The Key to the Family Deed Chest: How to Decipher and Study Old Documents / Being a Guide to the Reading of Ancient Manuscripts

CHAPTER IX.
PARISH OFFICERS AND THEIR BOOKS.

Among the contents of the parish deed-chest wherein registers are supposed to be safely kept are often found other books and papers, seemingly of little interest or importance, but in reality very likely to yield curious and original scraps of information, with glimpses into the life of the poorer classes during the past centuries. Some day these old account books, now flung aside as worthless, will be of great importance in an antiquary’s eyes, for they give lists of all the residents in the parish, from the squire to the lowest and poorest, showing the social status of each; and further, are of value when compared with the parish registers, as giving a clue to the length of residence of inhabitants who, if of the middle class, sooner or later served their turn as parish officers; and if paupers, were entered as recipients of parochial charity.

Previous to this century the churchwardens, overseers, road surveyors and parish constables held office for one year only, being elected at the annual Easter vestry; now re-election is supposed to take place, but the post is usually carried on from year to year without opposition.

Apparently some rule of yearly income or rental governed the election, or else certain tenements were represented in rotation by their tenants, for widows were liable to serve, in which case a son or some near neighbour was deputed to act in the woman’s name.

Now the custom of yearly change has died out, and a churchwarden once elected goes on from year to year, until sickness, old age, or death renders some fresh arrangement absolutely necessary. This statement was ‘caught up’ by the reviewers of this book, but, nevertheless, it is perfectly true. Surely, if in those old days, when education was so sparsely distributed, and even reading and writing looked upon as sciences—if then it was possible to find men able and capable of directing local affairs, it seems strange that now so few are considered fit for the post, when every day-labourer’s son is taught drawing and essay-writing in addition to his elementary studies.

The office of churchwarden is very old. Now it has lost most of its prestige, and the churchwarden is almost forgotten except on the Sundays when collections are made; formerly each villager took a personal interest in affairs which some day he himself would probably be called upon to manage.

The two churchwardens of a parish represented the rival interests of its inhabitants: the parson versus the squire and his tenants. Each officer had his clients’ interests to uphold and consider. The most onerous duty before the present system of Poor Law, however, fell upon the overseer of the poor, in whose hands rested the responsibility of the proper distribution of the public funds in the shape of bequests and legacies; to him came applications for relief, and with him also were mooted all questions relating to the disposal of paupers, both dead and alive. Edward III. forbade the giving of alms to able-bodied men, but no regular Poor Laws were invented till Henry VIII. was King.

The first Acts of Parliament relating to Poor Laws were passed towards the conclusion of Queen Elizabeth’s long reign. It was absolutely necessary to make some fresh statutes applicable to the new state of affairs consequent upon the Reformation. Previously most of the charity had been distributed or directed by the monks, and after these were dispersed and their lands seized by the Crown and sold, their unfortunate dependents were rendered still more dependent, and all the severe laws against vagrancy and beggars made by the Tudor sovereigns could not abate the nuisance or solve the difficult question, while doles and gifts of bread or alms served only to increase the evil through toleration.

Worse and worse the state of things became, till towards the end of the last century the climax was reached; there were then whole families of paupers who, generation after generation, made no effort towards self-support either for themselves or their offspring. These last were brought up entirely on charity, clothed, fed, and apprenticed, till finally married by charity, the fees being paid out of the charity money; nor did the matter end there, for, probably, after the lapse of years the wedded couple with their children (if they became chargeable to the parish) were returned to their native village, again to become recipients of its charity till death claimed them, and the parish paid the funeral expenses.

The first commission upon the Poor Laws took place in William IV.’s reign, and since then reform has gradually been at work. In many places public charity is still abused; but no real good can be effected at once, and every effort must be proved by long and fair trial, under which all unsuitable experiments will fail, and only the practical and beneficial ones will survive the test. Of course, relief and outdoor assistance were left very much to the discretion and honesty of the overseer, whose accounts were yearly scrutinized at the Easter vestry, when the parochial accounts were discussed. Sometimes these discussions were considered of sufficient importance to be entered in the parish books. Questions as to the ownership and distribution of pews in the church, repairs to the edifice, by whom they were to be done, boundaries, and whose business it was to keep in order certain roads lying between rival parishes—all such matters came forward for consideration, and, finally, the officers for the ensuing year were elected, and the books handed over to the new churchwardens.

Perhaps a further check upon miscellaneous entries being made in the books was that all the accounts had ‘to be passed’ at the nearest Sessions and signed by the presiding magistrate, who was some neighbouring squire.

The parish constable is now replaced by the policeman supplied by the county, as visible representative of the law in rural places.

