Shotwick, Cheshire Genealogy

England Cheshire  Shotwick



Parish History
St Michael's Church, Shotwick is in the village of Shotwick, Cheshire, England. It is a Grade I listed building. It has a Norman doorway but most of the church dates from the medieval period. Its furniture includes some ancient items. In the churchyard are a number of structures which have been listed as grade II. The church is in the diocese of Chester, the archdeaconry of Chester and the deanery of Wirral South. Its benefice is combined with that of St Nicholas, Burton.

Shotwick is a tiny agricultural village of only fifteen houses and a small seventeenth century manor house situated on the Wirral peninsula, some eight miles from the Roman city of Chester in the North West of England.

Henry II left from Shotwick for Ireland and Edward I used the port to leave for Wales in 1278.

Shotwick Castle was built about 1093 by Hugh Lupus, 1st Earl of Chester, sited at what is now Shotwick Park and near the River Dee, before the area succumbed to the effects of silting. The Norman castle lay in ruins by the 17th century and now only the foundations remain.

The village, including part of the hamlet of Two Mills was within the Wirral Hundred.

St. Michael’s is a medieval double aisled church with largely eighteenth century furniture including box pews and a three decker pulpit. It stands on the site of a former ford across the River Dee which forms the border with Wales.The Saxon church, which was most likely a wooden structure, would have either perished, or disappeared in the general rebuilding of churches that followed the Conquest. What is certain is that when the Domesday Book was compiled, a church existed at “Soto-wiche”, belonging to the secular canons of St. Werburgh. This church had probably been established about 100 years before.

The Norman Church, which supplanted the Saxon one about the beginning of the 12th Century, consisted simply of a nave and chancel without aisles. The Norman arch of the South doorway is part of this first building, and is the oldest part of the present church, the chancel doorway being added later.

Shotwick is a village and civil parish on the Wirral Peninsula in the unitary authority of Cheshire West and Chester and the ceremonial county of Cheshire, England. The village is situated close to the border with Wales.

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.

Online events may be searched online at Cheshire BMD

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

Shotwick, St. Michael and All Angels (C of E). An ancient parish church, originally serving the townships of Capenhurst, Great Saughall, Little Saughall, Shotwick and Woodbank. Registers of Baptisms 1681–1991, Marriages 1681–1992 and Burials 1681–1992 have been deposited at the Cheshire Record Office, where Bishop's Transcripts survive from 1591.

The Parish registers Parish registers for Shotwick, 1681-1992 Microfilm of original records in the Cheshire Record Office, Chester, England. Cheshire Record Office call no.: P49/1/1-3, 2, P49/4832/1-3, P49/3/1-3, P49/5/1-2

The Bishop's Transcripts are on Microfilm as follows:

The Cheshire, Church of England christening and marriage records are available online at FamilySearch Historic Records

Census records
http://www.1881pubs.com/ for details of public houses in the 1881 census

Probate records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Cheshire Probate Records to find the name of the court having primary jurisdiction. Scroll down in the article to the section Court Jurisdictions by Parish.

Poor Law Unions
Tarvin (previously Great Boughton) Poor Law Union, Cheshire

Hawarden Poor Law Union

Chester Poor Law Union from 1871-1930

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