History of Brightlingsea

Brightlingsea, Sailing Barges 1907, Essex
Reproduced courtesy of The Francis Frith Collection.

Feature articles

All Saints Church, Brightlingsea, contains unique memorials to parishioners who have lost their lives at sea - 213 memorial tiles, to be exact. >>more

White's Directory of Essex 1848

BRIGHTLINGSEA, a considerable fishing village on the eastern side of the estuary of the river Colne, 10 miles South East by South of >>more.

White's Directory of Essex 1848 - list of inhabitants.

More local history sources

Books featuring Brightlingsea from Abebooks. Just click the logo. The search terms are already formatted for Brightlingsea.

Search for Brightlingsea census returns at ancestry.co.uk.

1841 England Census | 1851 England Census | 1861 England Census
1871 England Census | 1881 England Census | 1891 England Census
1901 England Census

'Jacobes', Brightlingsea. First recorded in 1315.
Has a rare c.16 polygonal brick stair-turret.
©Robert Edwards
Photograph by kind permission of Robert Edwards,
contributor to the Geograph Project

The Essex Record Office: an excellent starting point for research. The ERO has an online catalogue by the name of SEAX and a database of Parish Records held in the ERO. Access to both via their home page.

Explore the Brightlingsea Town Guide with sections on family trees, old photographs and a maritime history of Brightlingsea.

Brightlingsea is one of the Cinque Ports, apart from Town Guide above, additional information appears on the Cinque Port Liberty.

1881 Ordnance Survey Map from the British History Online web site (Essex: 037, Ordnance Survey 1:10,560: Epoch 1.0).

Ordnance Survey - type the place name in the gazetteer search box to view detailed map of Brightlingsea.

Images of England web site which has a photographic record of England's listed buildings - from the grandest house to the humblest cottage. Enter the town or village in the search box. Photographs are accompanied by a detailed architectural description of the property.