If you are tracing ancestors in the UK, most online resources will only take you as far back as the early 19th century, so if you want to trace your UK ancestry further back the main source of information will be the UK parish registers. These are held at the record offices of each county and will either necessitate a trip to the relevant record office, or hiring a local genealogist to search them for you.
What are the parish registers?
In 1538, Thomas Cromwell ordered that every baptism, marriage and burial should be recorded by the incumbent of each parish. This was not always carried out in the early years, and many of these earlier registers have been lost or destroyed.
Image of a parish register from www.rotherham.gov.uk
The third problem with early (and sometimes later) parish registers is that the handwriting can be difficult to decipher, or the writing has faded or the script is so badly organised on the page that it is almost impossible to sort it out.
Before 1598, the registers were recorded on paper and therefore of poor quality. After 1598, it was required for them to be recorded on parchment. The order stated that earlier records should be copied onto parchment (though some of these were only copied from 1558, Queen Elizabeth’s accession). Thus, many registers seem to begin in 1558.
Many early registers are written in Latin, but this should not be a problem for the family historian. You only need to learn a few words to be able to understand each entry.
After 1812 the parish registers were written on specially formatted pages, so they are much easier to read.
The parish registers are one of the main sources of family history and can often help you to confirm and back up information that you find in civil registration and census records, as well as continue your searches well into the 18th, 17th and, if you are lucky, the 16th centuries.
How To Search the Registers
The county record offices have produced the vast majority of parish registers onto microfiche or microfilm in order to conserve the original registers.
In most archives, there is an open access system, where you can look up the parish register you need in an index, note the reference number and then take the relevant film or fiche from a drawer or cabinet. In some record offices you may need to fill in a withdrawal request slip.
You will find that at different periods the records look very different. By the late 19th century the baptism, marriage and burial registers were kept in separate books, making it easier for the researcher to find the right entry.
In earlier registers often the baptisms, marriages and burials were written up in the same books, usually on separate pages, but quite often all jumbled up together, and occasionally not even in chronological order, so you will need a lot of patience and a good set of eyes at times!
Because of these different ways of keeping the records, you may find that you have to change your researching tactics from time to time.
For example, it is much easier to search for specific ancestors in the later registers where the information is laid out neatly in separate books, but once the records get to a more disorganised stage, I find it best to note down every instance of your family surname that you can find and then go over your notes later to try and make sense of them.
This can save a lot of time because you do not want to have to go back over the same registers again just to look for a separate marriage or burial, parents or siblings.
If you have a lot of ancestors in the parish, it can be quite enjoyable to do this, putting together all the information you have noted like a jigsaw later.
Tracing ancestors in the UK parish registers can be a fascinating activity, though at times frustrating. Sometimes you will find extra information that the incumbent decided was important, such as whether a child was illegitimate (e.g. “base born” or “bastard”) or if the parents or a couple getting married had come from another parish. This kind of information is priceless for the family historian and can help you to establish further lines of research.
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