Weston-super-Mare St John the Baptist, Somerset Family History Guide

Weston-super-Mare St John the Baptist is an Ancient Parish in the county of Somerset.

Other places in the parish include: Milton and Ashcombe.

Alternative names:

Parish church: St. John

Parish registers begin:

Parish registers: 1668
Bishop’s Transcripts: 1599

Nonconformists include: Baptist, Bible Christian Methodist, Independent/Congregational, Roman Catholic, Society of Friends/Quaker, and Wesleyan Methodist.

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Parish History

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

WESTON-SUPER-MARE, a town and a parish in Axbridge district, Somerset. The town stands on the coast, at the terminus of a short branch of the Bristol and Exeter railway, under the rocky fir-covered Worle hill, 3 miles NE of Brean-Down point, and 20 SW by W of Bristol; was, so late as 1810, a poor small fishing hamlet; suffered then, and for years afterwards, such extensive depositions of ooze from the tide as to be nick-named Weston-super-Mud; underwent great and rapid change, in result of becoming a watering-place; rose to a population of nearly 4,000 in 1851, and doubled that population before the end of 1861: acquired, onward to 1869, such increasingly great improvements as to become a very handsome town and a first-rate sea-bathing resort; comprises many fine streets, terraces, and crescents, together with numerous detached elegant residences; includes a fine open space, called Ellenborough Park lined along the sides with ornamental villas; enjoys a salubrious climate, a good bathing beach, and charming environs; is a seat of petty-sessions and county courts; publishes two weekly newspapers; carries on fine pottery manufacture in two establishments, and a very extensive sprat fishery; and has a new and handsome head post-office, a very fine r. station with telegraph, two new and handsome banking offices, three hotels, a town hall in the Venetian style, built at a cost of £3,000, a handsome suite of assembly-rooms, a gentlemen’s club-house of 1869, a market-hall built in 1854 and enlarged in 1859, a promenade-pier 1,100 feet long and 20 feet wide, completed in 1867 at a cost of £20,000, a steam-boat landing-stage beyond the pier, new harbour works at Brean-Down, a parochial church rebuilt in 1824 and enlarged in 1837, another church in the later English style built in 1847, two other churches built in 1855 and 1861, each with a tower and spire, an Independent chapel of 1858, with very fine front steeple, a Baptist chapel of 1866, cruciform and second-pointed, three other dissenting chapels, a Roman Catholic chapel, a tasteful cemetery of 7½ acres, with two fine mortuary chapels, a mechanics’ institute, subscription reading rooms, a school of art, national and British schools, and some charities. The parish includes Ashcombe and Milton hamlets, and comprises 1,590 acres of land and 1,180 of water-Real property, £36,639; of which £384 are in gasworks. Pop. in 1851, 4,034; in 1861, 8,038. Houses, 1,127. Pop. in 1869, about 12,000. Traces of ancient camps are on Worle hill; and various objects interesting to antiquaries, geologists, and tourists, are in the near vicinity. The head living or St. John’s is a rectory, and the livings of Emmanuel, Christchurch, and Trinity are p. curacies, in the diocese of Bath and Wells Value of St. J., £264; of E., £148; of C., £138; of T., not reported. Patron of St. J., the Bishop of B and. W.; of E., C., and T., Trustees.

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

A Topographical Dictionary of England 1848

WESTON-SUPER-MARE (St. John), a parish, in the union of Axbridge, hundred of Winterstoke, E. division of Somerset, 9 miles (N. W.) from Cross; containing 2103 inhabitants. This parish, which is on the margin of Uphill bay, near the Bristol Channel, has within the last few years more than trebled its population, from the construction of a bathing establishment at Knightstone, since which it has become a fashionable and well-frequented watering-place. The town is beautifully situated under the shelter of Worlebury Hill, which commands an extensive view of the surrounding country, with the range of the Mendip hills: an act of parliament for its general improvement, and for paving, lighting, and watching the streets, was passed in 1842. The bathing-house contains commodious apartments for the residence of invalids, and contiguous to it are furnished lodging-houses for the reception of families, and several good inns; the establishment comprises a public reading-room, and may be heated to any required temperature by steam apparatus detached from the building. Weston is situated immediately opposite to Cardiff on the Welsh coast, and a few of the inhabitants are engaged in the sprat and herring fishery; cod, whiting, soles, and salmon are also taken in considerable numbers. Limestone is quarried for building, for burning into lime, and for the roads; and the making of bricks is carried on to some extent. A convenient market-house has been erected at the expense of Richard Parsley, Esq. The Bristol and Exeter railway runs near the parish; and a branch worked by horses diverges to this place, where a station has been established. An act for constructing a pier was passed in 1846. The powers of the county debt-court of Weston, established in 1847, extend over part of the registration-district of Axbridge. The living is a discharged rectory, valued in the king’s books at £14. 17. 11., and in the patronage of the Bishop of Bath and Wells: the tithes have been commuted for £235, and there is a glebe of nearly 40 acres. The church is a neat edifice, partly rebuilt in 1824, and enlarged in 1837 by Archdeacon Law, the present rector, who also greatly improved and beautified the interior. An additional church, dedicated to Emmanuel, and situated near the railway station, at the entrance of the town, was consecrated in Oct. 1847: it consists of a nave, chancel, north and south aisles, and a western tower; the chancel is separated from the nave by carved oak screens, and the pulpit is of stone. There are places of worship for Independents and Wesleyans. At Worlebury is a rampart of stones, 20 feet high, with ditches, supposed to have been the last fortified camp of the Romans in this district. A well in the parish possesses the unusual property of being empty at high water, and full when the tide is at its ebb.

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Parish History

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

A Topographical Dictionary of England 1848

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