Online Parish Register Search

You can search the database free of charge, for as many names and variations as you like. All you need to do is select a Parish, enter the required Surname and press Search. If you find nothing, that's one Parish Register you won't have to spend many hours searching for your Docklands Ancestors.

Enhance your search by adding a forename. This feature has been added due to a number of requests from our regular visitors and is entirely optional. If you use this feature, all forenames will be searched according to your request (including any 'middle' names).

If results are obtained, we charge just £3.25 to view full details of all the matches returned by your search. We don’t believe in subscriptions, vouchers, registration, or any other gimmicks. It’s a flat rate £3.25 to view all the details of all the matches for a name in any single database. Quite simply, you pay just for what you want, when you want it.

The details you can expect to find in the full results are:

• Entry number
• Date of baptisms
• Date of birth (if given)
• Child's fornames
• Child's surname
• Names of mother and father
• Address
• Occupation
• Source reference number and notes from the margin

Please READ this IMPORTANT NOTICE:
If you are paying online then please follow these instructions: Once you have made your payment, and reached the successful payment page, you must click the 'Get Your Detailed Search Result' button at the bottom of the page, to obtain your Detailed Search Results. You will then be presented with the full results of your search, which will simultaneously be e-mailed to the address you provide. If you think that you might forget these instructions then please make a note of them now.

N.B. These are all baptism records unless stated otherwise.

Important Notes

1) If you are unable to view the words in the Security box above, please click here.

2) If you are using the forenames option to search with, please be aware that a search for, say, David John Smith will also return a match of 'David John Alexander Smith'. This is because all the forenames are in the same field in the database. For more SEARCH TIPS please click here.

3) For further information regarding Detailed Search Results please click here to open the 'Understanding Your Results' pop-up window.

4) Transcriptions with an * indicate that these parishes were transcribed by Rob Cottrell as part of his Thames Riverside Series.

Location of Parishes

To view the location of the parishes we have transcribed, please use the links below: Modern Greater London    Modern Docklands    Parish Map

The importance of parish registers to family historians

Parish registers began in 1538 when a law was passed requiring the clergy to record baptisms, marriages and burials. It was further decreed by Queen Elizabeth I in 1597 that all existing records should be copied into "fair parchment books, at least from the beginning of this reign". Thus began a practice that endures to this day.

Although there was much resistance to the practice at first by some of the clergy on the grounds of cost, it quickly became universal. England at that time was still almost exclusively a Catholic and still largely a feudal society. The Church held enormous sway in the lives of the people. The new Church of England continued the practice of recording baptisms etc and it is this body of information that is of most use to family historians.

The bulk of these records have now been deposited by the various churches into the care of County Record Offices. For the London area, (with the exception of the City of London) that's the London Metropolitan Archives. Most have been microfilmed and some indexed.

Our databases are derived from these microfilms. Each has been transcribed by an experienced transcriber and fellow family historian. In addition, each transcriber has a geographical connection with the the area.

The function of the Church in the early registers was to record events that were connected with the church. Hence, dates of baptism, marriage and burial were recorded and not dates of birth and death.. However, from the 18th century onwards, dates of birth and death were increasingly recorded in the parish registers.

The discovery of an ancestor in a parish register is an exciting event. Not only do you find a date for a specific event, like a birth date, but you pin a whole family down to an area and often a trade. If there's one entry in a register there's likely to be more. A search of the nearby parishes is also likely to be fruitful.


*Please note that we cannot be held responsible for any mispelling or errors made by visitors using our database facilities. Refunds will be given at the discretion of the Docklands Ancestors' Management.

-A Passion For Family History-

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