Act Books

[Catling121]

Hi All,

Question on Archdeaconry Act Books - do these archives often have an index, either as part of the record or compiled by a FHS, or if one were to search them would it be a case of just trawling through everything on the off-chance that an ancestor features?

Many thanks in advance,

Chris

[arthurk]

According to "Ecclesiastical Courts, Officials & Records" by Colin Chapman (Lochin Publishing, 2nd edn 1997) the records of these courts have sometimes been indexed ("to varying standards"), but he comments that it would be rare to find the names of all witnesses mentioned.

The best thing to do would be to find out where the Act Books are held, and investigate whether there is any kind of index, either local (an ancient card index, perhaps?) or published (in which case it might be available elsewhere too).

There's an online index for the Diocese of York at https://www.hrionline.ac.uk/causepapers/ but I don't know if it includes every single name. I remember consulting records of this sort at Canterbury Cathedral Archives, and presumably there was an index of some sort which led me to the name I was looking for, but I can't remember what format it was in.

If you can tell us which diocese/archdeaconry you're interested in, maybe someone will be able to give a more specific answer.

[Catling121]

Hi Arthurk, thanks for your contribution.

I imagine that I'll stick to the Oxford Archdeaconry for the time being. Most of my research being in West Oxfordshire, Chipping Norton and surrounding parishes.

Many thanks,

Chris

[horselydown86]

Oxfordshire Act Books, at least as far as they concern probate, are in the Oxfordshire Wills Collection on FindMyPast.  They are indexed, although the indexed names may not be accurate.

As I recall the Act Book entries were free to view (but I can't say whether that is still the case).

[arthurk]

I didn't distinguish in my earlier post between different kinds of Act Books, which horselydown86 has picked up on. What I wrote related mainly to archdeaconry court records, sometimes called "bawdy courts", and these often require trips to the archives. Probate Act Books (or their contents) are much easier to consult, and many are online in one form or another, or otherwise indexed - as horselydown has said, the Oxfordshire ones are at FindMyPast.

It's always worth looking into what the local family history society has published, as their indexes etc are often available only on their own websites or in printed form. For Oxfordshire it's also worth looking at the booklets published by the Eureka Partnership. I couldn't see anything in their list relating to the bawdy courts, but they do have some Oxfordshire probate booklets which have indexed every name found in wills, including executors and beneficiaries etc. They also have a "People of..." series with names from a variety of sources - I see there are three for Chipping Norton.

[Catling121]

Hi Both, many thanks for your input.

I won't say that I've exhausted the Wills collection on Find My Past, but I'd say I've probably gotten most of the information that I can out of them for now. At this stage I'm interested to see if any of the Court Proceedings etc. contain any of my ancestors. It's really a shot in the dark, but I'm working my way through Paul Chambers' 'Early Modern Genealogy' at the moment and it's an area I've not looked into before.

Many thanks,

Chris