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Local and family
history information
The Baptist Church in Burwell is located on North Street, of course at the north end of the village. This area was known as 'Low Town' (in contrast to 'High Town,' centred around the parish church and several manors) and was a mixed area. There were smart town houses owned by well-to-do merchants and traders, with gardens and orchards running from North Street down to wharves on the Lode; in the 19th Century barges transported the local clunch stone, sedge and farm- and orchard produce south- wards to Cambridge, or north towards Wisbech or King's Lynn for onward shipping; and trains took produce to London. There were large numbers of agricultural labourers in Low Town, working on the fens as the drainage and field enclosure schemes increased agricultural employment and produce. Overall it was a very tight-knit community, with the same family names in the same area for hundreds of years, and with marriage connections between many of the families. So if you were researching your family connections and they were around Burwell, and particularly the North Street area, there is a good chance that they had some links with the Baptist church and their names may feature appear in various information in the church archives that might be of interest to you. (But do note though that the church was built in 1846, and there are only a few Baptist records for earlier than that. There are older records for the parish church and the former Congregation church in the village.)
The church history book focuses on the people of the church and their activities, and is a good source of information on Burwell. It includes pointers to other source material. It looks at the early beginnings of the Baptist church in Burwell, and then looks at the ups and downs of life in Burwell, considering events locally, nationally and internationally. The story is revealed to us as written by the congregation themselves in the original writings, and illustrated by over 100 period photographs. This publication was awarded Cambridgeshire Local History prize in May 2006. It is now the 155th year of the church and this new edition includes supplementary information and improved images, and brings the story up-to-date including the church extension work in 2006. It is available at Burwell Post Office, Museum and Library, and at the County Records Office (CRO, Shire Hall in Cambridge), or click to email the author. There are a number of other Burwell publications, see http://burwell.co.uk/history.asp ========================================= Sources: here are the sources used in the history book that may be of interest to you in your own research: At the Cambridgeshire Records Office, Shire Hall, Cambridge: Burwell Baptist Church minutes (for listings see Church records at CRO) Soham Baptist Church minutes Graveyard inscriptions, of Baptist church and St. Mary's church (also available at Burwell Museum) At the Cambridgeshire Collection, Central Library, Cambridge: Annual Reports of the Cambridgeshire Baptist Association Cambridge Independent Press and Cambridge Chronicle newspapers Cambridgeshire Collection of photographs At Burwell Museum: Photographs from Burwell Village Archive (also available at Burwell Reading Room) 1841, 1861-1891 Burwell census (also available at Cambridgeshire Records Office) 1841 Tithe maps and information (also available at Cambridgeshire Records Office) Suffolk Records Office, Shire Hall, Bury St. Edmunds Births, Deaths and Marriages for Burwell Wills & Testaments Some on-line census & genealogy sites: www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/frameset_search.asp?PAGE=census/search_census.asp www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=18907 www.cfhs.org.uk/ www.old-maps.co.uk For an extensive research in Burwell families, and particularly of Burwell- Rochester, US emigration, http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~monroecounty This page updated: 10 January 2008 |
"150
Years in Minutes - A Social History of Burwell Baptist Church",
by David Martin, 2006.