Radstock Somerset Family History Guide

Radstock is an Ancient Parish in the county of Somerset.

Parish church: St. Nicholas

Parish registers begin:

  • Parish registers: 1652
  • Bishop’s Transcripts: 1597

Nonconformists include: Baptist, Primitive Methodist, Wesleyan Methodist, and Wesleyan Methodist Reform.

Adjacent Parishes

Historical Descriptions

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

RADSTOCK, a village and a parish in Clutton district, Somerset. The village stands on the Fosse way, on a small affluent of the river Avon, at a meeting-point of railways forming in 1868 from Frome, Bath, and Keynsham, 7 miles NW of Frome; takes its name from red sandstone lying below and around it; is the centre of an extensive coal-field; was connected, by mineral railway, with the canal near Mitford, and with the Great Western railway at Frome; and has a post-office under Bath. The parish comprises 1,005 acres. Real property, £14,548; of which £9,202 are in mines. Pop. in 1851, 1,792; in 1861, 2,227. Houses, 413. The property is divided among a few. The manor belongs to the Countess of Waldegrave. Round Hill barrow is near the village. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Bath and Wells. Value, £270. Patron, the Countess of Waldegrave. The church consists of nave, aisles, and chancel, with porch and tower. There are chapels for Baptists, Wesleyans, Primitive Methodists, United Free Methodists, and a national school.

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

A Topographical Dictionary of England 1848

RADSTOCK (St. Nicholas), a parish, in the union of Clutton, hundred of Kilmersdon, E. division of Somerset, 8 miles (N. W.) from Frome; containing 1447 inhabitants. It comprises by measurement 1005 acres, and is bounded on the north-west by the Roman fosse-way, and intersected by the road between Bath and Exeter: some small rivers flowing here, run into the Avon. The chief part of the population is employed in five coal-mines; and there are several quarries of corngrit and lias stone, used for rough building, and which make excellent brown lime that hardens under water. Tramroads run from all the pits, for ten or twelve miles, to the Kennet and Avon canal. In 1845 an act was passed for constructing the Wilts, Somerset, and Weymouth railway, with a branch of nearly nine miles to Radstock. The living is a rectory, valued in the king’s books at £6. 11. 0½., and in the gift of Earl Waldegrave: the tithes have been commuted for £264, and the glebe comprises 35 acres. The church was enlarged in 1832. Here is a place of worship for Wesleyans. Radstock gives the title of Baron to a branch of the family of Waldegrave; the late admiral Lord Radstock, brother of George, fourth earl Waldegrave, having been created a peer by this title.

Source: A Topographical Dictionary of England by Samuel Lewis 1848

Administration

  • County: Somerset
  • Civil Registration District: Clutton
  • Probate Court: Court of the Bishop (Consistory) of the Archdeaconry of Wells
  • Diocese: Bath and Wells
  • Rural Deanery: Frome
  • Poor Law Union: Clutton
  • Hundred: Kilmersdon
  • Province: Canterbury