Parish Register Society of Dublin, Marriage Entries from the Parishes St. Andrew, St. Anne, St. Audoen, & St. Bride 1632-1800 (1913)

Cat No.:   IE0353:

Printed for the Parish Register Society of Dublin by William Pollard & Co., and first published in 1913 is volume XI of the Parish Register Society of Dublin, the Marriage Entries for the Parishes of St. Andrew, St. Anne, St. Audoen & St. Bride, Dublin. Republished here on fully-searchable CD-Rom the registers are amongst the oldest surviving parish records in Ireland, and in three instances date from or very nearly to the foundations of the parishes in question.

By Act of Parliament on 1875 the parish registers of the Established Church of Ireland were placed under the Control of the Master of the Rolls. However, by the time of the publication of volume I of the Parish Register Society in 1906, one of the main conditions of the Act, namely the concentration, collection and depositing of the parish registers of the former Established Church in the Public Record Office of Ireland in Dublin, had not taken place. In a sense and with hindsight this transpired to be fortuitous as many of the parochial records that did find their way to the Public Record Office were destroyed in the infamous 1922 fire. In line with the formation of a number of Parish Register Societies in England, it was deemed necessary by the founding members of the Parish Register Society of Dublin to make publicly available the older and more important surviving parish registers of the Established Church of Ireland, beginning with the oldest in the country, those of Dublin City, for the valuable work undertaken by genealogists and local and family historians.

There would appear to have been no obligation to keep parish registers in Ireland until the Canon of 1634, although there had been an abortive attempt to introduce a form of public registration as early as 1617. However, this was discontinued in 1620 in a row over fees, the year after the commencement of the St. John's registers, the oldest surviving parish registers in Ireland. The Canon of 1634 required every parish and chapel in Ireland to keep a book wherein must be written the day and year of every Christening, marriage and burial. The Canon does no appear to have been strictly enforced as no registers in Ireland begin immediately after the date of instruction. Only two registers in Ireland pre-date the Canon, that of St. John's and St. Brigid, Dublin and in only five other instances are registers known to pre-date 1642, amongst which is the Parish of St. Bride.

Republished here are the marriage entries for St. Andrew dating from 1672 to 1800; St. Anne from 1719 to 1800; St. Audoen from 1672 to 1800 and St. Bride from 1632 to 1800. In the first two instances the republished registers date from virtually the foundation of the parishes and in the case of the second two few records pre-date 1632, although the churches are of much older origin. The Registers for St. Bride are noteworthy for a number of reasons, not least because of the large numbers of French names that occur due to the prevalence of French Huguenots that settled within the bounds of the parish. Appendices of occupations and places are included in this publication as are the names of famous individuals such as Napper Tandy and Wolfe Tone. The editor has crossed check the marriage entries against the Dublin Grant Index and has also provided marriage entries found in the Parochial Returns that were not found in the Parish Registers. All of this makes for a most satisfactory and complete publication and in the case of the Parish of St. Bride, the only records that now survive for the parish. The Republication of this number in the series of the Parish Register Society of Dublin remains as relevant to the genealogist and family historian today as they were when the registers were first published. 

No. of CDs is:  1 ;   Format is:  PDF ;   Searchable?:  YES;

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