England
& Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index |
The ParishLancashire's ecclesiastical arrangements are complex, St Helens, whilst a very substantial town, is actually only a chapelry in the very large parish of Prescot. It was, however, licensed for marriages throughout the transcript period. St Helens is a market town and a large undustrialised manufacturing town in the southern portion of Lancashire. It is located about 11 miles northeast of the port of Liverpool and lies about 2 miles south of the major east/west route of the A580 (East Lancs Road) which links Liverpool to Manchester. St Helens cannot be mentioned without documenting the two principal employers in the area namely coal from the Lancashire coalfield and glass from the high silica-rich sands deposited onto the Lancashire plains by the glaciations of the geological past. St Helens has grown into one of the major glass manufacturing sites of England and is almost synonymous with name of its major employer, Pilkingtons. The British Cast Plate Glass Company was founded in 1773 and managed by the wonderfully French named Jean-Baptiste Francois Graux de la Bruyere (plate glass technology having been developed in France) grew to be a significant industry not only in Lancashire terms but for England. The area prior to this had been largely rural and pastoral, lowly populated and of little worth to the country as a whole. St Helens sits at the centre of a web of major roads (both A58 and A570 cross its centre), it is located at around 30 metres above sea level on the broad south Lancashire plains, land falling away to the south where the River Mersey estuary lies. Most drainage heads for the Mersey, much of its through the Sankey Brook which heads southeastwards through nearby Warrington to join the Mersey. From a relatively minor small village St Helens grew rapidly to a population of over 17,000 parishioners. There is no mention of St Helens in Domesday Book. |
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Register No | Covering Dates | Deposited With | Register Style | Quality Standard | Comments |
1 | 9th May 1754 - 3rd October 1758 | Lancashire Record Office - Preston - Reference -
PR2923/1/1 |
Plain, unruled book, a continuation of the extant composite register in contravention of Hardwicke's segregation & wording requirements | Grade 3 Register - there are sufficient quality issues with this register to indicate that some misreads will occur albeit few in number | Fading might lead to a possibility of a few misreads |
2 | 6th April 1760 - 4th December 1785 | Lancashire Record Office - Preston - Reference - PR2923/1/14 | Standard preprinted and self-numbered combined Banns & Marriage register with 4 entries per page | Grade 2 Register - not a perfect read but with a low likelihood of misreads | None |
3 | 29th January 1786 - 15th November 1812 | Lancashire Record Office - Preston - Reference - PR2923/1/16 | Plain, unruled book containing Marriages | Grade 5 Register - the condition of this register is such that the transcript carries a "health warning" as to the likelihood of being substantially incorrect | There has been such fading to this register as to make large parts virtually unreadable. Despite use of optical assistance many entries are pure guesswork and some have been omitted as un-guessable Users should treat this section with extreme caution as errors will be frequent. Sadly there are no contemporaneous BTs to aide in corrections. |
4 | 4th May 1813 - 12th June 1837 | Lancashire Record Office - Preston - Reference - PR2923/1/17 | 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 | Fading continues albeit at a much reduced scale but still may result in a few misreads |
Rainford
All Saints
Prescot St Mary |
Rainford
All Saints
Billinge St Aidan |
Billinge
St Aidan
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Kirkby
St Chad
Prescot St Mary |
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Farnworth near Prescot St Luke
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Burtonwood
St Michael
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1760 1770 1780 1790 1800 1810 1820 1830
Corrections to Tinstaafl Transcripts