MARRIAGES - CHRIST CHURCH ST LAURENCE SYDNEY

 
 
The parish of Christ Church St Laurence was established to cater to the 
population living in the south of Sydney Town in 1838. The first marriage was 
performed in the new parish on the 14 May 1838 by the Rev Thomas Steele, 
the first chaplain. Up until the end of 1840 there were 146 marriages performed.
 
The information recorded for each marriage is as follows:
 date
 groom 
 family name
  Christian name
 year and ship of arrival
 civil status at time of marriage
 age at marriage
 parish
 bride 
 family name
  Christian name
 year and ship of arrival
 civil status at time of marriage
 age at marriage
 parish
 consent given by
 officiating minister
  reference number
 
The marriages are listed in chronological order.
 
Post 1826 all parishes were required to record all marriages on a standardized 
printed form, which contained the following information: register entry 
number, family name  and Christian name of both bride and groom, residant parish 
of the bride and groom, date of marriage, who gave consent to the marriage 
and the officiating minister. Information recorded on the register but not 
included here includes the names of the witnesses to the marriage (Interested 
readers are urged to consult the original register for this information).
 
It should be pointed out that 'year and ship of arrival', 'civil status at time 
of marriage' and 'age at marriage' for both bride and groom are all "value added" 
additions researched by this work to complement the church register. As 
explained above the age at marriage is a derived figure.
 
The Rev. Thomas Steele was appointed first minister to the parish in 1838 but 
he only remainded one year to be placed by Rev. William Walsh in 1839.
 
Occasional mininsters included: Rev.Hart Sparling, Rev.John Duffus, Rev.E 
A Dicken all in 1838, then Rev.William Cowper & Rev.John Troughton in 1839 
and finally Rev.Robert Bolton, Rev.John Elder, Rev.W W Simpson in 1840.
 
Of the grooms, 48 (33%) have been identified and for the brides 52 (36%). 
The consent of the Governor was required in 30 cases (21%), the lowest 
percentage of any parish in the colony reflecting the social standing of 
St Laurence's.
 
The reference number would direct the reader to the entry in the original parish 
register. The numbers commenced from 1 in May 1838 but were initialized to 
B001 in February 1839 and ran to B114 by the end of the decade. 
 
There was one marriage in the State Archives Pioneer Series file which had 
no entry on this parish register. It is very likely that this results from 
typographical errors and relates to post 1840 marriage.
 
To locate an entry on this list; firstly an alphabetical search on the name 
would be made on Lists 3 or 4 using code "SLS" from which the date of marriage 
would be retrieved, secondly using the appropriate date, the marriage would 
then be located on this list.

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