Place:Newport, Isle of Wight, England

source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names

source: Family History Library Catalog

source: Family History Library Catalog

source: Family History Library Catalog

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

Newport is a civil parish and the county town of the Isle of Wight, England, an island off the south coast of England. Newport had a population of 23,957 according to the 2001 UK census, increasing to 25,496 at the 2011 UK census. The town is situated slightly to the north of the centre of the Island, at the head of the navigable section of the River Medina, which flows northward to Cowes and the Solent. Newport has a quay on the Medina.

In 1648 Charles I and a group of Parliamentary Commissioners concluded the Treaty of Newport, an attempt at reaching a compromise in the Civil War, undermined by Charles's negotiations with the French and Scots to intervene on his behalf. The Treaty was repudiated by Oliver Cromwell upon returning from defeating the Scots at the Battle of Preston. This led to Charles's execution.

The town was incorporated as a borough in 1608, having previously been a chapelry to Carisbrooke. The town's position as an area of trade accessible to the sea meant it rapidly took over from Carisbrooke as the main central settlement, eventually absorbing the latter as a suburb in 1933 along with the parishes of Northwood and Whippingham.

The borough ceased to exist in 1974 when it was incorporated into the larger Borough of Medina or Medina District, which was itself superseded in 1995 by a single unitary authority, the Isle of Wight (council) covering the whole of the Isle of Wight.

Pankhurst

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

Parkhurst is a neighbourhood northwest of the town of Newport, Isle of Wight.

It is notable for housing H.M.P. [Her Majesty's Prisons] Isle of Wight, on three sites, formerly three separate prisons: the well-known Parkhurst Prison itself, Camp Hill, and Albany. Parkhurst and Albany were once amongst the few top-security prisons in the United Kingdom, but were downgraded in the 1990s.

Research Tips

• Victoria County History of Hampshire, volume 5, chapter on Newport.
• Victoria County History of Hampshire has an outline map of the parishes of West Medina.
• The Isle of Wight Family History Society has a website with a lot of information.
• The Isle of Wight Record Office and Archives is located at Newport.
• GENUKI has a list of archive holders in Hampshire including the Hampshire Record Office, various museums in Portsmouth and Southhampton, the Isle of Wight Record Office and Archives.
• The Hampshire Online Parish Clerk project has a large collection of transcriptions from Parish Registers across Hampshire.
• A listing of all the Registration Districts in England and Wales since their introduction in 1837 together with tables listing the parishes that were part of each district and the time period covered, along with detailed notes on changes of parish name, mergers, etc. Do respect the copyright on this material.
• The three-storey City Museum in Winchester covers the Iron Age and Roman periods, the Middle Ages, and the Victorian period.
• Volumes in The Victoria County History Series are available for Hampshire through British History Online. There are three volumes and the county is covered by parishes within the old divisions of "hundreds".

A collection of maps on the A Vision of Britain through Time website illustrating the English county of Hampshire over the period 1832-1932 (the last two are expandible):

• The Hundreds of Hampshire, a map from HMSO Boundary Commissioners, dated 1832
• Hampshire showing parishes in their Rural Districts as of 1900, a map from the Ordnance Survey
• Hampshire showing parishes in their Rural Districts after the alterations of 1932, a map from the Ordnance Survey

• A group of maps of the post-1974 municipal districts or boroughs of Hampshire on Wikipedia Commons