Eastchurch, Kent Genealogy

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

Parish History
EAST-CHURCH (All Saints), a parish, in the union of Sheppey, liberty of the Isle of Sheppey, Upper division of the lathe of Scray, E. division of Kent, 5 miles (E. by S.) from Queenborough. There is a place of worship for Wesleyans. Eastchurch All Saints is an Ancient Parish on the Isle of Sheppey, two miles east of Minster. The present church dates from 1431-1432 when the previous church on the site was ruined and has had restoration after 1922 fire damage to roofs. It is designated as a grade I listed building by English heritage. Eastchurch has place in British aviation history due to Eastchurch airfield. A stained glass window in the parish church commemorates the death of Charles S Rolls and Cecil Grace who died in an accident in 1910 and an aviation memorial opposite the church. The Wright brothers Orville and Wilbur flew from here and Eastchurch was home to early aircraft building and flight in the 1900s.

Civil Registration
Eastchurch sub district was within the Sheppey registration district. Kent County Council Registration Services Invicta House County Hall Maidstone Kent ME14 1XX Telephone 08458 247 400 http://www.kent.gov.uk are developing online search for all birth marriages and deaths as a result of a community volunteer effort. Not all events are capable of search but the index is updated annually. 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
Eastchurch 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.

Census records
See Kent Census

Poor Law Unions
Sheppey 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