One entry often found among the old accounts was of repairs done to the village stocks, frequently used to punish petty offences, especially drunkenness. The pound, too, often needed mending; fines for allowing animals to stray and become empounded are among the most frequent entries in old manor court rolls. In many places a hayward was a regularly appointed officer for this purpose, whose duty it was to capture the animals and attend to them until they were reclaimed by their owner or sold to defray expenses. In Berkshire the hayward, or pinder, gave a tally to the person who brought the beast found on his land, and he did not deliver the beast until its owner produced the tally, proving that compensation for damage had been properly paid, as well as expenses for keep during its detention.

The offices of overseer of the poor and of road surveyor, the latter called waywarden, are not of any great antiquity; nor are they of consequence so far as regards the old account books, in which their elections are often not even mentioned. As to the constable, we only get a casual glimpse of his duties when we read a list of his expenses incurred in conveying some delinquent parishioner to the county gaol, or of journeys taken to distant places to enquire into the antecedents of paupers, or in taking them back to their own villages.

It is the overseers’ accounts which are really curious—those long lists of garments bought to clothe the paupers and their children, the old apprentice forms by which the children were placed out in service so soon as they were capable of earning a stray sixpence towards their own keep. Cruel as it seemed to be to send out such young children to work, it was, in reality, the kindest thing that could be done for them, for it gave them a chance of thoroughly learning a trade and so becoming independent and working for themselves. With all our modern Poor Law organization and schemes of education, I believe in the end we shall eventually return to the old system of juvenile apprenticeships—a far more practical method of teaching than any mere class instruction.

Maybe a bundle of old papers are rolled together among the account books. These may be the orders for the removal of paupers back to the village they called ‘home,’ a custom first originated by some Acts of Parliament passed by Charles II. At the same time the parish officers were commanded and forced by penalties to provide for paupers removed back into their parish, and, to prevent fraud, written proofs as to the proper home or residence of the paupers had to be obtained and produced; these papers are called ‘settlements.’ Paupers are now removed back to the workhouse of their own district if they can prove a certain length of residence.

The parish officers did their best for the welfare of their charges: they provided the old women with spinning-wheels, so that they could earn a trifle for themselves, while the men were set to work on the road; when failing in health they were tended by a parish nurse, and if sick the doctor saw them. Sometimes they were sent to Bath or Cheltenham to be cured by the far-famed waters. For many years these old annuitants lingered on, till we read the last entry paid for burying Goody or Goodman So-and-so.

Any public event which required to be celebrated by the ringing of the church bells is sure to be mentioned among the ordinary expenses.

There are in the old books (those of that unsettled time when the religion of the State varied according to the Sovereign in power, during the Tudor and Stuart dynasties) many notices of the alterations wrought both in town and country places. The church goods were first catalogued by order of Edward VI.’s Ministers; rich vestments, altar hangings, and numerous vessels are named in the first list, but later on, under Queen Elizabeth, the parish churches were further despoiled, till there was little left for the Puritans to remove, and in the later lists only the old service books and books of religious instruction are left to the churchwardens to chronicle. Although instances as early as 1287 are on record, the erection of pews was an innovation only introduced by degrees after the Reformation. The destruction of screens and the removal of altars caused altar rails and communion tables to be used instead. Then came the terrors of civil war. Upon the churchwardens devolved the duty of providing burial for soldiers slain in battle. Such burials were not often in the churchyard, but on the boundaries of parishes, the expenses being defrayed equally by both parishes; this was probably an old custom in warfare, but it was carried out as late as the Commonwealth. A battle was a public calamity, and the responsibility of providing interment for the slain was therefore a public duty.

After the Restoration of Charles II. the churches were repaired and the royal arms restored. Later on we find some parsons resigning their work from nonconforming scruples; at this time, too, are notices of excommunicated persons. The Puritan zeal was aroused by James II.’s injudicious attempt to restore Catholicism; and attendance at church, first commanded by Queen Elizabeth, was further enforced by an order that taking of the Sacrament should be regarded as a test of conformity; for disobedience the punishment of excommunication was inflicted upon the churchwardens’ application to the bishop. The Recusants, as papists were called, were treated with great severity and injustice, and heavily fined for their religious beliefs.

Any fresh Act of Parliament with reference to fees or taxes was soon noted in the parish books. Fees varied in different places, according to custom. Prior to the eighteenth century fees for burial within the church were payable to the churchwardens, but afterwards became the parson’s perquisite. These entries in the churchwardens’ books may lead to the identification of vaults and interments not noted in the parish register, and consequently forgotten. The burial of strangers was always charged for at a higher rate; for paupers the parish paid the expenses, and the tax of 3d. on each burial, as levied by Act of Parliament, was not enforced. Taxes were levied on many things under the Georges, but none were more obnoxious to the people than the birth, marriage, and death taxes, of which the clergyman was made to act as a most unwilling tax-gatherer.

