My thanks and acknowledgments to the Parochial Church Council for Wimpole and St Andrew's Parish Church for allowing the online publication of the Church Registers. Listings prior to 1864 are based on the Church Registers for the Parish of Wimpole, as transcribed and collated by T P R Layng in March 1983. Originally typed by C L and A E Hatton. Additional research for this website is by Steve Odell. In medieval times there were no parish registers. Through the efforts of Thomas Cromwell in 1538 a mandate was issued by Henry VIII for churches to maintain parish records. This ordered that every parson, vicar or curate was to enter in a book every wedding, christening and burial in his parish. In 1558 Queen Elizabeth re-confirmed her father's mandate into law and many church records date from that year. Wimpole's own church records for baptisms, weddings and burials began in 1560. In 1754, the Lord Hardwicke's Act (and yes, that's our Lord Chancellor Hardwicke [1690-1764], interred within his memorial in Wimpole's Chicheley Chapel) required separate registers for banns and marriages. Banns being an announcement made in a parish church of an intention to marry. The act was passed to prevent clandestine and under-age marriages. To make the Act more effective, a special printed form was devised which called for the signatures of the officiating minister, the two witnesses and those of the bride and groom. Wimpole's church records for banns and marriages in the new format began in 1754. Banns were to be read in the parish church in both parishes where the bride and groom each lived plus the church where the wedding would take place if different. The banns needed to be read for three consecutive Sundays ending a week before the wedding day. In England, under the provisions of Lord Hardwicke's Act of 1753, from 1754 onwards a marriage would only be legally valid if the banns had been properly read. The date shown in the listings below is the last (third) date of reading the banns, not the date of the eventual wedding. The original spelling of names (as transcribed) has been retained. Information, notes and comments additional to the Wimpole Registers are usually shown within [square brackets] and italics. Key: [PR: ]: Parish Registers.  (x): Can not read/write/sign.  [BT: ]: Bishops Transcripts. I have compared the Layng transcript with the commercially available Cambridgeshire Family History Society version. Any significant differences have been identified as [C:  ]. Local parish records on CDs can be purchased from the society. I would be pleased to hear from you if you can offer any additional genealogical or family information relevant to this page, especially if you possess old photographs that could be added to the more general site for those who follow. Please use the site's Contact Page in the first instance.

Searching for 'Names' in the Wimpole Registers: The parish register pages for Wimpole are being progressively reset to facilitate name searches using the following 'phrase' formats within the search boxes provided [check the † symbol in the register index below]. - "John Smith" [search using quote marks around the name as shown] when looking to     match an exact name. - [John Smith] [search using square brackets around the name as shown] when looking    to match any similar name. - {John Smith} [search using braces around the name as shown] when looking to match    any approximate name. The search results will generally provide the first match found on each page. On long 'list' pages such as a register or a census page, there may well be other similar name matches further down the page and you are advised to use your browser's 'find on this page' facility to check and locate any additional matches. This alphabetical name index [originating long before the era of internet search engines...] which lists over 1000 early Wimpole 'names' [and variations] from the Registers, can still be helpful in suggesting alternate or obscure spellings of surnames. For additional help and further advice on searching, visit the site's Search page.

Wimpole Parish Registers: Baptisms:   1560-1599†   1600-1649†   1650-1699*   1700-1749*   1750-1799*    1800-1824†   1825-1849†   1850-1874†   1875-1899†   1900-1924†** Banns:   1755-1849†   1850-1900† Marriages:   1560-1599   1600-1699   1700-1799   1800-1863 Burials:   1560-1599   1600-1699   1700-1799   1800-1849†   1850-1899† * indicates page is unavailable. ** indicates some year transcriptions are available. † indicates complete page has been set to facilitate name searches.