O ,
-- burnt, 3, 4, 8, 15, 246
Registers damaged through negli-
gence, 9
-- interpolations in, IO-I2
-- lost, 9
-- mutilation of, 2-4 IO, 11, 13
-- preservation of, 16, I7
--sold, 6, 7
--- stolen, 3
--value as legal evidence, IO-
I2
Registration Act, the, I9, 21
Rose's Act,
Royal touch, the, 79, 80
Rushes for churches, 217

Sabbath, observance of, 2o6-2o8
Saltpetre-man, 177
Scape-begotten, illegitimate chil-
dren so called, IO8
Scrofula, cure for, 79
Sermons, 77"79
Serpent, a huge, 237
Servants, persons of quality as,
172
Seventh son, superstition relating
to, 77"79
Shorthand, curious specimen of,

Shows, curious, 238
Sieve and shears, 77
Singing-man, 178
Small-pox, $I
Smocks, marriage in, 14o
Snow-storms, gceat, 228, 229
Social usages,  7o- 19 I
Solenn burials, I52-I54
Spinsters, 142
Sponsalia, 136
Stamp Act, I8
Stealing, death for, IOO
Stocks, parish, 95
Stop-gallant, plague so called, 82
Storms, destructive, I5, 223-225
Strangers, decision relating to, 253
Strange sights, 237-242
Suicides, burial of, I5O , 15I
Sun, curious appearance in, 236
Superstitions, 69-80
Sweating sickness, 8I

Thunderbolt, death by, 221
Tithes, 27
Tomb-maker, I77
Torchlight burials, I49
Trades, curious, I75 ,
-- obsolete, 177

Virginal master, I52 , I75

Want, death from, 184, 185
"Vater-bearer, I76
Wey-house, the, 176
Whipping, customs relating to,
96-98
Whitsuntide, marriage forbidden
at, 135
Wife's debts, I39
Wills made by parson, 62, 63
Winding-sheet, burial in, I52
Wise man, 74
Wise woman, 75
Woodmonger, a, 177
Worms, death from, $I

THE END.

Elliot Stock, 6z, Pater, taster Row, London.