Plymouth St James, Devon Genealogy

Guide to Plymouth St James, Devon ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
PLYMOUTH, a sea-port, borough, and market-town, having separate jurisdiction, locally in the hundred of Rororough, Roborough and S. divisions of Devon, 44 miles (S. W.) from Exeter, and 215 (W. S. W.) from London; containing, exclusively of the out-parts of the parishes of St. Andrew and Charles the Martyr. Church districts named respectively St. James and St. Peter's, were formed in 1847 by the Ecclesiastical Commission, the former out of St. Andrew's parish, and the latter out of the parishes of St. Andrew and East Stonehouse.

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
Plymouth St James 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.

Records are also available at the Devon Archives and Local Studies.

Non-Conformist Churches
The following non-Church of England denominations were located somewhere in Plymouth, but the exact parish has not been identified:


 * Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
 * Moravian/United Brethren

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

Websites
Plymouth St James on GENUKI

Plymouth East Stonehouse on GENUKI