BERKSHIRE (abbreviations:
Berks, BRK)
1887, John Bartholomew's Gazetteer of
the British Isles
Berkshire, one of the inland cos. of England, lying between
Hants and the river Thames, bounded on the N. by Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire,
and Bucks, E.
by Surrey, S. by
Hants, and W. by Wilts; greatest
length, E. and W., 53 miles; greatest breadth, N. and W., 30 miles;
area 462,210 ac., pop. 218,363. It is intersected in a westerly
direction by a line of chalk hills, a continuation of the Chilterns,
the highest elevation being White Horse Hill, alt. 893 ft. N. of this
is the White Horse Vale (so called from the figure of a horse cut out
on the hill-side), and to the S. lies the Vale of Kennet, watered by
the Kennet stream. These tracts are well cultivated, and produce good
crops of grain, &c., especially in the Vale of the White Horse.
Dairy farms and commons abound; much of the surface is under woods,
chiefly of oak and beech. Windsor Forest, covering upwards of 50,000
ac., lies in the E. (For agricultural statistics, see Appendix.) The
Thames flows along the entire N. boundary (100 miles in extent); its
tributaries are the Kennet, Lambourn, Ock, and Loddon. The mfrs. are
unimportant, being chiefly agricultural implements and malt. The Great
Western Ry., the Thames, and 2 canals are the chief means of transit.
The co. contains 20 hundreds, 193 pars. with parts of 4 others, the
parl. and mun. bors. of Reading (1 member) and New Windsor (1 member),
the mun. bors. of Maidenhead, Newbury, and Wallingford, and the greater
part of the mun. bor. of Abingdon. It is almost entirely in the diocese
of Oxford. For parliamentary purposes it is divided into 3 divisions,
viz., Northern or Abingdon, Southern or Newbury, and Eastern or
Wokingham, 1 member for each division.
See also general descriptions about Berkshire from Berkshire
FHS, Pigot's 1830 Directory, The National Gazetteer
of Great Britain and Ireland (1868), Cassell's
Gazetteer of Great
Britain and Ireland, 1899
. Other descriptions can be
found from other periods in various trade
directories
covering Berkshire from the early 19th century onwards and from A Vision of Britain Through Time.
What
is Berkshire? The
geographic extent of the county has changed over the centuries (more
about
boundary changes... and also see
Historical
Geography below). For
the purposes of these pages, Berkshire
is the pre-1974 county defined by the Towns
and Parishes list and this map
of the ecclesiastical parishes
of 19th century Berkshire.
If
in any doubt, consult the GENUKI
Gazetteer
to determine on which county page your place of interest is located.
See Berkshire
Genealogy to understand how
these Berkshire pages are structured
and how do we fit into the rest of GENUKI.
- The Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints offers a
wide
range of genealogical resources at its Family History Centers around
the world. For contact details, click
here and search for the
centre nearest you. Reading FHC is the only centre in Berkshire.
Bibliography
- The British Library's Integrated
Search allows you to
search through over 13 million books in
their collection. Tip: include "Berkshire" in the
search
to receive more meaningful results.
- Reading
Central Library has a
particularly good selection of
Berkshire-related books and, even if you cannot visit, their catalogue
can still be used to identify titles that can then be sourced
elsewhere.
- Online books
are
available from various websites
that provide free digitised
copies of out-of-copyright books
that can be downloaded, some relating to Berkshire history. They are
particularly useful to
find
local history written in the 17th, 18th and early 20th centuries,
magazines, professional & army listings. Because they
are
fully text searchable, they are useful for finding passing
reference to events, people and places without having to know the title
of the book. Currently,
they are
dominated
by the holdings of US libraries but will hopefully expand to other
areas.
Be aware that these files are large.
- Francis
Frith
sells modern books about the history of Berkshire places
Business
and Commerce Records
- Many records are
held by the BRO
but some are un-catalogued.
For catalogued records, use Access
to Archives advanced search and
select Repository = Berkshire
Record Office. Some un-catalogued records appear on this
list and others are listed below:
Berkshire
Printing
Company, Reading, 1900-2001 (D/EX1667); Blatch’s
Brewery,
Theale, 1763-1972 (D/EX 1639); S & E Collier Ltd of
Reading,
brick and tile makers,
1902-1964
(R/D 130); Henry Bird & Sons, brewers of Reading,
1738-1867
(D/EX 1668); S H Higgs Ltd, brewers of Reading,
1937-1960s (D/EX 1668); John Hooper of Reading, pill
manufacturer 1787-1849 (D/EX 1830), see
also Vol 26 2004 page 3 of the
Berkshire
Echo; Strange
& Sons, brewers of Aldermaston, 1818-1999
(D/EX 1668); Thomas Wethered & Sons,
brewers of Marlow,
Buckinghamshire,
1580-1983 (D/EX 1668); Heelas & Co of
Wokingham,
department store 1798-1919 (D/EHS); Huntley, Boorne &
Stevens
of Reading, tin box manufacturers, 1878-1959 (D/EX 1745);
Maidenhead Waterworks Company, 1874-1957, and Wokingham
District
Water Company, 1926-1934 (D/EX 1913).
- Agricultural equipment
manufacturers - business records of Berkshire firms in agricultural
engineering, processing, and farm and garden seed
production are held by the The
Rural History Centre of Reading
University, including: Gascoignes, Reading; Goodenoughs, Reading;
Nalder & Nalder
Ltd,
Wantage; Sottons Seeds, Reading; Wantage Engineering Company;
Thomas Baker of
Newbury; John Wilder of Reading.
- Canals:
- Railway
& Canal Historical Society
- Kennet & Avon
Canal
- see the Museum
which describes
the way the canal was planned, built and worked during its 200 year
history and Wikipedia.
- The novel The Cry
Of The Heron by Dick Allan (ISBN 0-9533291-2-7) has a
background on the River Wey and Basingstoke Canal and is set in the
late 18th and early 19th centuries, available from Reading Central Library
- Huntley
& Palmer (biscuit manufacturers):
- Peek
Frean (biscuit manufacturers) in
the Reading University
archive
- Plenty of Newbury (lifeboats, marine steam engines, and latterly,
pumps), 1746-1997, records are held by the BRO (D/EX1739, 1771, 2097)
- Reading Gas Company and
Reading Gas Works, 1899-1965. -
records are held by the BRO
(D/SG 8 & D/EX 1593). Reading
Gas Company
1862 -1912 Douglas H Helps,
1912
available from Reading
Central Library
and Berkshire
FHS library.
