Eastry, Kent Genealogy

Guide to Eastry, Kent ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish register transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
EASTRY (St. Mary), a parish, and the head of a union, partly in the hundred of Downhamford, but chiefly in that of Eastry, lathe of St. Augustine, E division of Kent, 2¾ miles SW. by S from Sandwich.

Eastry is a village and civil parish in the Dover district of Kent, see Eastry Wikipedia

Eastry St Mary the Virgin is an Ancient Parish; the church stands on the site of a former Saxon Church and dates from about 1230.

The Palace of the Saxon kings was in Eastry. King Ecgberht Of Kent's cousins were murdered here in 665 and legend has it that the royal residence was passed to Christchurch in Canterbury as penance for the crime. The site of the palace is believed to have been at Eastry Court. Two Saxon burial sites in the village from this period have been excavated.

The parish church of St Mary the Virgin has been designated as a grade I listed building British listed building

The village was the birthplace of Henry of Eastry, Prior of Christ Church, Canterbury 1285-1333, in whose honour the Cathedral tower in Canterbury bears the name “Bell Harry”.

See Edward Hasted, The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent: Volume 10 (1800), pp. 98-121 at British History Online and Kent Churches website

Civil Registration
Eastry Registration District and Thanet Registration District

Kent County Council (KCC) has a certificate centre at the Mansion House in Tunbridge Wells which holds all the completed registers for Kent since 1 July 1837 and can supply a certified copy of any Kent birth, death or marriage entry from any register within its custody or a Kent civil partnership registration from the government online database.

The Mansion House (Certificate Centre) Grove Hill Road Tunbridge Wells Kent TN1 1EP

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.

Church Records
Eastry parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

Kent Online Parish Clerks (OPC)

Non-Conformists (All other Religions)

 * 1717 England & Wales, Roman Catholics, 1717 at FindMyPast ($), index and images (coverage may vary)

Poor Law Unions

 * Eastry Poor Law Union, Kent

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


 * See England, Kent, Wills and Probate - FamilySearch Historical Records

Local Family History Centre

 * Canterbury Family History Centre, Kent
 * Maidstone Family History Centre, Kent
 * FHC Portal This centre has access to the Family History Centre Portal page which gives free access in the centre to premium family history software and websites that generally charge for subscriptions.
 * Publication of the restricted access images England, Kent, Wills and Probate - FamilySearch Historical Records and England, Kent, Land Tax Assessments - FamilySearch Historical Records means that it is advisable to telephone the centre to reserve a computer if you wish to view these

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