Place:Barnham, Sussex, England

source: Family History Library Catalog

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

Barnham is a semi-rural village and former civil parish, since April 2019 in the parish of "Barnham and Eastergate", in the Arun District of West Sussex, England. The new parish is centred about five miles (8 km) north of Bognor Regis.

Barnham is mentioned in the Domesday Book and retains some of its rich agricultural history, with gently rolling cereal fields and pasture instead of woodland for many centuries.

Geography

Up to its recent merger with Eastergate the area of the parish of Barnham measured 3.73 km2 (1.44 sq mi). In the 2011 UK census it had a population of 1,391. Eastergate was north of Barnham. Both parishes had Aldingbourne as their boundary on the west. Other parishes sharing boundaries with Barnham were Felpham which reached the coast on the south, and Yapton on the southeast and east.

West Barnham forms a semi-rural conurbation with Barnham (the main settlement in the former civil parish of Eastergate - see below) which had 3,107 people living in it 2001.

The cattle market (founded in 1890 but now long gone) was, in its heyday, considered to be one of the most important in Sussex for both cattle and cereals.

In the 20th century this area, on alluvial soils, was important for market gardening; There are many large, industrial-sized greenhouses in the area, although very few were within the parish boundary.

The larger electoral ward with the same name exists but including the parish of Aldingbourne had a total population at the 2011 census of 8,627.

Amenities

The parish church, dedicated to St Mary, was given to the Abbey of Lessay in Normandy in 1105 and later passed to Boxgrove Priory. There is an elaborate carved rectangular font of Sussex marble. The white wooden tower was once regarded as an important aid to shipping in the English Channel.

Barnham Windmill is on the southeastern boundary of the village on the road to Yapton. The present windmill was built in 1829 and has undergone much restoration.

Part of the Portsmouth-Arundel Canal (opened in 1823 but now disused and filled in) is visible to the southeast of the village, including remains of the locks and pivots used for the locking mechanisms.

Barnham had a railway station (now closed) with a junction for Bognor Regis which was located about one mile north of the church and the focus of the village shifted northward as businesses built premises adjacent to the station. This was followed by housing developments centred on this location during the 20th century. This area became known as West Barnham. It does not appear on maps of 1900.

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 Barnham
• British History Online. A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 5, Part 1, Arundel Rape: South-Western Part, Including Arundel, section on Barnham
• Maps of the local area are to be found on pages for Avisford Hundred and Arundel Rape.
• MapIt UK provides a map of the new parish of Barnham and Eastergate.