- Reading Iron Works - Barrett,
Exall & Andrews' Reading Iron Works,
an article in Berkshire
Family Historian, Dec 2010, Vol
34, page 19 describes the
life of this agricultural equipment manufacturer 1858 -
1872.
- Sutton's
Seeds
was formed in 1806 to sell corn, moved to Market Place, Reading in
1832. Their website
provides a brief
history.
Sutton's
Seeds - The
History 1806-2006, Earley
Local History Group ISBN
0954004124 (available from Reading
Central Library).
Records 1860s-1940s are held by the The
Rural History Centre of Reading
University
- Taylowe (printers) founded in Slough in the 1930s and moved to
Maidenhead in the 1950s -
records are held by the BRO
(D/EX2012)
Cemeteries
- For Berkshire parishes now located in modern Oxfordshire, some
monumental inscriptions have been transcribed by Oxfordshire FHS
- The BRO
hold all the census
enumerators' returns for Berkshire
1841-1901 on microfilm or fiche, with indexes for 1851 and
1881.
- See also The Berkshire
Religious Census 1851 under Church
History
below.
- Joseph Toomer's census of
Newbury 1815 - a full transcript and
index is available from Berkshire
FHS
shop
- The GENUKI
Church Database provides
information about places of worship (not just Church of
England) and
burial grounds, including links to the individual churches' own
websites and to the related Parish page where further information may
be found. Currently, it lists most C of E
Berkshire churches, and other denominations are being added.
Contributions and corrections are
positively invited. More about how
to use the
database and how you can contribute.
-
Church of England:
-
A Church Near
You
lists the existing
churches in the Church of England
with current information, maps, contact information, service
times, often with links to the churches' own websites.
-
The Churches
Conservation Trust (formerly the Redundant Churches Fund) protects
historic churches that have been made redundant by the Church of
England, but not sold off. There are currently four
in Berkshire. This list of
redundant churches within the diocese of Oxford (which includes
Berkshire) also lists those sold for other purposes and may also be
useful.
-
The Clergy of
the Church of England Database includes background
information on
particular dioceses, cathedrals &
collegiate churches and non-diocesan locations (as well
as information
on the careers of Church of England clergymen)
- Methodist Church: the
BRO
hold the records of Valerie May Eyers who was the Reading (later
Reading and Silchester) Circuit archivist, ref. D/EX
1638 which contain much historical information about the Reading
area Methodist churches, including leaflets, books, press cuttings and
photographs. The Methodist church website provides historical
background and advice
on research.
- Find a Church is a directory of
modern churches of all denominations in the UK. It offers no
genealogical information, but does have links to the individual
churches' websites which may hold such data.
- The Incorporated
Church Building Society's
archive includes over 15,000 files
relating to applications by parishes for grants from the
Society 1818 to 1982. Individual files may include application
forms, correspondence, plans, building specifications, engravings or
artists' impressions, certificates of satisfactory completion,
parochial subscription lists, parish magazines, and photographs (from
1867 onwards). Their online
database
lists the archive contents and, perhaps most usefully, links on-line
copies of plans and drawings of many of the churches.
- In the Thames
Valley Papists, Tony Hadlands
"tells the story of the Catholics of
the Thames Valley from Henry VIII's break with Rome until Catholic
Emancipation nearly three hundred years later."
- For photographs of churches, see:
- Parish
Registers: Before
English & Welsh Civil
Registration started in July
1837, baptisms,
marriages and burials were recorded by the churches in the Parish
Registers. The originals and microfilms of most Berkshire
parish
and non-parochial registers for
baptisms/births, marriages, and burials/deaths are held by the BRO.
Their on-line guide to Parochial
(ie Church of England) registers covers
all
parishes past and present in the Archdeaconry of Berkshire and parishes
in the Archdeaconry of Buckinghamshire that are within the present
Berkshire borders. The English parish church was a key secular
(as well as religious) institution until the Victorian period. As
part of local government, it was responsible for poor relief, running
local charities, and even local roads and law enforcement. As a
result, the 'parish chest' contains a lot more than just the
registers. The Non-Parochial
registers covers non-Church of
England baptisms,
marriages and burials. Some of these records are available online
from Findmypast, see Index to the
Parish Registers below.
Maidenhead
Library: the Brooks Collection: transcripts of registers
for all Maidenhead parishes except Waltham St. Lawrence, and
transcripts of registers for a number of other parishes in former
Berkshire, but not including Windsor. This covers the period from
1500's to 1837. It is hoped that a full list of which registers
are available at Maidenhead Library, will be online later in
2012.
Windsor
Library: New Windsor (St. John the Baptist) only: Baptisms
1559–1837; Marriages: 1559–1837; Burials: 1560–1837;
Index: 1559–1837.
For
post-July 1837 English & Welsh
civil records of births,
marriages and deaths, see
Civil
Registration.
- Index
to the Parish Registers:
- The International
Genealogical Index (IGI)
contains most, but not all, indexes to
the records on 131 of Berkshire towns and villages, and is a useful
finding aid.
- Berkshire FHS's Berkshire
Marriage Index containing
a full transcription of the marriages (both Anglican (Church of
England) and nonconformist) in all pre-1974 Bershire parishes from 1538
to 1837 (and in some cases beyond). Those BFHS transcriptions
more than 85 years old are also available online from Findmypast.
Parishes
that were formerly in Berkshire and now in Oxfordshire are on the North
Berkshire
Marriage Index compiled by the Oxfordshire FHS.
- Berkshire FHS's Berkshire
Burials tenth edition,
released in Dec 2011, contains
over 773,000 entries for these
places. Those BFHS transcriptions more than 50 years
old are also available online from Findmypast.
NOTE: inscriptions on gravestones are not necessarily the same as
burial records, see Cemeteries.
- John Brooks Marriage
Index, 1538-1837, indexed under the
groom’s surname only in alphabetical order in approximately
50
year periods, is held by the BRO.
- Berkshire Parish
Registers,
Marriages, ed.
by W. P. W. Phillimore, is fully searchable on line and so can
be
used an an index, see below.
