Padstow, Cornwall Genealogy

England   Cornwall  Cornwall Parishes

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

Parish History
PADSTOW (St. Petrock), a sea-port, market-town, and parish, in the union of St. Columb Major, hundred of Pyder, E. division of Cornwall, 14 miles (W. N. W.) from Bodmin, and 249 (W. S. W.) from London. Here are places of worship for Wesleyans and Baptists.

Padstow, (Cornish: Lannwedhenek) is an Ancient Parish and a market town in the county of Cornwall.

The church is dedicated to St Petroc who lived here from AD 518 and afterwards settled at Bodmin where he died in AD 564. According to Bishop Bronscombe's registers, Edmund Stafford, Bishop of Exeter, licensed services in this church on 28th September 1415. There were a number of chapels in this parish from the medieval period.

The church of St Petroc is one of a group of three said to have been founded by the saint, the others being Little Petherick, Cornwall and  Bodmin, Cornwall. It is quite large and mostly of 13th and 14th century date. There is a fine font of Catacleuse stone which is 15th century: the pulpit of ca. 1530 is also of interest. There are two fine monuments to members of the Prideaux family (Sir Nicholas, 1627 and Edmund, 1693): there is also a monumental brass of 1421

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 in historic records (formerly Record Search) Images refer to Cornwall Record Office reference: P 170

Census records
Cornwall Online Census Project

Cornwall Online Parish Clerks (Genealogy)
The Padstow section of the OPC website contains many records.

Poor Law Unions
St Columb Major 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 web sites are:


 * England Jurisdictions 1851
 * Vision of Britain