Truro St Mary Cornwall Family History Guide

Truro St Mary is an Ancient Parish and a market town in the county of Cornwall.

Alternative names: St Mary Truro, St Marys Truro, Truro

Parish church:

Parish registers begin:

Parish registers: 1597
Bishop’s Transcripts: 1609

Nonconformists include: Baptist, Bible Christian Methodist, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Independent/Congregational, Methodist New Connexion, Presbyterian, Roman Catholic, Society of Friends/Quaker, and Wesleyan Methodist.

Table of Contents

Adjacent Parishes

Parish History

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

TRURO, a town, a parish, and a district, in Cornwall. The town stands on the Cornwall railway, at the head of a creek of Falmouth harbour, 8½ miles N by E of Falmouth; may have been originally called either Treru, signifying “the castle on the water,” or Truru, signifying “the three streets;” had anciently a castle, which belonged to the Earls of Cornwall, and is now extinct; had likewise an ancient Dominican friary and an ancient nunnery; was visited in 1645 by Prince Charles, and then garrisoned for the king; was taken in 1646 by Fairfax; numbers among its natives the comedian Foote, the antiquary Polwhele, the African explorers R. and J. Lander, the missionary Henry Martyn, the Christian philanthropist Dr. T. Harris, and the late Lord Vivian; gives the title of Baron to the family of Wilde; is a seat of quarter sessions, petty-sessions and county courts, a polling place, a municipal and parliamentary borough, and a head port; may be considered as, more than Bodmin, the head town of the county; carries on a considerable trade in the smelting of ores, the working of tin into bars and ingots, and the exporting of tin and copper; publishes two weekly newspapers; consists of numerous wide, well built, well-paved streets; and has a head post-office, a r. station with telegraph, three banking offices, two hotels, a modern town hall in the Italian style, public rooms erected in 1867, assembly rooms, a theatre, a recent market house, a police station, a later English church with modern tower and spire, two modern churches, four dissenting chapels, the royal institution of Cornwall with lecture-room and museum, and the county library and reading room, a diocesan female training college, an endowed grammar-school with two exhibitions at Oxford, a mining school, national and infant schools, a horticultural society, a county infirmary, alms houses with £126 a year, and other charities £118. Markets are held on Wednesdays and Saturdays; and fairs, on 5 March, 14 May, 19 Nov., and 8 Dec. Vessels of 100 tons come up to the town. The vessels belonging to the port, at the beginning of 1864, were 12 small ones, of aggregately 354 tons; and 55 larger ones, of aggregately 5,025 tons. The vessels which entered in 1863 were 17 British sailing-vessels, of aggregately 5,920 tons, from British colonies; 14 British sailing-vessels, of aggregately 1,214 tons, from foreign countries; 57 foreign sailing-vessels, of aggregately 14,479 tons, from foreign countries; 752 sailing-vessels, of aggregately 55,117 tons, coastwise; and 40 steam-vessels, of aggregately 9,671 tons, coastwise. The amount of customs in 1862 was £11,836. The town was first chartered in the time of Henry I.; it has sent two members to parliament since the time of Edward I.; and it is governed, under the new act, by a mayor, 6 aldermen, and 18 councillors. The borough boundaries include all T. parish and parts of Kenwyn and St. Clement. Amount of property and income tax charged in 1863, £4,548. Electors in 1833, 405; in 1863, 655. Pop. in 1851, 10,733: in 1861, 11,337. Houses, 2,391.

The parish comprises 190 acres. Real property, £13,162. Pop., 3,117. Houses, 638. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Exeter. Value, £184. Patron, the Rev. W. W. Harvey. The district contains 23 parishes and a part, and is divided into 6 sub-districts. Acres, 92,211. Poor rates in 1863, £14,064. Pop. in 1851, 42,270; in 1861, 43,070. Houses, 9,004. Marriages in 1863, 367; births, 1,482, of which 96 were illegitimate; deaths, 1,072, of which 487 were at ages under 5 years, and 29 at ages above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 3,332; births, 13,637; deaths, 8,590. The places of worship, in 1851, were 31 of the Church of England, with 9,986 sittings; 7 of Independents, with 1,672 s.; 2 of Baptists, with 440 s.; 1 of Quakers, with 350 s.; 59 of Wesleyans, with 14,222 s.; 3 of New Connexion Methodists, with 1,550 s.; 10 of Primitive Methodists, with 1,427 s.; 21 of Bible Christians, with 3,722 s.; 1 of the Wesleyan Association, with 52 attendants; and 1 undefined, with 95 s. The schools were 28 public day-schools, with 2,572 scholars; 73 private day-schools, with 1,794 s.; 79 Sunday schools, with 7,481 s.; and 2 evening schools for adults, with 25 s. The workhouse is in St. Clement.

