Hartlepool, Durham Genealogy

England Durham



Parish History
In 1724 the parish of St. Hilda was created from the nearby ancient parish of Hart. Subsequent parishes of Holy Trinity and St Barnabas were created in the town of Hartlepool.

The living is a perpetual curacy, in the patronage of the Vicar of Hart; impropriator, Mr. Milbanke. The church is an ancient and spacious structure in the early English style, with a lofty embattled tower strengthened with flying buttresses and crowned by crocketed pinnacles, and contains some portions in the later Norman style; the chancel, which had sustained much injury from high winds, was rebuilt in 1724: among the monuments is one said to be of a member of the royal family of Bruce. There are places of worship for Presbyterians, Primitive Methodists, Wesleyans, and Roman Catholics. A school was founded in 1742, by Mr. John Crooks, who endowed it with land, now producing £20 per annum; and there is another school, endowed by Mr. John Wells. Various bequests have been made for the benefit of the poor, among which is one of £500, by Henry Smith, alderman of London, in 1620, which was vested in the purchase of 19 acres of land let for £110 per annum. A convent of Franciscan friars was founded here prior to the year 1275, the site of which is said to have been near a house now called the Friary, where the foundations of some ancient buildings have been discovered. In forming a new street upon the moor, the cemetery of the monastery of St. Hilda was discovered, with several monumental inscriptions in Saxon and Runic characters. William Romaine, a learned divine and Hebrew scholar, was born here in 1714.

From: 'Hartford - Hartlington', A Topographical Dictionary of England (1848), pp. 421-427. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=51010 Date accessed: 29 March 2011.

The living is a rectory in the diocese of Durham. Value, £300.* Patron, the Vicar of Hart. The chapelry of Holy Trinity is mainly in Hartlepool parish, but partly in Hart; and was constituted in 1853. Rated property, £4, 800. Pop. in 1861, 5, 638. Houses, 839. Pop. of the Hartlepool portion, 4, 954. Houses, 741. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Durham. Value, £300.* Patron, the Vicar of Hart.—The sub-district is a poor law union, and now practically a district; and it contains the parishes of Hartlepool, Stranton, Greatham, and ElwickHall; and the townships of Hart, Throston, Elwick, Dalton-Piercy, and Thorpe-Bulmer in the parish of Hart. Acres, 26, 369. Poor rates, in 1863, £6, 501. Pop. in 1851, 16, 068; in 1861, 29, 153. Houses, 4, 720. Marriages in 1862, 275; births, 1, 266, -of which 47 were illegitimate; deaths, 651, -of which 351 were at ages under five years, and 3 at ages above 85.

(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

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.

Parish records
The Parish Registers for the period 1566-1987 are deposited at Durham County Record Office, County Hall, Durham, DH1 5UL (EP/Ha.SH). Engineering work will be undertaken in future to improve access to the Parish Register transcripts at FamilySearch Historical Records.


 * Hartlepool, Holy Trinity 1852-1980 (EP/Ha.HT).
 * Hartlepool, St. Barnabas 1905-1951 (EP/Ha.HT).

Durham University Library Archives and Special Collections DDR/EA/PBT/2/126 Parish Register transcripts are available to search free online at FamilySearch Historical Records. They contain under that reference the 1897 transcript of the burial of West Hartlepool Friends.

The dates of the post-1760 transcripts have been noted in detail and sometimes only cover years. For most parishes in the collection there are gaps in the sequence of transcripts. It is advisable to consult the original parish registers for these years and events.

FamilySearch Historical Records includes England Durham Marriage Bonds and Allegations (FamilySearch Collection)

Census records
Contributor: Include an overview if there is any unique information, such as the census for X year was destroyed. Add a link to online sites for indexes and/or images. Also add a link to the Family History Library Catalog showing the film numbers in their collection.

Poor Law Unions
Stockton Poor Law Union, Durham

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

Web sites
Contributor: add any relevant sites that aren’t mentioned above.