Kirk Session Records.....

DavidWW · Post by **DavidWW** » Thu May 18, 2006 10:06 pm

Liz Turner wrote:.....snipped................One entry I do remember was a bit of a stooshie about the minister being called before the session as a result of "pre-marital fornication". From the first entry it wasn't clear who was being called before the session, but subsequent entries showed that it was the minister himself!! He was disciplined and in effect booted out. ....snipped

A not that infrequent reason for a gap in the OPRs is that the meenister had been deposed for such a transgression

, with his successor not appointed for some time. Drunkendness and a bit of houghmagandy with the housekeeper were not uncommon "problems"

..........

In the interim, a minister in a neighbouring parish might look after baptisms and marriages/banns in the "empty" parish, but it could also be the case that folk went to neighbouring parishes for these needs .........

David

Davie · Post by **Davie** » Thu May 18, 2006 11:49 pm

Since posting this topic, I have been looking at the Kirk Session records
Never thought of looking at them before.
As I understand it now, all the records are in the local county archives.
For example. if I want to find a rellie in Stirling, Perth, Argyle, I have to go to their Kirk Session records,
And all the others are in the NAS in Edinburgh?
Looking for help on this
Davie

DavidWW · Post by **DavidWW** » Fri May 19, 2006 6:53 am

sheilajim wrote:....snip...... I think that there was some mention of them going online sometime in the future. This would be very useful for people like me, who have to do their searching long distance. Does anyone know when they might go online? ....snip...............

They're being digitised and indexed. The former is complete, so that the images can now be seen on the search room computers on a visit to NAS, but the indexing is going to be a long project. In fact, the first phase of the indexing is a pilot project involving just one area to see just what different indexing methods are possible and feasible. So some long time yet before anything becomes available on-line.

BTW NAS holds most of the sessional records of Established Church of Scotland congegrations (CH2 series of records) which includes the United Free Church congregations (CH3) which rejoinded the Auld Kirk in 1929. They don't have all of the originals. Some of these are with local archives, but NAS normally then have a microfilm. That's apart from the something like 50 or 60 Established CoS congregations around Scotland that have exercised the option to keep their kirk session records.

David