| Description | The return of transcripts of parish registers to the bishop at visitation is normally assumed to date back to the Provincial Constitution of Canterbury, 1597, although in some other dioceses they start earlier. In 1603 the 70th Canon of the Convocation of Canterbury regulated the method of return by churchwardens, which was to be from Lady Day to Lady Day. In Lichfield, however, they seem to have been returned every three years, apparently via the bishop's visitation, rather than annually. In 1812 the Parochial Registers Act (52 Geo 3 c 146) laid down that they were to be returned by the incumbent within two months after the end of each year, and were to include peculiars. Transcripts posted in accordance with directions could be sent free of charge, but this ended with the Postage Act of 1840 (3 & 4 Vict c 96). The fact that the regulations were not always complied with resulted in the destruction of unknown quantities on which registrars refused to pay the postage.
At Lichfield, Bishops transcripts usually begin in the 1660s, probably as a result of destruction or loss during the Civil War and Commonwealth periods. Apart from a few strays dating from the first half of the 17th century, those which begin in the 16th century were compiled either in 1598-1599 or in 1693, when incumbents seem to have been encouraged to fill up post-1660 gaps, and a few apparently went back to the earliest register: Atcham (Salop) from 1619, Coleshill (Warks) from 1538 and Loppington (Salop) from 1558, although the surviving registers for this last parish do not start until 1654. In general, the transcripts are fairly complete from 1700, and for many parishes from c1660. After the commencement of civil registration in 1837, marriages are often excluded, and the transcripts cease altogether at varying dates from the 1830s and 1840s (mainly parishes in Coventry archdeaconry transferred to the diocese of Worcester in 1836) and more often in the 1850s to 1880s. Two only continue into the 20th century: Shenstone (Staffs) to 1910 and Donnington Wood St Matthew (Salop) to 1924. Some transcripts for Coventry archdeaconry, 1833-1917, will be found among the Worcester diocesan records at Worcestershire Record Office (b 736 BA 2022, 2027).
The transcripts are arranged by parish in two main series: the pre-1813 irregular shaped parchment sheets (B/V/7/1), which are in bundles, usually one per parish but more in the case of populous parishes; the post-1813 transcripts, which are entered on forms in the same format as the registers themselves (B/V/7/2).
For some parishes in the Oswestry rural deanery the physical division between the two types is not so clear-cut. As these were deposited later, these parishes sit at the end of the main alphabetical sequence (B/V/7/2/760-771 and B/V/7/2/760-771).
A third series (B/V/7/3) consists of the burial registers of eleven municipal cemeteries covering the period 1854-1924. |