CONSECRATION AND DEDICATION OF CHURCHES

This series contains consecration and dedication papers. The following document types are present: conveyance, petition, form of service or narrative of events, sentence, act, deeds of title and abstracts of title, letters and plans. Not all document types are present in each file, but the majority of files contain the petition and sentence.

Consecrations are the ceremonies performed, by permission of the bishop, in declaring or setting apart church buildings and churchyards as sacred. Consecrations were initiated by a petition which includes details of the land and building to be consecrated, a narrative of the events of the ceremony and a sentence declaring that the consecration has taken place. These papers were entered into registers and usually kept in files of consecration papers with original correspondence, written consents of patrons and other interested parties and titles to land.

Examples of consecrations and dedications include

The consecration of addition to burial ground for Mitcham, Surrey [DS/CP/1909/2]

The consecration of a new church, Saint Paul's, Furzedown, Streatham, Surrey [DS/CP/1926/2]

The consecration of a rebuilt church, Saint James', Clapham Park [DS/CP/1958/2]

Arranged by year, alphabetically by metropolitan borough and then parishes

<p>From 1907 entered in full in Southwark muniment books. See also DS/OP, especially after 1968</p>

Deposited in 1963, 1965, 1973 and 1976 by Southwark DR (Ac/63/50, Ac/65/6, Ac/73/6, Ac/73/125, Ac/73/135)