How did parish removal orders, settlement examinations work?

[melba_schmelba]

Would the person, and their family if they had any, be escorted to their legally agreed place of settlement?

Officially, yes: before 1834 by a parish officer, after 1834 by the relieving officer for the relevant district of the poor law union.

If they were not, what was to stop them becoming vagrants and moving parish to parish as they liked?

In practice nothing, and many returned to the parish, some almost immediately. Before 1795 they could be removed again at any time on the basis of being ‘likely’ to need relief, unless they carried a settlement certificate from their own parish. After 1795 they couldn’t be removed again unless they actively reapplied for relief.

What about cases where people's legal place of settlement was agreed to be in Wales, Scotland, Ireland, or some other British territory, such as America, Australia, India etc? Or the other end of England say from Hampshire to Durham? Surely it was not practical to expect the people to return to there? So in such cases, how was it handled?

No, it wasn’t practical, but it was often done nevertheless. The rate-payers in a parish would not tolerate paying relief for paupers who did not ‘belong’ there. They would be escorted by a parish officer or a trusted deputy, on foot if the parish was close by, or by a local carter or carrier, or later by train. There are many examples in parish accounts showing expense claims made by officers for escorting paupers to other parishes.

After 1834 it was the Relieving Officer’s responsibility to remove paupers: he would claim back his travel expenses from the poor law union, and these would sometimes include overnight stays. I have seen plenty of poor law accounts showing claims for escorting paupers from London and southern counties to the Liverpool docks, for removal back to Ireland.

It wasn't unusual, but it was impractical and very expensive, it took a vast amount of time to organise administratively, and the legal costs were huge when something went wrong. The spiralling cost of removal was one of the factors that prompted the setting up of the Poor Law Commission in the 1830s. But the situation did not improve greatly until legislation specifically regarding removal was introduced in 1846 (modified twice in the 1860s), which allowed unions to recompense each other and trade off expenses, reducing the need for the actual physical removal of paupers.

Thanks very much for your knowledge BookBox . I have seen many payments in the Overseers accounts for people to go to so and so place, even payment for travel by ship, but it isn't always clear if it's a removal without cross checking to the removals and settlement examinations. Another interesting thing you find in overseers accounts is payments, presumably to people considered settled in the parish who were in need of relief elsewhere, again it gives an interesting insight into how people moved about. Also things of social and cultural interest such as items of clothing given out to the poor, especially children, lots of food and other things such as cloth and coals to be distributed, and people being taken to hospital or to see a doctor etc. As you say, this system seems rather bonkers and expensive, it makes sense that eventually a system of recompensing each other without removals was eventually implemented.

[coombs]

I have come across a few settlement examinations, certs, where the man was actually born in the parish, thanks to other records, but had to gain settlement in that parish later in life. I guess he lived somewhere else and his father became settled there and he took his fathers settlement.

Poor law documents can be quite complex when you think of it.

It is all a bit confusing . Being born somewhere, didn't necessarily give you a settlement there, if you father didn't have one. Also I think there would be a somewhat strange possibility that you could originally have had a settlement somewhere from your father, but you then gained a settlement elsewhere through apprenticeship or at least a year's service, so if you then applied to your place of birth for relief, you would likely not get it and be removed!

And as we know the survival rate of settlement certs, examinations and removal orders is very hit and miss. If all of them had survived in their entirety, it would make 1700s research a lot easier. Also I am not sure that everyone who moved into a new parish had to have such a cert. It was only if they were candidates for poor relief, or something like that.

It is a goldmine when you do find a settlement examination for an ancestor, and it gives a parish of birth, but even then you may not always find a baptism in that parish, same for ones who gave a certain village or town as their POB in the censuses, or their POB is listed in Dade and Barrington registers.

[melba_schmelba]

I have come across a few settlement examinations, certs, where the man was actually born in the parish, thanks to other records, but had to gain settlement in that parish later in life. I guess he lived somewhere else and his father became settled there and he took his fathers settlement.

Poor law documents can be quite complex when you think of it.