-
Some other
church records (eg minutes of
meetings) are also held by
the BRO.
-
The Archdeaconry of
Berkshire was part of the Diocese of
Salisbury until 1836 when it was transferred to the Diocese of Oxford.
As a result of this, Bishop's Transcripts and items, such as some
wills, which came under the jurisdiction of the diocesesan courts are
found in the Wiltshire
and Swindon History Centre at
Chippenham or the Oxfordshire
Record Office
at Oxford. There are several 'peculiar' jurisdictions.
-
Map of the ecclesiastical
parishes of 19th century
Berkshire from Berkshire
FHS
-
A comprehensive listing of
Parish Registers, Monumental
Inscriptions and transcripts can be found in the "National
Index of
Parish Registers Volume 8 Part 1 - Berkshire, 2nd edition,"
compiled by Anthony Wilcox and published by the Society of Genealogists
in
2003 and available from the Berkshire FHS
shop.
-
Births, marriages and
deaths post-July 1837 were recorded by
local Register
Offices (even those conducted in church), with copies also held by the
General Register Office (GRO).
Indexes are available:
Court
Records
-
Archived
court petty
sessions records are held by the BRO
for the following : Abingdon
County Division, Faringdon Division, Forest Division, Hungerford and
Lambourn Division, Hungerford Division, Ilsley Division, Lambourn
Division, Maidenhead Borough, Maidenhead County Division, Maidenhead
Division, Moreton and Wallingford Division, Moreton Division, Newbury
Borough, Newbury County Division, Reading Borough, Reading County
Division, Slough Division, Wallingford Borough, Wantage Division, West
Berkshire Division, Windsor Borough, Windsor County Division.
-
Berkshire
Coroners Index 1688 - 1926,
an index to the surviving papers of
coroners' inquests held by the BRO
is available on CD from Berkshire FHS
shop.
- Descriptions of the county
and its towns and parishes from
different periods can be found in various trade
directories, from the
early 19th century
onwards, including:
- Trade
Directories
- British Genealogy describe
what is typically
found in Trade Directories and
why they are useful.
- The University
of
Leicester's free online Historical
Directories
collection includes Kelly's Directories of Berkshire 1848,
1914
and 1915, the Berkshire Commercial Directory 1833,
and
Slater's
Directory of Berkshire 1852, Webster's Reading Directory 1874,
Harrod & Co's Directory of Beds, Bucks, Berks, etc 1876,
Pigot's
Directory 1844, Post Office Directory of Berkshire, etc 1854.
Search
tip: when searching for a person
under Find By Keywords, "John w/2 Smith" will find
"John
Smith", "John A
Smith" and "Smith, John" (w/2 means "within two words of").
If
you know his occupation, try "Smith w/2 candlestickmaker".
(
More
about searching...).
- Berkshire FHS
publish various Berkshire
trade
directories
- Reading
Central Library holds
various trade directories for reference,
the earliest being the Universal British Directory of 1796.
To
see what is available, search in their catalogue
for
"trade directory" . They also provide online
the following: The
Post-Office Reading directory 1842,
Macaulay's Reading directory, almanac, and official
register 1865, Steven's Directory of Reading and
neighbourhood 1888.
- Windsor and Maidenhead libraries
hold a
selection of local
directories
- Sue O'Neill's
searchable Trade
Directory Surname Index covers
Pigot's directories of Bedfordshire, Berkshire,
Buckinghamshire, Cambridgeshire, Cheshire, Cornwall,
Cumberland, Co Durham, Huntingdonshire, Northamptonshire,
Northumberland, Oxfordshire, Westmoreland, Wiltshire and Worcestershire
for 1830. Also included is Slater's 1854 Trade
Directory of Durham County and the Electoral Polls for Bucks
1784,
Sussex 1734 and Wilts 1772.
- Direct
Resources
have provided Surname
Indexes to several Trade Directories of around 1848. The 1847 index
for Berkshire includes 4,641 surnames.
- Stephen Whatley's Gazetteer
of England of 1750 is available free online from Google
Books in two volumes, with an index from Mel Lockie.
It was never intended to be a complete gazetteer and Whatley
concentrates on
mediaeval lordships and their history of ownership but I think it
provides a unique source of information, and about places not otherwise
mentioned in conventional gazetteers.
- British-Genealogy.com
features a list of County Directories for Berkshire.
- Rate Books
record taxes
paid to a local
authority. Entries typically include owner’s name,
address
and type of property, rateable value and amount levied and sometimes
the occupier. Used with other
sources, rate books can be useful for: studying all kinds of
property, residential, commercial and industrial.; filling
gaps
between the publication of trade directories and
censuses; tracing
owners and occupiers before 1918 who do not appear in electoral
registers; finding the rough age of a property, its relative
value and size, changes to street names and numbering, and the number
of occupied houses and tenements in a locality. For the
archived
records held by the BRO, see Town
Records
below.
- Protestation Returns
for
Berkshire, 1641/1642 - copies are held by the BRO
(T/A 40) and the originals are held
at the House of Lords Record Office. On the eve of the
English
Civil War, Parliament ordered that a protestation be made as an oath of
allegiance to the King, to Parliament and to the established church.
Signed initially by members of Parliament in 1641, the order to take
the protestation was later extended to all males in England and Wales
over the age of eighteen. The officials of the parish were required to
make the oath in front of the Justices of the Peace of the hundred, and
then in turn the parish officials administered the oath of loyalty for
their parishioners. The returns usually take the form of a list of the
names of all of the men in the parish over the age of eighteen who took
the protestation. Very occasionally, children and servants
are
listed, as in the case of Sutton Courtenay; or women took the
protestation, as in the case of West Shefford. Those who refused to
take the oath also had their names listed. The returns were later used
to identify Roman Catholics by their refusal, who were
then subject to increased taxation. The returns that
survive
for
Berkshire offer partial but substantial coverage, with most of central
Berkshire extant. See article in the Berkshire
Family Historian, Vol
23, Sep 2009, page 15.
- Berkshire
hearth tax returns,
1662-1664 are held by
the BRO
- Telephone Directories
- Ancestry
provide subscription
access to British phone books published between 1880 (the year
after the public telephone service was introduced to the UK) and 1984.
