The Church of St James, Milnrow in the County of -- Lancashire --

The Church of St James
Notes on the Transcription of Baptisms 1715 to 1765

I have used both the transcripts of the Milnrow Parish Records completed by Rev F.R.Raines in the 1830s and checked them against the microfilm of the actual documents which he used to make the transcripts. He was on the whole extremely accurate but occasionally I have corrected some of his mistakes. At one point on a very difficult document he mistook 1843 for 1842 and did all the dates incorrectly. I have corrected this.

The Page Numbers column refers to either FR Raine's transcription page numbers or to numbered original records. Where there are no numbers the pages had no number.

Some of the pages of the original records have further deteriorated in the 150 years since Rev Raines's transcript. So where the edges of pages have disappeared I have had to trust his interpretation of the data on a small number of pages. All I can say is - thank goodness Rev Raines had the foresight and patience to transcribe the records! That man was someone with great vision, way ahead of his times.

This is not a letter for letter transcription of the Milnrow Baptism Parish Records because I wanted the database to be more easily searchable. Therefore I've modified the spelling of names and places and not included the individual vagaries of various clerks' spellings.

In a society where many couldn't read or write it must have been difficult for the clerks to work out exactly what names to record, especially when they were new to the district.

If you're really interested in the actual words and spelling variations I suggest that you order and view the Microfilm No. 506448 "Parish Registers 1726-1851. Church of England Chapelry of Milnrow, Lancashire, England" at your nearest Church of The Latter Day Saints Family History Centre.

I've also made all placename spellings to the modern name as far as I can.

All surnames Scholefield, Scholfield etc will be found as "Schofield" It was transcribed as Scholefield in the 1720s and gradually seemed to become Scholfield by the 1750s then later Schofield. I have left Scholefield Hall the place with that spelling, as this persisted during the period covered.

All Haigh will be found as Hague.

All Howorth, Howerth etc will be found as Howarth. There were no Howards in the area until 1743, whether they moved to Milnrow then or it was a corruption of Howarth I don't know.

All Whittle, Wittles etc will be found as Whittles.

Garsides are found as Gartside.

Miln, Milln, Millne, Milns etc are all Milnes.

Wild are all Wilde.

The same with Susana, Susanna etc are all Susannah.

Abram is always Abraham.

Alys, Als, Ales is always Alice.

and so on...........

Turnough, Turner is more problematic. I haven't been able to find out if they're the same place and just due to the different clerks or 2 different places. The modern spelling is Turnough so I've left the 2 variations, also with the Surname.

All name abbreviations now read as the full name.

Interestingly the few names which never varied or were misspelled are Sutcliffe, Butterworth, Robinson and Belfield.