England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Preston Patrick St Gregory

The Parish

The chapelry of Preston Patrick, a daughter chapelry of Burton in Kendal parish, lies in southern Westmorland not too far from its border with neighbouring Lancashire. Preston Patrick is roughly equidistant from Kendal and Kirkby Lonsdale being 6 miles south of the former and a similar distance northwest of the latter. Preston Patrick sits just east of the A65 road which connects Kendal through to Skipton in Yorkshire. There is no defined village of Preston Patrick, as such, there being other village settlements like Crooklands, Endmoor and Millness within the area of the chapelry. Preston Patrick is dominated by the grounds of its eponymous hall, a 14th century hall sitting on the site of a short-lived 12th century Abbey. Otherwise the chapelry is dominated by a landscape of stone walls, pastures with both sheep and cattle in roughly equal measure. In contrast with this rural scene the modern development of the M6 motorway carves its way through en route from London to Carlisle. Preston Patrick is drained southwestwards by the fast-flowing Peasey Beck which soon joins the River Bela and reaching Morecambe Bay and the Irish Sea through Milnthorpe. Both church and hall within the chapelry are sited at around 60 metres above the sea in undulating countryside land rises steeply eastwards onto the Pennines reaching 284 metres on nearby Scout Fell. The chapelry of Preston Patrick is detached from its mother parish with an area of Beetham in between, the chapelry's area amounted to just under 3,600 acres and would have supported a population of close to 500 parishioners. In Domesday times Preston Patrick is recorded as being held by King William but is described as "waste" with no detailed assets.

The Church

St Gregory's church sits high on a hill above the A65 and is accessed by a surfaced track from the latter. Whilst the church is attractive and has a picturesque setting it is not some medieval masterpiece no indeed is it entirely the church in which these marriages were made. Today's church was almost totally rebuilt in the early 1850s whilst its chancel was further rebuilt in the early 1890s leaving very little of the original visible. Pevsner notes genuine Perpendicular style windows in both the northwestern tower and in the canopied niches complete with grotesques flanking the eastern window, all that these parishioners would recognise. The track to the church has a gravelled surface with grass growing down the centre but thankfully opens out to a fine parking area immediately outside the churchyard. A few trees grace the churchyard but these present no obstacle for the photographer.