These days, East Grinstead is in West Sussex; the ancient parish was in East Sussex.
This is the United Reformed Church; the Catholic Church of Our Lady & St Peter is on the opposite side of the road junction.
St Swithun's, the Anglican parish church of the town, is on a hill top site which has been occupied by a church since the 11th century. The church was struck by lightning in 1684 when the tower was rebuilt poorly. It subsequently collapsed in 1785 and after rebuilding, the church was re-opened in 1789.
On 9th July 1943, ten German aircraft crossed the Sussex coast at Hastings and headed for London. At 5.05 pm the air raid sirens sounded in East Grinstead. At the time 184 people were watching a film in the Whitehall Cinema.
One pilot became separated from the other planes and decided that he would find another target before he returned home. Supposedly aiming for a train entering the railway station, one bomb hit the cinema and others landed on several shops in the High Street and the London Road. As a result of the raid 108 people were killed and 235 were seriously injured. It was the largest loss of life in any air raid in Sussex.
Church details, together with baptism, marriage, monumental inscription & burial records can be accessed by clicking on the church name.
The OPC Database has no census returns for people residing in this parish yet.
9 individuals in the OPC Database for the 1851 census.
10 individuals in the OPC Database for the 1861 census.
1 individual in the OPC Database for the 1881 census.
3 individuals in the OPC Database for the 1891 census.
The Weald site has transcriptions of the 1841, 1851 & 1881 census returns
1841 and 1851 - look up service offered
Grid reference: 539500, 138500 ~ View on: Google Maps, Open Street Map, Streetmap, National Library of Scotland Map or Oldmaps.
Roll of Honour - a transcription from the church
East Grinstead Town Council have their own website
East Grinstead Town Museum have a website
The OPC database contains 466 poll register entries for people entitled to vote in this parish.
There are no protestation returns for this parish in the OPC database.
The OPC database contains 255 entries for people associated with this parish mentioned in Gazettes.
Local Histories by Tim Lambert has a history of East Grinstead
There are 320 images depicting this parish in the OPC database.
POWPics (The new Roughwood churches album) contains 2 photographs of churches in this parish. This album will also display any postcards or other images of churches which are in the Sussex OPC database.
The OPC database contains 341 postal directory entries for this parish, (breakdown below).
256 entries from the 1791 Universal British Directory.
85 entries from the 1823 Pigot's Directory of Sussex.
The OPC database contains the following directory sections which cover this parish.
1791 Universal British Directory for East Grinstead.
1823 Pigot's Directory of Sussex for East Grinstead.
1867 Kelly's Directory for East Grinstead is available on the GENUKI site
1840 Pigot Directory for East Grinstead
1851 Post Office Directory for East Grinstead
There are 4 books about this parish in the Sussex OPC Bibliography.
There are 23 articles about this parish in the OPC Sussex Archeaological Collections Index.
There are 28 people from this parish in the OPC Sussex Archeaological Society Members Index.
The OPC database contains 19 wills of people who lived in this parish.
The OPC database contains 4 wills which mention this parish.
1 registered user has badged this parish. To contact them or see their details, please register as a frequent visitor to this site.
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