Sevenoaks, Kent Genealogy

Guide to Sevenoaks, Kent ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
Sevenoaks St Nicholas is the primary Ancient parish in the market town of Sevenoaks Kent. Sevenoaks Wikipedia

Sevenoaks St Nicholas parish boundary included Riverhead, Weald and Kippington; a map of this and other Sevenoaks parishes may be found at A church near you

Sevenoaks Weald, Kent is a former chapelry and the subsequent churches of St Luke Kent Churches website, St Mary and St John the Baptist were formed from parts of the Ancient Parish.

The church dates from the 13th century with rebuilding in the fifteenth century. The church of St Nicholas High Street Sevenoaks has been designated as a grade II* listed building British listed building

See Edward Hasted, The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent: Volume 3 (1797), pp. 60-105. Date accessed: 12 October 2013. at British History Online and Kent Churches website

See Sevenoaks North West Kent Family History Society which includes other places of worship in the town.
 * Sevenoaks St Nicholas
 * Weald St George Sevenoaks Weald, Kent
 * Riverhead St Mary see Riverhead, Kent
 * Sevenoaks St John the Baptist see kent Churches website
 * Kippington St Mary

Civil Registration
See Sevenoaks Registration District 1837-1941 Tonbridge Registration District

Kent County Council (KCC) has a certificate centre at the Mansion House in Tunbridge Wells which holds all the completed registers for Kent since 1 July 1837 and can supply a certified copy of any Kent birth, death or marriage entry from any register within its custody or a Kent civil partnership registration from the government online database.

The Mansion House (Certificate Centre) Grove Hill Road Tunbridge Wells Kent TN1 1EP

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.

Church Records
Sevenoaks St Nicholas parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

Sevenoaks St John parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

Kippington St Mary registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

Census records
Census returns for Sevenoaks 1841-1891

FamilySearch Records includes collections of census indexes which can be searched online for free. In addition FamilySearch Centres offer free access to images of the England and Wales Census through FHC Portal Computers here have access to the Family History Centre Portal page which gives free access to premium family history software and websites that generally charge for subscriptions.
 * Category:England Family History Centres to locate local Family History Centres in UK
 * Introduction to Family History Centers to locate outside UK.
 * Many archives and local history collections in public libraries in England and Wales offer online census searches and also hold microfilm or fiche census returns.

Images of the census for 1841-1891 can be viewed in census collections at Ancestry (fee payable) or Find My Past (fee payable)

The 1851 census of England and Wales attempted to identify religious places of worship in addition to the household survey census returns.


 * Ancestry UK Census Collection
 * Find my Past census search 1841-1901

Poor Law Unions
A Parish workhouse at St John's Hill which could accommodate up to 80 people existed in the 18th century and upon creation of Sevenoaks Poor Law Union, Kent the Union decided to enlarge these premises; however criticism of the resulting conditions lead to the Union building a new workhouse at Sundridge and the sale of the former St John's Hill land and buildings in the mid 1840s.


 * See England, Kent, Workhouse Records - FamilySearch Historical Records

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


 * See England, Kent, Wills and Probate - FamilySearch Historical Records

Local Family History Centre
Orpington Family History Centre, Kent is within reach of the Sevenoaks district, located adjacent to Orpington Station.
 * Maidstone Family History Centre, Kent
 * FHC Portal This centre has access to the Family History Centre Portal page which gives free access in the centre to premium family history software and websites that generally charge for subscriptions.
 * Publication of the restricted access images England, Kent, Wills and Probate - FamilySearch Historical Records and England, Kent, Land Tax Assessments - FamilySearch Historical Records means that it is advisable to telephone the centre to reserve a computer if you wish to view these

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

Websites
The History of Sevenoaks up to 1650 by Jean Fox is a well researched, documented website that would equal a stack of 18 inches of printed paper which includes the wills, parish register entries and families from Sevenoaks and some of the surrounding areas.

http://vulpeculox.net/history/