England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Boughton St Matthew

The Parish

The parish of Boughton lies in northern central Nottinghamshire just under 2 miles northeast of the small town of Ollerton. Boughton sits on and mostly north of the A6075 road which links Ollerton with Tuxford. Boughton is in reality merely the eastward extension of Ollerton being contiguous with it. Most properties within the village lie along two parallel northeastward running lanes from the A6075. This rural area was, at the time of this transcript, typically a mixed farming area with patches of woodland managed by coppice for typical woodland products, however the exploitation of deep lying coal measures in more modern times has lead to a plethora of infrastructure across the parish. Freight railway lines, now mostly disused criss-cross the area and once served the now-closed mines. Boughton is drained northwards by the River Maun which becomes renamed as the Idle further north, at Bawtry the Idle turns sharply eastwards to meet the Trent and join that river for its final miles to the North Sea through the Humber Estuary, Boughton is sited at around 40 metres above the sea, to its southeast the isolated knoll of Golden Hill (106 metres) dominates the local skyline. Boughton parish was typically sized for this area covering close to 1,800 acres which would have supported a population of around 300 parishioners. In Domesday times two landholders, Gilbert of Ghent & Roger de Bully, shared Boughton, it was a small rural manor offering just 5 ploughs backed by typical meadows and more extensive woodland.

The Church

St Matthew's church sits about 300 yards north of the A6075 at the junction where Church Road meets Church Lane. As can readily be seen this is not a medieval church, nor indeed the church in which these marriages took place. Today's St Matthew was built in 1868 replacing an earlier medieval church which early gazetteers described as a "simple structure". The replacement church, in stone, is built in a 14th century-like style with a notable tower complete with slate-covered splayed-foot spire its main stand-out feature. The church has a small car park to the east of the site and signed from the churchyard. The entrance is a wooden gate shaded by thick tree-cover which continues into the churchyard proper, most southern aspects are markedly restricted leaving only poor northern views for landscape portraits.