Tatham Fells, Lancashire Genealogy

Guide to Tatham Fells, Lancashire ancestry, family history, and genealogy: chapelry register transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Chapelry History
Tatham Fells was created a chapel of ease in 1737 from, and lying within the boundaries of Tatham Ancient Parish; and situated in Lowgill. A large part of the parish of Tatham is an upland area, known as Tatham Fells, which includes the largest settlement in Tatham, Lowgill; its highest point, at Ward's Stone; and the Great Stone of Fourstones, known locally as "The Big Stone".

Lowgill is a hamlet within the Forest of Bowland.

The Forest of Bowland is a sparsely inhabited Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty with sheep farming and steep narrow unclassified roads passing between settlements and isolated farms.

The present church was built in the 1880's; the site of the altar of the previous chapelry is marked in the churchyard by a stone cross.

The Diocese of Blackburn is a Church of England diocese, covering much of Lancashire, created in 1926 from part of the Diocese of Manchester. The Diocese includes the towns of Blackburn, Blackpool, Burnley, and the cities of Lancaster, and Preston, as well as a large part of the Ribble Valley.

"TATHAM-FELL, a chapelry, with Lowgill village, in Tatham parish, Lancashire; 2½ miles S by W of High Bentham r. station, and 5 ESE of Hornby. Post town, Wray, under Lancaster. The living is a p. curacy in the diocese of Manchester. Value, £125. Patron, the Rector of Tatham. The church was built in 1745. There is a parochial school."

rom: John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870)



A Vision of Britain through Time includes a large library of local statistics for administrative units. For the best overall sense of how the area containing Tatham Fells has changed, please see our redistricted information for the modern district of Lancaster. More detailed statistical data are available under Units and statistics, which includes both administrative units covering Tatham Fells and units named after it.

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.

Online index of Lancashire Births, Marriages and Deaths Lancashire BMD

Lancashire Online Parish Clerks
An extremely useful resource for research in Lancashire Parishes http://www.lan-opc.org.uk/

Online Records

 * 1538 - 1910 at FamilySearch — index
 * 1603 - 1910 at FamilySearch — index and images

 Church of England 

Tatham Fells chapelry's registers of christenings, marriages and burials, along with those of the ancient parish of Tatham St James The Less to which it is attached, have been mostly transcribed and are displayed online at the following websites and ranges of years:

For a full list of all those chapels surrounding Tatham Fells and comprising the whole ancient parish of Tatham St James The Less to which it was attached, be certain to see "Church Records" on the TATHAM ST JAMES THE LESS PARISH page.

Parish registers for Melling, 1625- Microfilm of original records in the Lancashire Record Office, Preston, England. Lancshire Record Office no.: PR 2898/1/1-12; PR 3326/1/1.

Bishop's transcripts for Tatham, 1676-1872 Text in Latin and English. Microfilm of original records at the Lancashire Record Office, Preston. Includes records for chapelry of Tatham-fell 1813-1836, 1862-1865 (baptisms and burials). Tatham-Fell is a chapelry in the parish of Tatham.

Non Conformist Records

 * 1647-1996 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index (dates may vary by parish)

Poor Law Unions
Caton Gilbert Union,Lancashire

Probate records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Lancashire 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