Family Reconstitution Using Parish Register Data

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

"One demands of modern historians more details, better ascertained facts, precise dates, more attention to customs, laws, mores, commerce, finance, agriculture, population" – Voltaire (1751) [1] . This essay will examine five primary sources, each of which provides significant contemporary evidence to historians studying the English family c.1600- c.1800; and, in which the family can be considered both in terms of its internal structure and relationships, and also its relationship to the wider community [2] . Specifically, this is an examination of diaries, census listings, parish registers, hearth tax records and probate documents. The nature of each source and the extent of its survival is introduced, examples of its application by historians are given, and, the strengths and weaknesses of each is discussed, as a source for studying the family. A conclusion is then drawn.

The early modern period (1500–1800) saw the beginning and increasing popularity of the diary with only three hundred and fifty four surviving [3] . Ralph Josselin, a seventeenth century clergyman in Earls Colne, between 1641 and 1683, recorded intimate details of family and kinship in a small, isolated, rural community. MacFarlane’s analysis gained an understanding of the domestic cycle revolving around the rituals of birth, marriage and death; and, the clear importance of friends and neighbours, in reconstructing, as he did, the nature of a local ‘community’, of shared interests and identities, of consensus and conflict [4] . Thomas Turner, a shopkeeper in East Hoathly, kept a diary from 1754 to 1765 and the persons referred to as ‘my family’ were analysed by Tadmore to support the notion of continuity of family structure throughout this period [5] . Turner’s entry regarding the death of his own child perhaps suggests a lack of firm early parental attachment [6] . Josselin’s losses, by contrast, accompanied unequal emotional responses [7] . Pollock used both diaries, with others, to examine child-rearing practices (1500-1900) and established the parent-child relationship was based on reciprocity rather than on natural authority and superiority of the parent [8] . The general strength of diaries, such as these, relate to: the promotion of truth rather than official record; the immediate, direct, frank, day-to-day action recorded; the intent and motivation revealed for people not otherwise known; and, adding to our understanding of the individuals, family structure and family roles. There are a number of weaknesses, specifically: that of representation in the kind of people who wrote and why they did so and which varied widely; that, in the nature of censorship details were omitted either by the diarist or the editor; and, of the impossibility to infer behaviour of other sections of society [9] . In Josselin, we are unable to gain an understanding of: the relationships of the nuclear family, participating in them, and, particularly in the relationship of the man and wife; or, parents and children as a united family; and then of parents with married offspring separated from them [10] . Josselin also refers to a considerable number of burials, marriages, and, baptisms which are not recorded in the parish register; which, if either, is right [11] ?

The word ‘census’ appears in England around 1610’ [12] . For the period before 1800, in England and Wales, around five hundred ‘censuses’ remain: each listing the inhabitants of a particular parish or township at one point in time; and, no more than eight recording the ages of the inhabitants while also providing adequate detail on relationships of household members to the head of the household. Wall’s analysis of listings for residence patterns for the over sixty-fives living in four parishes, between 1599 and 1796, concluded that for an elderly person to live with other relatives in the absence of a spouse or child was extremely uncommon [13] . Laslett extended this list to nineteen in an examination of parental deprivation 1599-1811, which concluded that for an average 20.7 per cent orphans as a proportion of all resident children, there was a greater likelihood of losing a father, and how very rare it has been to lose both parents [14] . The associated Cambridge Group collected such listings and evolved methods for studying social structure and the size and structure of the family and household and the distribution of the population by sex and marital status [15] . These studies attest to a significant strength in versatility; a basis of quantifiable empirical data for answers to questions concerning microstructures; and, a considerable contribution towards dispelling the notion that historical writing is formulated in broad and unquestioned generalisations such as by Stone [16] . The Ealing census, illustrates a weakness in the transcription in ascribing gender from christian names [17] . The Ealing list is also not the full parish and Whittle’s research into servants established rural Ealing as a wealthy rural parish which could not be representative of the wider picture [18] . In all lists, there is a minimum of direct evidence about groups and nothing about their dynamics nor rules of inclusion or exclusion, and the kinds of positions of an individual must be inferred as it is not represented in the source document [19] .

