Abbotsbury, Dorset Genealogy

Guide to Abbotsbury, Dorset ancestry, family history, and genealogy: parish registers, transcripts, census records, birth records, marriage records, and death records.

Parish History
ABBOTSBURY, a village, a parish, and a subdistrict, in the district of Weymouth, Dorset. The village stands in a vale, about a mile from the sea, 7¼ miles W of the Weymouth railway, and 9 SW of Dorchester. The parish contains also the hamlets of Rodden and Elworth;.

Here is a 1848 perspective of this parish:

ABBOTSBURY (St. Nicholas), a parish, and formerly a market-town, in the union of Weymouth, hundred of Uggscombe, Dorchester division of Dorset, 8¼ miles WSW from Dorchester, and 129 SW by W from London. With the hamlets of Rodden and Elworth. .

An additional chapel called St. Catherine's chapel, was supposed to have been erected in the reign of Edward IV., stands on an eminence south-west of the town, and serves only as a land-mark.

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.

Probate Records
Records of wills, administrations, inventories, indexes, etc. were filed by the court with jurisdiction over this parish. Go to Dorset 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