The first volume of the Parish Registers of St. Albans Abbey, of which the following pages contain a complete genealogical transcript, has an interesting history. Inside its present handsome leather binding is pasted a sheet of paper containing the following note :
"This Register, supposed to have been burnt in a Fire, which destroyed the St. Albans Rectory a.d. MDCCXLIII, was in MDCCCLXXX discovered by Mr. Craggs in a hay loft attached to his house in St. Albans, the property of Mr. J. Kent, great-grandson of the Mr. John Kent who died in MDCCXCVIII, having been for more than half a century clerk to the Abbey. The Book was identified as the long lost Register by the Rev. John Griffith, LL.D., Vicar of Sandridge, at whose charge it was re-bound by the British Museum book-binders; he then handed it over to the care of the Rector, the Rev. W. J. Lawrance, for preservation with the other Parish Registers. July 22nd, 1880."
On the first fly leaf of the volume occurs the following memorandum:
"This Register booke for the Abby parish of St. Albanes was enlarged and new bound the 25 March 1652 by Eichard Williams, Stationer in St. Albanes by direction and order of Fromabove Done, William Stephens & John Clarke, being then and there Churchwardens, which cost fifteene shillings"
