Precinct of the Savoy, Middlesex Genealogy

England   Middlesex   Middlesex Parishes

Duchy of Lancaster 

Parish History
LANCASTER (DUCHY OF), a liberty in Strand district, Middlesex; forming part of the metropolis; and lying partly in the precinct of the Savoy and St Clement-Danes, but mostly in the parish of St. Mary-le-Strand. It includes the site of the palace of the Earls and Dukes of Lancaster.

The Savoy Chapel or the Queen's Chapel of the Savoy is a chapel off the Strand, London, dedicated to St John the Baptist. It was originally built in the medieval era off the main church of the Savoy Palace (later the Savoy Hospital). The Hospital was in ruins by the 19th century, and the Chapel was the only part to survive demolition.

The original chapel was within Peter of Savoy's palace, and was destroyed with it in the Peasants' Revolt in 1381. The present Chapel building was constructed in the 1490s (and finished in 1512) by Henry VII as a side chapel off his Hospital's 200-foot (61 m) long nave (this nave was secular rather than sacred, held 100 beds, and was demolished in the 19th century).

The chapel has been the host to various other congregations, most especially that of St Mary-le-Strand whilst it had no church building of its own 1549–1714. Also the German Lutheran congregation of Westminster (now at Sandwich Street and Thanet Street, near St Pancras[1]) was granted royal permission to worship here, when it split from Holy Trinity (the City of London Lutheran congregation, now at St Anne and St Agnes).[2] The new congregation's first pastor, Irenaeus Crusius (previously an associate at Holy Trinity), dedicated the chapel on the 19th Sunday after Trinity 1694 as the Marienkirche or the German Church of St. Mary-Le-Savoy.

As an Anglican church, the chapel has been noted in the 18th century as a place where marriages without banns might illegally occur,[3] and was referred to in Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited as "the place where divorced couples got married in those days – a poky little place".[4]

1. Wikipedia. Savoy Chapel  Wikipedia. Online | here.

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
Marriages from 1799 to 1837 are included in Pallot's Marriage Index.

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

Contributor: Include here information for parish registers, Bishop’s Transcripts, nonconformist and other types of church records, such as parish chest records. Add the contact information for the office holding the original records. Add links to the Family History Library Catalog showing the film numbers in their collection.

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.

Manorial Records
Records survive for Savoy Manor (1601-1884). The Manorial Documents Register will help you locate these records.

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