The preservation of three centuries of historical church records from St. Paul’s church, Halifax, is now guaranteed and the records can be accessed online – all largely due to the efforts of parish volunteers and a professional archivist.

Ten years ago, the church’s archives committee began to catalogue the records, after they were removed from the parish hall during a demolition in the 1970s.

“The group of parishioners soon discovered the historic significance of the dusty old documents and fragile register books, which date back to a baptism and a burial on June 1, 1749, when Edward Cornwallis arrived in Halifax aboard the ship Sphinx,” reported the Chronicle Herald. “Documents outline the 1917 transformation of the church and parish hall into a Red Cross hospital, homeless shelter and morgue for victims of the Halifax Explosion.”

Among the findings are pew rental records “that read like a who’s who of Nova Scotia history,” the Herald added.

With a grant of $8,000 from the federal government’s Canada Council of Archives, the committee was able to hire a professional archivist to properly catalogue the records.