Bodmin, Cornwall Genealogy

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

Parish History
BODMIN (St. Petrock), a parish, and the head of a union, in the hundred of Trigg, E. division of Cornwall. There are places of worship for Bryanites, the Countess of Huntingdon's Connexion, and Wesleyans.

Neighboring Parishes
Parishes either adjoining or nearby include Lanivet, St Mabyn, Helland, Blisland, Cardinham, Temple, Warleggan, St Winnow, Lanlivery, Lostwithiel, Withiel, and Lanhydrock. All of these parishes, in addition to a few others, have been part of the Bodmin Registration District at one time, although not all are presently part of the district at this time.

Because Bodmin was the administrative center of this part of Cornwall and the seat of the Bodmin Registration District (for civil registration), as well as the largest town in this area, many people who had moved to other parts of the UK or emigrated to other countries often named Bodmin as their birth place. That obviously has implications for the genealogy researcher, as one may find records that report Bodmin as the birth place of the person sought, when in reality the birth and/or christening may have occured in one of the other parishes or villages nearby, and the record of these events will not be found in the Bodmin parish records.

There are also parts of the Bodmin parish or borough, where the people living there have traditionally attended and had the events such as christening, marriage, and burial performed in a different parish. For example those living at Margate, Turfdown, Sunny Bank, and Fletchers Bridge, although part of Bodmin, attended church and received those events at the Cardinham parish church.

Civil Registration
Births, marriages and deaths were kept by the government from 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.

Bodmin is part of the Bodmin civil registration district which includes a number of surrounding parishes.

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

Records deposited cover 1558-1983, these registers are kept at the County Record Office, County Hall, Truro TR1 3AY.

The Family History Library has Parish registers beginning in 1558; Bishops’ transcripts 1683-1773. Church records indexes: Parish register and Bishops’ transcripts: 1523-1837. Film numbers for Bodmin can be found at FamilySearch.

Images of parish registers are available online at FamilySearch under Records. Images refer to Cornwall Record Office reference: P13.

The waypoint for Baptisms 1813-1830 contains a waypoint error the images refer to P 13/1/1 and this is clearly visible in the register. The issue has been reported to engineers for future correction.

Cornwall Online Parish Clerks
The Bodmin section of the OPC website contains many records.

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 web sites are:


 * 1851 Jurisdiction Maps
 * Vision of Britian

Websites
Bodmin in GENUKI