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London and Middlesex Probate Records

General information on probate is given in the national GENUKI page, including the locations of copies of the national indexes to all wills proved in the civl probate courts from 12 January 1858. Prior to that date probate was administered by the Church, and in order to find the records it is necessary to identify which of the hierarchy of church courts had jurisdiction over the place(s) where the deceased person's property lay. If there was property worth more than £5 in more than one jurisdiction, then the probate should have been granted in a superior court. It is also possible that a higher court was used simply for reasons of prestige or convenience.

"The city of London and the county of Middlesex were in the province of Canterbury and the diocese of London. The various jurisdictions are probably more complicated than anywhere else in the country and the searcher is advised to examine all major courts, split though they are between several record offices. P.C.C. was greatly used." (J Gibson & E Churchill, Probate jurisdictions: where to look for wills, 5th edition, FFHS, 2002, p.36.)

For details of which jurisdiction(s) a parish lay in see the above book or the Phillimore Atlas and index of parish registers. We are gradually adding details of jurisdictions to our parish pages as well. The process of proving a will generated several different types of records retained by the court, though not all of them survive. These include:

• The original will
• The court copy of the will, usually transcribed in a register book
• A grant of probate, usually copied into an act book

Where people died intestate (without a will), administrations of their goods could be granted to their heirs or creditors. These were granted by the same courts, but produced less in the way of useful documents for the genealogist. The principal record is:

• Letters of administration, copied into an act book

Both court processes would in principle produce other documents, though these survive less frequently:

• A bond, binding the executors or administrators to administer the estate according to the grant or else forfeit a sum of money
• An inventory of the goods of the deceased (the use of these died out during the 18th century)
• A probate or administrator's account

For London and Middlesex the relevant record offices and the court records they hold are:

• The National Archives. Information on tracing probate records is to be found in their Research Guide to Wills and Probate Records.
  • The Prerogative Court of Canterbury (PCC) was the superior court for all other jurisdictions in England and Wales. A full index to wills is available online with images of the court copy of the wills downloadable for a fee. Grants of administration are less easy to find. For the periods 1559-1660, 1701-1749 and 1853-1858 there are a series of printed and microfiche indexes, detailed in Gibson and Churchill. For 1750-1800 there is a card index at the Society of Genealogists. For other periods the manuscript calendars in PROB 12 have to be used.
    Until 1533 any appeal against a judgement of the PCC was to the Papal Court in Rome. In that year Parliament passed the Statute in Restraint of Appeals prohibiting appeals to Rome, and there were then two courts of appeal from PCC: the High Court of Delegates (whose functions were taken over by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in 1833), and the Court of Arches.
  • The High Court of Delegates existed from 1533 to 1833. It was succeeded as the court of last appeal for church courts from 1833 by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. The records of these courts relating to probate are in classes DEL 9 and DEL 10, and continued in PCAP 1 and PCAP 3. There is an index to wills and administrations 1651-1857 printed in The Genealogist new series 11 and 12, and also 19th century indexes in class DEL 11. The online catalogue for PCAP 1 and PCAP 3 appears to name the appellants and respondents for Privy Council cases, as well as naming the testator.
    A technical account of how the High Court of Delegates operated, including its functions other than probate, is to be found in Duncan, G.I.O., 1971 The High Court of Delegates, Cambridge University Press.
  • The Papal Court in Rome was the court of appeal from PCC until 1533. Calendars of these appeals can be consulted at the National Archives.
• London Metropolitan Archives have an information leaflet describing their holdings and others relevant to Greater London.
  • The Archdeaconry Court of Middlesex (Middlesex Division). Wills 1609-1810 are indexed in London Signatures, and images of the original wills are available to download for a fee.
  • The Consistory Court of London. LMA promise that these wills will also become available through London Signatures, and have temporarily made them available as a series of pdf files. Abstracts for wills 1621-1630 have been prepared by Leslie Mahler.
  • The Court of Hustings.
• Guildhall Library provides a guide to using its probate records.
  • The Commissary Court of London (London Division). Abstracts for wills 1629-1634 and 1644/5-1646 have been prepared by Leslie Mahler.
  • The Archdeaconry Court of London. Wills 1750-1800 are indexed by the Origins Network's Archdeaconry Court of London Wills Index. This index does not cover administrations.
  • The Peculiar of the Dean and Chapter of St Pauls.
  • The Royal Peculiar of St Katherine by the Tower.
• Lambeth Palace Library
  • The Deanery of Arches.
  • The Deanery of Croydon.
  records of both these courts are indexed by their catalogue on Access to Archives (A2A) under reference AA/V/H/97.
  • The Court of Arches
• City of Westminster Archives Centre
  • The Royal Peculiar of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster.

There is also a London Probate Index 1750-1858, "its 70,000 entries cover wills and administrations for all London and Middlesex probate courts (except the PCC)", available on FindMyPast.

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[Created 28 Sep 2007 by Andrew Millard. Last updated 05 July 2012 by Andrew Millard.]

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