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| No: 97 |
March 2014
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News March seminars 1: Semaphore heritage walk WEA Centre Adelaide 2:00 to 4:00pm 7: Dating nineteenth century photos WEA Centre Adelaide 7:00 to 10:00pm 15: North Adelaide heritage walk WEA Centre Adelaide 2:00 to 4:00pm 16: Family history on the Web WEA Centre Adelaide 10:00am to 1:00pm 23: Hindmarsh heritage walk WEA Centre Adelaide 2:00 to 4:00pm April Seminars 8: Researching your English ancestors WEA Centre Adelaide 6:30 to 9:30pm 12: Glenelg heritage walk WEA Centre Adelaide 2:00 to 4:00pm See the seminar program for more details and bookings. Now that is just quite peculiar Wills are a source of information for family historians and particularly those who had assets. Wills provide a snapshot of an ancestor at the time of their death. The contents of a Will can often reveal people in the family and friends. Apart from their genealogical significance, Wills can also reveal a long forgotten lifestyle. As a rule—the older the Will the more useful it will be in family history research. Often it is the accompanying documents such as inventories that provide the detail. Unfortunately they are difficult to locate. Searching for proven Wills in England prior to 1858 can be quite difficult although some recent online developments can only improve matters for researchers living well away from England. Post 1858 Wills are a different matter and have long been quite accessible but this article is focusing on the era before the State took over the role in early January 1858 and the task was in the remit of the Church of England. |
In
this issue: |
Graham Jaunay Services |
| Before one even embarks on this pursuit it is advisable to have some understanding of how the Church set about proving Wills. The Church of England was managed in a strictly hierarchical system. At the top of the tree was the Primate and that was always the Archbishop of Canterbury. The country was divided into two provinces: York in the north managed by the Archbishop of York and Canterbury in the south managed by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Each province in turn was divided into dioceses all managed by a bishop. (One diocese is not in England—Sodor and Man.) In the main the diocese takes its name from the city in which the cathedral is located but not always! Each diocese in turn is divided into Archdeaconries headed up by archdeacons. Finally each archdeaconry is further subdivided into parishes.
For example Westminster Abbey or more correctly, the Collegiate Church of St Peter Westminster, was a Royal Peculiar. That is it was a free chapel of the Monarch and exempt from any ecclesiastical jurisdiction other than that of the sovereign. It was previously, from 1222, a Papal Peculiar. Incidentally most of the York Peculiars probate documents held in the Borthwick Institute have been digitised, and these images can be purchased and viewed directly from the index records at Origins.net. If you discover your ancestor lived in a Peculiar your first task is to determine who held jurisdiction and then where they conducted their local court. More often than not the records will not be that far away and often the County Record Office or Diocesan Record Office will be the source. In the case of Westminster Abbey, prior to 1533 though, the records are in the Vatican! Now if that was confusing, hopefully the rest is more straightforward. The executor/s or potential administrator/s of a deceased person who lived and held all their assets across more than one archdeaconry within a diocese can have their Will proven or a grant of Letters of Administration (Admons) by the court associated with the bishop. Such courts are usually called Episcopal or Consistory Courts. The executor/s or potential administrator/s of a deceased person who lived and held all their assets across more than one diocese can have their Will proven or a grant of Letters of Administration (Admons) by the court associated with the archbishop. Such courts are usually called Prerogative Courts. There were of course just two—The Prerogative Court of York (PCY) and Prerogative Court of Canterbury (PCC). Where the assets were held in both provinces or beyond England then jurisdiction was with the Prerogative Court of Canterbury. Sounds quite simple when you read it through carefully but here is the twist. An executor or potential administrator could opt to go directly to a higher court. Average people did not go to this level of trouble and expense but the rich and famous sought prestige and a hearing in the PCC was the most prestigious of all! Appeals and disputes in any lower court could be settled by a higher court: the Court of Arches of Canterbury, the High Court of Delegates or the PCC. The Court of Arches of Canterbury was a court of appeal for both the Province of York and Canterbury. Its equivalent in the Province of York was the Chancery Court of the Province of York. The royal peculiars and the peculiars of the Archbishop were exempt and did not come under this court's jurisdiction. The High Court of Delegates established in 1651, was a court of appeals from the Court of Arches and the Court of Chancery and included their peculiars, royal peculiars, and the Irish probate courts. This court was abolished in 1832 when the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council was established. Where are the records for pre-1858 Wills and Admons? Technically the records of Local Courts, Commissary Courts and Episcopal or Consistory Courts will be found in the Diocesan Record Office and for most dioceses that is the same place as the County Record Office. Check to see what service, if any, the appropriate County Record Office offers remote clients at Mark Howells' website (now closed use TNA). You should check the FamlySearch Wiki as many records can be viewed on film. Search by parish name. Probate records for the Prerogative Court of Canterbury [PCC] from 1384 conducted at Lambeth are held at The National Archives. Probate records for the Prerogative Court of York [PCY] conducted at York are held at the Borthwick Institute of Historical Research. Wills in the London area may be at the The London Metropolitan Archives. The Court of Arches index and records 1660 to 1913 can be viewed on film at your local FamilySearch Library. The High Court of Delegates records are held in The National Archives. This court dealt with less than 400 Wills during its lifetime. These Wills can be viewed on film at your local FamilySearch Library. In both cases you will need to order the film for viewing online at FamilySearch and pay the small fee.  The problem remains that Wills within the Peculiar jurisdictions can be difficult to find and sometimes the best approach is to locate the taxation records levied on some legacies and on estate residuals in the period 1796–1903. These Estate or Death Duty indexes will lead the researcher to the Court where the Will was eventually proved and the registers themselves will indicate what a person actually left and to whom rather than what the deceased intended to leave as is normally the case with Wills. The tax was also imposed on Admons and can be employed as a useful adjunct to those records.Pictured: College House Masham—the former Peculiar Courthouse of the Prebend of Masham.* This particular source is very much under used by family historians, but can provide vital linkage information where it is found wanting. The only downside is that some of the records have not survived. These records are held by The National Archives in Series IR 27 and the indexes can be searched online at FindMyPast. You should also check IR 26 on The National Archives site which relates to Wills and Admons dealt with by local courts between 1796 and 1811. Search the Access to Archives (A2A) and the National Register of Archives (NRA) databases to find records held in local archives for not just Local Courts records but also the Commissary Courts and Episcopal or Consistory Courts. Remember: The more information you provide the more successful your search is likely to be and also the more cost effective. Try and provide as much detail as possible and it is essential you know the full and correct name of the deceased, the date and place of death, the subject's age and marital status. It is helpful to know the deceased's occupation, the names of the spouse and children. There are a growing number of online records being provided by the big four—Ancestry, FindMyPast, The Genealogist and Origins. The material available ranges from indexes through to the documents themselves.
* Anciently the Peculiar of Masham was within the jurisdiction of the Archbishop of York and the Court comprised of 24 men of Masham birth and living. At the Reformation Henry VIII gave it to the masters and fellows of Trinity College Cambridge and hence the courthouse name and address: College House, College Lane, Masham Yorkshire. Four and Twenty and Old Peculier beers brewed by Theakston Brewery commemorates the Peculiar that now functions as a local charity. ** All probate records for the Dioceses of Exeter and Bath and Wells deposited at the probate registry in Exeter were destroyed by enemy action in 1942. There are some printed abstracts/extracts available. |
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