Hatcham St James, Surrey Genealogy

England   Surrey

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Parish History
HATCHAM, an ecclesiastical parish, in the parish of St. Paul, Deptford, union of Greenwich, E. division of the hundred of Brixton and of the county of Surrey, 1½ miles (S. W.) from Deptford; containing about 5000 inhabitants. This place is noticed in Domesday Book under the appellation of Hachesham, and at a subsequent period was granted to the nunnery at Dartford, in Kent. The parish was constituted in June, 1845, under the provisions of the act 6th and 7th of Victoria, cap. 37; and is two miles in length from north to south, and one mile in breadth from east to west, lying at the foot of the range of hills which extend to Forest Hill, Norwood, &amp;c.; its eastern boundary, and the boundary of the county here, being the same. Hatcham is about three miles from London Bridge, on the old Kent road, and near New-Cross turnpike; and contains many good houses. The Brighton railway passes through; and the New-Cross station of the line is situated in the centre of the parish. The extensive workshops, the goods' depôt, &amp;c., belonging to the railway company, have been twice partly destroyed by fire, but the premises have been again built upon a larger scale. The living is a perpetual curacy, in the gift of Alexander Read, Esq., by whom it has been endowed. The church, dedicated to St. James, is a temporary building, erected by the incumbent at his own cost, of nearly £1000; it is a neat structure, consisting of a nave, chancel, and aisles, with open seats, containing accommodation for 700 persons. The principal portion of the land in the hamlet is held in trust by the Haberdashers' Company of London, for the support of the public schools and almshouses of the town of Monmouth, having been left by a person named Jones, a Monmouth peddler.

From: A Topographical Dictionary of England by Samuel A. Lewis (1848), pp. 435-441. courtesy: British History Online

Hatcham St James church was created in 1845 from Deptford St Paul, Kent. The church was designed by W Granville and consecrated on 17 October 1854 on a site bought from the governors of Christ's Hospital. It was declared redundant in 1981 and leased initially to Goldsmiths College, later to Laban Dance Studio until their own building was built.

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.

Link to the Family History Library Catalogue showing the film numbers in their collection

Census records
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Poor Law Unions
Greenwich Poor Law Union,Kent

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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