Place:Bispham (Fylde), Lancashire, England

source: Family History Library Catalog

Bispham (Fylde) was an ancient parish in the Amounderness Hundred of Lancashire. Originally it had two townships, both of which are being redirected here: Bispham with Norbreck (#1 on map) Layton with Warbreck the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia Bispham is a village on the Fylde coast in Lancashire, England, a mile and a half north of Blackpool town centre. The village is now part of the borough of Blackpool, and generally considered a northern suburb of the town. To the south of Bispham is Warbreck, North Shore and Layton, to the east is Carleton (#4), and to the north is Norbreck and Thornton Cleveleys (#18). The Irish Sea is to the west. The area is mostly urban. Bispham, known until 1910 as Bispham with Norbreck, was originally a village in its own right, pre-dating the town of Blackpool by several hundred years. In 1066 Bispham was part of the Lordship of Amounderness held by Tostig Godwinson, the Earl of Northumbria before the Norman Conquest of 1066. It is featured in the Domesday Book of 1086 as "Biscopham", (meaning Bishop's estate or Bishop's house). Many of the settlements and villages on The Fylde were Anglo-Saxon. However, some were 9th and 10th century Viking place names. Sometimes Anglo-Saxon and Viking place names were joined together, e.g., Bispham with Norbreck. Bispham having the Anglo-Saxon place name "ham" and Norbreck having the Viking place name "breck". Bispham with Norbreck comprised three hamlets – Great Bispham (or Greater Bispham), Little Bispham and Norbreck, with Anchorsholme (then Angersholme) being part of Norbreck.

Bispham and Poulton le Fylde (#14) were the two main populated centres in The Fylde in 1500, though the area was comparatively sparsely populated.

It was in Bispham that the first mention of "Blackpool" appeared, found in the Register of Bispham Parish Church in 1602 with the christening record of a child born on 22 September to a couple who lived "on the bank of the Black Pool". In the 17th century the Fylde coast was divided into three parishes: Bispham, Poulton le Fylde and Lytham. The parish of Bispham covered modern-day Blackpool and Thornton Cleveleys and comprised the townships of Bispham with Norbreck and Layton cum Warbreck. In 1877 a detached part of Little Carleton (then known as Horseman's Hill) was placed in Bispham, then in 1883 the area known as Bispham Hawes, which was at the south end of Layton with Warbreck, was detached from Bispham and added to Layton. The population of Bispham with Norbreck in 1901 was 985.

The village centre used to include a number of thatched pre-19th-century houses, it was redesigned in the 1960s; only two of the old houses remain. Much of the housing today is of the style consistent with that of the 1930s to the 1950s.

The following description from John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72 is provided by the website A Vision of Britain Through Time (University of Portsmouth Department of Geography).

"BISPHAM, a township and a parish in Fylde [registration] district, Lancashire. The township bears the name of Bispham-with-Norbreck; lies on the coast, and on the Blackpool railway, 1½ mile N of Blackpool; and has a post office of Bispham under Preston, and a [railway] station. Acres: 2,624; of which 985 are water. Real property: £3,307. Population: 437. Houses: 88. The parish includes also the township of Layton-with-Warbreck: which contains the town of Blackpool and the village of Southshore. Acres: 5,865; of which 1,825 are water. Real property: £20,553. Population: 4,344. Houses: 849. The property is much subdivided. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Manchester. Value: £235. Patron: the Rev. Hesketh. The church is modern. The chapelries of Blackpool and Southshore are separate benefices. There are an Independent chapel and a free school.

Research Tips

• See the Wikipedia articles on parishes and civil parishes for descriptions of this lowest rung of local administration. The original parishes (known as ancient parishes) were ecclesiastical, 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.
• Rural districts were groups of geographically close civil parishes in existence between 1894 and 1974. They were formed as a middle layer of administration between the county and the civil parish. Inspecting the archives of a rural 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.
• 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 parish of Bispham from British History Online (Victoria County Histories), published 1914
• A description of the township of Bispham with Norbreck from British History Online (Victoria County Histories), published 1914
• A description of the township of Layton with Warbreck from British History Online (Victoria County Histories), published 1914