Have you ever wondered what was in the Parish Chest?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is - A wooden chest used for storing parish records, such as records of births and deaths, property deeds, and legal documents. Parish chests were used particularly from the medieval to the Jacobean period. Chests were often bound with iron straps and locked with state-of-the-art (for the era) secure locks. In an era when written documents were rare and very valuable, chests were often used to store important papers for local inhabitants, not just church records. Though most medieval chests were extemely simple - some were even carved from a single tree trunk by hollowing it out - some are richly carved on the front face. Many, particularly Jacobean and Elizabethan chests, bear the date of construction carved on the front or top.

 

And with thanks from a blog from MJ McKinstry it can hold:

 

*Parish Lists – Naming those who had served as parish officers   and their date of tenure;

 

*Rent Books – Listing by quarter who by name was assisted with rent monies and how much;

 

*Care of the Poor – Ledgers naming a child, the mother and sometimes the father with a dated list describing cash expenditures and what it was for;

 

*Settlement Certificates – On a typed form, a certificate guaranteeing that a person/persons were inhabitants “legally settled in the parish of ------”;

 

*Parish Papers – Records tracking money spent on the poor, naming the person; itemized furniture and clothing expenses for individuals; lists of various parish expenditures and Pew Rents, listing the number of pews, how many could sit in a pew and its annual rate;

 

*Minutes of Vestry meetings were also included;

 

*Orders of Removal – Dated entries giving monies received from other named parishes to either maintain or remove a person/persons living in -----, naming the person;

 

*Apprenticeship Papers – Entries naming a tradesman and his occupation; identifying a child by the parent’s name with an apprentice contract giving the cash terms of the arrangement. Actual apprenticeship ledgers, giving a date, apprentice’s name, sex, age, parents’ names (if any), their resident parish, the name to whom the apprentice was bound, that person’s trade and resident parish, the term and fee of the contract, and the signatures of the parish officers and local magistrates.

 

 

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