Place:Wadsworth, West Riding of Yorkshire, England

source: Family History Library Catalog

source: Family History Library Catalog

the following text is based on an article in Wikipedia

Wadsworth is a civil parish now in the Metropolitan Borough of Calderdale in West Yorkshire, England. It has a population of 1,456, and includes the settlements of Old Town, Chiserley and Pecket Well.

Historically, Wadsworth was in the ecclesiastical parish of Halifax in the Morley Division of the wapentake of Agbrigg and Morley. From 1894 until 1937, Wadsworth was located in Todmorden Rural District. In 1937 Todmorden Rural District was abolished and replaced by Hepton Rural District. In 1974 the whole area became Metropolitan Borough of Calderdale in the new county of West Yorkshire.

A Vision of Britain through Time provides the following description of Wadsworth from John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72:

"WADSWORTH, a township in Halifax parish, [West Riding of] Yorkshire; containing parts of Hebden-Bridge and Mytholmroyd villages, and extending from 6 to 12 miles WNW of Halifax. Acres: 10,080. Real property: £13,889. Population in 1851: 4,491; in 1861: 4,141. Houses: 923. There are six places of worship and extensive manufactories."

Research Tips

• GENUKI on Wadsworth. The GENUKI page gives numerous references to local bodies providing genealogical assistance.
• The FamilySearch wiki on the ecclesiastical parish of Halifax provides a list of useful resources for the local area.
• A Vision of Britain through Time on Wadsworth.
• A Vision of Britain through Time also provides links to three maps for what is now South Yorkshire, produced by the United Kingdom Ordnance Survey, illustrating the boundaries between the civil parishes and the rural districts at various dates. These maps all blow up to a scale that will illustrate small villages and large farms or estates.

• Ordnance Survey West Riding 1888. The "Sanitary Districts (which preceded the rural districts) for the whole of the West Riding.
• Ordnance Survey West Riding South 1900. The rural and urban districts, not long after their introduction. (the southern part of Bradford, the southern part of Leeds, the southern part of Tadcaster Rural District, the southern part of Selby, Goole Rural District, and all the divisions of Halifax, Huddersfield, Wakefield, Doncaster, Barnsley, Rotherham and Sheffield)
• Ordnance Survey West Riding 1944. The urban and rural districts of the whole of the West Riding after the revisions of 1935.