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Worthenbury

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Worthenbury is situated in the northern part of Maelor Saesneg, the detached part of Flintshire. It is an extensive area of fertile farmland.
For more than 600 years, life in the village of Worthenbury was dominated by the Puleston family, who were the squires of the nearby Emral Hall.
Worthenbury was originally a parochial chapelry in the parish of Bangor Is-coed. In 1658, during the Commonwealth Period, it was designated as a parish in its own right - but in 1661, after the Restoration, this was declared invalid.
In 1689, Sir Roger Puleston obtained an Act of Parliament, and Worthenbury again became a separate parish. It was in the diocese of Lichfield until 1541, when it was transferred to the newly created diocese of Chester. In 1849, it was transferred to the diocese of St. Asaph, where it remains.

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Bibliography

  • Harrison, Sunter.      The four baronets of Emral and Emral Hall, Worthenbury, North Wales        Wrexham [Wales] : The Author, 1974.
  • Harrison, Sunter.    Worthenbury Church, Emral Chapel and the Pulestons     Wrexham : Mrs Sunter Harrison, [c1990]
  • Henry, Matthew.       Memoirs of the life and death of the Rev. Philip Henry, some time the minister of the Gospel at Worthenbury, and afterward at Broad-Oak, who died June 24, 1696, in the 65th year of his age       New ed., corr. and improved       London : Printed by T. Cordeux ; sold by T. Blanshard ; at the Methodist Preaching House in town and country, 1818.
  • Jones, Kath.       Wonderful Worthenbury         Country Quest, June 2008, p. 8-9
  • Puleston, Dorothy.            The Crane family of Worthenbury and London           Clwyd Historian = Hanes Bro Clwyd. No. 13 (Spring 1986), p. 19-20
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Church History

Ordnance Survey reference SJ 419462.
The earliest recorded reference to a church at Worthenbury dates from 1388. The church was completely rebuilt in 1739, and the interior still retains many of its Georgian features. Many experts consider it to be the finest example of a Georgian church in the whole of Wales. The church is dedicated to St. Deiniol.

The Clwyd FHS website has a photograph of the church.

St Deiniol - on CPAT

'Worthenbury Church' by Moses Griffith, c. 1770-1800 (watercolour) on the People's Collection Wales site

Nonconformist Churches

"Welsh Church Commission - County of Flint - The Statistics of the Nonconformist Churches for 1905" does not list any nonconformist places of worship for the Civil parish of Worthenbury. 

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Church Records

Parish Registers

  • The following Parish Registers have been deposited at Flintshire Record Office, Hawarden. They may be viewed on microfilm at the Flintshire Record Office, the Denbighshire Record Office, Ruthin, and the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth. These microfilms are not available elsewhere.
Baptisms Marriages Burials
1597 - 1749
1755 - 1936
1598 - 1749
1754 - 1970
1597 - 1749
1755 - 1939
  • Clwyd FHS has published full transcriptions of the registers (complete with indexes) for the following years :
Baptisms Marriages Burials
1597 - 1813 1598 - 1820 1597 - 1812

Bishop's Transcripts

  • Bishop's Transcripts for the years shown below have been deposited in the Cheshire Record Office, Chester.
    In 1990, these Bishop's Transcripts were microfilmed by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; and the films are available on request at Family History Centres of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
    The films may also be viewed at the Flintshire and Cheshire Record Offices.
Microfilmed copies of BT's
1599 - 1806
  • Bishop's Transcripts for the years shown below have been deposited in the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth.
    Around the year 1951, most of the Bishop's Transcripts which had been deposited at that time were microfilmed by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; and the films are available on request at Family History Centres of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
    The films may also be viewed at the Flintshire and Denbighshire Record Offices, and at the National Library of Wales.
Deposited at the National Library of Wales Microfilmed copies
1850 - 1876 1850 - 1876

I.G.I.

  • The following have been incorporated into the I.G.I., as part of an "official extraction" programme.
    They were extracted from the Bishop's Transcripts, not from the Parish Registers.
Type of Record Years Covered I.G.I. Batch Number
Baptisms 1850 - 1876 C056741
Marriages None -
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Civil Registration

When Civil Registration was introduced (on 1 July 1837), the parish of Worthenbury was assigned to the No. 2 ("Malpas") sub-district of the Wrexham Registration District, which was co-extensive with the Wrexham poor law Union.

On 30 September 1896, the parish of Worthenbury was transferred to the No. 1 ("Overton") sub-district of Ellesmere Registration District.

In the GRO indexes to civil registration, entries for Worthenbury are in the format :

  • Years 1837 - 1851: Wrexham XXVII. nnn
  • Years 1851 - 1896: Wrexham 11b. nnn
  • Years 1896 - 1930: Ellesmere 6a. nnn

(GRO index references have no relevance at the local Superintendent Registrar's Office)

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Description & Travel

Willington Worthenbury - on wikipedia

You can see pictures of Worthenbury which are provided by:

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Gazetteers

The transcription of the section for this place from the National Gazetteer (1868), provided by Colin Hinson.

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Maps

"North-East Wales Churches and Ancient Parish Boundaries" produced by Clwyd Record Office in 1994, published by Genuki with the permission of Flintshire Record Office and Denbighshire Archives

Kain, R.J.P., Oliver, R.R., Historic Parishes of England and Wales: an Electronic Map of Boundaries before 1850 with a Gazetteer and Metadata [computer file]. Colchester, Essex: History Data Service, UK Data Archive [distributor], 17 May 2001. SN: 4348.   Here is a gazetteer/finding aid plus a set of overview maps to accurately identify the position of parishes within the county

Map of the parish of Worthenbury in the County of Flint on the People's Collection Wales site

You can see maps centred on OS grid reference SJ423459 (Lat/Lon: 53.007026, -2.861982), Worthenbury which are provided by:

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Population

  • In 1831- the population was 623.
  • In 1901- the population was 441.
    [ Royal Commission on the Welsh Church - October 1907]