Timperley Family History and Genealogy
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Buying checks in British Pounds Sterling
I have used the following company to purchase checks in British Pounds. They charge $3 per check (1997). Call first to place your order and get a price. Your call locks in the exchange rate you will pay. Then send them a check. Once they receive your check they will send out your order. I found their service excellent and received my order within about 5 days of sending my check.
Ruesch International
700 Eleventh Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001-4507
Tel: 202-408-1200 or 800-424-2923
Fax: 202-408-1211
Buying Mint (UK) postage stamps
Non-UK residents can open an account with the British Philatelic Bureau, 20 Brandon Street, Edinbugh EH3 5TT (tel: +131 550 8989). They will send you a form from which UK stamps of any denomination can be ordered. They accept major credit cards. There is a small handling fee, but there is no charge for postage and the service is said to be quick. This is much cheaper than IRCs
International Reply Coupons
Most any Post Office in the world (at least those which participate in the Universal Postage Union) will sell you a IRC. You can then send the IRC to someone in another country who can then cash it in at a local Post Office for a postage stamp covering the minimum rate for an airmail letter. In the UK, one IRC can be purchased for 43 pence (1997). Each IRC is good for about 10 grams of material (about 2 sheets of paper + envelope). In the US, each IRC costs about a dollar.
Parish Registers (UK)
Records of baptisms, marriages and burials were undoubtedly kept from the earliest Christian times, but most of those that survived were destroyed during the Reformation. In 1538, Henry the Eighth's Vicar General, Thomas Cromwell, ordered that proper register books of baptisms, marriages and burials should be kept by every parish priest in the land. This edict was repeated several times during the reign of Elizabeth the First, but the ravages of time have left us a very meagre legacy of these early registers. In fact, out of more than 11,000 ancient parishes, there are less than 1,000 with registers going back to the 16th century. Although Cromwell's original mandate ordered every parson, vicar or curate to enter every wedding, christening and burial in his parish, the original order did not detail how the registers should be kept and until a standard printed form was introduced into the church in 1814, or in 1754 in the case of marriages, the amount of information recorded was left entirely to the whim of the local clergyman.
Census Returns (UK)
At various times in the history of the UK population surveys have been carried out for statistical purposes to evaluate the taxable or military strength of the nation. It was not until 1801 that the system of decennial censuses aimed at obtaining an accurate account of the number of people living was made. The enumerations from 1801 to 1831 are of no value for genealogical purposes but in 1841, for the first time, the names of persons in every household are recorded, together with their approximate ages and whether or not they were born in the same county as they were then living. In 1851, and subsequently, precise ages are given together with the place and county of birth and relationship to the head of the household for each named person.