Hampstead St John, Middlesex Genealogy

Guide to Hampstead St John, Middlesex ancestry, family history, and genealogy: Parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
Hampstead was granted to the Benedictine monks of Westminster Abbey by charter in 986 but, though it is unlikely they did not place a church there soon afterwards, the first concrete record of one comes from 1312 (when it was recorded that John de Neuport was its priest) and 1333 (through a mention of a Chapel dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary). On the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the Abbey was replaced by the Bishop of Westminster.

The civil and ancient parish of St John Hampstead was established by the year 1560.

'HAMPSTEAD (St. John), a parish, in the union of Edmonton, Holborn division of the hundred of Ossulstone, county of Middlesex, 4 miles north and west of London. Originally in ancient times, hamlet in the parish of Hendon, it became detached from it in 1598.

'Hampstead chapel, in Well Walk, originally the pump-room of the Wells Tavern; and St. John's chapel, Downshire Hill...erected in 1823, are proprietary episcopal chapels. There are chapels of worship for Baptists, Wesleyans, Unitarians, and Roman Catholics.'

The Victoria County History of Hampstead (1989) is available online. It includes chapters on manors, estates, economic history, local government, churches, Roman Catholicism, Protestant nonconformity, Judaism, Buddhism, Sikhism, other faiths, education, and charities for the poor.

Here's a list of Churches and Chapels of St John Hampstead in Pre-1900.

Resources

 * Baines, F.E. Records of the Manor, Parish, and Borough of Hampstead, in the County of London, to December 31st, 1889. London: Whittaker and Co., 1890. Digital version at Google Books.

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.

Church records
Hampstead St John parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

To find the names of the neighboring parishes, use England Jurisdictions 1851 Map. In this site, search for the name of the parish, click on the location "pin", click Options and click List contiguous parishes.

Records are also available at the London Metropolitan Archives.

1600 Lay Subsidy

 * 1600 - Lay Subsidy Returns for London, Middlesex, Surrey (north) 1593-1600: Hampstede (TNA E179/142/234) at Alan H. Nelson website - free

1666 Hearth Tax

 * Hearth Tax: Middlesex 1666: Hampstead at British History Online - free.

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

Poor Law Unions
Contributor: Add information about the pertinent poor law unions in the area.

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
Hampstead on GENUKI