Kirk Session Digitised Images .....

[DavidWW]

I've mentioned before the joint NAS/SCAN/GSU project to digititally image and index many of the kirk session records that they hold.

What I hadn't realised before I had to go into NAS on Friday to drag Catriona away to meet me and ADP for lunch , is that, as these images become available, they can be viewed on the NAS computer system.

Coverage as yet is not great, but obviously it's well worth enquiring of NAS before any visit, now and in the next wee while, whether the images for your particular areas of interest are available.

David

[the kiwi]

Hi David.

Just a follow up on your item on Kirk Session images.

Can you advise me where i can view these images on line or do you have to view them at source.

I am coming to Scotland in the New Year so if you can provide some answers it would be great.

The session i am interested is the Kinross parish, hope they have some info for me.

Thanks.
Regards
The Kiwi

[DavidWW]

Hi David.

Just a follow up on your item on Kirk Session images.

Can you advise me where i can view these images on line or do you have to view them at source.

I am coming to Scotland in the New Year so if you can provide some answers it would be great.

The session i am interested is the Kinross parish, hope they have some info for me.

Thanks.
Regards
The Kiwi

For the moment, only in at National Archives of Scotland at Old Register House just next door to New Register House (hence the "New"!).

They will come on line, but when I know not. Don't even know if this will be on a county-by-county basis or whether indexing has been started yet.

David

[CatrionaL]

Good Morning the Kiwi

It may be advisable to contact the NAS beforehand to enquire about what Kirk Session Records are available for Kinross, or consult their catalogue
http://www.nas.gov.uk/doingResearch/default.asp
The ones I actually wanted to consult were inexistant.

Must add though that I did strike gold. Decided to look up the only available records and discovered that 20 years after the birth of her illegitemate son,, my GG Grandmother, by then a married woman, was still having problems with the Kirk Session.

Enjoy your New Year visit to Scotland. Hope it helps to further your research.

Catriona

[scooter]

I'm not particularly au fait with the Kirk Sessions and wondered if anyone might be able to offer some advice on the following. I've been looking for the place of orgin of an ancestor who married in Kinfauns, Perthshire in 1813, but who was probably living in Perth at the time. It's highly likely that he hadn't been 'in county' for very long, and could have originated in Port Glasgow, Renfrewshire (the 1841 census lists him as being born Outside Census County). Unfortunately he died just after the 1841 census and as a result there are no clues as to his place of birth, or parentage.

I've been told that he might have needed a certificate of good behaviour from his birth parish if he needed to get married in Perthshire, and that this may, or may not be included in the Kirk Sessions. My question is, how are the Kirk Sessions organised, and if such a document did exist, where amongst them might I find it?

If anyone has any suggestions I'd be keen to hear them.

Thanks in advance,

Scott

[DavidWW]

Scott

It was indeed necessary to have such a certificate of good behaviour, - often called a testificate, - but it's very rare for them to survive, - I'm very fortunate to have one from 1804. Such a testificate was required before he could join a congregation in his new location, - Perth if he was living and worshipping there.

You may or may not find mention of new communicants from other areas who have joined the church after moving into the area from elsewhere, but you will be totally in the hands of the session clerk as to the level of, detail, if indeed there is any apart from his name, that is included in the kirk session minutes.

And then you have the not inconsiderable problem of knowing which of the congregations in Perth, both established and secession, that he may or may not have joined

Sessional records take the form of large books with minutes of the meetings of the session, sometimes very detailed, but sometimes very short, e.g. "This day the Session met" !, along with, sometimes, sets of church accounts, records of use of the mortcloth, and, sometimes baptismal and marriage/banns records whoch really should have gone in the OPR but sometimes got mixed up.

Most extant sessional records are at NAS in Edinburgh, but there is a small number of such records at various local archives, sometimes duplicated at NAS, sometimes not. See the above post re the digitisation project.

David

[scooter]

Thanks David,

That was both interesting and useful. I'm hoping that the window in which I have to look is quite small as the chap I'm looking for was nineteen when he married and none of his relatives seem to live in Perthshire. I'm also hoping that he was also a resident of Kinfauns at the time of the marriage, and perhaps moved to Perth afterwards (the first child was born there three years later). Family lore has it that he worked at the castle, probably as a Sawyer. All the subsequent children were baptised at the Gaelic Chapel in Perth, you wouldn't happen to know if that was established or secession?

I'm planning a visit to the NAS and will look on anything I find as a bonus rather than a certainty!

Thanks again,

Scott

[DavidWW]

Thanks David,

That was both interesting and useful. I'm hoping that the window in which I have to look is quite small as the chap I'm looking for was nineteen when he married and none of his relatives seem to live in Perthshire. I'm also hoping that he was also a resident of Kinfauns at the time of the marriage, and perhaps moved to Perth afterwards (the first child was born there three years later). Family lore has it that he worked at the castle, probably as a Sawyer. All the subsequent children were baptised at the Gaelic Chapel in Perth, you wouldn't happen to know if that was established or secession?

I'm planning a visit to the NAS and will look on anything I find as a bonus rather than a certainty!

Thanks again,

Scott

Guess whose website comes up first on a Google

From another:

" ....... St.Stephen's Gaelic Chapel in Perth. This particular church was built in 1788, after a fund raising drive by the town's other parishioners. The population of the town at that time was mushrooming due to economic prosperity, and one of the results of this was an increase in the number of Gaelic speaking Highlanders being attracted to the town from the surrounding countryside. The church was built for their needs, and the minister of the church initially preached all of his sermons in the language of these Highlanders, Scots Gaelic.

The 1845 Statistical Account of Perth quite categorically states:

St. Stephen's is entirely for the Gaelic population, which is limited, and not for the inhabitants generally (p.117). "

And from other references, it was established Church of Scotland.

David

[Thrall]

I too struck gold like CatrionaL, in August when I had a quick look at the minutes of the kirk session of Kilchrennan and Dalavich in the computer at NAS. A brick wall of several years standing was demolished in ten minutes of reading. Suffice to say that my gr.gr grandmother claimed that a certain young(ish) man from the next parish was father of her child. He denied it categorically, several witnesses were "compeared" and "interrogated", describing having seen them alone in her father´s house, but did not remember what the pair were doing or saying, and the midwife gave evidence and put the birth about six months too late! After the Presbytery of Lorne got involved, not to mention the sheriff, another young man was "compeared, declared himself the father, and being suitably admonished was absolved according to the usual discipline". Eighteen pages of fascinating minutes, rather difficult to read, but so well worth the effort. Not perhaps for the faint hearted though, the kirk session took their duties very seriously.

Good hunting,

Thrall.

[pinkshoes]

Not perhaps for the faint hearted though, the kirk session took their duties very seriously

Not the only ones Thrall. I visited the Society of Genealogists in London at the weekend (to help my English friend), and we found some records from a Roman Catholic Church. Similar to Kirk Session Records, they gave details of how members had fallen from grace - the usual fornication, post-nuptial fornication etc.

But some poor soul was given penance for "incontinence". The mind boggles


Pinkshoes

(edited for stupidity)