The other day I was researching in the parish registers of St. Cuthbert’s, an Anglican church in Darlington, County Durham, England. As I was studying these registers, I came across a curious baptismal entry that was recorded in the early eighteenth century. Which of the entries do you think it is?

The Unnamed Child

Look at the entry that reads “A child of a wandering beggar baptized darlington.” Now, when I saw it, I immediately began asking questions about this entry. Why wasn’t the name of the child recorded? Was it because the child might have been sickly and close to death? Had the parent not chosen a name yet? How old was the child? Was the child with a father, or a mother, or both? I would guess that the parent mentioned was the mother, but the entry does not even provide that piece of information. The focus of my research assignment did not permit me to take time to try to find the answers to these questions. However, this entry sheds light on some possible issues with pre-1837 British genealogical research.

Parish registers of baptisms, marriages, and deaths were kept in England for centuries before the civil registration of vital events began in 1837 and they are a valuable resource for genealogists. From 1538 onward, Anglican priests were required to record every baptism that took place in their parish, even if the person being baptized was not a resident of that parish.

The entry of the “unnamed child” I found suggests that it was less important to the priest to record the name of a person that he baptized if that person was not a member of his parish. If the beggar and child had stayed there, the financial responsibility of caring for the family would have fallen to that parish. The entry clearly states that the beggar was wandering, which provides absolutely no help in pinpointing where this individual might have lived.

This situation, although it is somewhat rare, provides a possible explanation as to why some people cannot find a baptismal record for their British ancestor. It’s one more piece of information to keep in mind when trying to trace our ancestors who manage to elude us from time to time.