It is all a bit confusing . Being born somewhere, didn't necessarily give you a settlement there, if you father didn't have one. Also I think there would be a somewhat strange possibility that you could originally have had a settlement somewhere from your father, but you then gained a settlement elsewhere through apprenticeship or at least a year's service, so if you then applied to your place of birth for relief, you would likely not get it and be removed!

And as we know the survival rate of settlement certs, examinations and removal orders is very hit and miss. If all of them had survived in their entirety, it would make 1700s research a lot easier. Also I am not sure that everyone who moved into a new parish had to have such a cert. It was only if they were candidates for poor relief, or something like that.

It is a goldmine when you do find a settlement examination for an ancestor, and it gives a parish of birth, but even then you may not always find a baptism in that parish, same for ones who gave a certain village or town as their POB in the censuses, or their POB is listed in Dade and Barrington registers.

Oh yes, it is definitely a quite hidden (and unexplored, for many) source of really interesting information for our ancestors, that I think is not really indexed yet, unless the removals were disputed and sent to the Borough or County Quarter Sessions, which sometimes are now indexed in various places, some online sites. The ones I am going through, I am finding through the LDS Mormon Familysearch Catalog
https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/

Search for a place, and if you are lucky, it will have parish chest records (sometimes listed under poor records etc.) which you can view online. Sometimes you need to go to your nearest Familysearch Center (or affiliate) to view them if they show a padlock on the film symbol. However I should also say, the records not appearing there definitely does not mean they don't exist - I think these will only be ones that were originally filmed by the LDS Church. You should also consult your local archives' catalogues, but I am not even sure they all list them (Essex SEAX is one example, in that case I only see Parish Registers browsable and find no mention of the parish chest records for many parishes that are on the Familysearch site). So to be doubly sure, if there are particular parishes you are interested in, you should contact the local archives. I know for example, that in some cases parish chest records were inherited by the local poor law unions after 1834, and separated from the parish registers so may not have been filmed by the LDS partly for this reason.

[coombs]

I have come across a few settlement examinations, certs, where the man was actually born in the parish, thanks to other records, but had to gain settlement in that parish later in life. I guess he lived somewhere else and his father became settled there and he took his fathers settlement.

Poor law documents can be quite complex when you think of it.

It is all a bit confusing . Being born somewhere, didn't necessarily give you a settlement there, if you father didn't have one. Also I think there would be a somewhat strange possibility that you could originally have had a settlement somewhere from your father, but you then gained a settlement elsewhere through apprenticeship or at least a year's service, so if you then applied to your place of birth for relief, you would likely not get it and be removed!

And as we know the survival rate of settlement certs, examinations and removal orders is very hit and miss. If all of them had survived in their entirety, it would make 1700s research a lot easier. Also I am not sure that everyone who moved into a new parish had to have such a cert. It was only if they were candidates for poor relief, or something like that.

It is a goldmine when you do find a settlement examination for an ancestor, and it gives a parish of birth, but even then you may not always find a baptism in that parish, same for ones who gave a certain village or town as their POB in the censuses, or their POB is listed in Dade and Barrington registers.

Oh yes, it is definitely a quite hidden (and unexplored, for many) source of really interesting information for our ancestors, that I think is not really indexed yet, unless the removals were disputed and sent to the Borough or County Quarter Sessions, which sometimes are now indexed in various places, some online sites. The ones I am going through, I am finding through the LDS Mormon Familysearch Catalog
https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/

Search for a place, and if you are lucky, it will have parish chest records (sometimes listed under poor records etc.) which you can view online. Sometimes you need to go to your nearest Familysearch Center (or affiliate) to view them if they show a padlock on the film symbol. However I should also say, the records not appearing there definitely does not mean they don't exist - I think these will only be ones that were originally filmed by the LDS Church. You should also consult your local archives' catalogues, but I am not even sure they all list them (Essex SEAX is one example, in that case I only see Parish Registers browsable and find no mention of the parish chest records for many parishes that are on the Familysearch site). So to be doubly sure, if there are particular parishes you are interested in, you should contact the local archives. I know for example, that in some cases parish chest records were inherited by the local poor law unions after 1834, and separated from the parish registers so may not have been filmed by the LDS partly for this reason.

