Talk:Hackney (parish)

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[edit] Civil parish/ecclesiastical parish

Just to put this right:

• the earliest form of parish was that into which the church (and country) in England was divided. It came under the jurisdiction of (a) the diocese and then (b) the priest who was the incumbent. Apart from administering the religious life of the parish, this, the ecclesiastical parish, also gradually became involved in more secular matters as well. The Poor Law was administered by the parish, using its committee structure (called the vestry: see that article). As time went on, other matters were added (Boards of Health/highway boards among others), but two Acts - the Local Government Act 1888 and the Local Government Act 1894 brought about secular local government. The latter introduced the civil parish inter alia.
• the articel mixes up the two: a vestry was the ecclesiastical parish; the Parish Council, the civil parish.

I have amended the opening entries to take this into consideration. Peter Shearan 15:11, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Not that simple. Civil parishes predate the 1894 act: which in any case did not effect the County of London: there was never a Hackney Parish Council. The definition pre 1866 as given in Youngs^[1] is an area "for which a separate poor rate is or can be assessed". Many townships, hamlets and tithings of ecclesiastical parishes had a distinct civil role from the seventeenth century. This situation was tidied up by the Poor Law Amendment Act 1866 which stated that all such areas should henceforth be called "parishes".

From 1825 the old parish of Hackney only existed for civil purposes. The ecclesiastical parish was repeatedly subdivided. The Vestry created by the Metropolis Management Act 1855 was quite distinct from the church vestry, in spite of its name. See [1]. It continued to exist until 1900, when the Metropolitan Borough Council was elected.

Lozleader 19:05, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Did Hackney take in South Hornsey in 1900 or was that Stoke Newington? I'm fairly sure it was Stoke Newington. Sam Blacketer 19:08, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Ooops! By rechecking Youngs, it seems that most of South Hornsey went to S Newington, but a bit went to Islington Met Borough and civil parish... Lozleader 19:25, 13 December 2006 (UTC)