In this volume that Index is continued and brought down to the year 1650, after which date, for about nine years, no wills are now preserved at Chester, and it seems probable that none were proved there during that period, 1651 – 1659. Why the year 1650 should have been specially selected at Chester, as the last year for some time, when wills were proved there, is difficult to explain, but it arose, at least in part, from the unsettled state of the country after the Civil War, and the abolition of Episcopacy. As early as Nov. 5, 1644, the House of Commons passed an Act appointing Sir Nathaniel Brent, Knight, doctor of law, and his deputies, to the office of Master or Keeper of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, and further enacted that no probates, letters of administration, &c., taken out since May 3, 1643, should be legal unless so taken out before the said Sir Nathaniel Brent or his deputies.
