Talk:Downe, Kent Genealogy

New Parish Table
Downe parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

To find the names of the neighboring parishes, use England Jurisdictions 1851 Map. In this site, search for the name of the parish, click on the location "pin", click Options and click List contiguous parishes.

Kent Online Parish Clerks has indexes available for select parishes. Records are also available at the Kent Archives.

Gazetteer entries
A gazetter reference has been added to the parish history which is already detailed. There is a heading for maps and gazetteers and the contributor might have used this to add the reference. Since the gazetteer adopts a 19th century spelling of the village name it is arguably better to restore the original parish history introduction and place the gazetteer entry elsewhere, if indeed a gazetteer entry needs to be added? ( See paragraph below about variant spelling of the village) Arguably the gazetteer content is not useful in this case; the Kent Online Parish Clerk page contains much more detailed gazetteer material and will be developed further in future. The image caption removed by this edit has been restored. DowneOPC 07:10, 3 November 2012 (UTC)

Down or Downe spelling?
The Family History Library film catalogue mis-spells the village name. In case of query Down House was the home of Charles Darwin! Penshurst 15:48, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

The error in the catalogue entry is also present in the International Genealogical Index batch entries. The village is spelled Downe (see link to Edward Hasted) consistently in record sources,but is also found as Down. It seems likely that the cataloguer made an error based on the microfilm information provided.

There is a debate on introduction of Downe as a fixed spelling when mail was introduced to avoid confusion with other places in the mail system; however examination of earlier records shows that no fixed spelling emerged consistently from the hand of most local clergy or Land Tax assessors; as indeed the spelling of names is inconsistent. All civil parish material is Downe; there is consistency from 1837 in the civil registration records held at Bromley which have been examined and Poor Law records vary in some cases ( depending on the author).

DowneOPC 20:06, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Downe Composite Register
Explanation of the earliest register has been added to assist anyone who is using microfilm images to attempt research. The quality of microfilm exposure in both the Kent Archive filming and the GSU filmings add to the difficulty of reading parts of the vellum pages. With permission the Kent OPC examination of the original document and the deed wrapper has enabled transcription to provide clearer help to searchers in the early register. It is hoped to have a transcript online with permission of the copyright holders as soon as possible. The anarchy of record keeping between 1640-1672 makes research prior to 1672 difficult with the evident loss of child baptisms reflected in 51 entries in 22 years.DowneOPC 19:03, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Copyright questions
Moderators please note that material contributed to this page is being adopted by other online pages which claim copyright on material. The content contributed describing detail of parish register series has been used to update the Bromley Archive catalogue as part of voluntary contributions to the updating of the catalogue; similarly parish poor house research has improved the catalogue references at the Archive. In case of query as to copyright please refer to contributor. The volunteer effort involved has resulted in collaboration with other relevant sites who acknowledge this effort. The date of text on this page will precede by several months any copyrighted site claims to copyright DowneOPC 09:14, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

FamilySearch Wiki technical issues
Due to a technical failure it has been necessary to resubmit edits from 25 June in connection with Poor Law records DowneOPC 14:16, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Cooperative Indexing Agreement
During October 2012 Kent Online Parish Clerks with the permission of Kent Library and Archives submitted a Cooperative Indexing Agreement request to FamilySearch for implementation during 2013 in respect of record sources for the parish previously microfilmed by the Genealogical Society of Utah. The existing Kent Online Parish Clerks transcripts extends beyond the FamilySearch material in years covered and offers a more accurate transcript than for example the data included in the International Genealogical Index batches.

Implementation of the agreement will depend upon the length of time FamilySearch take to provide material to the transcription group.

DowneOPC 12:15, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

Jurisdictions Infobox
I have added the Infobox England Jurisdictions to the top of this page. The purpose of this is to summarise the different bodies that had a jurisdiction over the local area and where records may be found. At the moment the infobox does not handle the ability to show multiple links under one heading. I would be interested to hear if this ability is essential or whether listing the most recent with narrative explanation in the article explaining the time period when this was not the case. Thoughts? The infobox is also a place holder for an image and will prevent the inadvertent removal of the image caption by contributors that use the rich text editor. I also removed some "+" that I found at the end of URLs that prevent the links working correctly. --Steve 16:31, 27 November 2012 (UTC)