Clitheroe St James, Lancashire Genealogy

England Lancashire  Lancashire Parishes



Parish History
St James Clitheroe was built in the year 1838 as a chapel of ease; it stood within the civil parish boundaries of Whalley, Lancashire.

The name Clitheroe is thought to come from the Anglo-Saxon for "Rocky Hill", and was also spelled Clyderhow and Cletherwoode. The town was the administrative centre for the Honour of Clitheroe (previously spelled Honor). This land was held by Roger de Poitou, who passed it to the De Lacy family from whom it passed in 1311 to Thomas, Earl of Lancaster. Up until 1835, the Lord of the Honour was also by right Lord of Bowland.

The town's earliest existing charter is from 1283, granted by Henry de Lacy, Earl of Lincoln and confirming rights granted by one of his forebears between 1147 and 1177.

The church was recently modernised.

The Diocese of Blackburn is a Church of England diocese, covering much of Lancashire, created in 1926 from part of the Diocese of Manchester. The Diocese includes the towns of Blackburn, Blackpool, Burnley, and the cities of Lancaster, and Preston, as well as a large part of the Ribble Valley.

Civil Registration
Birth, marriages and deaths were kept by the government, from July 1837 to the present day. The civil registration article tells more about these records. There are several Internet sites with name lists or indexes. A popular site is FreeBMD.

Online index of Lancashire Births, Marriages and Deaths Lancashire BMD

Lancashire Online Parish Clerks
An extremely useful resource for research in Lancashire Parishes http://www.lan-opc.org.uk/

Church records
Include here information for parish registers, Bishop’s Transcripts and other types of church records, such as parish chest records. Add the contact information for the office holding the original records. Add links to the Family History Library Catalog showing the film numbers in their collection

Census records
http://www.1881pubs.com/ for details of public houses in the 1881 census

Poor Law Unions
Clitheroe Poor Law Union, Lancashire

Probate records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Lancashire Probate Records to find the name of the court having primary jurisdiction. Scroll down in the article to the section Court Jurisdictions by Parish.

Maps and Gazetteers
Maps are a visual look at the locations in England. Gazetteers contain brief summaries about a place.


 * England Jurisdictions 1851
 * Vision of Britain

Web sites
Add any relevant sites that aren’t mentioned above.