« Reply #9 on: Tuesday 10 October 17 20:43 BST (UK) »
Anglican clergy were responsible for collecting the taxes in their parish. Therefore they had to know about and record the birth of every child, regardless of religious affiliation. Some are recorded in the baptism register as births, some as baptisms.
Paupers were exempt from these taxes, so if "poor" or "pauper" was written next to an entry in register it meant the tax hadn't been collected from that person. The tax was low but unpopular. Single men over a certain age and men who remained widowers for too long were also taxed.
There were other times in 18thC when births of children of Recusants were recorded in parish registers. Vicar of Kirkham in Lancashire kept a separate list in early years of century. Some other parishes seemed to lump them in with rest of children in chronological order.
I'm guessing some clergy were more zealous in this endeavour than others. I am having huge difficulties finding baptism and burial records for my early Methodist/Congregationalists in Lancashire
Newson, Steavenson, Walker, Taylor, Dobson, Gardner, Clark, Wilson, Smith, Crossland, Goldfinch, Burnett, Hebdon, Peers, Strother, Askew, Bower, Beckwith, Patton, White, Turner, Nelson, Gilpin, Tomlinson, Thompson, Spedding, Wilkes, Carr, Butterfield, Ormandy, Wilkinson, Cocking, Glover, Pennington, Bowker, Kitching, Langhorn, Haworth, Kirkham.