Dwellings
- English Heritage's ViewFinder shows
historic photographs of England from the 1850s.
- Lost
Heritage lists significant English country houses which have
been demolished, severely reduced in size, or are ruin, including many
in Berkshire, some with pictures
- Images of
England
provide a ‘point in time’ photographic library of
England’s listed buildings, recorded at the turn of the 21st
century, with over 300,000 images of England’s built heritage
from lamp posts to lavatories, phone boxes to toll booths, milestones
to gravestones, as well as thousands of bridges, historic houses and
churches. Note that this website uses the current boundary of
Berkshire, not the historic ones used by these pages, see more
about
boundary changes...
- British
Listed
Buildings Online is
an online database of buildings and
structures of architectural and historic interest with data
for
each building, some photographs, location on a
map, Google
Streetview and Bing Birds Eye View.
- Berkshire Return of Landowners,
1873 (of land over one acre) is held by the at TNA. Ancestry
provide subscription access. An extract Berkshire Return of Landowners, 1873 is available
on both microfiche and CD from Berkshire
FHS.
- For books about a building, or perhaps just a passing reference,
see Bibliography
For
those thinking of using the
services of a paid researcher, and only in response to a prior written
application, Berkshire FHS can return a short list of names and contact
details of researchers who undertake commissioned projects. This
information is offered by the society purely as a public service.
Inclusion of a researcher on a list neither constitutes nor implies
recommendation, endorsement or warranty of any kind by the society.
Client and researcher should always negotiate any commissioned work
directly and in entirety.
-
The most active forum to discuss issues concerning Berkshire
genealogy and solicit help and advice is that of Berkshire FHS for its members.
There are
also two online
fora open to all, the county-wide
forum at British-Genealogy.com
and the Berkshire
section of Rootschat.com.
-
Researchers may be
interested in the Berkshire
Genweb pages.
-
IGI
Batch Numbers for Berkshire,
courtesy of Hugh Wallis.
-
John Fuller has provided
links to mailing
lists that serve Berkshire.
-
Berkshire FHS maintains
an
alphabetic
list of Members
Name Interests that includes
about 10,000 surnames.
-
Berkshire FHS also
maintains a
surname
index to names and events in Birth
Briefs,
five-generation ancestral (i.e. pedigree) charts submitted by members
of the society.
- Curious Fox
is
a village by village contact site for anybody researching
family
history, genealogy and local history in the UK and Ireland. Every UK
county, town and village has a page for family history, local history,
surname and genealogy enquiries.
- Nigel Batty-Smith has
scanned the entire volumes I and II of the
Visitations of Berkshire, 1532, 1566, 1623, 1665-66 Harleian Society
volumes 56 & 57 old series and they are now available to view
free online
on his website. It is also available in downloadable (and
possibly more accessible) form from the Open
Library (25MB download).
- The Genuki
Gazetteer shows the location of
places and lists neighbouring
places with links to online maps and to Genuki pages that may contain
information about that place and the genealogical resources which are
available for it.
- A similar facility is provided by the LDS Family Search's England
Jurisdictions 1851 where the boundaries of parishes,
civil registration districts, CofE dioceses, rural deanerys, Poor Law
Unions and Hundreds can be superimposed on maps.
-
List of Berkshire hundreds,
the historical sub-divisions of counties, introduced in the 10th
century primarily as a unit of taxation but also having administrative,
judicial and military functions.
-
The local government
reorganisation of 1974 brought major
changes to the boundaries of Berkshire with parts being lost to
Oxfordshire and others gained from Buckinghamshire. Further changes in
1998 finally abolished Berkshire as an administrative unit and replaced
it with six Unitary Authorities - Bracknell Forest, Reading, Slough,
West Berkshire, Windsor and Maidenhead, and Wokingham. More
about
boundary changes... N.B.
Information on GENUKI pages
is organised on the
basis of the pre-1974 counties.
- Enclosures:
- Enclosure in
Berkshire, 1485-1885, ed.
Ross Wordie, Berkshire
Record Society, vol 5, 2000.
Between 1600 and 1900 the
landscape and agriculture of Berkshire was transformed. In
1600,
three quarters of the county was covered by large open fields, common
land or waste. By 1900 all but 4% was in the form of small
enclosed, hedged fields, owned by individual landowners.
- See
also New
Landscapes:
Enclosure in Berkshire in Maps
below
-
British
History Online is the digital library containing some of the
core printed primary and secondary sources for the medieval and modern
history of the British Isles, including Volumes 2, 3 and 4 of the Victoria
County History of Berkshire. Internet Archive have published Volume
1.
-
Perhaps the most famous
history of Berkshire is included in
Volume 1 of Magna Britannia
by the Rev. Daniel Lysons and his
brother Samuel Lysons, published in 1806 and re-issued in 1813. This
volume is also available from Archive
CD Books.
-
A more recent history is A
History of Berkshire by Dr.
Judith Hunter, published by Phillimore
in 1995.
-
David Nash Ford, history
editor at Britannia.com,
is the author of Royal
Berkshire History, a
website "featuring details of all aspects of the Royal County's
fascinating & historic past."
- Bygone Berkshire
by P. H.
Ditchfield, 1896, free from Open Library (13 MB download)
- Historical
photographs are
available from:
Manors
- At the time of the Domesday
Book in 1086, the manor was the basic
unit
of local government. The manor court evolved as the forum where all
matters relating to the manor were dealt with, including property
transactions, byelaws and local disputes. Records of these courts,
surviving from the mid thirteenth century, tell us much about
how
society was organised at a local level. They can
reflect the impact of national events and movements like the Great
Plague or Tudor enclosure. They are arguably at their most informative
in the medieval
period, when the power of the manor was at its height. It was later
supplanted by the parish vestry and local magistrate. However, the
manorial court system
survived officially until 1922 when the Law of Property Act abolished
both the courts and the manorial land tenure called copyhold. Manorial
records can be a great way to find out information on individuals
beyond their birth, marriage and death dates. Going back in time much
before census, electoral register and civil registration, manorial
records can fill in where other records are
patchy or non-existent,
with so many interesting notes of family relationships, abodes,
occupations and life events. Manorial
Documents
Register (MDR) is published by TNA
and most
of the records of the 350 Berkshire manors are at the BRO,
with others at TNA
and in public and private repositories.
