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England London Boroughs   Waltham Forest

Guide to The London Borough of Waltham Forest history, family history, and genealogy parish registers, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.



History
As with all the other London Boroughs, Waltham Forest was cobbled together from a number of local areas with no concern for history or for the desires of the population. Family History researchers will need to review the specific segments listed below that were all part of the original County of Essex.

The London Borough of Waltham Forest is a London borough in north east London, and forms part of Outer London. The major areas are Leyton, Walthamstow and Chingford.

Many Stone Age remains are found in the area. Ancient Roman relics have also been found in locations scattered around the borough, proving that it was a significant area of Roman occupation.

In 1213 King John visited Shern Hall, the manor house in Hoe Street that survived until it was demolished in 1896. Until the 19th century Walthamstow was largely rural, with a small village center (now Walthamstow Village) and a number of large estates. The main route through the district was Hoe Street. There were various smaller lanes crossing the town. The road now known as Forest Road was originally called Clay Street. Further south, the High Street was named Marsh Street, and led from the original settlement out to the marshes. Shernhall Street is an ancient route, as is Wood Street, to the east. In the 1660s Sir William Batten, Surveyor of the Navy, and his wife Elizabeth Woodcocke had a house in Wood Street where, according to Samuel Pepys, they lived "like princes" and cultivated a vineyard. The Vestry House, now the Vestry House Museum, was used as the first town hall. By 1870 the place had grown to the size of a small suburb and a new town hall was built in Orford Road from which affairs of the village were run.

The southern part of Epping Forest still extends into the south of the borough, 90% of it having been preserved by Epping Forest Act of 1878. This not only assisted in preserving the forest but also helped develop the towns around it: Chingford, Forest Gate, Walthamstow, Leytonstone, and Leyton. The area's location between the City of London and Epping Forest encouraged large-scale urban development.

The area now known as Waltham Forest experienced at least two Zeppelin raids during World War I. On 17/18 August 1915, Airship L10 took a route roughly following the Gospel Oak to Barking railway line, dropping incendiary and high-explosive bombs. The first bomb, an incendiary, fell on Hoe St, Walthamstow, at the junction of Orford and Queens Road; the last was dropped in Aldersbrook area. Ten people were killed in Leyton and another 48 injured across the wider area. On 23/24 September 1916 the German Navy airship L 31 dropped around ten bombs along the line of Lea Bridge Road, Leyton, killing eight there. She also dropped bombs on Streatham and Brixton the same night.

The London Government Act 1963 established the borough in 1965 from the combined areas of the former Municipal Borough of Chingford, Municipal Borough of Leyton and Municipal Borough of Walthamstow, which all transferred to Greater London from the English county of Essex.

Cemeteries (Civil)
Chingford Mount Cemetery:


 * 121 Old Church Rd
 * London E4 6ST
 * Phone: +44 20 8524 5030

Walthamstow Cemetery


 * Queens Rd
 * Walthamstow E17 8QP
 * Phone: +44 20 8524 5030

Waltham Abbey Jewish Cemetery


 * Honey Ln
 * Waltham Abbey EN9 3QT
 * Phone: +44 20 8950 7767

Waltham Abbey Cemetery


 * Cemetery Lodge
 * Sewardstone Rd
 * Waltham Abbey EN9 1NX, UK
 * Phone: +44 1992 712525

City of London Cemetery and Crematorium

Aldersbrook Rd
 * Manor Park, E12 5DQ
 * Phone: +44 20 8530 2151

Western Cemetery


 * Bulls Cross Ride
 * Broxbourne, Goff's Oak, Waltham Cross EN7 5
 * Phone: +44 1992 717820

Waltham Forest Muslim Cemetery


 * 16 Peacock Cl
 * Walthamstow, London E4 8TX

Adath Yisroel Cemetery


 * Carterhatch Ln
 * Enfield EN1 3NS

Parishes
St Mary's Walthamstow

8 Church End
 * Walthamstow, E17 9RJ
 * Phone: +44 20 8520 1430

St Anne's


 * 200 Larkshall Rd
 * London E4 6NP

St John's


 * 18 Brookscroft Rd
 * Walthamstow, London E17 4LH
 * Phone: +44 20 8523 3102

St Peter and St Paul


 * The Green Walk
 * London E4 7EN
 * Phone: +44 20 8529 1291

All Saints'


