Bodmin, Cornwall Genealogy

England Cornwall  Cornwall Parishes  

Parish History
General overview

Neighboring Parishes
Parishes either adjoining or nearby include Lanivet, St Mabyn, Helland, Blisland, Cardinham, Temple, Warleggan, St Winnow, Lanlivery, Lostwithiel, 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
Overview, Include information for parish registers and Bishop's Transcripts, Contact information for the office holding the original records, Links to the Family History Library Catalog showing the film numbers in their collection.

Images of parish registers are available online in historic records (formerly Record Search) Images refer to Cornwall County Record Office reference: P 13

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.

Census records
a.

Cornwall Online Parish Clerks (Genealogy)
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 [county] 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

Web sites
Add here any relevant sites that aren't mentioned above.