Orpington, Kent Genealogy

England   Kent



Parish History
Orpington is a suburban town in the London Borough of Bromley Orpington Wikipedia

Orpington All Saints is an Ancient Parish. Chapelries of the Ancient parish include Downe, Kent St Mary Cray, Kent and Knockholt, Kent

The church was enlargeded in 1957 by adding "The new Church" at right angles to the ancient original mediaeval chancel and thus changing the orientation of the interior.

The original Saxon material is still visible in the mediaeval walls. The tower and steeple were damaged by a storm in 1771 and the rebuilt steeple was truck by lightning in 1809 and was not replaced.

See Edward Hasted The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent: Volume 2 (1797), pp. 97-112 at British History Online and Kent Churches website

See Orpington North West Kent Family History Society and Orpington All Saints

Other Anglican parishes formed from the Ancient Parish include

Orpington St Andrew Lower Road

St Paul Crofton Road built as a chapel-of-ease to All Saints in 1887 and formed as an ecclesiastical parish.

Orpington Christ Church, Charterhouse Road, see Kent Churches website

Holy Innocents Roman Catholic church. The modern replacement for the original built in 1894

Orpington Family History Centre, Kent is within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Station Approach

Civil Registration
See Bromley Registration district

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
Deposited Parish registers are held at Bromley Archives reference P 277 1560-1937

Bromley Central Library Telephone: 020 8461 7170 Fax: 020 8466 7860 e-mail: localstudies.library@bromley.gov.uk

Kent Online Parish Clerks (OPC) plan to transcribe Orpington parish registers.

Link to the Family History Library Catalogue showing the film numbers in their collection

See also England, Kent, Parish Registers and Bishop's Transcripts (FamilySearch Historical Records)

Nonconformists
International Genealogical Index Old Baptist Meeting 1650-1815 (Births) Batch

Land Tax
Images for Orpington are available at FamilySearch Records see England, Kent, Land Tax Assessments (FamilySearch Historical Records) 1780-1831

Census records
Census returns for Orpington 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. to locate local Family History Centres in UK to locate outside UK. 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.

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

for details of public houses in the 1881 census

Prior to the 1911 census the household schedule was destroyed and only the enumerator's schedule survives.

The 1911 census of England and Wales was taken on the night of Sunday 2 April 1911 and in addition to households and institutions such as prisons and workhouses, canal boats merchant ships and naval vessels it attempted to include homeless persons. The schedule was completed by an individual and for the first time both this record and the enumerator's schedule were preserved. Two forms of boycott of the census by women are possible due to frustration at government failure to grant women the universal right to vote in parliamentary and local elections. The schedule either records a protest by failure to complete the form in respect of the women in the household or women are absent due to organisation of groups of women staying away from home for the whole night. Research estimates that several thousand women are not found by census search. Find my Past 1911 census search

Poor Law Unions
In the Orpington Vestry minutes P277/8/2 1808-1847 held at Bromley Public Libraries, Local Studies and Archives there is both reference to the purchase of clothing for poor from interest on parish stock in1814 with the parish giving up possession of poor house, 1815 and establishing a joint workhouse with St. Mary Cray, Orpington parish providing £900, 1815-1816. At about this time the St Mary Cray burial register shows burials from St Mary Cray Poor House. The Orpington Vestry Minutes of 3 March 1816 refer to the workhouse to be built on land "near Reynoldsmiths in the parish of St Mary Cray".

Reynolds Smith was a hamlet in St Mary Cray parish close to the parish boundary with Orpington parish and also contained the Red Lion public house.

The workhouse and garden appear as item 46 on the St Mary Cray Tithe Map 1839/40 and the Occupier appears as Samuel Chinock, presumably the master.

See also the St Mary Cray Poor House paragraph in the Bromley Poor Law Union page.

It appears from the vestry Minutes that the larger group of able bodied paupers were from Orpington parish and a Vestry meeting resoved to use these men to repair defective roads in Orpington.

It is worth examining the St Mary Cray burial transcript at Kent Online Parish Clerks if you believe prior to 1844 that an Orpington ancestor may have received parish poor relief and have died in the parish Poor House. From 1844 the Union Workhouse at Locksbottom usually arranged burial in the parish of origin where known on admission; otherwise burials were at Farnborough, 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)

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

Local Family History Centre
Orpington Family History Centre, Kent is within the London Borough of Bromley, located adjacent to Orpington Station and on major bus routes through the borough.


 * 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 collections using the portal.