| Description | Documents which were separate from the main series were deposited as part of LD412.
Few churchwardens' presentments at 17th and 18th-century visitations have survived. The questions to be answered concerned the defects in the state of the church, churchyard, glebe and glebe-house, minister and parishioners, charities, hospitals and schools, but the returns are often brief.
1673-1693: Charlecote, Elmdon, Marton and Wasperton (Warks). The returns for Charlecote and Wasperton were to the dean of the peculiar of Hampton Lucy. There are seven returns for Elmdon, six of them to the archdeacon, one to the bishop.
1726: most parishes in Stafford archdeaconry
1730: most parishes in Stafford archdeaconry
1739: 6 parishes in Salop archdeaconry (all but Wroxeter are nil returns)
1742: 27 parishes in Salop archdeaconry (all are nil returns, but Wroxeter has a separate sheet giving detailed answers to articles, and Sheinton has a note on a collection for the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel).
There are in addition: 1708 presentments for Coventry archdeaconry and 1730 presentments for Stafford archdeaconry among the consistory court cause papers, (B/C/5/1708 and B/C/5/1730)
A greater quantity of presentments survives from the early 19th century onwards, but by this time the printed form included the words "I have nothing to present", and only occasionally are more detailed returns made.
Returns made by the clergy to articles of enquiry at a bishop's primary visitations are usually considerably more detailed than the churchwardens' presentments, but they have survived only partially. These primary visitations were those of bishops Lloyd (1693), Chandler (1718), Frederick Cornwallis (1751), North (1772) and Ryder (1824), together with a further set of visitation articles of bishop Ryder in 1832 which are similar in nature to primary visitation articles.
The questions asked at the 18th century visitations chiefly concern the size of the parish, the strength of Protestant and Roman Catholic dissent, education and charities, residence of clergy and provision of curates, catechising, number of services, the frequency of the sacrament and the number of communicants.
The questions asked in 1824 and 1832 are more concerned with the provision of church accommodation and of day and Sunday schools. |