Dover St James the Apostle, Kent Genealogy

Guide to Dover St James the Apostle, Kent ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish register transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
DOVOR, or Dover, one of the cinque ports, a borough and market town, having separate jurisdiction, and the head of a union, locally in the lathe of St. Augustine, E division of Kent, 15 miles SE by S from Canterbury, and 71 ESE from London. The town formerly consisted of the parishes of St. James the Apostle, St. Mary the Virgin, St. John, St. Martin the Greater, St. Martin the Less, St. Nicholas, and St. Peter; of these, the five last no longer exist, and the churches have been demolished. There are places of worship for General and Particular Baptists, the Society of Friends, Independents, Wesleyans, Unitarians and Roman Catholics.

The Ancient Parish of St James the Apostle, St James Street included the mediaeval district surrounding the church.

During the Second World War Dover became known as "Hell Fire Corner" due to the intense bombardment from France and heavy bombing of the town.

The church of St James the Apostle and most of Church Street was totally destroyed by shelling from France. The remains of the building are scheduled as an Ancient monument see British listed building.

The church had not been used as a church since 1851 when the garrison church in the Castle had been restored. The Norman church was mainly built of Caen stone but had undergone restoration in the nineteenth century.

Find Neighboring Parishes
Use England Jurisdictions 1851 Map
 * Type the name of the parish in the search bar
 * Click on the location pin on the map
 * Choose Options from the pop up box
 * Click "List Contiguous Parishes" to find the neighboring parishes

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.

Registration Districts

 * 1837-1896 Dover Registration District

Church Records
The Church of England (Anglican) became the official state religion in 1534, with the reigning monarch as its Supreme Governor. Non-Conformist refers to all other religious denominations that are not the official state religion.

Church of England
Due to the increasing access of online records: Hover over the collection's title for more information Other Websites These databases have incomplete parish coverage.
 * Individual parish coverage for databases in this table are inconsistent and should be verified
 * Dates in the following table are approximate
 * Joiner Marriage Index - Kent ($)
 * Online Genealogical Index - Links to online genealogical records
 * The Genealogist Parish Registers - Kent ($)
 * UK Websites for Parish Records - Links to online genealogical records

Non-Conformists (All other Religions)

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

Census Records

 * Census returns for Dover, 1841-1891
 * Ancestry UK Census Collection ($)
 * Findmypast Census ($)

Poor Law Unions

 * Dover 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.


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

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

Websites

 * Dover, St. James Parish Kent Online Parish Clerks
 * Remains of ST James's Church British Listed Buildings
 * The town and port of Dover British History Online