- The Ordnance
Survey
(OS) is Great Britain's national mapping agency.
-
Digital Ordnance Survey
maps of Berkshire and elswhere in the mid 19th
century are available online at Old
Maps. Although
intended for the sale of maps, the free on-screen images can still be
useful. An article in the Berkshire
Family Historian, Vol
33, Sep 2009, page 18 describes how best
use can be made of the maps freely available on their website
TIP:
It can also be accessed via
the
Genuki
Gazetteer:
Enter the place name and click Search; click the pin on the
map
(NOT
the single item on the list top right); pick the third item
"More
maps"; pick Old-maps; zoom in as
necessary; pick a
suitable date and
scale from the maps along the right hand edge. The enhanced
zoom
is
useful.
-
Berkshire
FHS sell many historical
maps of Berkshire, including a
CD of the fifty-one 6 inch
maps of Berkshire (produced with the BRO)
originally published by
the Ordnance Survey between 1881-1887.
-
The BRO holds
a number of historic
maps, including 6 inch
and
25 inch Ordnance Survey sheets from
the first edition in the 1870s to the 1930s as well as earlier
tithe maps, and manuscript and printed maps, indexed by place.
They also have online Enclosure
Maps showing the process of enclosing the common fields of
Berkshire between 1738 and 1883, particularly useful for finding older
place names.
- Reading
Central Library holds a selection
of maps from 1574 for reference,
including enormous 1:500 Ordnance
Survey maps of Reading in the 1870s, and provides free online
access to estate maps for
Hardwick, Rose Hill, London Street, Good
Rest, Castle Hill, Earley, Burfield and Shinfield estates.
-
Maidenhead,
Windsor
and Ascot
Libraries hold a large selection of OS maps for each of their distinct
areas from 1868 to 1993.
-
An Historical Atlas
of
Berkshire,
editor Joan Dils, Berkshire Record Society, 1998 shows maps of:
parishes, geology, administration divisions, agriculture, country
houses, Poor Law areas, railways, roads, population, etc.
Copies are
held by Berkshire
FHS and Reading Central Library.
- Cambridge
University Library have
digitised John Speed's Theatre
of
the Empire of Great Britaine
published in 1611/12 of the UK,
including a map of Berkshire.
Medical
Records
- Many records are
held by the BRO
but some are un-catalogued.
For catalogued records, use Access
to Archives advanced search and
select Repository = Berkshire
Record Office. Some un-catalogued records are:
Binfield
Park Hospital (D/H9); Church
Hill
House, Bracknell, based in the former Easthampstead Workhouse (D/H8),
including the admission register, 1929-1933.
- Dentists
- the General
Dental Council hold
registration records which show the original application, list of
addresses, correspondence, etc going back to the compulsory
registration in
the 1920s.
- Doctors
- See Tracing
Your
Medical Ancestors from the Royal
College of General Practitioners.
- Google Books have full
text of the London
Medical Directory (a
commercial, and therefore voluntary.
register) for 1846
and
other years which include some
doctors outside London.
- Ancestry
provide subscription access to UK Medical
Register
(a compulsary register published by the General Medical Council)
1859-1959 listing the doctors who were licensed to practice in
the
UK, with each doctor’s residence, qualification, and date of
registration.
- For hospital medical
staff, try the Hospital Records Database
above.
- The archive of the British Medical Journal
allow
free full text search of articles since 1840 for those who may have
written for, or been mentioned in, their articles
- Battle Hospital
(was
Reading Union Workhouse) - see Story
of Battle Hospital in the Berkshire
Echo Vol 32, 2005
from
the BRO. Battle
Workhouse & Hospital 1867 -
2005, Margaret Railton
& Marshall Barr available from Reading
Central Library.
See
also Poorhouses.
- Fair
Mile
Hospital, Moulsford
- historic archives are
held by the BRO.
The
Moulsford
Asylum, as it was originally known, was
opened in 1870 and later became the County Mental Hospital,
Fairmile.
- Maidenhead hospitals
archives are
held by the BRO:
Maidenhead General
Hospital registers of operations, 1966-1970 (D/H 1),
St Mark's Hospital, 1946-1978 and Maidenhead Isolation Hospital,
1940-1978 (both D/H 3).
- Newbury District Hospital historic
archives are
held by the BRO
(ref. D/H4).
It was built in 1884 in Andover Road, Newbury,
to meet the medical needs of the people of Newbury and Newbury Rural
District following the closure of the Nurses Home and Navvy Hospital in
Bartholomew
Terrace. The hospital originally housed 12 patients,
but
various
additions
were made from 1894 onwards, with a major building programme in 1936-7
- Park Isolation Hospital,
Prospect Park, Reading, 1910-1931 records are
held by the BRO
(D/H 11), including
diphtheria and scarlet fever case books. These records are
subject
to a hundred
years’ closure.
- Royal Berkshire Hospital,
Reading - museum
and archive and library (their
most famous patient was perhaps Douglas Bader). Royal Berkshire Hospital
1839 - 1989, Margaret
Railton & Marshall Barr, ISBN 0951437305 is available from Reading Central Library.
- District Nurses
- Health
care for the poor in the first half of
the 20th century was often provided by District Nurses who were funded
by District Nursing Associations. Records are available
from the BRO
on these associations include:
The
Bagley Wood Nursing Association (for Kennington, Radley, Sunningwell
and Wootton), 1923-1948, (D/QNA/BW); and the Wantage District Nursing
Association (for Grove and Wantage, and from 1940 Letcombe Bassett and
Letcombe Regis), 1928-1942, (D/QNA/WT). Also available are the minutes
of Sonning Deanery Moral Welfare Association, 1934-1938 (D/RDS). This
association helped unmarried mothers, fallen women and deserted wives
by providing financial assistance, places in homes, referrals to the
police, and assistance with prosecutions for maintenance, although the
names of its clients are omitted.
Monumental Inscriptions (MIs) -
see Cemeteries
Military
Records
- The Wardrobe
provides information about the Duke of Edinburgh's Royal Regiment, the
Royal Berkshire Regiment, the Wiltshire Regiment, and the Royal
Gloucestershire, Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment.
