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vestry, as representing the inhabitants generally, had the power to administer common
property and to make by-laws on all matters of public concern.” 7
The Vestry literally dealt
with any issue any of the parish officers dealt with. Examples can be found in Vestry
minutes of dealing with Sabbath observance, fees for burial in church, agreements with the
Overseers concerning care of the poor, bastardy agreements, providing of psalm singers, the
prosecution of felons and providing of beer; literally everything.
Perhaps the most powerful of duties was to require the four key offices of parish service –
Churchwardens, Petty Constable, Surveyor of Highways and Overseers of the Poor – to have
their expenditures brought before the Vestry for approval.
Because of the broad ranging power, many vestries which began as “open” or including
virtually any resident of the parish, evolved into “select” vestries, which kept the power within
the offices noted above as well as the minister, parish clerk and wealthy land holders. In
fact, Webb gives a fascinating description of Vestries and how the often “represented” the
people. He states:
The so-called “Vestry” was, in fact, in no sense a body representative of the
population as a whole. It raised its revenues by direct taxation of its own
members, and exercised by its expenditure autocratic power in the details of
parish government, but it was, in its turn, subject to a very real, if somewhat
spasmodic control at the hands of the squire, the parson, or other
neighboring Justices of the Peace. Moreover, the official relationships
between the parties were inextricably woven into the economic relationships
that existed between the same individuals in their private capacities.
The Justice of the Peace was probably the landlord of the whole of the
parish officers; the officers were the employers of the paupers; and even the
clergyman, who was in many respects the most independent person in the
village, often owed his position to the squire, let his glebe to the
Churchwarden, bargained with the Overseer as to the rates on his tithes,
and drew these tithes from every occupier of land in the parish. 8
The effect this had on records is that often “there were no minutes, no printed accounts and
no reporters for the newspapers, the persons who paid the rates themselves controlled every
item of expenditure and knew everything that was going on.” 9
As for the records kept, it was
often the case (and you will notice as you search them) that “parish account books, kept by
successive Churchwardens or Overseers, and often containing the entries for a whole
century, reveal, in inextricable confusion, the multifarious duties of the parish organization.
7 ibid. Page 16
8 Webb. Page 48.
9 ibid. Pages 48-49.