Widcombe, Somerset Genealogy

England   Somerset



Parish History
Widcombe St Thomas a Becket is an Ancient Parish in the county of Somerset. Other places in the parish include: Lyncombe and Bath St Mary de Stalls.

LYNCOMBE with Widcombe (St. Thomas à Becket), a parish, in the union of Bath, hundred of Bath-Forum, E. division of Somerset; containing 9920 inhabitants. The parish comprises about 1800 acres; it is separated from Bath by the river Avon, and the Kennet and Avon canal passes through it. The surface is diversified with hill and dale, and the soil, though thin on the higher grounds, is rich in the valley adjoining the river. Freestone is extensively quarried in the hills, and large quantities of it have been used for the buildings in Bath, Windsor, London, and other places. Many of the inhabitants are employed in the manufacture of fine woollen-cloth. In this parish, and that of Twiverton, three small cuttings were made, to the extent of 86,770 cubic yards, for the line of the Great Western railway. A fair is held on May 14th. The living is a vicarage, annexed to the rectory of St. Peter and St. Paul, Bath: the impropriate and vicarial tithes have been commuted for £260 each. Besides the parish church, a modern church dedicated to St. Mark, and Dolmead chapel, are both connected with the living. Here is a college, instituted and partly supported by the Roman Catholic bishop of the western district, for the education of Roman Catholic boys in general, and particularly of secular clergymen for the service of the district. At Holloway, in the parish, John Cantlow, prior of Bath, towards the close of the 15th century, erected a small chapel dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene, with an hospital for lunatics annexed; the chapel was partly rebuilt by subscription in 1761, and the incumbency is in the gift of the Crown.

From: 'Lydham - Lyng', A Topographical Dictionary of England (1848), pp. 198-203. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=51126 Date accessed: 15 March 2011.

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
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Somerset Online Parish Clerks
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Census records
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Poor Law Unions
Bath Poor Law Union, Somerset

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