Hessenford, Cornwall Genealogy

Guide to Hessenford, Cornwall ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
HESSENFORD, a village and a chapelry in St. Germans parish, Cornwall. The village stands in a deep wooded bottom, on the river Seaton, 3 miles W of St. Germans railway station.

Hessenford (Cornish: Rys an Gwraghes) St Mary is an Ecclesiastical Parish in the county of Cornwall, created in 1834 from St Germans, Cornwall Ancient Parish.

The church was built by local subscription with labour, material and financial contributions and was dedicated on the 26th September 1833, at that it time was a district chapel of Saint Germans parish, the perpetual curate being appointed by the vicar of Saint Germans however, Hessenford became a parish in its own right by "Order in Council" in 1852. The lych gates were a gift and built in 1905, the original gates being used for the entrance to the church yard.

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
Hessenford parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

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.

Images of parish registers are available online at FamilySearch Images refer to Cornwall Record Office reference: P86

Cornwall Online Parish Clerks
An extremely useful resource is the Cornwall Online Parish Clerks page for the parish.

Poor Law Unions
St Germans Poor Law Union

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

Websites
Hessenford in GENUKI