The Anglican Church has been obliged to record baptisms, marriages and burials in England, since 1538. There were 9,244 parishes in England in 1603 with, for example, around a third of records surviving in the north-west and north-east [20] . Historians have examined family reconstitution (figure 1) for patterns of fertility, bastardy, mortality, and nuptiality, and to a limited extent those of migration in historical populations as demonstrated in E.A.Wrigley et al [21] .

Figure 1: family reconstitution using parish register data [22] .

http://www.history.ac.uk/cmh/pip/images/Reconstitutionbig.jpg

Registers are also used for the wider study of social and economic history, including the study of occupations for particular communities. Parish registers have been one the most important sources for historical demography, with a major strength in offering a continuity of local recording of the three primary entries across England and across time [23] . Serious weaknesses arise in source validity, source quality, under-registration, and, in representation. The historian has relied upon treating rites as being equivalent to the vital events of birth, entry into sexual behaviour and death, where, in reality: baptism could not always be related straightforwardly to birth; marriage could not always be related straightforwardly to the onset of sexual activity and family formation; the content of parochial registration changed over time with increasing levels of detail being recorded; and, a growing proportion of the population was not resorting to parochial registration [24] . Out-migration from parishes will ordinarily go unremarked in parish records [25] . Levels of under-registration varied from parish to parish, and by type of event, through: an unknown percentage of births missing due to infant mortality before baptism; dissenters and clandestine marriages which were not registered; and, not all deaths in a parish led to burials within the parish [26] . Wrigley et al’s study was of only thirty-four parishes, a representation for England of only 0.37 per cent, which is considered a ‘reconstitutional minority’ [27] . Finally, the quality of information can be affected if, for instance, there is a gradual change, over time, in the process of recording of illegitimate births, emergency baptisms, or circumnatal deaths, requiring considerable scrutiny and cross-checking [28] .

Few types of tax records of the seventeenth-century England, have survived on such scale and quantity as hearth tax records. Enacted in 1662, a charge of 1s was made for every fire, hearth and stove within each 'dwelling: and, exemptions by level of rent and wealth applied [29] . The Assessments, preliminary reckonings of the number of hearths that should be charged, are the best preserved and most useful for population purposes [30] . Across England, the five-hearth house has been taken by King to represent an important threshold in relation to social status for the gentry, wealthy tradesmen, and, professionals, in towns [31] . Arkell, amongst many others, used hearth tax assessments to derive a multiplying factor for population total estimation [32] . The returns for the West Riding of Yorkshire lady day 1672, list the names of 31,866 people, confirms their whereabouts, an insight into the status and economic position of the individual by the hearths they were liable for, or if they were exempt due to poverty, limited means or other factors [33] . In addition, the information on hearths sheds invaluable light on vernacular architecture and on developments in building during the later seventeenth century [34] . The major strength of hearth tax records is in providing rare snapshots of both the extent and distribution of wealth and population across the entire country. Where there is sufficient data on the exempt this can also be plotted to show areas where the less well-off lived [35] . As the assessments were often made in arrears, as internal administrative evidence reveals, they may contain arithmetical errors and their accuracy varies between counties, depending upon the degree to which instructions were followed. The greatest remaining weakness, is in the evaluation of information about the poor; and, whether those people below the level for assessment, or the out-and-out parish paupers, were actually receiving poor relief. They had to apply for a certificate of exemption, through local parish government, and these certificates seem to be under constant review with communication between the assessing body and the certificating body not always resulting in accurate and up-to-date listings. That the Assessments were more interested in ‘hearth tax paying units’ rather than in houses, as such, has presented problems for researchers into family and household structure, such as Laslett, in defining such a unit [36] .

