Marton, Lancashire Genealogy

England Lancashire  Lancashire Parishes

Chapelry History
Marton St Paul was created as a district chapelry by 1801 from, and lying within the boundaries of Poulton le Fylde, Lancashire Ancient Parish.

Other places in the parish include: Great and Little Marton, Little Marton, and Great Marton.

Great Marton and Little Marton were collectively listed in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Meretun. The name usually means "farmstead by a pool", derived from the Old English words mere and tu-n. Its area was estimated in that survey to be six carucates of arable land.

By no later than the end of the 11th century, St Chad's Church had been built in the nearby town of Poulton-le-Fylde and became the parish church for the area following the Reformation in the 16th century.Marton residents travelled 5 miles to worship at St Chad's, a journey that was difficult in winter. Around 1625, they petitioned to become a separate parish from Poulton-le-Fylde, with Layton and Blackpool. It was not until 1800 that their request was granted and the Church of St Paul was built in Great Marton. Originally a chapel of Poulton-le-Fylde, the church was consecrated in 1804. It later became a parish church. In 1857, the church as extended to accommodate Marton's growing population, and a tower was added.

The Diocese of Blackburn is a Church of England diocese, covering much of Lancashire, created in 1926 from part of the Diocese of Manchester. The Diocese includes the towns of Blackburn, Blackpool, Burnley, and the cities of Lancaster, and Preston, as well as a large part of the Ribble Valley.

Here is an 1848 perspective from the topographer Samuel A. Lewis on this chapelry:

"MARTON, a chapelry, in the parish of Poulton, union of the Fylde, hundred of Amounderness, N. division of Lancashire, 2 miles (S. E.) from Blackpool; containing 1562 inhabitants, of whom 935 are in Great, and 627 in Little, Marton. This place is mentioned in the Domesday survey under the name of Meretun, or "the town of the mere," and is chiefly remarkable for its moss and mere. Adam de Merton occurs in the Testa de Nevill as holding land here, and the Walters and Botilers or Butlers were anciently proprietors; the Fleetwoods subsequently became possessed of the estates of the Butlers in Great Marton. In the 4th of Edward III., Little Marton was held in trust for the convent of Furness by William de Cokerham, and at the dissolution of monasteries it appears to have passed to the Holcrofts. The estate, with other estates in Lytham, was purchased of Sir John Holcroft by the Clifton family, in 1606; and the whole of Little Marton, and the larger part of Great Marton, now belong to Thomas Clifton, Esq., of Lytham Hall. The moss extends about six miles in length from north to south, and one mile and a half in breadth. The mere was formerly very extensive, and a stream issuing from it turned the wheel of a watermill situated beyond the present windmill in Great Marton: the right of fishery on this lake was the subject of legal contest in the reign of Edward III. The living is a perpetual curacy; net income, £120; patron, the Vicar of Poulton. The chapel, dedicated to St. Paul, was erected in 1801. A free school was founded in 1717 by James Baines, who endowed it with lands now producing £84 per annum; and a boys' and two girls' schools are supported."

From: A Topographical Dictionary of England by Samuel Lewis (1848), pp. 269-271. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=51138 Date accessed: 20 July 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.

Online index of Lancashire Births, Marriages and Deaths Lancashire BMD

Lancashire Online Parish Clerks
An extremely useful resource for research in Lancashire Parishes http://www.lan-opc.org.uk/

Church records
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Census records
http://www.1881pubs.com/ for details of public houses in the 1881 census

Poor Law Unions
Fylde Poor Law Union, Lancashire

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