Penzance St Mary

Many inscriptions are available on the Cornish Cemeteries Site which can be searched..

The Cornwall Family History Society have published Monumental Inscriptions for
the Parish Church - 971 entries
Jewish Cemetery - 49 entries.

Census information for this parish (1841 - 1891) is held in the Cornwall Record Office. The Cornwall Family History Society offers a census search service for its members.
Specific census information for this parish is available as follows:

• 1841. In 1841, Penzance, St Mary, was enumerated under Penzance Borough.
• 1851.
  • In 1851, Penzance, St Mary, was enumerated under Penzance Borough.
  • The New Zealand Society of Genealogists have compiled separate surname indexes of the 1851 Census for each Cornish registration district; Penzance (St Mary) is listed in Volume 28. The booklets are available in Cornwall at the Cornwall Centre, (formerly known as the Cornish Studies Library), and is also available in the Cornwall FHS Library from which it can be purchased.
• 1861 In 1861, Penzance, St Mary, was enumerated under Penzance Borough.
• 1871. The 1871 Census of Penzance, St Mary (RG10/2339), Enumeration District 14,is available on-line from the Cornwall Online Census project.
• 1881. The 1881 Census of Penzance, St Mary, is available on-line from the Cornwall Online Census project as follows:
  • RG11/2345.
    • Enumeration District 14.
    • Enumeration Districts 15 and 16.
  • RG11/2346.
    • Enumeration Districts 17 and 18.
    • Enumeration District 19.
    • Enumeration District 22 [including Schools] and 23.
  • RG11/2347.
    • Enumeration District 24 [including Schools].
    • Enumeration Districts 25 and 26.
• 1891. The 1891 Census of Penzance, St Mary, is available on-line from the Cornwall Online Census project as follows:
  • RG12/1857.
    • Enumeration District 8.
    • Enumeration District 13.
  • RG12/1858.
    • Enumeration District 18.
    • Enumeration Districts 21 and 22.
  • RG12/1859.
    • Enumeration Districts 23 and 24.
    • Enumeration Districts 25 and 26.

Anglican. The parish church is located in OS Grid Square SW4730 and was dedicated to St Mary the Virgin. The present church was built in 1833-5, and opened on 15th November 1835. It was consecrated by the Bishop of Exeter in 1836. The architect, Charles Hutchens, was a native of St Buryan, a few miles west of Penzance. The Church replaced a chapel building which had been on the same site, and when it was completed it was still actually known as the Madron Chapelry of Penzance as it came under the parish of Madron.
St Mary's became a Parish Church with a Vicar of its own on 24 March 1871, the Bishop of Exeter being the patron, although the bishop still had to consult the Vicar of Madron before he appointed a priest to the living. In March 1985, the interior of the church was devastated by fire which completely destroyed the High Altar and Reredos and the organ in the west gallery.

The church consists of a chancel, nave, north and south aisles, vestry, organ loft and side galleries. At the restoration of 1987, the opportunity was taken to divide the church by glass screens to provide a narthax or vestibule, with kitchens, etc. and to create a new Chapel of the Resurrection. Meeting rooms were also provided upstairs at gallery level. The upper casing of the organ and pipes (part dating from 1675) came from the University Church at Oxford; the new action and console were constructed by Lance Foy of Truro. The Mayor's seat, by the South wall near the font, was restored by the Town Council; it was believed to have been in the previous building pre-1835 and had not been used by the Mayor for some 150 years. It was used in the sanctuary, prior to the fire of 1985, as a sedilia for the priest and his assistants.

A relic from an even older chapel of St Gabriel and St Raphael, sited near the harbour and dating from 1425, is the remains of a granite cross which can still be seen outside the south-east corner of the church. Relics of St Mary's chapel, which still survive, are the alms box (dated 1612) and the Holy Water Stoup found towards the back of the church. The bowl of this was the original font. The weather vane on top of the church dates from 1789.
The churchyard has been restored by Penwith District Council in whose care it remains. There has been much replanting of shrubs; seats have been provided and all paths renewed. It faces out to Mount's Bay.

Following the parish's union with St Paul in 2000, it is now styled the Church of St Mary with St Paul.

• LDS Church Records. The LDS Church batch numbers for Penzance are: P002611, Bible Christian Circuit C065301, the Lower Meeting Independent, East Street C065281, Wesleyan Methodists C065291. These are searchable by surname.
• The Cornwall Record Office holdings: Baptisms 1789 - 1908, Burials 1789 - 1936, Marriages 1837 - 1967.
  Penzance St. Mary Registers 1789-1983 (original + microfiche) CRO 1908-83 P179/1/22.
  BTs (Exeter) 1813-21, 1823-27, 1829, 1831-32 DRO.
  For earlier registers and BTs, see Madron.
  Copy (LDS) 1700[!]-1812 [0254189, 0254190].
  Transcript (Index?) 1789-1900 CRO P179/1/23.
  IGI 1700[!]-1812 [P002611].
• Baptisms. Baptisms 1784 to 1901 (including Madron Chapelry - 1823 to 1839) for this parish are available on-line through the OPC search Facility - (C-PROP).
• Marriages. Marriages 1837 to 1866 for this parish are available on-line through the OPC search Facility - (C-PROP).
• Burials.
  • Burials 1813 to 1900 for this parish (Madron Chapelry) are available on-line through the OPC Search Facility - (C-PROP).
  • The Cornwall Parish Registers Index contains the Madron Chapelry of Penzance St Mary's church burial details 1813 to 1837. The on-line index is searcheable by surname.
  • The Cornwall Family History Society have published transcripts of 1813-37 Burials.

• Geograph
• Flickr

• Ask for a calculation of the distance from Penzance St Mary to another place.

OPC Assistance. The On-line Parish Clerk (OPC) scheme operates a service to help family historians; the OPC page for this parish is available on-line, from where the OPC can be contacted by email.

• Map of the Penzance Registration District in which the parish lies.

You can see maps centred on OS grid reference SW475300 (Lat/Lon: 50.116258, -5.533397), Penzance St Mary which are provided by:

• OpenStreetMap
• Google Maps
• StreetMap (Current Ordnance Survey maps)
• Bing (was Multimap)
• Old Maps Online
• National Library of Scotland (Old Ordnance Survey maps)
• Vision of Britain (Click "Historical units & statistics" for administrative areas.)
• English Jurisdictions in 1851 (Unfortunately the LDS have removed the facility to enable us to specify a starting location, you will need to search yourself on their map.)
• Magic (Geographic information) (Click + on map if it doesn't show)
• GeoHack (Links to on-line maps and location specific services.)

• All places within the same township/parish shown on an Openstreetmap map.
• Nearby townships/parishes shown on an Openstreetmap map.
• Nearby places shown on an Openstreetmap map.

Penzance (St Mary) parish was part of the Penzance Union for Poor Law administration and parish relief.

Population figures for this parish are included as part of Penzance Town. However, it is recorded that in 1901, the population for Penzance, St Mary was 6216 persons.