Bodmin, Cornwall Genealogy

Guide to Bodmin, Cornwall ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
BODMIN (St. Petrock), a parish, and the head of a union, in the hundred of Trigg, E. division of Cornwall. There are places of worship for Bryanites, the Countess of Huntingdon's Connexion, and Wesleyans.

Neighboring Parishes
Parishes either adjoining or nearby include Lanivet, St Mabyn, Helland, Blisland, Cardinham, Temple, Warleggan, St Winnow, Lanlivery, Lostwithiel, Withiel, and Lanhydrock. All of these parishes, in addition to a few others, have been part of the Bodmin Registration District at one time, although not all are presently part of the district at this time.

Because Bodmin was the administrative center of this part of Cornwall and the seat of the Bodmin Registration District (for civil registration), as well as the largest town in this area, many people who had moved to other parts of the UK or emigrated to other countries often named Bodmin as their birth place. That obviously has implications for the genealogy researcher, as one may find records that report Bodmin as the birth place of the person sought, when in reality the birth and/or christening may have occurred in one of the other parishes or villages nearby, and the record of these events will not be found in the Bodmin parish records.

There are also parts of the Bodmin parish or borough, where the people living there have traditionally attended and had the events such as christening, marriage and burial performed in a different parish. For example those living at Margate, Turfdown, Sunny Bank, and Fletchers Bridge, although part of Bodmin, attended church and received those events at the Cardinham parish church.

Find Neighboring Parishes
Use England Jurisdictions 1851 Map
 * Type the name of the parish in the search bar
 * Click on the location pin on the map
 * Choose Options from the pop up box
 * Click "List Contiguous Parishes" to find the neighboring parishes

Civil Registration
Births, marriages and deaths were kept by the government from 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.

Bodmin is part of the Bodmin civil registration district which includes a number of surrounding parishes.

Church records
The Church of England (Anglican) became the official state religion in 1534, with the reigning monarch as its Supreme Governor. Non-Conformist refers to all other religious denominations that are not the official state religion.

Church of England
Due to the increasing access of online records: Hover over the collection's title for more information Other Websites These databases have incomplete parish coverage.
 * Individual parish coverage for databases in this table are inconsistent and should be verified
 * Dates in the following table are approximate
 * The Genealogist Parish Registers - Cornwall ($)
 * UK Websites for Parish Records - Links to online genealogical records
 * Online Genealogical Index - Links to online genealogical records
 * Cornish Parish Records

Non-Conformists (All other Religions)

 * 1717 England & Wales, Roman Catholics, 1717 at FindMyPast ($), index and images

Cornwall Online Parish Clerks
The Bodmin section of the OPC website contains many records.

Probate Records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Cornwall 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
There are many maps and gazetteers showing English places. Valuable web sites are:


 * 1851 Jurisdiction Maps
 * Vision of Britian

Websites
Bodmin in GENUKI