Catalogue description Probate Records

The destruction of the vast bulk of locally proven wills at the district probate registry Exeter in 1942 has rendered this a much depleted class.

Probate act books and registers of wills, administration bonds, tuition bonds, etc. from the mid C17th - early C18th may be found among the Licence Books (D\D\01), some of which were calendared by Col.H.R.Phipps for the years 1564-1665 (typescript in office library).

Probate material for the archdeaconry of Taunton, mainly comprising inventories mid C17th - mid C18th is held among the Sheppard MSS(DD\SB). The antiquarian Thos. Serel rescued a section of a will register of the bishop's Consistory Court from a Wells butcher's shop in the late C19th and it is now among the S.A.N.H.S.archives (DD\SAS SE 30: calendared Proc.S.A.N.H.S. 61).

Copies of the Estate Duty Will registers 1805-1812 and original will copies 1813-1857 are held under reference DD\ED. The latter series does not include wills proven in peculiars although some probate material from these jurisdictions is listed among the Peculiars Series D\D\P-.

The effect of the loss of wills in 1942 was a little mitigated by the existence of a number of publications of abstracts and lists of wills viz. three volumes of Somerset Wills proved in the P.C.C. between 1383-1558 by the Somerset Record Society vols.16, 19 and 21; 6 volumes of Somerset Wills (mainly but not wholly P.C.C.) for the C16th and C17th by Rev.F.Brown; lists of wills and administrations proved in the court of the Archdeacon of Taunton 1537-1799 and 1569-1799 respectively and of wills proved in the court of the Royal Peculiar of Ilminster between 1690-1857 by the British Record Society vols.45 and 45a and finally, the Revd. W. Weaver published abstracts of about 600 wills proved at Wells between 1528-1536 in his book Wells Wills. Volume 62 of the Somerset Record Society comprises a compilation of various lists of wills together with abstracts of several Chew Magna wills of C16th and various wills compiled by Rich. Holworthy. The Society subsequently deposited various unpublished abstracts at the S.R.O. under reference DD\X\SR. The Society of Genealogists holds a MS. list of all wills proven in consistory and peculiar courts at Wells up to 1857.

Finally many original wills are found in the various collections of archives held at the S.R.O. and are all noted in the Office Wills index.