Place:Holywell cum Needingworth, Huntingdonshire, England

A Vision of Britain through Time provides the following description of Holywell cum Needingworth from John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72:

"HOLYWELL-CUM-NEEDINGWORTH, a parish, containing the village of Holywell and the large hamlet of Needingworth, in St. Ives [registration] district, Huntingdon[shire]. Holywell village stands near the river Ouse and the boundary with Cambridge, 1½ mile E by S of St. Ives [railway] station; and Needingworth hamlet lies nearly 2 miles NE by E of that station, and has a post office, under St. Ives, Hunts. The name Holywell was taken from a spring which rises in the churchyard, and which, in the Romish times, was much frequented by devotees.

"The parish comprises 3,209 acres. Real property: £7,189. Population in 1851: 915; in 1861: 826. Houses: 193. The manor belongs to the Duke of Manchester. The manor house is now used as a farm house. Numerous fragments of Roman pottery have been found. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Ely. Value: £528. Patron: the Duke of Manchester. The church consists of nave, aisles, and chancel, with porch and tower; and was recently restored. A large Baptist chapel was built at Needingworth in 1861. A building, formerly a dissenting chapel, is now a parochial school. Charities, £25."

Since 1866 there has always been one civil parish comprising the two settlements. Until 1965 Holywell cum Needingworth was located in the County of Huntingdonshire. After mergers in 1965 and 1974 the county became part of Cambridgeshire. It was part of the St Ives Rural District until 1974 and is now in the Huntingdonshire administrative district of Cambridgeshire.

For more information, see the EN Wikipedia article Holywell.
For more information, see the EN Wikipedia article Needingworth.

Research Tips

• Original historical documents relating to Huntingdonshire are now held by Cambridgeshire Archives and Local Studies at Shire Hall, Ely, Cambridgeshire, CB7 4GS
• The Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire Family History Society has transcribed the parish registers for all the ancient parishes of Huntingdonshire and these can be purchased from the Society as pdfs.
• A History of the County of Huntingdon in 3 volumes from British History Online (Victoria County Histories). This is by far the most complete history of the parishes of the county to be found online. The chapters are ordered by the divisions of the county called hundreds, but each chapter is linked to the volume's content page. Volume 2 (published 1932) covers Hurstingstone and Toseland hundreds (index of parishes); Leightonstone and Norman Cross Hundreds (index of parishes) are found in Volume 3 (published 1936). Volume 1 is a part-volume describing the religious houses of the county.
• GENUKI has a page on Huntingdonshire and pages for each of the ecclesiastical or ancient parishes in the county. These give references to other organizations who hold genealogical information for the local area.
• The FamilyTree Wiki has a series of pages similar to those provided by GENUKI which may have been prepared at a later date.
• A Vision of Britain through Time, section "Units and Statistics" leads to analyses of population and organization of the county from about 1800 through 1974. There are pages available for all civil parishes, municipal boroughs and other administrative divisions.
• Map of Huntingdonshire divisions in 1888 produced by UK Ordnance Survey and provided online by A Vision of Britain through Time
• Map of Huntingdonshire divisions in 1944 produced by UK Ordnance Survey and provided online by A Vision of Britain through Time