England &
Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index |
The ParishThe parish of Otham lies in west central Kent about 2 miles southeast of the town of Maidstone. Otham, once a discrete separate village, has almost been absorbed into the growing town and is contiguously joined along the A274 road which connects Maidstone with Headcorn and onwards to Tenterden. Most of the properties in Otham lie to the north of that road in what was once a quite dispersed settlement. At the time of this transcript Otham would have been a farming community with a mixed farming regime, albeit the local stone was quarried mainly for building locally, a substantial portion of the parish was also still under managed coppiced woodland. Today Otham is very much a suburb of its larger neighbour with modern developments swamping the prior landscape. The small River Len drains the parish westwards to shortly join the Medway in Maidstone and turn northwards to reach the Thames Estuary & the North Sea. Otham is sited on a sloping site, the church being at 60 metres whereas those properties along the A274 are some 30 metres higher; the general landscape is undulating but not unduly hilly. Otham parish was one of the smaller in the area, it covered around 950 acres and would have supported a population of about 350 parishioners. In Domesday time Otham was held by one Bishop Odo of Bayeux and was tiny place indeed, it could offer just a pair of ploughs, small meadows and woodlands but did possess a mill. |
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Register No | Covering Dates | Deposited With | Register Style | Quality Standard | Comments |
1 | 15th April 1754 - 27th May 1811 | Kent History & Library Centre - Maidstone - Reference - P280/1/A/4 | Standard preprinted and self-numbered combined Banns & Marriage register with 4 entries per page | Grade 3 Register - there are sufficient quality issues with this register to indicate that some misreads will occur albeit few in number | Poor handwriting makes it likely that a few misreads will have occurred |
2 | 27th September 1813 - 9th August 1835 | Kent History & Library Centre - Maidstone - Reference - P280/1/D/1 | Standard Rose style preprinted and prenumbered Marriage register | Grade 3 Register - there are sufficient quality issues with this register to indicate that some misreads will occur albeit few in number | Poor handwriting makes it likely that a few misreads will have occurred |
Maidstone
All Saints
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Bearsted Holy
Cross
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Bearsted
Holy Cross
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Maidstone All
Saints
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Leeds St Nicholas
Langley St Mary |
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Langley
St Mary
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Langley St
Mary
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Langley
St Mary
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1760 1770 1780 1790 1800 1810 1820 1830
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