Chelsea St Luke, Middlesex Genealogy

England Middlesex  Middlesex Parishes  Chelsea St Luke

Parish History
CHELSEA, (1559) comprised the parishes of St. Luke and the more modern one of Holy Trinity, Sloane Street, Upper Chelsea (1830), both of which in 1851 were in the Kensington division of the hundred of Ossulstone, county of Middlesex. In addition to these two churches, Chelsea was comprised of a considerable number of additional chapels subdividing the parish boundary. View a comprehensive List of District Churches and Chapels Within the Parish of St Luke Chelsea.

Within this civil parish boundary lay the large Chelsea Royal Hospital for veteran (army) soldiers, "a handsome structure" erected by Sir Christophen Wren, with an operating chapel. The hospital held about 500 in-pensioners (in-house pensioners). In addition, another hospital, for soldiers awaiting admittance into Chelsea Royal Hospital, called York Hospital also lay within the parish. The parish included the Royal Military Asylum, built and founded in 1801. It was specifically built for the support of those children whose fathers were serving in foreign stations and for the education of orphaned children of soldiers, with a chapel.

In the parish, there were places of worship for Baptists, Independents, Wesleyans, and Roman Catholics.

View a List of District Churches and Chapels Within the Parish of St Luke Chelsea.

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.

Church records
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.

Contributor: Include here information for parish registers, Bishop’s Transcripts, nonconformist 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.

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

Poor Law records

 * The St Luke Chelsea, Workhouse Admission and Discharge Registers, 1743-1769 and 1782-1799, courtesy: London Lives

Contributor: Add information about the pertinent poor law unions in the area.

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
Contributor: Add any relevant sites that aren’t mentioned above.