SWARKESTONE, Derbyshire

Census

• The parish was in the Melbourne sub-district of the Shardlow Registration District.
  
  
• The table below gives census piece numbers, where known:
  
  

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Church History

• The Anglican parish church is dedicated to Saint James.
  
  
• It appears that the church was originally built in the 12th century.
  
  
• The church was restored and rebuilt in 1876.
  

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Church Records

• The Anglican parish register dates from 1604.
  
  
• The early years of the registers above are virtually unreadable and the Bishop's Transcripts should be consulted.
  
  
• We have a pop-up window of partially extracted Parish Register burials in a text file for your review. Your additions are welcomed as the list is not complete.
  
  
• The church was in the rural deanery of Melbourne.
  

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Civil Registration

• Civil Registration began in July, 1837.
  
  
• The parish was in the Melbourne sub-district of the Shardlow Registration District.
  

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Description and Travel

"SWARKESTON, as before-mentioned [Ed: with Stanton-by-Bridge], is an adjoining parish to Stanton, in the same hundred as Melbourn, about three miles from that village. Swarkeston bridge is supposed to be the longest in Europe, extending nearly a mile over the meadows and low grounds to Stanton; it was originally very narrow, but has been widened so as to allow carriages to pass each other. The Trent and Mersey canal runs through the parish, and is here joined by the Derby canal. The church is dedicated to St. James: the living is a rectory, in the same patronage as Stanton. Population, by the returns for 1831, 308."

[Description from Pigot and Co's Commercial Directory for Derbyshire, 1835]

The parish covers about 850 acres and lies on the north bank of the Trent River some 5 miles south-by-east from Derby city. Its famous bridge, once the longest in Europe, was originally built in the 13th century. The bridge is Grade I listed with British Heritage.

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Directories

• Ann Andrews provides a transcription of the Swarkestone entry from Kelly's Directory of the Counties of Derby, Notts, Leicester and Rutland (1891).

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Gazetteers

• The transcription of the section for Swarkestone from the National Gazetteer (1868) provided by Colin Hinson.

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Politics and Government

• This parish was in the ancient Repton aud Gresley Hundred (or Wapentake).
  

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Poorhouses, Poor Law, etc.

• We have a pop-up window of 1820 Paupers receiving parish relief in a text file for your review.
  
  
• As a result of the 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act his parish was in the Shardlow Poorlaw Union.
  

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