The window-tax fell heavily on old manor houses pierced with innumerable windows and skylights. It was then that many windows were blocked up to avoid payment.

In the last century are many entries of payment for the release of men seized for service in the army or navy; when the father of a family went away, his wife and children were left to be provided for by charity, and the first payment by the churchwardens for his release was in the end the cheapest.

A list of rails (spelt usually ‘rayles’) surrounding the churchyard reminds one of another almost obsolete custom, that of each person repairing the rail in the fence next to his property or for which he was liable. The liability was attached to the land, though custom decided whether the owner or the occupier was the person to do such repairs.

Last, not least, in the parish chest were bundles of old papers, technically known as ‘briefs.’ In the account books all church collections were duly entered. Originally collections were more of the nature of voluntary rates, for the name of each donor is given and the sum he gave, varying in accordance with his social position and means.

The origin of church collections is obscure; no doubt the offerings given at the Sacrament were always devoted to the relief of poverty and distress.

To regulate and restrict the right of levying collections Acts of Parliament were passed, and no collection was allowed to be made without a proper license called a ‘brief’; but the issuing of these grew to an alarming extent. Briefs were issued for all sorts of emergencies and disasters, principally for damage by fire, there being then no insurance offices; and the old buildings, once set alight, were seldom rescued from total demolition. A complete list of early briefs would be curious, but would be so extensive as to fill a large volume. The subject has not met with the interest it deserves, but I believe now it is beginning to be studied.

The churchwardens probably kept few, if any, accounts prior to the sixteenth century, therefore any older church collections are unrecorded or only mentioned by chance.

In an old parish book of Sulhamstead are entries of the following collections:

1670. Collected towards the redemption of English captives in Turkey; and, again, in 1680, a similar collection took place. It puzzled me much why such a small Berkshire parish should subscribe so liberally for the release of slaves; but this was explained on discovering that Turkish pirates infested the seas, and even landed with impunity on the Western coasts, and carried off prisoners, both men and women, to become slaves. The main road to the West ran through Berkshire; travellers along it doubtless brought tales of such wild deeds, which lost nothing in the telling, and excited the sympathy of the country-folk.

In 1699 money was again collected; this time to redeem 300 captives detained by the King of Morocco.

In 1678 funds were collected towards the rebuilding of St. Paul’s Cathedral, destroyed twelve years previously in the Great Fire of London. Many papists all over England added their contributions to this collection.

1699. Collection was made for the French refugees and Vaudois settled in Switzerland, who had fled at the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. To inhabitants of Sulhamstead village this may have had a keener interest in that Samuel Morland, afterwards made a baronet, the son of a former rector, Rev. Thomas Morland, was sent out by Government in 1655 to inquire into the condition of the Waldenses, and he wrote thereon a book descriptive of the country and its inhabitants. Martin Morland, another son of the rector, had returned to his old home—at the Restoration; he resigned his living in 1665—for here two of his sons were born.

Five collections for fires in different counties made in one small parish within a year!

In 1703, brief for refugees in the Principality of Orange.

After 1703 the givers’ names are no longer entered.

The parish doctor was regularly engaged by the churchwardens. In 1774 the agreement for Sulhamstead was made and signed by the doctor, and witnessed that he ‘should do the business of surgery and apothecary, broken bones excepted, for the yearly sum of five guineas’! No wonder that these hard-worked physicians lacked skill, and relied more upon practice than education for what talent they did possess.

The perambulation of parish bounds was another vestry question, upon which rested disputed tithes. In entries of tithe old field-names, now forgotten, may often be recovered. The commutation of tithe also was discussed, and in some places the parson made agreements with his parishioners on the subject. Visitation fees came before the vestry, and sending copies of the register to the Diocesan Registry was, or ought to have been, an annual occurrence. Any dispute seems to have come within the vestry’s jurisdiction, and all dry subjects were washed down with plenty of ale, an item regularly entered among the expenses.

Perhaps it was at the vestry that the village urchins came up to claim rewards offered for the extermination of vermin, their instinctive love of sport being further developed by their love of gain. Foxes are among the animals named on the list, together with stoats, sparrows, etc., and the prices paid for this wholesale destruction seem very high.

The spelling of many of the old account books is decidedly phonetic and original, but as a whole they are legible and neatly kept. They need nothing to explain their meanings as to what class of information their pages will yield, except a guide such as I have endeavoured to give, for the books of one parish closely resemble all others.

The history of a parish can never properly be written if the parish books are missing. The value of these books is not fully appreciated, and they are too often thrown aside as useless rubbish.