St Breward, Cornwall Genealogy

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

Parish History
BREWARD, ST., or Simonward (St. Bruard), a parish, in the union of Camelford, hundred of Trigg, E. division of Cornwall, 6¾ miles N by E from Bodmin.

St Breward (Cornish: Sen Branwalader) is an Ancient Parish in the county of Cornwall. Other places in the parish include: Lower Lanke. Until the 19th century it was commonly known by the corrupt form of the name: 'Simonward'. The church was dedicated to St Brueredus in 1278 and is the highest church in Cornwall.. It is a substantial building of the Norman period to which a south aisle and western tower were added in the 15th century (these additions are of granite). It was restored in the 19th century and only parts of the Norman north arcade remain. There were in the mediaeval period three chapels in the parish: at Hamatethy the manorial chapel of the Peverells; St Michael's Chapel at Roughtor, and another at Chaple. Thomas Taylor the historian was vicar here and edited the parish registers.

The village of St Breward boasts the highest Church in Cornwall at about 700 ft above sea-level, and is well known for granite and china clay quarries. Within the parish lie two of Cornwall's best known landmarks: Roughtor and Brown Willy. St Breward is also famous for its granite. It had three quarries: Tordown, Hantergantic and De Lank. Moorland Granite has been used for centuries to build local houses and churches, and stone from the De Lank Quarry was used for important and famous landmarks, such as the Eddystone Lighthouse (1882), the Beachy Head Lighthouse (1900) and London's Tower Bridge (1890).

Civil Registration
Births, 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 Free BMD.

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

Images of parish registers are available online at FamilySearch Images refer to Cornwall Record Office reference: P 20

The baptismal register book for Baptisms 1813-1866 vol P 20/1/3 contains an anomaly. The recorded baptisms end in December 1832 on page 46 of the register at entry number 362. The numbers 363-368 are then left blank. The register resumes baptismal entries in 1850 on page 47 at number 369.

It is not clear whether records for the gap were kept and where.

Thomas Taylor was vicar at St Breward. During his time at St Breward he found the parish registers to be complete from 1599 to 1812: his work editing the registers brought him into contact with W. P. Phillimore, a publisher of books relating to Ecclesiastical Law, who in 1905 appointed him editor of the Parish Marriage Registers throughout the diocese: by 1916 he had published twenty-five volumes. It is for this work, much used by genealogists and family historians, that he is probably most widely known.

He contributed to the Encyclopaedia Britannica and the Victoria County History of Cornwall, of which he was local editor. His standard works Celtic Christianity and Life of St Samson of Dol are still sources of reference.

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

The history registers and much more have been contributed by the Online Parish clerk for St Breward. Crissy Parker's website is also a valuable resource.

Census Records
Cornwall Online Census Project

Poor Law Unions
Camelford 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
There are many maps and gazetteers showing English places. Valuable websites are:


 * 1851 Jurisdiction Maps
 * Vision of Britain

Websites
St Breward in GENUKI