Crossens, Lancashire Genealogy

England Lancashire  Lancashire Parishes



Chapelry History
Crossens St John is an Ecclesiastical Parish in the county of Lancashire, created in 1840 from North Meols North Meols, Lancashire Ancient Parish.

Crossens is the northernmost district of the town of Southport, Merseyside, England and part of the ancient parish of North Meols. Whilst most of the village is now within Merseyside, part of northern Crossens known as Fiddlers Ferry, is in West Lancashire. Formerly, Crossens was a detached settlement lying on the western edge of Martin Mere, but after the drainage of the Mere and the expansion of Southport, it had become absorbed into the town's conurbation.

Formerly Crossenes or Crosnes meaning a “ness” or headland with a cross. The cross was possibly a guide for shipping or people crossing the Ribble Estuary from Freckleton (near Lytham). A hospice or lodging house was sited in Crossens where travellers could rest after making the crossing. It is also believed to be the point at which 2,000 horsemen from a retreating Royalist force crossed the Ribble estuary following the battle of Marston Moor. They later joined the battle at Lathom Hall.

CROSSENS, a hamlet, in the parish of North Meols, union of Ormskirk, hundred of West Derby, S. division of Lancashire, 3½ miles (N. E.) from Southport; containing 582 inhabitants. The surface here is generally level; the soil is various, much of it of good quality, and chiefly arable. The village is prettily situated on slightly rising ground, at the mouth of the Ribble; the population principally consists of farmers, labourers, and hand-loom weavers. A church (St. John's) was erected in 1837, for the accommodation of the inhabitants, and those of the adjoining hamlet of Banks, which has a population of 840; it is a neat structure with a tower. The living is a perpetual curacy, in the patronage of Trustees; there is a parsonage house. A good national school has been established; and at Banks is another national school, in which divine service is performed by the minister of Crossens.

From: A Topographical Dictionary of England by Samuel Lewis (1848), pp. 733-737. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=50907 Date accessed: 29 June 2010.

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/

Church records
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Census records
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http://www.1881pubs.com/ for details of public houses in the 1881 census

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
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 * England Jurisdictions 1851
 * Vision of Britain

Web sites
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