Upper and Lower Bullinghope with Grafton, Herefordshire Genealogy

Guide to Upper and Lower Bullinghope with Grafton, Herefordshire ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
BULLINGHAM, a parish, in the hundred of Webtree, union and county of Hereford, 2 miles (S.) from Hereford. This parish comprises 1679 acres, of which 705 are in Upper Bullingham; it is bounded on the north by the river Wye, and is intersected by the road from Hereford to Ross.

GRAFTON, a township, in the parish of All Saints, Hereford, hundred of Webtree, union and county of Hereford; and comprising an area of 428 acres.

References in record sources to the villages of Lower Bullingham and Grafton may refer to Old Bullingthorpe Church or Bullingham Old Church. Immediately to the South of Hereford are the civil parishes:

Lower Bullingham is a village and civil parish in Herefordshire Lower Bullingham Wikipedia

Grafton is a village and civil parish in Herefordshire Grafton Herefordshire Wikipedia

John Harnden The Parish Registers of Herefordshire, J Harnden, 1987, ISBN 0 95123 47 0 6 explains that Hereford St Martin, Herefordshire parish included Grafton and Lower Bullingham until 1866 and included Blackmarstone and Putson and that the church was destroyed in 1645 and only rebuilt in 1845. For this period the parish was annexed to Hereford All Saints, Herefordshire however many entries especially for Lower Bullingham and Grafton are found in the registers of Bullingham.

The parish church of St Peter Grafton, Bullingham Lane, Grafton which dates from 1880 has been designated as a grade II listed Building British listed building The English Heritage listing text describes a drawing of the Old Bullinghope church reported as being about 1830. The listing also mentions that in the past St Peter has been referred to as being in Bullingham parish probably due to the adjacent parish of Lower Bullingham.

The ruins of the Church of St Peter, Bullingham Lane, Grafton are those of the old parish church replaced by the 1880 building and have been designated as grade II listed and are scheduled as an Ancient monument County number 130 under the name Bullingham Old Church British listed building

Colin Hinson's transcription of the 1868 National Gazetteer refers to Grafton in the entry for Hereford, see GENIUKI

England Jurisdictions 1851 refer to Upper and Lower Bullinghope with Grafton as being an Ecclesiastical parish formed in 1747 from Bullingham chapelry and part of Hereford All Saints, Herefordshire

Herefordshire Churches refers to Bullinghope St Peter

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
Upper and Lower Bullinghope with Grafton parish registers of christenings, marriages and burials are available online for the following years:

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

The Herefordshire Archive and Records Centre houses many parish registers. See The records we hold for a list of records available there. How to contact them:
 * Herefordshire Archive and Records Centre Fir Tree Lane Rotherwas Hereford HR2 6LA Telephone: +44 (0)1432 260750 Email: [mailto:archives@herefordshire.gov.uk archives@herefordshire.gov.uk] Website: Herefordshire Archive and Records Centre

In view of John Harnden's description of the parish registers ( see parish history above) it is advisable for the researcher to consult other parish records dependent on period and to reflect that citation of the relevant register needs to include the complexity of the naming variations of this area south of hereford and parish annexation after the loss of church.

Census records
See Herefordshire Census

Census returns for Upper Bullingham 1841-1891

Census returns for Grafton 1841-1891

FamilySearch Records includes collections of census indexes which can be searched online for free. In addition FamilySearch Centres offer free access to images of the England and Wales Census through the FHC Portal page which gives free access to premium family history software and websites that generally charge for subscriptions.

Category:England Family History Centres to locate local Family History Centres in UK

Introduction to Family History Centers to locate outside UK.

Many archives and local history collections in public libraries in England and Wales offer online census searches and also hold microfilm or fiche census returns.

Images of the census for 1841-1891 can be viewed in census collections at Ancestry (fee payable) or Find My Past (fee payable)

The 1851 census of England and Wales attempted to identify religious places of worship in addition to the household survey census returns.

Ancestry UK Census Collection

Find my Past census search 1841-1901

Poor Law Unions
Hereford Poor Law Union, Herefordshire

Probate records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Herefordshire 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