Source: The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales [Wilson, John M]. A. Fullarton & Co. N. d. c. [1870-72].

Health and Housing

In 1842, Mr. Spry, medical officer of the Truro district, Truro union gave the following description of parts of Truro:

“In this road, called the Back lane (in Truro), is a lodging-house for vagrants, and some tenements adjoining, the filth from which is all cast into an open trench before the houses. From the attention paid to the sweepings of the streets by the commissioners of paving and lighting, a general show of cleanliness is preserved, but in some of the courts where the scavengers are prohibited from entering, being private property, and no thoroughfare, the stench is sometimes abominable, and instead of being desirous of having the accumulated filth removed, each resident emulates the other in filling his much-cherished pit. One such place on the western side of Culinick-street is especially remarkable for this distinction, and here two out of the four cases of typhus occurred. One of them, transferred to me by my predecessor in office, I immediately caused to be removed to the workhouse in a healthy situation, where he ultimately recovered; and the other case also did well, although kept in the same situation, by the purification of the premises and court, and liberal allowances of porter, wine, &c.”

Source: Local Reports on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Population of England 1842

Parish Registers

Marriages Out of Parish

Details	Place of Marriage
John [Bremell ?], of Truro, & Hester Sloggat 5 Sep. 1735	Lanteglos by Camelford

Bankrupts

People from Truro who have been declared bankrupt.

Allan John, Truro, Cornwall, tea dealer & draper, Oct. 13, 1826.

Bastian James, Truro, Cornwall, merchant, Julie 26, 1835.

Bath Tristram, Truro, Cornwall, grocer, Aug. 6. 1839.

Beall John, Truro, Cornwall, mine agent and share broker, Sept. 11, 1838.

Bennallach John Ferris, Truro, Cornwall, scrivener and broker, Jan. 1, 1825.

Bennett Samuel, jun., Truro, Cornwall, grocer. March б, 1829.

Hugo Samuel, Truro, Cornwall, maltster, April 17, 1838.

Jervis William, Truro, Cornwall, innkeeper, June 14, 1833.

Mackennal Patrick, Truro, Cornwall, common brewer, March 11, 1836.

Randall Richard, Truro, Cornwall, draper, Nov. 15, 1823.

Sambell Philip, Truro, Cornwall, timber merchant, Feb. 28, 1834.

Venuing Thos.; & Thos. Tucker; Truro, Cornwall, coachmakers, July 15, 1828.

Woolcock John, Truro, Comwall, linen draper, March 9. 1822.

Woolcock John, Truro, Cornwall. linen draper, June 27, 1828.

The London Gazette 1851

Pursuant to an Order of the High Court of Chancery made in a cause Ferris against Ferris, the creditors of Hannah Ferris late of the borough of Truro in the of Cornwall, Spinster, deceased (who died in the month May 1848) are on or before the 17th day of February to come in and prove their debts before Richard Richards Esq one of the Masters of the said Court, at chambers in Southampton buildings, Chancery lane, London, or in default thereof they will be peremptorily excluded the benefit of the said Order.

Parish Records

FamilySearch

Cornwall Historical Directories

Historical Maps

British National Grid Ref: SW 82498 44818
BNG Eastings, Northings: 182498, 44818
Latitude, Longitude: 50.263196, -5.053112

Administration

County: Cornwall
Civil Registration District: Truro
Probate Court: Court of the Bishop (Consistory) of the Archdeaconry of Cornwall
Diocese: Exeter
Rural Deanery: Powder
Poor Law Union: Truro
Hundred: Powder
Province: Canterbury

Adjacent Parishes

Parish History

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

Health and Housing

Parish Registers

Marriages Out of Parish

Bankrupts

The London Gazette 1851

Parish Records

FamilySearch

Census

Church Records

Church records – Indexes

Cemeteries

Court records

History

Manors

Merchant marine

Newspapers

Occupations

Officials and employees

Public Records

Poorhouses & Poor Law

Taxation

Voting registers

Schools

Archives and libraries – Inventories, registers, catalogs

Cornwall

Cornwall Historical Directories

Historical Maps

Administration