- Some war
diaries from the First
World
War for operations between 1914 and 1922
have digitised by TNA;
they contain
daily
reports on operations, intelligence summaries and other
material for Berkshire (and other) regiments.
- Reading
Central Library holds
many books about local regiments and
militia, including the war
diaries of the Berkshire Regiment from the World
War I. They and Berkshire FHS hold
a set of Berkshire at War
which was published monthly during World War I with photos of
local casualties.
- History of the Royal
Berkshire
Militia: (now 3rd Battalion Royal Berkshire Regiment), Emma
Elizabeth Thoyts, 1897, 349 pages
- Berkshire
Yeomanry Cavalry Museum
-
The UK National Inventory
of
War Memorials, based at the
Imperial War Museum, London, is
compiling
a record of all war memorials in the UK to promote their
appreciation, use and preservation. Their database includes
the
location, type, inscription and historical details of memorials, but no
names of the dead and no photographs.
- The Maiwand Lion
war
memorial in Reading for the Afghan War of
1880 is described by the British
Empire site, Reading
Museum and Roll
of Honour (with photo and list
of the dead). Maiwand:
The
Last Stand of the 66th
(Berkshire) Regiment in Afghanistan, 1880
by Richard J
Stacpoole-Ryding, ISBN 978 0 7524 4537 3 (available from Reading
Central Library) aims to be the
definitive
description of the battle and associated campaign, with a full list of
participants and many photographs, very useful for anyone with
ancestors involved.
- The names the dead on some
Berkshire war memorials are available
from Roll
of Honour.
- World
War II records held by the BRO.
Highlights include a scrapbook from Oakfield Hostel in
Wokingham
for children evacuated from London, 1940-1951 (D/EX1362/1), a service
register for Remenham parish annotated with commentary on the war,
1939-1945 (D/P99/1B/4), and local government efforts for the home
front, such as Maidenhead Borough’s Holidays at Home and
Entertainments Sub-Committees, 1943, 1945 (M/AC2/3/2). It is
also
worth searching the BBC
which includes this about ARP
in Berkshire.
- The London Gazette
records the promotion of officers and the award of medals and
is fully searchable free online.
-
The Hundreds
of Berkshire.
-
Extra-parochial
places
for Berkshire.
-
Berkshire place-names and
landowners in Domesday
Book
Online.
-
The
Place-names of Berkshire - an
essay by Frank Merry Stenton, F. M.
(Frank Merry), Research Fellow in Local History, University College,
Reading. Published 1911 by University College Reading; digital
publication March 2008 sponsored by Microsoft.
- English
Counties, Parishes, etc. for Genealogists
- describes the meaning
of various geographic terms
(eg. Hundred, Wapentake, Parish, Tything,
Borough,
Urban and Rural District Council
- Thames Pilot
provides historical information about the river.
- The BRO
has the archive of the Thames
Conservancy and an early 17th
century map showing the River Thames
and its channels and islands at Cookham (D/EZ 132).
- Thames
Navigation Commission Minutes, 1771-1790
from the The Berkshire
Record Society
- The Royal River:
The
Thames from Source to Sea was
first published in 1885 (and
re-published by Bloomsbury Books in 1985, ISBN 0 906223 77 6)
provides a description of the river as it was, with maps and wood
engravings, available in Reading
Central Library
- A
Picturesque Tour of the River Thames in its Western Course: including
Particular Descriptions of Richmond, Windsor, and Hampton Court,
by John Fisher
Murray 9 editions, first published in 1845,
from Open Library
- Commissioners’
minute books are held by BRO
(D/TC) and record battles with vested interests, problems with
barge-owners, negotiations with riverside landowners, struggles to
raise the capital required (and problems caused by financial
mismanagement), as well as the technical problems encountered in
building the new locks.
- Thames
Gallery from the River &
Rowing Museum, Henley
- Down by the River: the
Thames and Kennet in Reading by Gillian Clark, 2009, childhood
memories of millers, bargees, lock-keepers, boat builders etc,
available from Berkshire FHS shop and Reading Central Library
- John Soane (1753-1837)
is
regarded as one of England’s
finest architects. He grew up and went to school in Reading and
designed, among other things, the Simeon Monument in the
Market
Place, Reading
- The BRO have portraits
of the following: George Charles Cherry (1822-1887), Richard
Benyon (1811-1897), Lord Wantage (1832-1901) (Robert James (Loyd)
Lindsay), James Herbert Benyon (1849-1935), Robert Palmer (1793-1872),
William George Mount (1824-1906).
- When looking for background
information about individuals,
as well as the Censuses, Church
Records, Civil
Registration,
consider the following online resources:
- Search other people's
published family trees: Genes
Reunited,
Rootsweb/Ancestry,
Mocavo
search of searches.
- For people famous or
infamous enough to get their names in the
newspapers or to have obituaries, or posh enough to announce their
births, marriages and deaths, see Newspapers
- Obituaries from Ancestry,
Rootsweb.
- For those who attended
Oxford or Cambridge universities,
see Alumni
Cantabrigienses
or Alumni Oxonienses
under Church
Ministers
- For those who may have
been mentioned, even if only in passing,
in books, see Bibliography
- Search engines like Google
are always worth a try, although you
may have to scroll through many pages of hits
- Library catalogues
usually have
synopses which will often allow you to find a name even if it is not in
the book title
- Who Was Who
(the
compilation of entries in Who's Who of people alive after 1897) (and
similar published biographical summaries) from most libraries
- For those who may have
appeared at the Old Bailey
- Directories
- TNA and Access to
Archives
(A2A)
- If you know their
occupation, see Occupations
- Reading
Central Library hold
various unindexed historic
Berkshire newspapers on
microfilm for reference and the
Illustrated London News. They provide full text search online
access to The Times
1785-1985 for library
members and NewsUK
(for more recent UK newspapers & magazines). They
also have
the book The
Early Newspaper Press
in Berkshire 1723 - 1855, KG
Burton, Reading, 1954 describing
the history and development of newspapers in Berkshire (ie.
mainly Reading).
- The Guardian
and Observer
archives offer online
every page of the Guardian
since 1821 and the Observer
since 1791. It is free to search, but they charge to read the articles
- Google provides a searchable
worldwide newspaper
archive,
although there are no Berkshire newspapers currently.
