Grain, Kent Genealogy

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

Parish History
GRAIN, ISLE OF (St. James), a parish, in the union and hundred of Hoo, lathe of Aylesford, W division of Kent, 1¾ mile NW by W from Sheerness. There is a place of worship for Independents. The Isle of Grain is a civil parish in the Medway district of Kent, see Isle of Grain Wikipedia

St James Grain is an Ancient Parish in the Diocese of Rochester on the Isle of Grain at the easternmost point of the Hoo Peninsula Wikipedia. A map of the parish boundary is available at A church near you

The church is 12th century in origin with later restoration in subsequent centuries and has been designated a grade I listed building by English heritage.British Listed Building

The Isle of Grain constitutes a civil parish but is mostly marshland which has a defense tower, Grain Tower accessible by a tidal causeway and industrial areas including an oil refinery and electricity generating station.

See Grain Kent Wikipedia Hoo Peninsula Wikipedia

See Kent Archeological Society and Edward Hasted, The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent: Volume 4 (1798), pp. 250-258 at British History Online

Civil Registration
This parish was part of Hoo sub district Chatham Registration District

and registrations from July 1837 to the present day are held at

Medway district The Register Office Northgate Rochester ME1 1LS Telephone 01634 338902 Fax 01634 338913 register.office@medway.gov.uk

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

Kent Online Parish Clerks (OPC)

Census records
[https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/show?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fcatalog-search-api%3A8080%2Fwww-catalogapi-webservice%2Fitem%2F508024 Census returns for Isle of Grain-St. James, 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. 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.
 * Category:England Family History Centres to locate local Family History Centres in UK.
 * Introduction to Family History Centers to locate outside UK.

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

 * Hoo Poor Law Union, Kent

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.

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