Southam, Warwickshire

Historical Description

Southam, a small market-town, the head of a poor-law union, petty sessional division and county court district, and a parish in Warwickshire. The town stands on a branch of the river Ichene, near the Warwick and Napton and Oxford Canals, 2½ miles NE of Southam Road and Harbury station on the Oxford and Leamington section of the G.W.R., and 7¼ ESE of Leamington. It was known at Domesday as Sucham, and gave a night's lodging to Charles I. and his two sons on the eve of the battle of Edgehill. It is a seat of petty sessions and county courts, and has a post, money order, and telegraph office (S.O.), two banks, a court-house, an institute, a police station, a workhouse, a mineral spring similar to the waters of Leamington, and another spring with intensely cold water. Blue lias lime and cement are manufactured. A weekly market is held on Monday, and a fair on the first Monday of every month. The church is partly Decorated, was repaired and partly rebuilt in 1854, and has a beautiful broach spire. The parish comprises 3118 acres; population, 1738. There is a parish council consisting of eight members. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Worcester; net value, £488 with residence. Patron, the Crown. There are Congregational and Primitive Methodist chapels, and a Roman. Catholic convent with a small chapel, and an orphanage.

Administration

The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.

Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.

Church Records

The Warwickshire County Record Office hold the following registers for Southam:

Most of the records prior to 1911 have been digitised and are available on Ancestry.co.uk

Directories & Gazetteers

We have transcribed the entry for Southam from the following:

• Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Southam (St. James))

Land and Property

The Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Warwickshire is available to browse.

Maps

Online maps of Southam are available from a number of sites:

• Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• Google Streetview.
• National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
• OpenStreetMap.
• old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
• Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)

Newspapers and Periodicals

The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following Warwickshire papers online:

• Leamington Spa Courier

Visitations Heraldic

The Visitation of Warwickshire 1619 is available on the Heraldry page.