"Register of Strangers" *COMPLETED*

[Ayashi]

Revisiting my Brady line, I remembered a comment by Jora that an ancestor's christening in 1772, Cornhill, was in a list titled "Register of Strangers 1756. Baptisms". I asked in the thread at the time (I've just re-read it) and realised I never got an answer for what the register of strangers meant... The most obvious idea is that they weren't from the parish... but does that mean the child wasn't born in the parish, or the father didn't come from the parish, or the whole family didn't come from the parish, or that they came from Scotland...?

Thanks.

[Radcliff]

Were your family Huguenots ,these were also called strangers,in other counties,
There may have been some families in  Northumberland,not that I am an expert ,

[stanmapstone]

A Dictionary definition of Stranger is  "In parochial registers: A person not belonging to the parish" OED.

Stan

[Ayashi]

Thanks both

Radcliff- The most I know is that they might have been dissenters a generation down the line (there was some confusion about where or how many places his baptism was recorded in!) I had assumed Presbyterian as most likely option... The surname is "Brady" so no clues about any French descent there  According to wiki Huguenots did relocate to Scotland and Cornhill is on the Scottish border, so that part gives little issue. It does look like there is only one obvious Brady family in Cornhill, I've traced them back to a common ancestor, unfortunately I'm at the mercy of familysearch and I don't know how many others are "Strangers".

Stan- thanks. I thought that was probably the case but wanted to clarify. Annoyingly, I think the child's father and grandfather were christened Cornhill as well... but I don't know about the wives, perhaps they were Scotland and if the child was born in Scotland, would that make them a stranger to the parish?

[stanmapstone]

They could have lived just over the parish boundary in one of the adjacent parishes, Carham, Ford, Norham, or Coldstream, and St. Helen, Cornhill was the nearest church or chapel.

Stan

[stanmapstone]

Canon Law states that; "A  minister who intends to baptize any infant whose parents are residing outside the boundaries of his cure, unless the names of such persons or one of them be on the church electoral roll of the same, shall not proceed to the baptism without having sought the good will of the minister of the parish in which such parents reside." http://www.baptism.org.uk/canons.htm

Stan

[Ayashi]

Thanks Stan So quite possibly the father at least was indeed native of that church as I thought, but  proving that is still a work in progress, half the children from a few generations appear to be missing.

[Geordie Mag]

Often, the term "stranger" refers to someone who thoughtlessly gives birth or dies while passing through the parish. I have seen the term several times in the Darlington parish registers, for example, because the town was on the Great North Road so a lot of people were  travelling through and inevitably there were pregnant women who gave birth early and people taking ill. Cornhill would be similar. I haven't seen a reference to a register of strangers as such, but the Overseers of the Poor, under whose remit strangers would come, kept lists of all those for whom they had to take responsibility.
Mag

[Ayashi]

Thanks. I guess that's not really anything I can prove either  I only know of one other child of the couple and I'm 99.9% sure they must have had more, even if I never find trace of them. I think I really need to know more about the entire family before I can formulate a theory on why that christening ended up as a "Stranger".