Colan, Cornwall Genealogy

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

Parish History
COLAN (St. Colan), a parish, in the union of St. Columb Major, hundred of Pyder, E. division of Cornwall, 3½ miles (S. W. by W.) from St. Columb Major. There are two places of worship for Wesleyans.

Colan (Cornish: Lannwydhek)St Colanus is an Ancient parish in Cornwall.

The church was built in 1250 by Walter Bronscombe, Bishop of Exeter, who annexed it to the office of the sacristan of Glasney College on 7th September 1276. It was dedicated on 14th July 1336 by John de Grandisson, Bishop of Exeter.

The church comprises a chancel, nave, north aisle, and south transept. The arcade has five four-centred arches of St Stephen's china stone, supported on pillars of the same material. There is a south porch and a north door. The tower is of two stages, embattled, and of the turrets only the pinnacles remain. There are three bells.

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 FreeBMD.

Church records
Colan 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 Cornwall Record Office.

Cornwall Online Parish Clerks
An extremely useful resource is the Cornwall Online Parish Clerks

Census records
Cornwall Online Census Project

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

Websites
Colan in GENUKI

http://www.colan-church.org/ includes virtual tour of the church