Place:Wisborough Green, Sussex, England

source: Family History Library Catalog

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

Wisborough Green is a village and civil parish in the Chichester District of West Sussex, England, 2 miles (3.2 km) west of Billingshurst on the A272 road.

Newbridge, where the A272 crosses the River Arun 1 mile (1.6 km) east of the village, was the highest point of the Arun navigation (a canal), and the southern end of the Wey and Arun Canal. Newbridge Wharfe, on the southern side of the bridge, was an important part of the local transport system in the nineteenth century.

The parish has a land area of 1756.9 hectares (4339.5 acres or 6.78 sq mi). The 2001 census recorded a population of 1,360 people. In the 2011 UK census, the population (including the settlement of Bedham) was 1,414.

The Church of England parish church of St. Peter ad Vincula (St Peter in Chains) is on higher ground near a small pond with pollarded willow trees. Its unusual dedication is after the ancient Basilica of San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome.

The parish of Wisborough Green was reduced by an area equivalent to 49% of its total size in 1933 when a new civil parish named Loxwood was carved out of the northern section. This did not reduce the population by the same amount. In 1931 its population was 1751; in 1951 it was 980. (There was no census in 1941.)

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 Wisborough Green
• British History Online. A History of the County of Sussex does not cover either Bury Hundred or Rotherbridge Hundred.
• Maps of the local area are to be found on the page for Arundel Rape and on that for Petworth Rural District.