P89/5/1

Churchwardens' account book (summary receipts and detailed disbursements)

1704 - 1807

From: 1704 To: 1807

Regular business includes purchase of Communion bread and wine, bell ropes, books etc.; payments to ringers; payments for cleaning, minor repairs, Visitation and Confirmation expences; payments of quit rents; Vermin payments; repairs of churchyard fences; receipts of rents; and from c.1720 occasional minutes of election of Churchwardens and passing accounts etc. At front: notes on rents, 1705-1711 [very scruffy], and later accounts [possibly private accounts] Occasional business includes: 1704-5 Purchase of account book for 3s. 1706 "Paide at a meeting about the Bells" 3s. 6d. Repairs and purchase of materials 1708 A ladder for the bell loft, 1s. 8d. 1709 For a Book of Homilies, 9s. 1710 Recasting bell, transport, and rehanging etc., cost over £10 1715 Purchase of a pulpit cloth, £3 10s. 6d. 1731 Purchase of tiles and sand etc. 1732 "Paid John Joanes for the Church Chest" 12s. 1737 Repairs to the steeple [?] 1738 "Paid the carpender for his worke for the stox" 3s. 7½d. 1740 "Paid for Iurenwook dun for the bells" 3s. 19d. 1743 New lead for the roof 1745 "Paid for a Tarier for Vickrage Land and a parchment" 2s. 6d. and payment for "taking in the Tarier" 1747 "Paid John Cambers for making a pue dore and mending the seats" 3s. 6d. 1754 "Paid for Binden the Church Bibill" 15s. 6d. 1757 New padlocks for church chest 1757-60 Accounts kept in very great detail 1760 New surplice and purchase of cloth etc. 1780 Repairs to Town houses 1784 Making hangings for the pulpit 1785 Church repairs by Thomas Berrill, mason 1788 Three bills stitched in volume: Ed. Wildman for church repairs 1798-9; James Bailey for a scarlet broad cloth, 1788; and Red Lion Inn, Bedford, for Visitation dinners, 1788. 1791 Minutes of Vestry meeting re Church rates due on various properties in the parish, and re damage to a hedge belonging to the parish, 27 February 1791 1793 Purchase of a psalm book from Mr. Smith, stationer [Bedford] 1807 Paid Mr. Webb for a pipe, 6s.

item

Joanes, John,
Cambers, John,
Berrill, Thomas,
Wildman, Edward,
Bailey, James,
Smith,
Webb

RAVENSDEN, churchwardens, accounts, bread, wine, church bells, bellringing, confirmation, Episcopal Visitations, quit rents, vermin, churchyard, church fabric, Bedford Red Lion, High Street, Vestry, parish rates