 * 184 Old Church Rd
 * London E4 8BU
 * Phone: +44 20 8529 0323

St John the Baptist


 * High Rd
 * Leytonstone, London E11 1HH
 * Phone: +44 20 8558 2481

Non Conformists
Christian non-conformist groups that meet in Oxford include:


 * Baptist
 * Bethel Gospel Church
 * Church of Christ
 * Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormon)
 * Emmanuel Community Church
 * Emmanuel Tamil Church
 * Evangelical Free Church
 * New Life Christian Center
 * Potters House Christian Center
 * Redeemed Christian Church of God
 * Salvation Army
 * Seventh Day Adventist
 * Unitarian

Non Christian groups follow:


 * Buddhist
 * Confucian
 * Jewish
 * Hindu
 * Muslim
 * Sikh

Civil Registration
Birth, marriages and deaths records have been kept by the UK government since July 1837 to the present day. Prior to that, local parishes of the Church of England, and local branches of other faiths were the only repositories of this information.


 * Waltham Forest BMD records


 * bmd-certificates: Waltham Forest


 * Essex County Records office


 * ukbmd.org: Waltham Forest District

Local Histories

 * visionofbritain: Waltham Forest
 * British History on line: Walthamstow


 * Walthamstow Through Time by Lindsay Collier

Maps and Gazetteers

 * geopunk uk: Brent London map


 * google maps: Brent Borough


 * oldmapsonline: Brent


 * francis frith: old Wembley maps


 * francis frith: old Kilburn maps


 * old map of Harlesden


 * francis frith: Old Neasden maps


 * Brent Council Gazetteer


 * visionofbritain: Wembley Gazetteer


 * hidden-london: Kilburn gazetteer


 * britishhistoryonline: Harlesden GAzetteer


 * hidden-london: Neasden Gazetteer

Newspapers

 * Brent and Kilburn Times


 * London Live: Brent


 * getwestlondon: Wembley


 * The Harrow Times

Occupations
The major area of employment opportunities in the general Brent Borough area is in the professional athletic field. Eng;land's most famous sporting location is the rebuilt and renewed Wembley Stadium, home to most of Britain's major sporting events.

Brent is also the headquarters of Diageo, PLC., the world's largest producer of high alcohol content spirits, and also producer of major brands of beer. While the conglomerate has many producing sites through the UK, and indeed, the world, the HQ facility provides many employment opportunities for locals.

Close by is the UK's busiest airport, Heathrow with a multitude of career opportunities.

The general location is also home to the UK's major film industry, with most of the BBC's entertainment films made in this location. additionally the HQ for Elstree studios, a generic name synonymous with British movie making, is located in the district.

Despite the regional and national decline of this sector over the last twenty years, the manufacturing sector continues to play an important role in the local economy, albeit a less significant one that previously. Indeed, West London is the only place in the UK – with the exception of Northern Ireland - that hasn't succumbed to a mass wave of manufacturing redundancies in recent year. With around 53,000 people out of a total local workforce of 750,000 plying their trade within this sector, a high number of these jobs are concentrated in and around the Park Royal area in Ealing Brentford – the largest industrial estate in Europe. Carillion and GlaxoSmithKline remain the leading employers in this sector.

With the West End and Soho being the cultural, entertainment and leisure hub of the capital attracting some 200 million visitors a year – 50 per cent from overseas – it is hardly surprising that the tourism sector is the biggest provider of jobs in West London. Overall this sector employs around 232,000 (31 per cent of the district workforce) people in the district.

Societies

 * Waltham Forest FHS

Archives

 * Brent Borough Archives


 * The National Archives: Brent


 * The National Archives: Wembley

Web Sites

 * Brent Borough Council


 * Greater London Council


 * wikipedia: Middlesex


 * wikipedia: Wembley


 * wikipedia: Willesden


 * wikipedia: Kilburn, London


 * wikipedia:Harlesden


 * wikipedia: Neasden