Ross Herefordshire Family History Guide

Ross is an Ancient Parish and a market town in the county of Herefordshire.

Alternative names: Ross-on-Wye

Other places included in the parish: Ross Foreign, Ross Borough, Cleeve, Detchant, Easington, Easington Grange, East Grange, Elwick, Middleton

Parish church: St. Mary

Parish registers begin:

• Parish registers: 1671
• Bishop’s Transcripts: 1662

Nonconformists include: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Independent/Congregational, Particular Baptist, Plymouth Brethren, Roman Catholic, Society of Friends/Quaker, and Wesleyan Methodist. 

Adjacent Parishes

• Walford
• Weston under Penyard
• Goodrich
• Brampton Abbotts
• Bridstow
• Hope Mansell
• Upton Bishop

Parish History

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

ROSS, a town, a parish, a sub-district, and a district, in Herefordshire. The town stands on the river Wye and on the Hereford and Gloucester railway, at the junction on the Ross and Monmouth railway, 12¼ miles S E by S of Hereford; belonged once to the Bishops of Hereford, who had a palace at it; was devastated by the plague in 1637; has a house in which Charles I. slept, on his way to Raglan; possesses celebrity in connexion with John Kyrle, “the Man of Ross,” the subject of a poem by Pope; sent members to parliament in the time of Edward I.; was made a borough by Henry III.; is now governed nominally by a serjeant or mayor, and four constables; occupies elevated ground, amid a richly cultivated and highly picturesque tract of country; has a promenade, called the Prospect, formed by John Kyrle, and commanding a delightful view; comprises several irregularly constructed streets, and several good ones; has, of late years, undergone material improvement; is a seat of petty-sessions and a county court, and a polling-place; publishes two weekly newspapers; and has a head post-office,  a railway station with telegraph, three banking offices, three chief inns, a bridge, a town hall, a market house, a police station, a church, five dissenting chapels, a mechanics’ institute, an agricultural society, a choral society, a grammar-school with £10 a year from endowment, a blue-coat school with £211, alms-houses with £99, a dispensary, a work-house, and general charities £213. The market house was built in 1862, at a cost of £2,500; and includes apartments used as reading-rooms, and as the mechanics’ institute library. The church is decorated English; has a tower and elegant spire, 121 feet high; was recently restored and enlarged; and contains monuments of the Rudhalls and the Westfalings, and an elaborate monument of John Kyrle. The Wesleyan chapel was built in 1867 A weekly market is held on Thursday; a cattle-market, on every 4th Thursday; and fairs on the Thursday after 10 March, Holy Thursday, the second Thursday after Whit-Sunday, 20 July, the Thursday after 10 Oct., and 11 Dec. There are a large brewery, two large tan-yards, an iron foundry, agricultural-machine manufactories, and several corn mills. Pop. of the town in 1851, 2,674; in 1861, 3,715. Houses, 736.

The parish is divided into borough and foreign; but part of the latter division, as well as all the former, is occupied by the town. Acres of the whole, 3,118. Real property of the borough div., £7,741; of which £100 are in gas-works. Pop. in 1851, 2,674; in 1861, 2,718. Houses, 521. Real property of the foreign div., £10,887; of which £121 are in quarries. Pop. in 1851, 1,343; in 1861, 1,628. Houses, 344. The living is a rectory and a vicarage in the diocese of Hereford. Value, £1,100. Patron, the Bishop of Hereford. The sub-district contains also the parishes of Weston-under-Penyard, Lea, Hope-Mansell, Walford, Goodrich, Marstow, and Ruar-dean, and the tything of Lea-Bailey, the two last electorally in Gloucester. Acres, 17,250. Pop., 9,032. Houses, 1,883. The district comprehends also the sub-district of St. Weonards, containing the parishes of St. Weonards, Hentland, Pencoyd, Llanwarne, Llandinabo, Harewood, Ballingham, Llangarren, and Tretire-with-Michaelchurch; and the sub-district of Sollershope, containing the parishes of Sollershope, Brockhampton, Kings-Caple, Sellack, Foy, How-Caple, Upton-Bishop, Brampton-Abbotts, Peterstow, and Bridstow, and the township of Yatton. Acres of the district, 55,568. Poor-rates in 1863, £8,661. Pop. in 1851, 15,502; in 1861, 16,306. Houses, 3,357. Marriages in 1863, 111; births, 531, of which 49 were illegitimate; deaths, 325, of which 92 were at ages under 5 years, and 15 above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 1,042; births, 4,819; deaths, 3,213. The places of worship, in 1851, were 27 of the Church of England, with 6,426 sittings; 3 of Independents, with 520 s.; 4 of Baptists, with 810 s.; 1 of Quakers, with 250 s.; 9 of Wesleyans, with 920 s.; 3 of Primitive Methodists, with 165 s.; 1 of Bible Christians, with 105 s.; 1 of Brethren, with 250 s.; and 1 of Latter Day Saints, with 30 s. The schools were 12 public day-schools, with 636 scholars; 22 private day-schools, with 509 s.; and 20 Sunday schools, with 1,306 s. The work-house has accommodation for 160 inmates.

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

Parish Records

FamilySearch

Bankrupts

Below is a list of people that were declared bankrupt between 1820 and 1843 extracted from The Bankrupt Directory; George Elwick; London; Simpkin, Marshall and Co.; 1843.

Bellamy John, Ross, Herefordshire, apothecary, Oct. 14, 1834.

Bellamy Richard Wanklin, Ross, Herefordshire, grocer, March 13, 1840.

Gerrish Peter, Ross, Herefordshire, cheese and bacon factor, Nov. 24, 1835.

Green John, Ross, Herefordshire, inn-holder, July 10, 1824.

James James, Ross, Herefordshire, grocer, April 27, 1841.

Lloyd Timothy, Ross, Herefordshire, grocer. April 12, 1823.

Matthews Thomas, Ross, Herefordshire, currier, Nov. 30, 1822.

Morgan Thomas, Ross, Herefordshire, tailor and draper, Dec. 15, 1829.

Roberts James, Ross, Herefordshire, mercer and draper, Dec. 18, 1827.

Simkin Thomas Allen, Ross, Herefordshire, wine merchant, Jan. 28, 1826.

Wellington James, Ross, Herefordshire, butcher, May 22, 1840.

Wilde William Gilley, Ross. Herefordshire, tanner, Dec. 15, 1840.

Woolley Peter, Ross, Herefordshire, tailor and draper, Feb. 13, 1838.

Maps

Vision of Britain historical maps

Administration

• County: Herefordshire
• Civil Registration District: Ross
• Probate Court: Court of the Bishop of Hereford (Episcopal Consistory)
• Diocese: Hereford
• Rural Deanery: Ross
• Poor Law Union: Ross
• Hundred: Greytree
• Province: Canterbury