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The purpose of this major project was to create an index to the surnames of the couples entered in the manuscript calendars of the marriage licences issued by the office of the Vicar-General of the Archbishop of Canterbury for the period 1694 to 1850. The project was undertaken by the Society of Genealogists between 1994 and 1998 and was co-ordinated by Colin Allen and David Squire. The index has now been published in sections (generally of 25 year although the earliest part is 32 years). This site provides background on the licences themselves, the project to index them, how to purchase the completed parts and, most importantly, how to obtain useful genealogical information by using them.
Published indexes already exist for years prior to 1694 and by 1850 general civil registration of marriages was well established and so the need for this index greatly diminishes.
Introduction
Lambeth Palace Library in London contains an extensive collection of marriage records. Amongst these are the allegations submitted in applications for marriage licences granted by the Archbishop of Canterbury through the channels of his Vicar-General and the Master of Faculties. These allegations often contain biographical material which is of value to the genealogist but, without an index, they are inconvenient to locate if only a surname or is known.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, through his Vicar-General, issued common licences for couples to marry in any parish church or chapelry in the province of Canterbury. Common licences merely dispensed with the calling of banns on three successive Sundays. Until Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act of 1753, the Vicar-General's Office also granted special licences "to marry at any meet and convenient place", generally a college chapel or nobleman's private chapel not normally licensed for marriages. These licences are few in number, and are noted in the calendar as "lic[entia] extra[ordinaria]" (ie special licence). From 1753 special licences could only be obtained through the Faculty Office.
As the original licences were generally handed to the parties concerned, the records which survived in the custody of the Vicar-General's Office consisted of the marriage allegations (sworn statements in application for a licence) and a chronological calendar of licences issued. These calendars give the surnames of the couples licensed to be married. Occasionally they contain annotations and christian names.
The allegations are much more informative than the calendars. They have the full names of the bride and groom, whether over 21, their respective parish, and the church for which the marriage was licensed. In the case of a minor (aged under 21), there is usually the written consent of parent or guardian, sometimes from overseas. A review has shown that the calendars reflect the allegations quite accurately so that an index to the calendars can the treated as an index to the allegations. Examples of
allegations are given on another page of this site.
The original records of the Vicar-General are kept at Lambeth Palace Library, London SE1 7JU. A full set of allegations corresponding to the index in preparation is also available on microfilm for consultation at the Society of Genealogists, 14 Charterhouse Buildings, Goswell Road, London EC1M 7BA (+44 (0)20 7251 8799).
For further information see "Records of Marriage and Divorce in Lambeth Palace Library" by Melanie Barber which appeared on page 109 of issue 4 of volume 20 of "Genealogists' Magazine".
In addition I would strongly recommend two books in the "Chapmans Records ameos"
series if you would like additional well informed and readable background. Both are wriiten by Colin Chapman and are available from the Society of Genealogists on-line bookshop. They are "Marriage Laws, Rites, Records & Customs" ISBN 1-873686-02-1 and "Sin, Sex and Probate - Ecclesiastical Courts, Officials and Records". ISBN 1-873686-16-1.
Scope of project
As explained above, the Vicar-General calendars are lists, in date order, of the parties to a marriage and are generally surnames only.
Because it was found that there was a good correlation between the allegations and the calendars, and because photocopies of the calendars were donated by Lambeth Palace Library to the Society of Genealogists it was decided to mount a project for SoG volunteers to index the calendars. This is, in effect, an index to the allegations so far as the parties to the marriage were concerned although it does obviously not index people mentioned in the allegation who did not share a surname with either the groom or bride.
The range of the index has been set as the years from 1694 to 1850. During this period the number of licences issued varied quite significantly but was typically between five hundred and two thousand a year. More statistics can be viewed on another page on this site.
Progress of project
Preparation for the project was carried out during the period April 1994 to October 1994. This included recruiting volunteers and writing a customised data input and merger program
which would help to minimise errors and maximise productivity.
Data input, detailed checking and merging, sorting and printing was carried out until February 1998. The final volume was presented to the Lambeth Palace Library with many of the volunteers present on 4 March 1998.
Since then Colin Allen, David Squire, data input volunteers and checkers have been working on the Faculty Office Marriage Licence Indexing Project. The last checking of the Faculty Office data was finished during November 2000 and the various volumes of this second project should all be published during 2001.
Using the index
As should be clear from the above, the index itself does not give genealogical information directly but is a finding aid to assist the user in locating the allegation(s). In order to proceed the following steps are recommended:
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