North Meols, Lancashire Genealogy

England Lancashire  Lancashire Parishes



Here is a List of Chapelries in North Meols Parish

Parish History
North Meols St Cuthbert is an Ancient Parish in the county of Lancashire.Other places in the parish include: Banks, Birkdale, Churchtown, Hawside, Southaws, Higher Blowick, Little London, Marshside, Rowe Lane, and High and Lower Blowick.

Dating from before the Norman Conquest, this area of small farming and fishing villages was originally known as Otegrimeles, from the Norse word "melr", meaning sand-dunes.The present pronunciation "mee-als" stems from Old Norse influences on the local dialect.This is also found in other dialects with strong Norse connections, especially the dialect of Shetland. Compare, however with Meols pronounced as "mells", on the nearby Wirral.

Historically, North Meols has been centred around St. Cuthbert's Church in Churchtown, although there were vicarages in Crossens, Banks and Birkdale. Parts of the parish were almost completely surrounded by water until large scale drainage of Martin Mere and other marshland in the 19th Century. This left behind a legacy of fine agricultural soil, which is still exploited to this day - the primary industry in the area is farming, especially of flowers and vegetables.

North Meols is a civil parish in the West Lancashire district of Lancashire, England. The parish covers the village of Banks. Historically the parish covered a wider area including much of what is now Southport.

Here is an 1848 historical perspective by the topographer, Samuel A. Lewis, for this parish:

"MEOLS, NORTH St Cuthbert, a parish, in the union of Ormskirk, hundred of West Derby, S. division of Lancashire, 9½ miles north by northwest of Ormskirk, containing, also the township of Birkdale. The township of North Meols contains the modern and rising bathing-place of Southport, and the villages or hamlets of Churchtown, Marshside, Crossens, Banks, and others. The church, which stands in Churchtown. There are three additional churches within the parish; two at Southport, and one at Crossens. The Independents, Wesleyans, and Primitive Methodists also have places of worship at Churchtown.—See Birkdale, Crossens, and Southport."

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 index of Lancashire Births, Marriages and Deaths Lancashire BMD

Lancashire Online Parish Clerks
An extremely useful resource for research in Lancashire Parishes http://www.lan-opc.org.uk/

Online Records
North Meols St. Cuthbert parish registers and those registers of all of its smaller chapelries lying within its boundaries have been mostly transcribed and are displayed online at the following web sites and ranges of years:

Original Records North Meols Parish original parish registers exist at the Cumbria Record Office,.

For original registers of above please enquire at Lancashire Record Office.

In addition, microfilmed copies of North Meols' original registers are accessible for searching via the Family History Library, Salt Lake City, UT, U.S.A and/or for ordering to any of its 4,600 satellite FamilySearch Centers worldwide.

Poor Law Unions
Ormskirk Poor Law Union, Lancashire

Probate records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Lancashire 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
North Meols (Southport) Family History Society