General Info
Service provided with support from:
Copyright:Reading Borough Council 2012
You are here: Home > Family History > Wills and Probate
Wills, or grants of administration for those who died without a will, can tell you a lot about someone and their relatives.
Until 1858, it was the Church that dealt with wills and probate, as soul and property were joined together. The BRO has the records of two church courts that granted probate: the Archdeacon of Berkshire, and the Peculiar of Faringdon. The Archdeacon oversaw wills of people with property in Berkshire, unless they owned land elsewhere or lived in one of the 'peculiars', places where court jurisdiction had been granted to another Church official.
Indexes to the entire Archdeacon's collection, 1480-1857, is available at the BRO, and a new, complete index should be published in 2012. The index to probates granted by the Faringdon Peculiar Court is available below.
Peculiar of Faringdon: probate index 1547-1853 (81KB)
Files with this symbol are in .pdf format. To view these files you will need the Adobe Acrobat Reader software. It can be downloaded below free of charge. Click To Download
39,000 names on one CD.
Latest Galleries
Inside Victorian BroadmoorStories from England's first Criminal Lunatic Asylum
For the Welfare of the Insane PoorA History of Fair Mile Hospital 1870-2003
The Berkshire County Council Portrait CollectionThe Great and the Good from County Government
The Berkshire Echo
The Berkshire Echo 59April 2012: Gardens and Gardening - Illicit Love at Buscot Park - a Littlewic...
View All