Place:Racton, Sussex, England

source: Family History Library Catalog

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

Racton is now a hamlet in the parish of Stoughton in the Chichester District of West Sussex, England. It lies on the B2147 road 2.1 miles (3.4 km) northeast of Emsworth, Hampshire along the River Ems. Racton was a separate civil parish up until 1933.

The Racton Monument, 0.4 miles north of the hamlet, was constructed between 1766 and 1775 by the 2nd Earl of Halifax. Another prominent structure just outside the hamlet is Lordington Manor, former home of the Pole family. St Peter's Church, located in the centre of the hamlet, is a Grade I listed building, dating from the 12th-13th century.

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).

"RACTON, a parish in Westbourne district, Sussex; 2¾ miles N N E of Emsworth r. station, and 6¼ W N W of Chichester. It includes the chapelry of Lordington; and its post town is Emsworth. Acres: 1,180. Real property: £1,306. Population: 95. Houses: 18. The property is divided among three. The living is a rectory, united with the chapelry of Lordington, in the diocese of Chichester. Value: £183. Patrons: the Dean and Chapter of Chichester. The church is early English, and contains a fine monument to a Gunter."

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 Racton
• British History Online. A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 4, the Rape of Chichester, section on Racton
• Maps of the local area are to be found on pages for Westbourne and Singleton Hundred and Chichester Rape.