Thanks, a great link. I have many Essex ancestors but many of them were of Suffolk descent, there seems to be a huge amount of Suffolk people move to Essex, a neighbouring county and nearer to London and the Thames. It is like there was a lot of Italian migration into France and Switzerland in the 1800s, and that is similar to the wave of Suffolk people moving into Essex, particularly south East Essex where many of my ancestors came from, but one of the furthest areas of Essex away from Suffolk.

The link may be handy for other ancestral counties of mine such as Durham and Oxfordshire.

I have an ancestor who lived in Romford in 1728, and he was a brickmaker, and his surname is a Leicestershire/Rutland/Derbyshire surname. Not been able to trace back any further than Joseph Stillington/Stinnington but on the case. He may have been from Middlesex or Essex of Midlands descent. Not found any poor law records for him yet.

[melba_schmelba]

Thanks, a great link. I have many Essex ancestors but many of them were of Suffolk descent, there seems to be a huge amount of Suffolk people move to Essex, a neighbouring county and nearer to London and the Thames. It is like there was a lot of Italian migration into France and Switzerland in the 1800s, and that is similar to the wave of Suffolk people moving into Essex, particularly south East Essex where many of my ancestors came from, but one of the furthest areas of Essex away from Suffolk.

The link may be handy for other ancestral counties of mine such as Durham and Oxfordshire.

I have an ancestor who lived in Romford in 1728, and he was a brickmaker, and his surname is a Leicestershire/Rutland/Derbyshire surname. Not been able to trace back any further than Joseph Stillington/Stinnington but on the case. He may have been from Middlesex or Essex of Midlands descent. Not found any poor law records for him yet.

I think there were times there were agricultural depressions due to several years of bad harvests due to bad weather or disease or pest outbreaks, so you probably had people moving towards towns and cities from the country at that point, or just simply travelling around rather in desperation to find work anywhere they could. You also had some farm mechanisation come in in the late 18th century I think, which continued into the 19th century, meaning there was a lot less work available for agricultural workers. The land enclosures also took away land that was used for grazing for poorer farmers and graziers. All that eventually led to the Swing Riots
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swing_Riots
  It is very interesting to read through the examinations as you get a very good impression of rural life. It seems that the practice of having a contracted service to a farmer was probably more on the rare side, and most work rural people got was by daily or weekly wages. If they did work for a farmer for a year by pre agreed contract, that would give them settlement, but only if there was a contract, i.e. if the farmer just kept paying daily or weekly wages at various times for over a years period, I don't think that person would gain settlement in the parish.
   I did eventually find the parish chest records for some Essex parishes on SEAX, but finding them is nowhere near as simple as the familysearch method, you have to search for the parish name and keywords for something that might be in parish chest records such as removal, settlement, vestry etc. Vestry may be better as it avoids finding quarter sessions or other parish records if you use removal. Here's a few I found, you can see that the survival of various parts of the parish chest, like overseers accounts, poor rates, church rates, bastardy records, apprenticeship, settlement examinations and removals vary greatly with some with just a few years or examples of each type of record, none of these are on Familysearch so you would have to go to Essex Record Office to view:

Epping
https://www.essexarchivesonline.co.uk/ViewCatalogue.aspx?ID=15046

Hornchurch
https://www.essexarchivesonline.co.uk/ViewCatalogue.aspx?ID=39911

Kelvedon
https://www.essexarchivesonline.co.uk/ViewCatalogue.aspx?ID=26940

North Ockendon
https://www.essexarchivesonline.co.uk/ViewCatalogue.aspx?ID=15479

Romford
https://www.essexarchivesonline.co.uk/ViewCatalogue.aspx?ID=49416

[coombs]

Thanks. A lot of them Romford records will be available at the Essex RO at Chelmsford. I last went there about 10 years ago. One day SEAX may digitise them, as they are adding more record to there all the time.

Also there must be many pauper apprenticeship records that are available with the relevant parish, ones that will not appear in the 1710-1811 index of official apprenticeship registers.

Of course many of our ancestors were never rich enough to leave a will but never poor enough to come under the poor law system.