Wareham Dorset Family History Guide

Wareham is an Ecclesiastical Parish and a market town in the county of Dorset, created in 1678 from Wareham Holy Trinity Ancient Parish, Wareham Lady St Mary Ancient Parish, and Wareham St Martin Ancient Parish.

Arne is a chapelry of Wareham.

Other places in the parish include: St Martin Without, Lady St Mary Out, Worgrete, Wargate, Stoborough, Lady St Mary Within, St Martin Within, Sandford, Redge, Middlebere, and Lady St Mary Without.

Alternative names:

• Wareham Holy Trinity
• Wareham St Michael
• Wareham St Martin
• Wareham Lady St Mary
• Holy Trinity

Parish church:

Parish registers begin:

• Parish registers: 1754
• Bishop’s Transcripts: 1731

Nonconformists include: Independent/Congregational, Presbyterian, Primitive Methodist, Society of Friends/Quaker, Unitarian, and Wesleyan Methodist.

Adjacent Parishes

• Morden

Parish History

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

WAREHAM, a town, three parishes, a sub-district, a district, and a division, in Dorset. The town stands on a branch of Icknield-street, and on the Southampton and Dorchester railway, between the rivers Piddle and Frome, near their influx to a large creek of Poole harbour, 16 miles E by S of Dorchester.

It dates from ancient British times; occupies the site of the Roman station Morinio or Moriconium; was known to the Saxons as Varamo and Waerham; took its name from Varia, the Roman designation of the Frome; had an early fort, British and Roman, destroyed in 875; had also a Saxon priory or nunnery, founded about 705, burnt by the Danes in 876, restored afterwards as a Benedictine cell to Lira abbey, and now represented by some slight remains; was made a mint town by Athelstan.

It received the corpse of Edward the Martyr, prior to its removal to Shaftesbury; sustained severe damage by incursions of the Danes at various periods up to 1015; had 125 houses at Domesday; belonged then to the Crown; passed soon to R. Bellomont; acquired, in his time, either a reconstruction of its ancient fort or a new castle, now extinct; was occupied by alternately both parties, and burnt by Stephen, in the war between him and Maud.

It was visited, in 1205, by King John, who landed at it from France; had then, at the mouth of the Piddle and the Frome, a considerable harbour, which afterwards became choked up; sent three ships, in the time of Edward III., to the siege of Calais; was garrisoned by the parliamentarians in 1643, and taken by the royalists in 1644; had once so many as 8 churches, only 3 of which remain.

It suffered destruction of about two-thirds of its houses in 1762, by an accidentally-raised fire; had, as natives, Horace Walpole and Lord Camden’s tutor Chapman, as a rector, the antiquary Hutchins, as a prisoner in its castle, R. de Beleme; is a borough by prescription, governed by a mayor and 18 burgesses; sent two members to parliament from the time of Edward I. till 1832, and now sends one.

It comprises within its parliamentary boundaries, its own three parishes, the parishes of Arne and Corfe-Castle, and parts of Bere-Regis, East Stoke, and Morden; is a seat of sessions and county courts and a polling place; presents nearly the form of a parallelogram, with streets crossing at right angles; retains three sides of an ancient vallum, from 1,600 to 1,960 feet long, and about 30 feet high.

It includes vacant spaces between its present houses and the vallum’s E side, now disposed in gardens, but formerly occupied by streets; and has a head post-office, a r. station with telegraph, two banking offices, two chief inns, a town hall, a five-arched bridge of 1779 over the Frome, a three-arched bridge over the Piddle, an early English church, two other churches, three dissenting chapels, an endowed school with £34 a year, alms houses with £171, a workhouse, general charities £63, a salmon fishery, some small manufactures, and a weekly market on Tuesday.

Amount of property and income tax charged on the borough in 1863, £1,484. Electors in 1833, 339; in 1863, 361 Pop. in 1851, 7,218; in 1861, 6,694. Houses, 1,339.

The parishes are Holy Trinity, Lady-St. Mary, and St. Martin; and the first includes Stoborough liberty. Acres of H. T., 2,670,-of which 150 are water; of L.-St. M., 823; of St. Martin, 4,873, of which 840 are water. Real property, £7,122. Pop., 816, 1,643, and 617. Houses, 181, 345, and 123.

The manor belonged anciently to the Clares; passed to the Mortimers, Henry VIII.’s wives, the Plunketts, and the Erles; and belongs now to J. H. Calcraft, Esq.

The livings are rectories in the diocese of Salisbury; and they are held conjointly with one another and with Arne. Value, £400. Patron, J. H. Calcraft, Esq.

The sub-district contains 13 parishes. Acres, 33,800. Pop., 6,230. Houses, 1,308. The district comprehends also Corfe-Castle, Bere-Regis, and Swanage sub-districts; and comprises 96,309 acres. Poor rates in 1863, £10,573. Pop. in 1851, 17,417; in 1861, 17,072. Houses, 3,543. Marriages in 1863, 118; births, 592, of which 35 were illegitimate; deaths, 327, of which 101 were at ages under 5 years, and 14 at ages above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 1,175; births, 5,488; deaths, 3,192.

The places of worship, in 1851, were 32 of the Church of England, with 7,337 sittings; 9 of Independents, with 2,405 s.; 1 of Baptists, with 120 s.; 1 of Unitarians, with 230 s.; 17 of Wesleyans, with 1,851 s.; 2 of Primitive Methodists, with 85 s.; 1 undefined, with 30 s.; and 1 of Roman Catholics, with 300 s.

The schools were 29 public day-schools, with 2,025 scholars; 33 private day-schools, with 564 s.; 40 Sunday schools, with 2,894 s.; and 1 evening school for adults, with 56 s. The division contains 6 liberties or hundreds and 5 parts. Acres, 98,817. Pop. in 1851, 18,001. Houses, 3,541.

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

Parish Registers

Marriage Allegations

The following people have been recorded in the Hampshire Allegations for Marriage Licences granted by the Bishop of Winchester 1689 to 1837.

BIRD, John. of Wareham St. Mary’s, co. Dorset, clerk, b., & Jennet Murray, of Gosport, sp., 1 Sep., 1771.

Burt, Thomas William, of St. Mary’s, Wareham, co. Dorset, 21, b., & Harriet Lomer, of Holy Rood, Southampton, 21, sp., at H. R., 29 Sep., 1824. Aff.

CAVE, John, of Wareham, co. Dorset, 22, b., & Charlotte Taylor, of St. Mary, Southampton, 21, sp. , at St. M., 24 Jan., 1832. Aff.

Parish Records

FamilySearch

Dorset Historical Directories

Administration

• County: Dorset
• Civil Registration District: Wareham
• Probate Court: Court of the Archdeaconry of Dorset
• Diocese: Salisbury
• Rural Deanery: Whitchurch
• Poor Law Union: Wareham and Purbeck
• Hundred: Wareham Borough; Winfrith
• Province: Canterbury