Long Melford Holy Trinity

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Transcribed from duplifiche of registers held at Suffolk Record Office in Ipswich. Entries are indexed alphabetically by surnames. They are also available to search on FreeREG, along with later baptisms, marriages and burials, from the 1760s to 1830s.

Baptisms, burials and marriages from the mid-1500s currently in progress. They will be searchable on FreeREG before appearing here.

Notes

  • The earliest register begins with: baptisms from 1 January 1559/60, burials from October 1559, and marriages from September 1570.
  • The earliest register is very challenging. There are a great many entries, as Long Melford was a large, busy parish. The pages are divided into two columns, which means the entries are quite squashed. The vicar/clerk has used a lot of abbreviation. Most of these are easy to spot as there’s a full stop immediately following, or the last letter is written in a particular stylistic way, which indicates abbreviation. While “Robtt.” “Wm.” and “Hen.” are obvious, please be aware that “Jo.” was usually short for “John”, not “Joseph”. “Ma.” crops up as an abbreviated forename – while it could be Margaret, Margery, or Martha as well as Mary, it seems most likely that it’s just Mary. “Anne” or “Ann” is spelt typically “An” or “Ane” – the “e” is a superscript just after the “n”. It’s unclear if it’s just “Ane” or “Anne” abbreviated. I’ve kept it as “Ane”. “Ka.” also crops up – presumably for Katherine. There are several forenames abbreviated to “Ed”. without any indication if they’re an Edward or an Edmund. Perhaps Edward is implied, because it was a more common name than Edmund? They’ve even abbreviated surnames, which is particularly unhelpful. The surname “Nottingham” appears a few times, but then appears to be abbreviated to just “Nott.” “Cooper” and “Cowper” become “Coop.” and “Cowp.”. “Sheaphard” (and variations) becomes “Sheap.” and in one case just “Shrd.”. Boreham/Borrum/Boreum is abbreviated to “Borru”. “Parmenter”, which sometimes is written generally at this period at just “Parment”, is written in this register as “Parmtt”. Several people called “Mayor” have had their surname abbreviated to “Mayr.” with the “r” as a superscript. Where the ink has faded, it’s hard to tell if it’s Mayor or perhaps another surname likes May or Mayes. I’ve transcribed the surnames in full, where it’s obvious what is should be. Otherwise, they have an * on the end, e.g. Bysto*. I’ve done my best with these, but sometimes it’s very difficult to know what the surname should be, especially if the ink has faded, and/or part of the entry is lost on the edge of the page.
  • The condition of the earliest register is quite poor in places. At some point, someone decided to trim the edges (along the sides, and top and bottom), which is a terrible way to treat a parish register, as it cuts off crucial information. There are days of the month, or ends of forenames and surnames which are lost as they’ve been lobbed off. In some cases, this has meant that entries right at the bottom of the page have been almost entirely lost – all that remains are the tantalising tops of names, without enough to decipher them. There are also the common problems of faded ink, and parts of entries (particularly days of the month) which are lost on the edge of the page where the register has been tightly bound and the curve of the page prevents the full entry from being read. I am transcribing from microfiche and there are some pages which aren’t in focus or were jogged at the shutter clicked, so are blurred, and hard to read.
  • The plague visited Long Melford several times. A note entered in the register towards the end of 1604’s burials says: “This Plauge lasted from the beginninge of May to the end of September in wch 5 monthes The Tottall that died & are her registred were juste one hundred & nineteene men woomen and children.” There are increased number of burials in the late 1720s – this is noticeable in parishes across the country and followed a bad harvest.
  • Baptisms: if you find the same child baptised twice within the space of a few weeks, it’s likely that the first baptism was private, i.e. not during a church service (usually due to medical urgency), and the second was when the child was “received into the church” during a service. Note that pages for 1618 and 1619 are quite faded in places so some surnames are very hard to read. Baptisms are fairly consistent with about 40-50 baptisms per year. This drops to: 25 in 1657, 30 in 1658, just eight in 1659, and 26 in 1660.
  • Marriages: these are recorded consistently, without any gaps, until the 1640s. We have a note after marriages in June 1642 saying “from 1642 to 1650 as followeth” – the next marriage is from 1644, then the one following has no date at all. Then we have two marriages from May 1642. No marriages are recorded from 1643 to 1645, then we go back to near-consistency again, although only one marriage is recorded for 1647, which seems unusually low. None 1653-1659 (these were likely performed by a Justice of the Peace, perhaps in another parish where they may be recorded).
  • Burials: consistent without obvious gaps until the end of 1642. There are two burials in October, one in November, none in December or February 1642/3, and one in January 1642/3 – this is unusually low. There’s a burial on 28th March 1643, then none recorded at all until September. It seems likely to me that we’re missing a four-month chunk of burials from May to August 1643. Only two burial for 1644 (one in March, the other in April). No burials at all for 1645. Burials recommence in 1646. Only 12 burials in 1655, seven in 1656, nine in 1657, seven in 1658, and six in 1659. They seem to pick up again in 1660.
  • Names: there’s a Whittingham/Wittingham family here in the late 1600s/early 1700s, but it seems that the same family’s name is sometimes spelt “Willingham” etc, with L’s instead of T’s (sometimes they can be hard to tell apart, but it does appear that the spelling is changed by the person recording the family in the register). Please watch out! Similarly, the surname Salter is spelt “Sarter” in the early 1700s. The name Hazell is also spelt Haxell and Hasell.

Baptisms

Burials

Marriages

1570-1650

1651-1700

1717-1753

To be revised and updated, including marriages 1701-1716. (April 2025)

1754-1771

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