Diocesan records

Records of the Vicar General of the Archbishop of Canterbury relating to the ecclesiastical administration of the diocese of Canterbury.

<p>With the exception of the subscription books, diocesan surveys, and visitation returns, and a small collection of visitation act books, 1540-1640, most of the purely diocesan records are in Canterbury Cathedral Archives.</p>

Until the mid-19th century the diocese of Canterbury comprised parishes in Kent, east of the river Medway. But with the rearrangements of the boundaries of the sees of London, Rochester, and Canterbury following the abolition of exempt jurisdictions in 1845, a number of parishes in the deaneries of Malling and Dartford and the archbishop's peculiar of Shoreham were transferred to the diocese of Canterbury. In addition the Canterbury diocese gained the Surrey parishes of Croydon, a former archiepiscopal peculiar, and of Addington, formerly in the diocese of Winchester, but including Addington Park, purchased as an archiepiscopal residence in 1807. With the exception of Croydon and Addington, all the parishes gained in 1846 reverted to the diocese of Rochester following the founding of the diocese of Southwark in 1904.