Heighington, Lincolnshire Genealogy

England   Lincolnshire

Parish History
The village and civil parish of Heighington is close to RAF Waddington and the adjoining parish of Washingborough, Lincolnshire and was a former chapelry of that Ancient Parish.

Heighington chapel of ease is an interesting architectural conundrum with a Norman tower arch clearly mediaeval in origin. Since there was a parish church nearby Heighington would have been a chapel of ease in the parish of Washingborough with Heighington. There is documentary evidence of the chapel mentioned in 1200 when William the priest at Hictington is a witness to a deed of gift.

The building was clearly dipidated by 1619 when the chapel of ease to Washingborough was built under the patronage of Thomas Garratt who was one of the engineers who drained the Fens. He bought thhe chapel of ease from the Crown. In Thomas Garratt’s will he set up a Trust Fund to found a school in the building for the boys of Heighington, Washingborough, and Branston, (in 1620) which for many years ran as a Grammar School with pupils from all over the country.This Trust fund is the Thomas Garratts Charity and the Rector of Washingborough is automatically one of the Trustees,and who is also tasked with taking services in the Chapel under the terms of the Will. The building to this day remains the property of the Trust and not the church of England.

The tower had been the only part of the building made of Stone the chapel being built of brick until the 1860's when the rector had work carried out to form the building visible today.

It was not until 1993 when the building had ceased to be used as a school and formed the Thomas Garratt Heritage Centre that the diocese of Lincoln dedicated the building as St Thomas chapel. Debate about dedication to St Martin as a stone cross in the village had such a dedication.

The Free Methodist chapel was built in 1882

Civil Registration
Birth, marriages and deaths were kept by the government, from July 1837 to the present day. The civil registration article tells more about these records. There are several Internet sites with name lists or indexes. A popular site is FreeBMD.

Church records
Material deposited at Lincolnshire Archives,

St Rumbold Street Lincoln Lincolnshire LN2 5AB England

Enquiries: lincolnshire.archives@lincolnshire.gov.uk The website enables you to view a PDF file for all records held for each parish as part of continuing efforts to provide an online catalogue.

Contributor: Include here information for parish registers, Bishop’s Transcripts, non conformist and other types of church records, such as parish chest records. Add the contact information for the office holding the original records. Add links to the Family History Library Catalog showing the film numbers in their collection

Census records
Contributor: Include an overview if there is any unique information, such as the census for X year was destroyed. Add a link to online sites for indexes and/or images. Also add a link to the Family History Library Catalog showing the film numbers in their collection.

Poor Law Unions
Lincoln Poor Law Union, Lincolnshire

Probate records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Lincolnshire Probate Records to find the name of the court having primary jurisdiction. Scroll down in the article to the section Court Jurisdictions by Parish.

Maps and Gazetteers
Maps are a visual look at the locations in England. Gazetteers contain brief summaries about a place.


 * England Jurisdictions 1851
 * Vision of Britain

Web sites
Contributor: Add any relevant sites that aren’t mentioned above.