Westbourne, Sussex Genealogy

England   Sussex



Parish History
Westbourne St John the Baptist is an Ancient Parish in the county of Sussex. Southbourne, Sussex was a chapelry of Westbourne.

Other places in the parish include: Prinstead, Woodmancote, Aldsworth, Hermitage, and Nutbourne.

The Church of St John the Baptist which dates from the late 14th century was restored in 1865 and has been designated a grade I listed building British listed building

history and images

In 1870-72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described Westbourne like this:

WESTBOURNE, a village, a parish, a sub-district, a district, and a hundred, in Sussex. The village stands 1 mile N of Emsworth r. station, and 2¾ ENE of Havant; was once a trading town; and has a post-office under Emsworth. The parish includes five tythings; comprises 4,306 acres of land, and 785 of water: and contains W. workhouse. Real property, £10,914. Pop., 2,165. Houses, 467. Much of the land belongs to Lord Leconfield and Messrs. Hipkin and Wyatt. The living is a rectory and a vicarage in the diocese of Chichester. Value, £450.* Patron, J. Sperling, Esq. The church is good; and there is a national school.—The sub-district contains 4 parishes. Acres, 14,120. Pop., 3,726.—The district includes Funtington sub-district, and comprises 32,886 acres. Poor rates in 1863, £4,287. Pop. in 1851, 6,944: in 1861, 6,954. Houses, 1,427. Marriages in 1863, 53; births, 217,-of which 12 were illegitimate: deaths, 154,-of which 47 were at ages under 5 years, and 7 at ages above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 441: births, 1,986; deaths, 1,215. The places of worship, in 1851, were 14 of the Church of England, with 3,518 sittings; 3 of Independents, with 275 s.; 2 of Baptists, with 88 s.; and 1 of Bible Christians, with 90 s. The schools were 10 public day-schools, with 758 scholars: 7 private day-schools, with 193 s.; 8 Sunday schools, with 546 s.; and 3 evening schools for adults, with 36 s.-The hundred contains 12 parishes; bears the name of W. and Singleton; and is in Chichester rape. Acres, 32,019. Pop. in 1851, 5,722. Houses, 1,110.

See also Westbourne Wikipedia

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
Westbourne St John the Baptist

West Sussex Record Office has deposited parish Registers Bap1550-1998 Marr 1550-1987 Bur 1550-1942

Bishop's Transcripts 1572-1904

Contact West Sussex Record Office 3 Orchard Street Chichester West Sussex PO19 1DD Phone: 01243 753602 Fax: 01243 533959 Email: records.office@westsussex.gov.uk Link to the Family History Library Catalogue showing the film numbers in their collection

Census records
See Sussex Census

Poor Law Unions
Westbourne Poor Law Union, Sussex

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

Web sites
Contributor: Add any relevant sites that aren’t mentioned above.