Recusant Returns

The records are arranged as follows (note that some of the documents are Catholic Record Society transcripts):

• 1643: document concerning recusancy (transcript).
• 1706: returns for Diocese of York (transcript).
• 1733: summaries made from returns for Diocese of York (transcript).
• 1735: returns for Diocese of York, with summaries, correspondence and notes, arranged by deanery and peculiar (transcript).
• 1743: summaries made from returns for Diocese of York.
• 1745: return for Liberty of Ripon (transcript).
• 1765: returns for Doncaster deanery.
• 1767: returns for Diocese of York, with summaries, cuttings and correspondence. Transcript of returns and related material also available.
• 1780: returns for Dioceses of York and Sodor and Man, arranged by deanery and peculiar.

In the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries it was deemed necessary to assess and regulate the strength of Catholicism, which was seen as a threat to the authority of the established church as well as to the state. Recusant returns, consisting of censuses of Catholics by parish, formed part of this process. Many returns give names and other details of individual Catholics, and incumbents occasionally strayed from the issue of recusancy to refer to other parish affairs or to express opinions about Catholicism.

Of the returns described here, those for the years 1706, 1767 and 1780 formed part of a countrywide survey ordered through the archbishops and bishops by Parliament. Each diocese submitted the returns (or summaries compiled from the returns) to the House of Lords.

A summary list is available at the Borthwick Institute.

Bundles of paper.

• R. Trappes-Lomax, 'Archbishop Blackburn?s Visitation Returns of the Diocese of York, 1735', Catholic Record Society 32 (1932), 204-388.
• J.C.H. Aveling, Post-Reformation Catholicism in East Yorkshire, 1558-1790, East Yorkshire Local History Society series 11 (1960).
• J.C.H. Aveling, 'The Catholic Recusants of the West Riding of Yorkshire 1558-1790', Proceedings of the Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society 10 (1963), 191-306.
• J.C.H. Aveling, Northern Catholics: the Catholic Recusants of the North Riding of Yorkshire (London 1966).
• J.C.H. Aveling, Catholic Recusancy in the City of York, 1558-1791, Catholic Record Society monograph series 2 (1971).
• E.S. Worrell (ed.), Returns of Papists 1767, Catholic Record Society Occasional Publications nos. 1-2 (1980, 1989).
• W.J. Sheils (ed.), 'Sources for the history of Dissent and Catholicism at the Borthwick Institute', Borthwick Institute Bulletin 3 (1983-86), 11-28.