Place:Singleton, Sussex, England

source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names

source: Family History Library Catalog

source: Family History Library Catalog

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Singleton is a village and civil parish in the Chichester District of West Sussex, England. It lies in the Lavant valley, north of Chichester on the A286 road to Midhurst. It is bordered on the east by Eastdean (near Chichester) and on the west by West Dean (near Chichester). The northern border is with the parishes of Cocking and Heyshott and its southern border is with the parish of Lavant.

The civil parish has a land area of 1,602 hectares (3,960 acres or 6.19 sq mi). In the 2001 census there were 199 households containing 476 people. The population marginally increased to 480 at the 2011 Census.

History

Singleton (as "Silletone") was listed in the Domesday Book of 1086 as the ancient hundred of the same name with 237 households including the settlements of East Lavant, Mid Lavant, Binderton and Preston. In Singleton parish itself there were 167 households: 89 villagers, 58 smallholders and 20 slaves; with ploughing land, woodland, meadows, three mills and a church, it had a value to the lords of the manor of £121.

In 1861, the population of the Anglican parish (by then "Singleton with Charlton"), was 556 and the area was 5,010 acres (2,030 ha). Charlton is a hamlet in Singleton parish.

Between 1880 and 1953 a railway served the village at Singleton station. The station complex is now a private dwelling.

The following description from John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72 is provided by the website A Vision of Britain Through Time (University of Portsmouth Department of Geography).

"SINGLETON, a parish and a [registration] sub-district in Westhampnett [registration] district, Sussex. The parish lies among the South downs, 5½ miles S by W of Midhurst [railway] station; includes Charlton hamlet; and has a post-office under Chichester. Acres: 5,010. Real property: £3,135. Population: 556. Houses: 117.

"The manor belonged to Earl Godwin; passed to the Earls of Arundel; and belongs now to the Duke of Richmond. Molecombe House is the residence of Prince Edward of Saxe-Weimar; and Drove House, of the Hon. R. Denman. The parish was, in the 17th century, a resort of royalty and nobles for hunting; and contains now the race-stand of Goodwood. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Chichester. Value: £115. Patron: the Duke of Richmond. The church is later English, with a Norman tower; and was recently restored. There are a national school, and charities £70."

Research Tips

• The West Sussex Record Office is located in Chichester. Because it holds the records of the Church of England Diocese of Chichester, which covers the whole of Sussex, it has church records relating to both parts of Sussex.
• An on-line catalogue for some of the collections held by the West Sussex Record Office is available under the Access to Archives (A2A) project (a nationwide facility housed at The National Archives, Kew).
• West Sussex Past - database of 2 million records from West Sussex heritage organizations.
• The Institute of Heraldic and Genealogical Studies' Sussex Collection (PDF). This is a 9-page PDF naming the files relating to Sussex in their collection-a possible first step in a course of research.
• The National Library of Scotland has a website which provides maps taken from the Ordnance Survey England & Wales One-Inch to the Mile series of 1892-1908 as well as equivalent maps for Scotland itself. The immediate presentation is a "help" screen and a place selection screen prompting the entry of a location down to town, village or parish level. These screens can be removed by a click of the "X". The map is very clear and shows parish and county boundaries and many large buildings and estates that existed at the turn of the 20th century. Magnification can be adjusted and an "overlay feature" allows inspection of the area today along with that of 1900. The specific map from the series can be viewed as a whole ("View this map") and this allows the inspection of the map legend (found in the left hand bottom corner. Becoming familiar with the various facilities of these maps is well worth the trouble.

• GENUKI on Singleton
• British History Online. A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 4, the Rape of Chichester, section on Singleton
• Maps of the local area are to be found on pages for Westbourne and Singleton Hundred and Chichester Rape.