Preston St George, Lancashire Genealogy

England Lancashire  Lancashire Parishes

Chapel History
Preston St George church was built in 1723 as a Chapel-of-Ease to the Parish Church of St John, the first Chapel-of-Ease in Preston. It was commenced by the then Vicar at St John's Church, the Revd. Samuel Peploe who became the Bishop of Chester and returned to dedicate the church in 1726. The Vestry accounts show that there was an organ in the west gallery from about 1740.

In 1798-9 St. George's had been enlarged presumably by the addition at the two transepts, for in 1837 Whittle describes St. George's Church as a "building of cruciform shape standing on the south west side of Friargate, of brick and lighted by six windows on each side of the body with circular heads commonly called Norman style, the attic windows are semi-circular".

The Diocese of Blackburn is a Church of England diocese, covering much of Lancashire, created in 1926 from part of the Diocese of Manchester. The Diocese includes the towns of Blackburn, Blackpool, Burnley, and the cities of Lancaster, and Preston, as well as a large part of the Ribble Valley.

"St George's district church, built in 1723, is a cruciform structure of brick, cased with stone in 1845: the living is a perpetual curacy; net income, £150; patron, the Vicar of Preston."

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/

Online Records
 Church of England 

Preston St George chapelry's registers of christenings, marriages and burials, along with those of the ancient parish of Preston St John to which it is attached, have been mostly transcribed and are displayed online at the following web sites and ranges of years:

For a full list of all those chapels surrounding Preston St George and comprising the whole ancient parish of Preston St John to which it was attached, be certain to see "Church Records" on the PRESTON ST JOHN PARISH page.

Preston Guild
The right to hold a Guild Merchant was conferred upon the Burgesses of Preston by a charter of 1179;[11] the associated Preston Guild is a civic celebration held every 20 years, with the next one due in 2012.[12]

Before 1328 a celebration had been held on an irregular basis, but at the Guild of that year it was decreed that subsequent Guilds should be held every twenty years. After this there were breaks in the pattern for various reasons, but an unbroken series were held from 1542 to 1922. A full 400 year sequence was frustrated by the cancellation of the 1942 Guild due to World War II, but the cycle resumed in 1952. The expression '(Once) every Preston Guild', meaning 'very infrequently', has passed into fairly common use, especially in Lancashire.

Guild week is always started by the opening of the Guild Court, which since the Sixteenth century has traditionally been on the first Monday after the feast of the decollation (the beheading) of St John the Baptist celebrated on 29 August. As well as concerts and other exhibitions, the main events are a series of processions through the city. Numerous street parties are typically also held in the locality.

In 1952, the emphasis was on the bright new world emerging after World War II. The major event held in the city's Avenham Park had every school participating, and hundreds of children, from toddlers to teenagers, demonstrated different aspects of physical education in the natural amphitheatre of the park.

In 1972, participants at the Avenham Park celebrations were treated to a low level, low speed, flyby by Concorde.

Poor Law Unions
Preston Poor Law Union, Lancashire

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
Maps are a visual look at the locations in England. Gazetteers contain brief summaries about a place.


 * England Jurisdictions 1851
 * Vision of Britain

Web sites
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/prestonian/st_george.htm for images and history of the church