Chesham, Buckinghamshire Family History Guide

Chesham is an Ancient Parish and a market town in the county of Buckinghamshire. Chesham Bois and Latimer are chapelries of Chesham.

Other places in the parish include: Waterside, Hundridge, Charteridge, Botley, Bellingdon, Ashley Green, and Asheridge.

Alternative names:

Parish church: St. Mary

Parish registers begin:

Parish registers: 1538
Bishop’s Transcripts: 1575

Nonconformists include: Baptist, General Baptist, General Baptist New Connexion, Independent/Congregational, Particular Baptist, Primitive Methodist, Society of Friends/Quaker, and Strict Baptist.

Adjacent Parishes
Parish History
- The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870
- A Topographical Dictionary of England 1848
Parish Registers
- Marriages at Chesham 1637 to 1837
- A transcript of the first volume, 1538-1636, of the parish register of Chesham
Parish Records
- FamilySearch
Maps
Administration

Adjacent Parishes

Parish History

The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales 1870

Chesham, a town, a parish, and a, sub-district, in Amersham district, Bucks. The town stands on the river Chess, near its head, 2½ miles N by E of Amersham, and 5¼ SSW of Berkhampstead r. station. It consists chiefly of three streets; and has a post-office under Amersham, a banking-office, two chief inns, a town-hall, a temperance-hall, a parish church, five dissenting chapels, a mechanics’ institute, almshouses, and an endowed school. The church is ancient and cruciform; and has a tomb by Bacon. Total endowed charities, £100. A weekly market is held on Wednesday; fairs are held on 21 April, 22 July, 28 Sept., and the 2d Wednesday of Nov.; and manufactures are carried on in shoes, straw-plait, silk, paper, malt liquors, and flour. Real property, £5,483. Pop., 2,208. Houses, 477. The parish includes also the hamlets of Asheridge, Ashley-Green, Bellingdon, Botley, Charteridge,. Hundridge, Latimer, and Waterside. Acres, 12,657. Real property, £24,473. Pop., 5,983. Houses, 1,260. The property is not much divided. Chesham Hall, Blackwell Hall, and Latimer House are chief residences. A mineral spring, of some medicinal repute, is at a short distance from the town. Remains of a Danish fort, with walls and moat in tolerable preservation, are at Grove-farm. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Oxford. Value, £453. Patron, the Duke of Bedford. Hester, the wife of Sir Thomas Temple, and one of Fuller’s “Worthies,” who lived to see 700 of her descendants, was a native. The sub-district contains also the parish of Chesham-Bois. Acres, 13,562. Pop., 6,203. Houses, 1,302.

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

A Topographical Dictionary of England 1848

CHESHAM (St. Mary), a market-town and parish, in the union of Amersham, hundred of Burnham, county of Buckingham, 3 miles (N.) from Amersham, and 29 (N. W. by W.) from London; comprising the hamlets of Asheridge, Ashley-Green, Bellingdon, Botley, Charteridge, Hundridge, Latimer, and Waterside; and containing 5593 inhabitants, of whom 2425 are in the town. This place derives its name from the small river Chess, which rises in the neighbourhood, and, after running through the town, empties itself into the Colne near Rickmansworth. The town consists of three streets, is situated in a pleasant and fertile valley, and was formerly noted for its extensive manufacture of wooden-ware and turnery, which has of late much declined. The prevailing branch of manufacture at present is the making of shoes for the London market; many females are employed in making lace and strawplat; and there are several mills worked by the Chess for the manufacture of paper, and a silk-mill worked by machinery. The market-days are Wednesday, for corn, which is pitched in the market-place, and Saturday, for straw-plat and provisions: fairs are held on April 21st and July 22nd, for cattle; and September 28th, a statute-fair. The county debt-court of Chesham, established in 1847, has jurisdiction over the greater part of the registration-districts or poor-law unions of Amersham and Berkhampstead, and over two or three adjacent parishes.

The parish comprises by computation 12,650 acres, which, excepting about 500 of wood and 143 common or waste, are chiefly arable: the surface is in general hilly, and the soil on the high lands abounds with flint and chalk, which latter is obtained for manure. The living is a discharged vicarage, formerly consisting of the medieties of Chesham-Leicester and CheshamWoburn, each valued in the king’s books at £13. 1. 5½., but consolidated in 1767; patron, the Duke of Bedford. The great tithes have been commuted for £2326, and the vicarial for £550; there are 2½ acres of vicarial glebe. The church is an ancient cruciform structure, with a square embattled tower surmounted by a low spire: in the chancel is a monument from an elegant design by Bacon, to the memory of Nicholas Skottowe, Esq. At Latimer is a chapel of considerable antiquity, which has lately been rebuilt; it is supposed to have been endowed by the Cavendish family. There are four places of worship for dissenters, two of which are for Baptists. A chalybeate spring was discovered in 1820. At Asheridge, a college for a rector and twenty brethren was founded in 1283, by Edmund, Earl of Cornwall; the revenue of which, at the Dissolution, was £447. 18.

Source: A Topographical Dictionary of England by Samuel Lewis 1848