England, Kent, Bishop's Transcripts - FamilySearch Historical Records

What is in This Collection?
This collection consists of bishop's transcripts from the county of Kent for the years 1560-1911. The originals are held at Kent Archives Office. Availability of records may vary by year and locality.

Beginning in 1598, every parish priest of the Church of England was supposed to make a copy of his parish register and send it to send to the archdeacon or bishop every year. Termed either archdeacon’s or bishop’s transcripts, these copies were generally produced in the same form as a regular parish transcript. Many priests stopped producing these transcripts with the beginning of civil registration in 1837, but they did not fully disappear until after 1870.

As bishop’s transcripts generally contain more or less the same information as parish registers, they are an invaluable resource when parish records have been damaged, destroyed, or otherwise lost. However, because bishop's transcripts are, as their name implies, copies of the original records, they are more liable contain errors than parish registers might be.

Most collections of bishops’ transcripts have been preserved, and their condition is relatively good considering the age of the records and their storage conditions over the centuries. Many collections have also been copied to microfilm or microfiche.

One of the 39 historic counties of England, Kent is a coastal county located in southeastern England. Much of the northeastern portion of the county is now incorporated into the Greater London metropolis. For a list of parishes which historically made up this county, see the Kent Parishes page.

What Can These Records Tell Me?
The following lists indicate potential information given in each type of record. It must be remembered that every record may not provide all the listed information, as the procedures for keeping parish records evolved considerably over the centuries after 1538. It must also be noted that individual parishes often developed record-keeping traditions unique to themselves.

How Do I Search This Collection?
Before beginning a search in these records, it is best to know the following information:
 * Full name of the individual in question
 * General location of the event
 * Date range for record

No matter the search method, this information is the best way to identify the correct person, though other information may be used if the name, location, and date are not all known.

Browse Images of the Records
To find the digital image of a specific record, follow these steps:
 * 1) Go to the collection browse page.
 * 2) Select the appropriate Name of County link.
 * 3) Select the appropriate Name of Parish link.
 * 4) Select the appropriate Event Type and Year Range (with Volume) link to go to the images.
 * 5) Look at the individuals listed in each record and decide any of them are the right person. This may require examining several images before a match is located.

Some of the records in this collection may be written in an old script that can be challenging to read. Refer to BYU’s Script Tutorial for assistance with reading the records.

I Found the Person I Was Looking For, What Now?

 * Make sure to fully transcribe and cite the record for future reference; see below for assistance in citing this collection.
 * Use the information which has been discovered to find more. For instance, use the age listed in the record to estimate a year of birth, if that is yet undetermined.
 * If in the appropriate period, use the information which has been discovered to find the individual in civil records. Particularly useful for research in nineteenth-century England are the England Census and the England Civil Registration records.
 * Continue to search the index to identify children, siblings, parents, and other relatives. Remember that family members often appear on an individual's vital records, such as in the role of witnesses to a marriage.

I Can’t Find the Person I’m Looking For, What Now?

 * When looking for a person with a common name, look at all the entries for the name before deciding which individual is correct. Use other information, such as place of birth, age, occupation, or names of parents, to determine which candidate is the correct person. If listed, a personal title may be a clue to property ownership or occupation, either of which might be noted in other records.
 * Check for variants of given names and surnames. An individual might appear under a different name in a record for a variety of reasons:
 * An individual might have been listed under a middle name, nickname, or abbreviation of their given name.
 * Spelling was not standardized for much of the period of this collection, so names were often spelled as they were pronounced. Pay attention to how the name should have been pronounced and try spelling variations that could have that pronunciation.
 * Some women reverted to their maiden names after the death of their husbands.
 * Vary the search terms. For example, search by either the given name or surname to return broader list of results which can then be examined for matches. You might also try expanding the date range; this is especially useful in searching baptismal records, as it was not unusual for a child to be baptized weeks or even months after birth.
 * Search the records of nearby locations. In the period of this collection, most people never moved more than 20 miles away from the place of their birth, though smaller relocations were not uncommon. For this particular collection, this step may require finding records in the bordering English counties of Sussex to the south, Surrey and Middlesex to the west, or Essex across the estuary of the River Thames to the north. If the individual lived in the northwestern area of Kent, a thorough search of London records might be necessary.

Known Issues with This Collection
For a full list of all known issues associated with this collection see the attached article. If you encounter additional problems, please email them to [mailto:support@familysearch.org support@familysearch.org]. Please include the full path to the link and a description of the problem in your e-mail. Your assistance will help ensure that future reworks will be considered.

Citing This Collection
Citations help you keep track of places you have searched and sources you have found. Identifying your sources helps others find the records you used.

"England, Kent, Bishop's Transcripts, 1560-1911" Index and Images. FamilySearch. http://FamilySearch.org : accessed 2017. Citing Church of England. Kent Archives Office, Maidstone.
 * Collection Citation:

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