Pett, Sussex Genealogy

England   Sussex     Sussex Parishes



Parish History
PETT (St. Mary and St. Peter), a parish, in the hundred of Guestling, union and rape of Hastings, E. division of Sussex, 4½ miles (E. N. E.) from Hastings. The parish is bounded on the south-east by the English Channel. The church is a neat edifice; the chancel contains several monuments to the Wynch family. In many parts of Pett Level, trees have been dug up in a sound state, supposed to have lain there since October 1250, when the sea overwhelmed and destroyed a large tract of land.

history and images

Pett Sussex Online Parish Clerks (OPC)

other places of worship include

Mount Calvary Bible Christian Chapel Sussex Online Parish Clerks (OPC) St Nicholas, Pett Level Sussex Online Parish Clerks (OPC) This tiny building was erected by the Admiralty at this coastal location as a Lifesaving Rocket Apparatus Station-a safety device intended to rescue shipwrecked sailors. It was bought by the Diocese of Chichester and opened as a church on 26 April 1935.

See A Topographical Dictionary of England (1848), pp. 558-564. here

Pett Methodist Church dates from 1848 and has been designated a grade II listed building British listed building

See also list of places of worship in Rother Wikipedia

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

Contributor: Include here information for parish registers, Bishop’s Transcripts, non conformist and other types of church records, such as parish chest records. Add the contact information for the office holding the original records.

Link to the Family History Library Catalogue showing the film numbers in their collection

Census records
FamilySearch Centres offer free access to images of the England and Wales Census through FHC Portal Computers here have access to the Family History Centre Portal page which gives free access to premium family history software and websites that generally charge for subscriptions.

to locate local Family History Centres in UK

to locate outside UK. Many archives and local history collections in public libraries in England and Wales offer online census searches and also hold microfilm or fiche census returns.

The 1851 census of England and Wales attempted to identify religious places of worship in addition to the household survey census returns.

Prior to the 1911 census the household schedule was destroyed and only the enumerator's schedule survives.

The 1911 census of England and Wales was taken on the night of Sunday 2 April 1911 and in addition to households and institutions such as prisons and workhouses, canal boats merchant ships and naval vessels it attempted to include homeless persons. The schedule was completed by an individual and for the first time both this record and the enumerator's schedule were preserved. Two forms of boycott of the census by women are possible due to frustration at government failure to grant women the universal right to vote in parliamentary and local elections. The schedule either records a protest by failure to complete the form in respect of the women in the household or women are absent due to organisation of groups of women staying away from home for the whole night. Research estimates that several thousand women are not found by census search.

Poor Law Unions
Hastings Poor Law Union, Sussex

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