Sign up for Genealogy Pointers »

Christ Church was established in 1695 and was the first Episcopal church in Philadelphia. For a number of years it served the entire Anglican community, and by 1760, when St. Peter's was split off from it, more than 10,000 baptisms and burials were recorded in its registers. These registers are intact from 1709 and the baptismal and burial records are abstracted in this work, which was originally published as two long-running series of articles in the Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography. Both the baptismal and burial records are arranged alphabetically by surnames. In the baptismal records each entry gives the date of baptism, the name of the child and the names of his parents, and the birth date or approximate age of the child when baptized. In some cases the entry identifies an adult who was baptized, and the entry gives his or her age at the time. The burial records give the date of burial, the name of one of the parents of the deceased or, in the case of an adult who died, the name of the surviving spouse. This is a very important book for anyone with an interest in colonial Pennsylvania genealogy!