Poor Law Records

Poor Law records were kept by the parish churches to administer providing relief to families unable to support themselves by work. The records mentioned here almost all refer to the 'Old' Poor Law. The original Poor Law act was in 1547, and further regulations followed. Then in 1834 there was a major change in the law when the 'New' Poor Law was passed.

The records contain a lot of information that is useful to family historians, but regrettably only a small percentage of the many records survive to this day, and almost no records, country wide, have been indexed. The aim of this page is to show which records in our area have survived, and where they can be found.

The main types of record that exist are as follows:

  • Settlement Examinations - where an examiner finds out which parish is responsible for providing relief to a person/family.
  • Removal Orders - which follow as a result of the Settlement Examination. These are orders that a person/family be removed to another parish which then becomes liable to provide the relief. Removal Orders may be From this parish, or To this parish.
  • Bastardy Examinations - these were conducted to identify the father responsible for making a single woman pregnant. The father was then liable for a portion of the relief.

By default only the parishes with some surviving Poor Law records are shown, but you may also see the full list of ancient parishes (as of 1838) by selecting from the dropdown.

Display option:               



Surviving Poor Law records of West Middlesex
ParishRecords existNo of records
Brentford, St. Lawrence 1721-1829109
Chelsea, St. Luke 1733-18386751
Ealing, St. Mary 1783-1846497
Feltham, St. Dunstan 1715-182725
Fulham, All Saints 1706-1833659
Hammersmith, St. Paul 1796-1834320
Hampton, St. Mary Dates not known100
Kensington, St. Mary Abbott 1699-1835400
Shepperton, St. Nicholas 1714-180390
Staines, St. Mary 1699-1844592
Stanwell, St. Mary 1752-185414
Teddington, St. Mary 1800-1800100
Uxbridge, St. Margaret 1716-1843255
ALL RECORDS 1699-185410112



The detail of record types and which records have already been transcribed is given in the Online Guide to our Poor Law records.




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