Expert’s Choice
Stuart Raymond, author of Tracing Your Church of England Ancestors (2017)
CCEd, the Clergy of the Church of England Database ( theclergydatabase.org.uk), is the authoritative source for identifying Anglican clergymen between 1540 and 1835. It enables you to identify all incumbents of Anglican parishes, most curates, and some schoolmasters. It tells you where they served, who ordained them, and who their patrons were. Occasionally, it also gives dates of baptism, provides details of education, and notes dates when livings became vacant (a clue to deaths). You can search for individual clergy in the ‘browse persons’ box, and for the succession of clergy in particular parishes in ‘browse locations’.
CCEd is based on sources from some 50 archives, and records the major events in clerical careers: ordinations; institutions; appointments as schoolmasters, lecturers and curates; and resignations. Sources are mostly diocesan archives, rather than parish registers or university alumni listings, which should be searched separately. The most important sources used are Bishops’ Transcripts (recording ordinations and institutions), visitation books (recording attendance at regular visitations), subscription books (recording clergy oaths) and licensing records. These sources, with others, have been brought together in order to trace the careers of individual clergymen.
The database is an important first step in the process of tracing clergy. Do read the information for genealogists before you search, and bear in mind that there are other potential sources. Indeed, I devoted a whole chapter of my book to researching forebears in the Anglican clergy.