Probate sources have been used for over fifty years to study the vast majority of the population, with over one million wills surviving from 1501 to 1700 [37] . There were, potentially, several sets of records: the will, the inventory, and the accounts of the executors. The study of family, kinship and community has benefited greatly from the use of wills, as in the seminal work of Wrightson and Levine, a study of the social dynamics of a single village in the national context of economic and social change in the years between 1525 and 1700, and in Vann’s exploration of family structure in Banbury [38] . Spufford and Takahashi cite will witnessing as evidence for the strength of both social and family relationships across any economic divisions one might attempt to impose [39] . Todd, in a study of eight Lincolnshire parishes from 1567 to 1800, from counts of 10,763 bequests made in 1,442 wills, firmly concluded that testators increasingly focused on the nuclear family at the expense of unrelated individuals and the community at large [40] . Evidence of wills has also been used to counter Stone’s thesis that there was little affection between spouses in the early modern period and that wives of under-age or no children were expected to manage the family farm or business [41] . In terms of sheer numbers and their stretch down the social structure, Whittle contends, no other type of document from this period can equal the reach of wills and inventories. Probate documents do have drawbacks: most notably, they provide only positive rather than negative evidence [42] . Also, transcription is laborious and aggregation for a national study is challenged by the loosely systematic format of wills. As an indicator of wealth, debts, are not initially apparent nor factored in to estimates of wealth [43] .

The use of a single source presents an additional weakness in tempting an historian to seek a settled outcome, to find the one right answer, the one essential fact, and, the one authoritative interpretation. To overcome this problem requires the use of more than a single source: and of a rich variety of historical documents and artifacts that present alternative voices, accounts, and interpretations or perspectives on the past. Historians may differ on the facts they incorporate in the development of their narratives and disagree as well on how those facts are to be interpreted. This obliges that the historian learn analytical skills that differentiate between expressions of opinion, no matter how passionately delivered, and informed hypotheses grounded in historical evidence [44] . In this, qualitative data such as in Josselin’s and Turner’s diaries is mutually indispensable alongside quantitative evidence, such as census listings, hearth tax assessments, probate, and, parish records. Carus and Ogilvie maintain, it is impossible to understand a qualitative document, from the past, without a knowledge of the basic categories or parameters, such as ‘household’, of its social context [45] . This, in turn, cannot be done by looking at a particular society in isolation. Only by comparing it with other relevant communities, such as nearby ones, can the role of such parameters in a particular context be understood. It is possibly, in this regard, that Wrightson and Levine, in an absence of collaborative studies, have had to present such a robust defence of their seminal research of Terling over the period 1525 to 1700 [46] .

In conclusion, it has been said, local history does not write itself, but depends upon the nature of the evidence and the way that it is interpreted. Documents are decisive as an acknowledged source of bias, especially if the historian is heavily reliant on a single source: and, gains a very different perspective of the English family from the nature of this, such as can be gained from comparing the diary of Ralph Josselin, compared with the Ealing census. Often the crucial evidence for what the historian wants to write about is missing, as in the case of Lawrence Stone, and it might be better to acknowledge the fact and signal it to readers, rather than present a partial picture as through it were whole. The use of a single source presents an additional weakness in tempting an historian to seek a settled outcome, to find the one right answer, the one essential fact, and, the one authoritative interpretation. To overcome this problem requires the use of more than a single source: and of a rich variety of historical documents and artifacts that present alternative voices, accounts, and interpretations or perspectives on the past. In this, qualitative data such as in Josselin’s and Turner’s diaries is mutually indispensable alongside quantitative evidence, such as census listings, hearth tax assessments, probate, and, parish records. Precision can often only be achieved by narrowing the field of vision, as in the case of Laslett in family structure or gain perspective by widening it, as in the case of Wrightson and Levine in using multiple sources in the social structure and community relationships of the villagers in Terling, and, the historian should make the reader aware, and recognise the loss which accompanies either gain. In this, primary source documents are the most contingent factor of all. Their survival is hazardous and uneven and as is evident, by the numbers of extant documents cited, it is the more bureaucratic records that are most likely to have been preserved, diaries a great rarity, while parish records, wills and hearth tax records abound. The lottery element in local history remains and can never be eliminated but in recent times, with an increasing focus on calendaring, such as for hearth tax records, at least it can be substantially reduced.