Place:Great Heaton, Lancashire, England

Watchers
NameGreat Heaton
Alt namesHeaton Reddishsource: Family History Library Catalog
Over Heatonsource: alternate name
TypeTownship
Coordinates53.32°N 2.15°W
Located inLancashire, England
See alsoSalford Hundred, Lancashire, Englandhundred in which it was located
Prestwich cum Oldham, Lancashire, Englandancient parish in which it was located
Middleton (Manchester), Lancashire, Englandmunicipal borough into which it was part transferred in 1894
Prestwich, Lancashire, Englandurban district into which it was part transferred in 1894
Manchester, Lancashire, Englandcounty borough into which it was part transferred in 1903
source: Family History Library Catalog

NOTE:Great Heaton should not be confused with Heaton township, near Bolton, or Heaton Norris township, between Manchester and Stockport.


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

Great Heaton (also known as Over Heaton and Heaton Reddish) was a township in the ancient parish of Prestwich cum Oldham and Hundred of Salford, in Lancashire, England. It occupied land between Prestwich and Manchester, near Heaton Park.

The township of Great Heaton was comprised of detached sections which surrounded the township of Little Heaton. This unusual situation would have come about through various parcels of land being held by different owners before the 19th century. Great Heaton has two detached portions lying on the border of Middleton. Heaton House stands on an elevated situation in Heaton Park, and was built in 1772 by Sir Thomas Egerton (afterwards first Earl of Wilton). In 1852 the whole of the land in Great Heaton belonged to the Earl of Wilton. (Source: Victoria County History of Lancashire, see below.]

Image:Prestwich cum Oldham ancient parish.png

The township formed part of the Manchester Poor Law Union, 1841–50, but in 1850 was included in Prestwich Poor Law Union. The Registration District for Prestwich cum Oldham changed from Manchester to Prestwich in 1894. Following the Local Government Act 1894 the township was dissolved and its area divided between the Municipal Borough of Middleton (Manchester) and Prestwich Urban District.

In 1903 the Heaton Park area became part of the city of Manchester.

Research Tips

  • See the Wikipedia articles on parishes and civil parishes for descriptions of this lowest rung of local administration. The original parishes were ecclesiastical (described as ancient parishes), under the jurisdiction of the local priest. A parish covered a specific geographical area and was sometimes equivalent to that of a manor. Sometimes, in the case of very large rural parishes, there were chapelries where a "chapel of ease" allowed parishioners to worship closer to their homes. In the 19th century the term civil parish was adopted to define parishes with a secular form of local government. In WeRelate both civil and ecclesiastical parishes are included in the type of place called a "parish". Smaller places within parishes, such as chapelries and hamlets, have been redirected into the parish in which they are located. The names of these smaller places are italicized within the text.
  • An urban district was a type of municipality in existence between 1894 and 1974. They were formed as a middle layer of administration between the county and the civil parish and were used for urban areas usually with populations of under 30,000. Inspecting the archives of a urban district will not be of much help to the genealogist or family historian, unless there is need to study land records in depth.
  • Civil registration or vital statistics and census records will be found within registration districts. To ascertain the registration district to which a parish belongs, see Registration Districts in Lancashire, part of the UK_BMD website.
  • The terms municipal borough and county borough were adopted in 1835 replacing the historic "boroughs". Municipal boroughs generally had populations between 30,000 and 50,000; while county boroughs usually had populations of over 50,000. County boroughs had local governments independent of the county in which they were located, but municipal boroughs worked in tandem with the county administration. Wikipedia explains these terms in much greater detail.
  • Lancashire Online Parish Clerks provide free online information from the various parishes, along with other data of value to family and local historians conducting research in the County of Lancashire.
  • FamilySearch Lancashire Research Wiki provides a good overview of the county and also articles on most of the individual parishes (very small or short-lived ones may have been missed).
  • Ancestry (international subscription necessary) has a number of county-wide collections of Church of England baptisms, marriages and burials, some from the 1500s, and some providing microfilm copies of the manuscript entries. There are specific collections for Liverpool (including Catholic baptisms and marriages) and for Manchester. Their databases now include electoral registers 1832-1935. Another pay site is FindMyPast.
  • A map of Lancashire circa 1888 supplied by A Vision of Britain through Time includes the boundaries between the parishes and shows the hamlets within them.
  • A map of Lancashire circa 1954 supplied by A Vision of Britain through Time is a similar map for a later timeframe.
  • GENUKI provides a website covering many sources of genealogical information for Lancashire. The organization is gradually updating the website and the volunteer organizers may not have yet picked up all the changes that have come with improving technology.
  • The Victoria County History for Lancashire, provided by British History Online, covers the whole of the county in six volumes (the seventh available volume [numbered Vol 2] covers religious institutions). The county is separated into its original hundreds and the volumes were first published between 1907 and 1914. Most parishes within each hundred are covered in detail. Maps within the text can contain historical information not available elsewhere.
  • A description of the townships of Great and Little Heaton from British History Online (Victoria County Histories), published 1911
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Great Heaton. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.