Castle Hedingham Parish Records

Holly Adams has painstakingly created a catalogue of .xls files (which can be opened by Excel and many other speadsheet programs) based upon her research of Microfiche records at the Essex Record Office. She continues to add to her records, and to check her exisiting work, and some files have been added recently. I am extremely grateful to her for making them available to this website, where I hope that they will provide a valuable resource to visitors. The original documents are now being scanned by the ERO, and are becoming available online free of charge.

Holly makes the following points -

Sometimes entries are poorly written, and appear to have been entered some time after the event – this particularly applies to those in the mid-C18th. Entries have been copied in the order in which they appear, not in chronological order, so check the dates carefully when looking for something which you believe should be at a certain time. At one point in the burial register, the same dozen or so burials were entered twice on two adjacent pages. By the mid-1730s, either there were very few vital events happening in Castle Hedingham or they weren't being recorded. Perhaps the Sible Hedingham records for that period may show a large number of Castle Hedingham families. Most recent addition is an Excel transcript of the LDS film C067131: births, baptisms & burials (one burial!) from Castle Hedingham Independent Church 1775-1837.

Dates have been converted into New Style dates, with the 1st January being New Year's Day. Prior to 1751, the New Year began on 25th March, so the date 21 February 1748 would be in the final months of 1748 under the Old Style, but be in the first few months of 1749 under the New Style, which we use to this day. The dates are generally written as 21 February 1748/9, but I've opted just to use the New Style. I've indicated throughout where the minister used both OS and NS dates, except in the marriage records.

Census, 1841 (353kb) & Notes

Baptisms, 1654 - 1697 (new, Aug 09) (183 kb)

Baptisms, 1698 – 1787 (revised, Aug 09) (381kb)

Baptisms, 1788 – 1812 (revised, Aug 09) (146kb)

Baptisms, 1813 – 1839 (revised, Aug 09) (221kb)

Baptisms, 1839 - 1911 (new, Aug 09) (378kb)

Marriages, 1698 – 1754 (revised, Aug 09) (78kb)

Marriages, 1754 – 1799 (revised, Aug 09) (128kb)

Marriages, 1800 – 1812 (revised, Aug 09) (50kb)

Marriages, 1813 – 1836 (revised, Aug 09) (89kb)

Marriages, 1837 – 1939 (revised, Aug 09) (260kb)

Marriages 1940 - 1960 (revised, Aug 09) (75kb) The Congregational Chapel, Castle Hedingham (Independent Church)

Burials, 1698 – 1787 (revised, Aug 09) (310kb)

Burials, 1788 – 1812 (revised, Aug 09) (113kb)

Burials, 1813 – 1846 (revised, Aug 09) (164kb)

Banns, 1800-1846 (133kb)

Independent Church, births, baptisms and burials, 1775 -1837 (189kb)