West Molesey, Surrey Genealogy

England   Surrey   Return to the Surrey Parishes page.

Parish History
MOLESEY, WEST, a parish, in the union of Kingston, First division of the hundred of Elmbridge, W. division of Surrey, 4 miles (W.) from Kingston; containing 469 inhabitants. It belonged to Bishop Fox, founder of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, who settled it on that institution, the heads of which eventually exchanged it for other lands, Henry VIII. being desirous of annexing the manor to the chase of Hampton Court. The parish is bounded on the north by the Thames, across which is a ferry to Hampton, and on the southeast by the river Mole. Hampton races are held on Molesey Hurst or Common, in June. This was anciently a chapelry to Walton-on-Thames. The living is a perpetual curacy; net income, £104; patron, the Right Hon. J. W. Croker. The tithes were commuted for land and a money payment in 1815. The glebe land consists of 25 acres. The church presents no indications of an early age, though a church is mentioned in Domesday book; it is a low and irregularly-built edifice, with an embattled tower of stone and flints.

From: A Topographical Dictionary of England by Samuel A. Lewis (1848), pp. 329-332. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=51155 Date accessed: 30 November 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.

Church records
Contributor: Include here information for parish registers, Bishop’s Transcripts, non conformist 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 Surrey 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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