Norfolk Sources and Norfolk Record Office
Copies of some wills and probate records are available online through the Norfolk Sources website and the Norfolk Record Office lists Barton Turf wills and other probate records in its online catalogue.
Prerogative Court of Canterbury (PCC) Wills
You can search for and, on payment of a fee, download Prerogative Court of Canterbury (PCC) wills made between 1384 and 12 January 1858 on the National Archives Documents Online website.
National Probate Calendar, 1846-1941
The National Probate Calendar, (Index of Wills and Administrations), 1846-1941 is accessible through Ancestry.co.uk and provides a link to wills and probate records created in England and Wales between 1861 and 1941.
UK Extracted Probate Records
UK Extracted Probate Records is a collection of historical probate records from the United Kingdom accessible through Ancestry.co.uk . The records range in date from the early 1500s to the late-1800s and include wills and other miscellaneous types of probate records.
Reading and Transcribing Wills and Probate Records
Early wills and probate records are handwritten in scripts that can be difficult to read and often make use of unfamiliar abbreviations. University of Cambridge has an online course providing advice on interpreting and transcribing English Handwriting 1500-1700. The National Archives also provides an online tutorial: Palaeography: reading old handwriting 1500 - 1800.
Some or all of the early wills and administration bonds may be written in Latin. This and the frequent use of abbreviations can make transcription difficult. One way of checking the accuracy of transcription of Latin words is to see if they translate appropriately into English and a useful tool for this is Google Translate.
Barton Turf Wills and Probates
We have started to compile a list of wills and probates relevant to Barton Turf with Norfolk Record Office or Public Record Office catalogue references and, where applicable, links to online sources and any transcripts we are aware of.
We should appreciate any information that would help make the list more comprehensive. Please contact the project team by email if you can help.
The latest version of the list can be viewed in PDF format.
Norfolk Wills and Probates
Norfolk Wills and Probates is a new not-for-profit website, which is a development of the Barton Turf History Project. It is intended to provide a place where transcripts of Norfolk wills and other probate documents can be shared with others researching aspects of Norfolk family histories.
Transcripts will remain the copyright of the transcriber on the understanding that the information they contain may be used by others to further their personal research.
Links will be provided to wills and other probate documents of relevance to Barton Turf.
Until 12 January 1858 all wills had to be proved by the church and other courts. The PCC was the most important of these courts dealing with relatively wealthy individuals living mainly in the south of England and most of Wales.
These PCC wills are all registered copy wills, meaning they are copies of original probates written into volumes, by clerks at the church courts. Over the years, styles of handwriting changed, and you will find that many of the earlier wills are written in Latin.
You can search the wills using first and last names, place, occupation and date of probate.