Macclesfield Forest with Wildboarclough, Cheshire Genealogy

Guide to Macclesfield Forest with Wildboarclough, Cheshire ancestry, family history, and genealogy:  parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
MACCLESFIELD, is a market-town, parochial chapelry, and newly-enfranchised borough, having a separate jurisdiction, it is locally in the parish of Prestbury, and hundred of Macclesfield, and the head of a union, in the Northern division of the county of Chester. The town is pleasantly situated near the southern extremity of the forest.

The parochial chapelry consists of the nine townships of Hurdsfield, Kettleshulme, Macclesfield, Macclesfield Forest, Pott-Shrigley , Rainow , Sutton , Wildboarclough, and Wincle. The parochial chapel is, dedicated to St. Michael, and is dependent on the mother church at Prestbury.

There are places of worship for the Society of Friends, Independents, Primitive Methodists, Socinians, and Roman Catholics.

WILDBOARCLOUGH, a township in Prestbury parish, Cheshire; 6½ miles SE of Macclesfield.

St Stephen's Macclesfield Forest is an ancient chapelry in the Ancient parish of Prestbury. It included Tytherington, Upton, Wildboarclough, Kettleshulme, and Lyme Handley.

St Stephen's Church is also known locally as Forest Chapel.

Wildboarclough (pronounced Will'berclough) was a township and chapelry in Prestbury Parish, Macclesfield Hundred and Wildboarclough St Saviour, Cheshire was founded as a parish in 1873 from within St Stephen's parish.

Macclesfield Forest now forms part of Rainow parish, but still proudly retains its own local chapel. Forest Chapel (Church of St Stephen) in Macclesfield Forest was built in 1673.

In Wildboarclough, the church of St Saviour's is at the centre of one of the parishes in a benefice which also includes Wincle, Bosley and North Rode.

There is also a Methodist chapel on the boundary of the parish at Gradbach (built in 1849).



Census records
The 1611 Survey of the Manor and Forest of Macclesfieldwill provide a census substitute for the inhabitants. This website lists all those freeholders, copy holders and tenants living in the area at the time of the Survey

Church Records
Macclesfield Forest with Wildboarclough St Stephen chapelry registers of christenings, marriages and burials have been indexed by the following groups:

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.

Prestbury, St. Peter (C of E). The ancient parish church for Wildboarclough. Macclesfield Forest, St. Stephen (C of E). An ancient chapelry in Prestbury parish.

Wildboarclough, St. Saviour. Founded 1873 as a chapel to Macclesfield Forest, becoming a parish church in 1906. Registers of Baptisms from 1873, Marriages from 1912, and Burials from 1910 are held at the church. Parish registers date from 1737 earlier chapelry records for Macclesfield Forest with Wildboarclough are included:

Some entries read Macclesfield Forest with Wildboarclough. Macclesfield Forest and Wildboarclough are in the parish of Prestbury.

Here is a list of church records on microfilm at the Family History Library (FHL) in Salt Lake City.

Parish registers for Macclesfield Forest Chapelry, 1666-1971 Cheshire Record Office Call no.: P88/1-4, 2356/1.

Bishop's transcripts for Macclesfield Forest Chapelry, 1812-1837 Cheshire Record Office: EDB 140

Non-Conformist Churches

 * 1600s-1910 Cheshire Non-Conformist & Roman Catholic Registers (Marriages) 17th Century-1910 at FindMyPast ($); index and images (dates may vary by parish)
 * 1671-1900 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index (dates may vary by parish)


 * Wesleyan Methodist

Civil Registration
Birth, marriages and deaths were kept by the government, from 1 July 1837 to the present day. The civil registration article tells more about these records. Here are two excellent Internet sites with birth, marriage and death indexes available:


 * FreeBMD
 * Cheshire BMD

Registration Districts

 * Macclesfield (1837–98)
 * Cheshire East (post 1998)

Poor Law Unions

 * Macclesfield Poor Law Union, Cheshire

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

Websites
Macclesfield Forest with Wildboarclough on GENUKI

Macclesfield Forest on GENUKI

Macclesfield on GENUKI