Occupations
- The Clergy of
the Church of England Database
will ultimately contain information
on the careers of all Church of England clergymen between 1540 and
1835.
- Most early
ministers of the
Church of England were graduates of Cambridge or Oxford
Universities and so brief biographical details are
provided in either Alumni
Cantabrigienses by JA Venn
(ISBN: 9999087002 & 9999087003)
or Alumni Oxonienses : the
Members of the University of Oxford,
by Joseph Foster (ISBN:
9999086980 & 9999086981) respectively, held by many libraries,
including Reading
Central Library.
There is online subscription access from Ancestry to:
Oxford
University Alumni, 1500-1886
and Cambridge
University Alumni, 1261-1900.
- Crockford's
Clerical Directory: first published
in 1858, contains biographies of over 26,000 clergy of the Church of England, the Church in
Wales,
the Scottish Episcopal Church and the Church of Ireland. Copies
are held
by many libraries,
including Reading
Central Library. Also available
free for different years from
various online
books sites (eg.
this 1865
edition). Current clergy are also listed online.
- Millers - Berkshire Windmills,
Guy Blythman, 2007, available from Berkshire
FHS shop, lists the 49 windmills
known to have existed in Berkshire
with brief details and locations. See also Mills Archive
Trust.
- Trade Union
records held by the BRO:
the
printing union, Reading Typographical Society, 1898-1970 (D/EX1941);
and the Reading branch of the GMB union and its predecessors
(originally the National Union of Gasworkers and General Labourers),
1911-1988 (D/EX2017).
Organisations,
Other
See below for records of organisations other than Business and
Commerce Records, Schools, Courts, Military, Newspapers.
Check the
links
below and the catalogue at Access
to Archives advanced search and
select Repository = Berkshire
Record Office
- Charity: Robert
Palmer’s Almshouse Charity in
Sonning, 1815-1958 is held by BRO
(D/QX
24).
- Police
- Berkshire
is currently policed by the Thames
Valley
Police, formed by the amalgamation of various local forces:
- Abingdon Borough Police
1836-1889 amalgamated with the
Berkshire Constabulary
- Newbury Borough Police
1836-1875 amalgamated with the
Berkshire
Constabulary
- Reading Borough Police
1836-1968 amalgamated to form the
Thames
Valley Constabulary (now Thames Valley Police)
- New Windsor Borough Police
1836-1947 amalgamated with the
Berkshire Constabulary
- Wokingham - policed from
Reading
- Berkshire Constabulary
1855-1968, amalgamated with the
Buckinghamshire Constabulary, Oxford City Police, Oxfordshire
Constabulary and Reading Borough Police to form the Thames
Valley
Constabulary (now Thames Valley Police)
Sources
of historical information:
- The Thames
Valley Police Museum is located
within Sulhamstead House, known
locally as the 'White House', at Sulhamstead, Berkshire,
open
by
appointment. Surviving personnel records are
patchy, Berkshire
Constabulary records were destroyed by flood, Reading personnel records
survive.
- Was Your Ancestor a
Berkshire Policeman?,
article in Berkshire
Family Historian, Vol
14, page 112 gives a brief history of
the Berkshire police
forces.
- Queens Peace, a History
of
Reading Borough Police 1836-1968,
Alan Wykes, 1968; Short History
of the
Berkshire Constabulary, 1856-1956,
1956, ISBN: 9999043185,
both
available from Reading
Central Library
- The BRO (Q/APE
series)
hold examination records for many police officers
1856-1929, including details of age, address, previous jobs, reading
ability, etc. Search
by name at the TNA.
- Wikipedia
- Prisons
- Reading
Gaol from Berkshire
FHS and Wikipedia.
Reading
Goal by Reading Town,
Peter Southerton, 1993 is a detailed history with a list of governors
and executions. Visiting Justices’ report book on Reading
Gaol,
1860-1878 is held by the BRO
(D/EX 1847), Reading Prison, 1878-1966 (P/RP1). Their best
known
prisoner was Oscar Wilde (see Ballad of Reading Gaol
by him
from Project Guttenberg).
Parish
Records -
see Church
Records
- Berkshire
Echo is published quarterly free
online by the BRO
with articles about their
holdings, in particular new additions. The best way to search
the
articles seems to be using Google
(or similar) and include "Berkshire Echo" (with quotes) in
the search field.
- Peter Higginbotham's The
Story of Workhouses
provides a detailed description
of each poorhouse and the location of
their archived records, including these serving Berkshire: Abingdon,
Bradfield,
Cookham (later
Maidenhead),
Easthampstead, Faringdon,
Hungerford (and
Ramsbury),
Newbury,
Reading,
Wallingford,
Wantage,
Windsor
and Wokingham.
- Many records are
held by the BRO
and, where they
exist, may contain:
lists of inmates, register of Apprentices, register of
births,
register of deaths, rate books, admission and discharge registers,
Board of Guardians' records.
- If you are looking
for someone who was in a
workhouse, it is worth also checking if they also appear in the Quarter
Sessions records, also held by the BRO
- Explanations about probate
and wills are provided by TNA.
Copies of post-1858 wills can be ordered from the Probate
Service or from UKDocuments
for a fee. Wills, administrations and
other probate records before 1858
will be found in the Record Office holding the documents of the
ecclesiastical (church) court where the will was proved.
- Berkshire was an
archdeaconry in the diocese of Salisbury in the
archdiocese of Canterbury until, in 1836, it was moved to the diocese
of Oxford.
- Berkshire
FHS,
in partnership with the BRO,
Berkshire Record
Society and Oxfordshire
FHS
has recently completed a project to index all probate documents of the
Berkshire Archdeaconry for the period 1508 to 1858. An index to the
records for 1480-1652 was published in three volumes by the Berkshire
Record Society in Jan 2011.
The intention is to publish the
full index covering
1480-1858 on a CD towards the end of 2011.
- The Salisbury Diocesan
probate collection contains 105,000 wills
and inventories dating from 1540 to 1858 and covers Wiltshire,
Berkshire, parts of Dorset and Uffculme in Devon. The catalogue
for this collection is searchable online.
