FOR a short history of her parish church’s choir, Ann Jolly would be grateful for information about the music — hymns or psalm settings — that would have been sung, and the service pattern at the beginning of the 19th century.

The churchwarden’s accounts of 1806 show payments to “little singing boys”, and for an organist’s salary and his board, as well as money for washing ministers’ and boys’ surplices. The organ was installed in 1801. She says that all this was a surprise to her as she had always thought that organs and surpliced choirs were reintroduced in the Victorian era.

The church is in a modest market town in Essex, with a population of about 33,000. At that time, the figure would have been just over 1000 people.

She can be contacted by email at d.jolly30@btinternet.com.