Differing Responses to an Industrialising Economy - eTheses ...

the ratio of agricultural to non-agricultural labourers was static over time, but this
approach at least reflects a more likely scenario than allocating all the many labourers in
baptism data to the primary sector.
I have also used baptisms (from Elizabethan times where available) to supplement
information regarding the population of each parish. The analysis of baptism numbers
for this purpose is discussed in Chapter 3. At the end of this chapter there is a discussion
of the occupational bias of parish registers compared with some other sources.
Other parish and ecclesiastical records
Where available and appropriate, use has been made of other Anglican parish
records such as churchwardens’ presentments, settlement certificates and examinations,
parish apprentice indentures, vestry minutes and accounts of the overseers of the poor and
the churchwardens. Published monumental inscriptions for local churchyards and
cemeteries of all denominations have been consulted and also diocesan records. 38
These
are not consistent enough to be used for analysis, but have helped to provide more
information on individuals and trades. In Harvington’s parish register there is a list of
those who paid towards a collection by brief in 1695, which contains occupational
information. This is analysed in Appendix 8.
Quarter Sessions records
Quarter Sessions records have proved a patchy seam of source material for the
purposes of this study. In general it is rather fortuitous who appears in these records and
who does not. If you were a miscreant, a recusant, a victim of a crime, a licensed
38 Diocesan records such as bishop’s transcripts, visitation books and subscription books. If cited, these
appear in Sources and Bibliography.
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