Bosley, Cheshire Genealogy

England Cheshire  Cheshire Parishes  Bosley

Guide to Bosley, Cheshire family history and genealogy: parish registers (baptism, christening, marriage, and burial records), civil registration (birth, marriage, and death records), census records, history, wills, cemetery, online transcriptions and indexes, an interactive map and websites.

Parish History
Bosley St Mary the Virgin was originally a chapelry in the Ancient Parish of Prestbury.

The church was originally dedicated to St. Thomas a Becket of Canterbury but later this was changed to St. Lawrence and then to St. Mary the Virgin. It was formerly a chapel of ease for Prestbury, and was granted the right to have a font and burial ground by Pope Boniface in a Papal Bull of 5 April 1402 as recorded at Lichfield. The parish registers go back to 1728 and the list of vicars to approximately 1596.

Following the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660, there were a series of Acts of Parliament designed to punish the Nonconformists and to protect the Church of England.

BOSLEY, is a chapelry, in the parish of Prestbury, union and hundred of Macclesfield, N. division of the county of Chester, it is 4¾ miles (E. N. E.) from Congleton. The chapelry is situated on the road from Manchester to Derby.

Church Records
Bosley St Mary parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials have been indexed by the following groups:

To find the names of the neighbouring parishes, use England Jurisdictions 1851. In this site, search for the name of the parish, click on the location "pin", click Options and click List contiguous parishes.

Prestbury, St. Peter was the ancient parish church for Bosley. Bosley, St. Mary. An ancient chapelry to Prestbury, becoming the parish church for Bosley in 1883.

Parish registers of Bosley, Cheshire, 1728-1847

Bosley is a chapelry in Prestbury parish. Cheshire Record Office reference: P42/1/1-2, P42/2, P42/3.

An index for Cheshire parish registers is available online in Record Search

Bishop's Transcripts 1617-1893 Some text in Latin. The transcripts are online on Record Search. Chapelry (now a parish) in Prestbury parish. Cheshire Record Office reference: EDB 31

An index for Cheshire, Church of England, Bishop's Transcripts (Diocese of Chester) is available online in Record Search

Non-Conformist Churches


Bosley, Methodist Chapel (Wesleyan). Founded 1832. Memorial inscriptions have been published by the FHS of Cheshire (1995).

Civil Registration
Birth, marriages and deaths were kept by the government, from 1 July 1837 to the present day. The civil registration article tells more about these records. Here are two excellent Internet sites with birth, marriage and death indexes available:


 * FreeBMD
 * Cheshire BMD

Registration Districts

 * Macclesfield (1837–98)
 * Cheshire East (post 1998)

Poor Law Unions

 * Macclesfield
 * Macclesfield Poor Law Union,Cheshire

Probate records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Cheshire 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 also England Cheshire Probate Records (FamilySearch Historical Records)

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