Shropshire, England Genealogy

Shropshire, or Salop, is an inland county of England along its border with Wales. Traditionally the county was bounded by the English counties of Cheshire; Staffordshire; Worcestershire and Herefordshire; and the historic Welsh counties of Denbighshire; Flintshire; Montgomeryshire and Radnorshire.

Shropshire is one of England's most rural and sparsely populated counties, although it also played an important role in the Industrial Revolution.

The county town is the history town of Shrewsbury, although the new town of Telford, built around the towns of Wellington, Dawley and Madeley, is the largest town in the county.

Much of Shropshire was previously within Wales, and formed the eastern part of the ancient Kingdom of Powys. It was annexed to Saxon Mercia by King Offa in the eighth century.

Motto: Floreat Salopia

Browse by Topic: All pages for Shropshire

Research Tools

 * Shropshire Gazetteer entry for 1870

Jurisdictions
Use an interactive mapto find jurisdictions for each parish in Shropshire.


 * Hamlet
 * Parish: an area of varying size under the responsibility of a clergyman of the Church of England
 * Hundred: a group of two or more parishes
 * Sub-district: comprised of more than one civil parish
 * Registration District
 * Poor Law Union
 * Archdeaconry
 * Diocese
 * County

Civil Registration Districts
When civil registration of births, marriages and deaths began in 1837, Shropshire was divided into a number of registration districts, each containing several parishes.The index to the civil records gives the name of the district where an event took place. Click here to see a list of the civil districts in Shropshire and the parishes covered by each. Read more about England Civil Registration.

Parishes
See a list of parishes of Shropshire with links to articles.

Probate Jurisdictions
Before 1858, every town and parish in Shropshire was under the probate jurisdiction of several ecclesiastical courts. To read more about probate records and see a list of Shropshire towns and parishes and the probate courts that had jurisdiction over them, go to Shropshire Probate Records.

Things you can do

 * Visit the Shropshire Archive in Shrewsbury.

Useful websites

 * Shropshire FHS
 * Shropshire Nonconformist Chapels
 * Ironbridge Gorge Museum

To view a further list of web sites and/or web pages for Shropshire and many of its parishes, visit FHLFavorites.info.