Whitfield, Kent Genealogy

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

Parish History
WHITFIELD (St. Mary), a parish, in the union of Dover, hundred of Bewsborough, lathe of St. Augustine, E. division of Kent, 3¼ miles (N. N. W.) from Dover. There is a place of worship for Wesleyans.

Whitfield is an ancient village and a civil parish in the Dover district of Kent, see Whitfield Kent Wikipedia. The ancient village had an alias Bewsfield,which was the name recorded in the eighth century and referred to Manorial lands mentioned in the Domesday survey. In later centuries Whitfield and Lower Whitfield and 20th century housing development "West Whitfield" are found in record sources.

The village of Church Whitfield Church Whitfield Wikipedia includes Whitfield St Peter, the Ancient Parish church in the Diocese of Canterbury. The modern parish is called Beauxfield otherwise Whitfield and a map of the parish boundary may be found at A church near you

The church of St Peter, Church Whitfield Road, Whitfield has been designated as a grade II* listed building British listed building

The early Congregational Chapel dated from 1781 but was rebuilt in 1867.

See also Edward Hasted, The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent: Volume 9 (1800), pp. 394-400. Date accessed: 2 December 2013. at British History Online for Bewsbury manorial history as well as history of the church and Kent Churches website.

Civil Registration
See Dover 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
Whitfield parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

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

Kent Online Parish Clerks has indexes available for select parishes. Records are also available at the Kent Archives.

Poor Law Unions
Dover 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.

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

Local Family History Centre
Canterbury Family History Centre, Kent

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

 * England Jurisdictions 1851
 * Vision of Britain