KNOW YOUR PARISH

CHOLLERTON, NORTHUMBERLAND

D.W. Smith

Chollerton is a large parish to the north of Hexham, comprising the townships of Chollerton, Barrasford, Great Swinburne and Colwell, Little Swinburne, White Sidelaw, Gunnerton,  Birtley, Buteland and Broomhope. It is bounded by the parishes of Corsenside, Thockrington and St. John Lee. It is an agricultural area with a church that is possibly pre-Conquest. St Giles was rebuilt in Victorian days but still retains its pillars of Roman monoliths. The registers date from 1643 the earliest (1643-1723) remaining only in the form of a copy "taken as far as possible by Matthew Wilkinson, clark in ye year 1766" The commonest surnames are Dinning, Robson, Urwin, Hutchinson, Kell, Macdowell, Colson, Cant, Shipley and Wilkinson, but a tremendous amount  of intermarriage took place in this isolated area. Indeed all attempts to disentangle the Robson clan have proved fruitless to date.

This was of old the country of the Errington clan whose town at Cocklaw still stands, and of the Riddells and Swinburnes. It was also, as witness an inscription "orate pro eis" as late as 1633, an area where the old Catholic faith continued to hold out. Several recusants seem only to have partly con- formed even to the mid-eighteenth century. Fr Bonaventure Hutchinson, a Franciscan,(c.1690-1750), came from Colwell and was active in the area (see CRS XXVI). The remains of skeletons found under the chancel of the ruined chapel at Colwell have been thought by some to suggest a priest active here in the seventeenth century. Indeed, the main families were then both Catho- lic and Jacobite - Riddells of Swinburne Castle, Charlton of Reedsmouth and Bower and the Hodgsons of Tone, who maintained a domestic chaplain until 1812. Hence, it is worth checking for possible entries in the registers of Swinburne Castle 1828 of Stonecroft 1737, and Cockshaw in the CRS volumes.

Chollerton registers at Woodhorn contain baptisms 1643-1933, marriages 1664-1925 and burials 1664-1891.The Bishops' Transcripts date from 1769-1868. The marriages have been included in Boyd and the M.I .s recorded.

The chapelry of Birtley after being in ruins for many years was restored in 1765 and served by a curate from Chollerton. Registers contain baptisms 1730-1867, marriages 1730-1837 and burials 1728-1908. The Bishops Transcripts run from 1769 to 1834.  There was also a domestic chapel for the Reeds at Chipchase Castle though (in 1774) "ye owner will allow no one any jurisdiction”. It was evidently on the site of an earlier one as four services a year were recorded in 1723.

The Visitation returns for Chollerton in 1774 show the vicar determined "to reside in the parsonage during ye 6 winter months but living at Brampton  27 miles away, the curate lives in the vicarage for the 6 months absence". The Sacrament was celebrated six times a year and services held each Sunday. Of 172 families (excluding Birtley) six were papist, twelve Presbyterian but no meeting house of any description was there.

Chollerton parish is covered in detail in Northumberland County History Volume IV, part 2. The copy of the parish registers in Newcastle Central Library was compiled from the North Tyne Magazine and edited by the Rev.  Edward E. Forbes. It covers the years 1643-1814 contain entries and parish news from Greystead, Humshaugh, Falstone, Corsenside, Wark and Simonburn, which give the flavour of parish events at the turn of the century. The Rev Forbes bravely attempted to disentangle each family and his Humorous comments are indeed useful, and, as far as I have found, quite accurate.  His successor said of him:

Mr Forbes during his tenure of office has built his own monument by his painstaking rewriting and editing of the Parish Registers. This constitutes a permanent gift to the parish and the archaeological world. He may be said to have constituted himself whole-sale purveyor of ancestors too many of us who hitherto had been content only with the dim consciousness of having a grandfather; but now we rejoice in a pedigree as long as the longest. He has made us all brush ourselves up and whisper to one another Noblesse oblige.

Editors note

Below are the sources for Parish records for the parish of Chollerton

“Chollerton, St Giles: Records of baptisms 1647-1959, marriages 1664-1991 and burials 1664-1995 are available at Northumberland Collections Service. Bishops' Transcripts for the period 1769-1868 are deposited at Durham University Library Archives and Special Collections, Palace Green, Durham City. The International Genealogical Index (I.G.I.) includes baptisms 1643-1875 and marriages 1664-1877 for this parish, and Boyd's Marriage Index includes marriages 1648-1814 and banns 1751-1814. Transcripts of baptisms 1643-1815 and marriages and burials 1643-1851 are available at Newcastle Central Library, Local Studies Dept” source Genuki

The Northumberland & Durham Family History Society have the following indices baptism 1643-1649 , 1745-1851 marriages 1813-1839 burials 1664-1851 Monumental Inscriptions with Index

Online Resources

Google Books:

“Chollerton A Tale of Our Own Times” by Lady Celia Frances Tilley

“Poll Book for the Contested Election for Northumberland 1832” - Chollerton Parish electors can be found on, page 128.