- Probate documents from
'peculiars' (parishes in one archdeaconry
or diocese but subject to the religious or lay authority of another
archdeacon, bishop or other body or person) may be found elsewhere. The
following Berkshire parishes were 'peculiars' of the Salisbury Diocese:
Arborfield, Blewbury, Hurst, Ruscombe, Sandhurst, Sonning &
Wokingham, with the Chapels of Upton and Aston Upthorpe. Probate
documents for Hungerford, Langford, Shalbourne, Wantage (early) and
West Ilsley can be found at the Bodleian
Library
in Oxford. Wills of
the few inhabitants of Windsor Castle are kept at The Aerary in Windsor
Castle.
- Nick Hidden has provided a
collection of about 1000 abstracts
of probate documents
from c1500 to 1858 (when civil probate
registries came into being in England & Wales) relating to
testators from the
neighbourhood of Hungerford and Wantage in Berkshire. There is some
spread into Wiltshire and to a lesser degree Hampshire and
Oxfordshire.
- Indexes to 1858 to 1943
wills and admons for England and Wales
(also known as the National Probate Calender) can be
viewed on microfiche at BRO.
(A less
complete version of the calendar can be viewed on Ancestry.)
Schools
Battle
Primary School, Reading,
1893-2000 (SCH20); Lambs Lane Council School, Swallowfield 1908-1916
(SCH19); Sir Charles Russell's school, Swallowfield 1873-1908
admissions register (SCH17); Lambrook School, a private preparatory
boarding school for
boys in Winkfield, 1870-1997 (D/EX1832); Streatley C of E School
1873-2003 (D/EX2127); Winkfield St Mary’s Church of England
School 1943-2003 (SCH18); Sir Charles Russell’s School,
Swallowfield, 1873-1908 (SCH17); Reading Teachers’ Centre,
1970-c.1983 (D/EX2081); Katesgrove Primary School, 1872-1987 (SCH6); St
Mary’s Church of England Junior School, Thatcham, formerly
Thatcham National School, 1883-2005 (SCH4); Ranelagh School, founded as
an elementary charity school in Cranbourne by the Earl of Ranelagh in
1709, refounded as a grammar school in new premises in Bracknell in
1908, and since 1981 a comprehensive school (SCH5) and Cranbourne
Ranelagh School, Winkfield, 1904-1942 (D/EX1979); Mrs Bland’s
School, Burghfield Common, 1904-1991 (D/EX2082); Princess Margaret Rose
School (formerly St Stephen’s Senior Girls’
School),
Clewer, 1889-1983 (SCH8); Newbury County Girls’ Grammar
School,
1904-2003 (SCH12 and D/EX2060); St Bartholomew’s Grammar
School,
Newbury, 1945-1975 (SCH11); St Bartholomew’s [Comprehensive]
School, Newbury, 1975- 2001 (SCH13); Winchcombe Infants’
School,
Newbury, 1964-1981 (SCH10); Wilson Primary School, Reading,
1904-c.1990s (SCH14); and Churchend School, Tilehurst, 1962-2008
(SCH15); West Hendred School admission register, 1904-1966,
(SCH1/11/1); St Bartholomew’s School, Newbury admission
registers, 1975-1998 (2004/SCH/1); Winchcombe Junior School, Newbury
records, 1950-2005 (SCH2); Reading and Earley Board School (later New
Town Board School and New Town Secondary Modern School) and Alfred
Sutton Secondary Girls’School, Reading, log books, 1877-1895
and
1949-1973 (D/EX2015); plans for several Reading schools, 1851-1872
(D/EX2009); an album of early 20th century photographs of Berkshire
schools (D/EX1964/1); photographs of Courtenay Lodge School,
Sutton Courtenay and Maiden Erlegh School, Earley, 1930s-1950s
(D/EX1914); Maidenhead Infant School, Brock Lane,
1870-1884 managers’ minutes (D/P 194);
Letcombe Bassett
National school, 1864-1926 log books (D/EX 1904); St Nicolas’
Primary School, East Challow (2003/SCH/1); Beech Hill Church of England
School, 1951-1967 (D/EX 1864); Robert Piggott Church
of
England Junior School, Wargrave,
1993-2000 log books (2001/SCH/2).
Reading schools: the British Infants School (later
a Board
School) in Southampton Street, 1870-1907, and George Palmer Infants
School, 1907-1996 (2001/SCH/3); Battle Mixed/Senior/Secondary Modern
School, 1891-1968, Wilson Mixed, Central and Senior Schools, 1905-1972,
and Meadway Comprehensive, 1972-2001 (2001/SCH/4); and Christchurch C
of E Primary School (now New Christ Church CE (VA) School), 1983-2000
(2001/SCH/5); St Nicholas C of E Primary School, East Challow,
1907-1992 (SCH21); St John’s Primary School, Wallingford,
1863-2010 (SCH22).
Check
also the links below.
- Reading Mechanics Institute:
records are held by the BRO
(D/EX1431)
- Royal
Military Academy, Sandhurst:
- For specialist societies,
see under the related subject sections
on this page
- A Vision of
Britain
Through Time from the University
of Portsmouth provides a vision of
Britain between 1801 and 2001, including maps, statistical
trends (from 1801
to 2001 census data) and historic descriptions.
Taxation
- Death
Duty records kept by TNA
have useful genealogical information,
often including: the name of the deceased, with address and last
occupation,
the date of the will, the place and date of probate, and the names,
addresses and occupations of the executors, the date of death,
and information about the beneficiaries.
- The E179
database by TNA
is
a searchable index to the "King's Remembrancer, particulars of account
and other records relating to lay and clerical taxation", containing
detailed descriptions of documents relating to the taxation of
the
laity in England and Wales, as well as descriptions and discussions of
every tax levied on both the laity and the clergy over the period
covered by the document. Click here for Berkshire
documents.
Town
Records
-
Archived
town
and borough records are held by
the BRO
for the following: Bracknell Development
Corporation, Maidenhead Borough, Newbury
Borough, Reading
Borough 1850-1962 (R/FR1-5), Slough Borough, Windsor
Borough, Wokingham
Borough. Search also the catalogue at Access
to Archives advanced search and
select Repository = Berkshire
Record Office.
Voting
Registers
- Electoral Registers (lists
of those eligible to vote):
- Poll Books (lists
of
those who actually voted):
Berkshire
Towns and Parishes
are
listed on a separate page.
