Bessingham, Norfolk Genealogy

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

Parish History
Bessingham St Mary is an Ancient Parish in the Repps deanery of the Diocese of Norwich. BESSINGHAM (St. Mary), a parish, in the union of Erpingham, hundred of North Erpingham, E. division of Norfolk, 8 miles (N.) from Aylsham.

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.


 * Erpingham 1837-1938
 * North Walsham 1939-1974
 * The Register Office, 18 Kings Arms Street, North Walsham, NR28 9JX. Tel/Fax: 01692 406220. E-mail: registration.nwalsham@norfolk.gov.uk

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

To find the names of the neighboring parishes, use England Jurisdictions 1851 Map. In this site, search for the name of the parish, click on the location "pin", click Options and click List contiguous parishes.

Records are also available at the Norfolk Record Office.

Census records
http://www.btinternet.com/~e.c.apling/1891Census/Bessingham.htm transcript of 1891 census

Poor Law Unions
Erpingham     http://www.institutions.org.uk/workhouses/england/norf/erpingham_workhouse.htm

Norfolk Poor Law Unions

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

 * Bessingham on GenUKI