Place:Berkeley, Gloucestershire, England

source: Family History Library Catalog

source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names

source: Family History Library Catalog

the following text is based on an article in Wikipedia

Berkeley ("Burklee" to older locals) is a town and civil parish in Gloucestershire, England. It lies in the Vale of Berkeley between the east bank of the River Severn and the M5 motorway within the Stroud District. The town is noted for Berkeley Castle where the imprisoned Edward II was murdered in 1327.

Berkeley is located mid-way between Bristol and Gloucester. The town is on the Little Avon River, which flows into the Severn at Berkeley Pill. The Little Avon was tidal, and so navigable, for some distance inland (as far as Berkeley itself and the Sea Mills at Ham) until a 'tidal reservoir' was implemented at Berkeley Pill in the late 1960s.

Berkeley was a significant place in medieval times. It was a port and market-town, and the meeting place of the hundred of Berkeley. The parish of Berkeley was the largest in Gloucestershire.

The parish included the tithings of Alkington, Breadstone, Ham, Hamfallow and Hinton, and the chapelry of Stone, which became a separate parish in 1797. Hinton became a separate civil parish, and then the separate ecclesiastical parish of Sharpness with Purton in the 20th century.

Research Tips

• These notes re sources from GENUKI may be of interest:

• Original source material relating to Berkeley, and other parishes in Diocese of Gloucester may be found at the premises of Gloucestershire Archives.
• Scribes Alcove is a site to enable searches of baptism, marriage and burial indexes from six Gloucestershire parishes: Berkeley, Thornbury, Oldbury-upon-Severn, Hill, Stone & Rockhampton.
• The period covered for St Mary's Church parish records is 1700-1900CMB (except 1790-1801M).
• Abstracts from Berkeley, Stone & Hill Wills 1541 - 1571, transcribed by Leslie Mahler as part of an ongoing project.