Enville Estate Archives

Information, links and Family Research Enquiry Form

The archival collection at Enville spans a period of over 800 years, the material of the last 500 years being assembled by the Grey family, later the Earls of Stamford and Warrington and their descendents. Most of the documents have been at Enville from the time that they were created and are of local and national importance. The collection is actively used by the owners and agent in the management of the Estate. It is privately maintained and is administrated by the estate archivist.

Enville was one of four large estates owned by the Grey family, as well as holding several smaller manors and properties spread over the Midland counties of Staffordshire, Leicestershire, Cheshire, Lancashire, Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire and Warwickshire.

The Archives

The collection contains deeds, leases, manorial records, estate papers, correspondence, maps, plans and drawings, personal papers, mining and transport, and social affairs. A fuller outline catalogue may be found on the National Register Archives site, which is part of the National Archives.

Click here to visit the National Archives website

It should be noted that this is not a continuous record and that there are many gaps in its 800-year-old history. Very seldom do we have lists of people employed on the Estates, although the archivist has been compiling a list over many years, which is an ongoing project.

Other repositories that hold papers relating to the Grey family, Earls of Stamford and Warrington are-

University of Manchester, John Rylands Library

Tameside Local Studies and Archives

Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland Record Office

Academic Research

By permission of the owners, Mr and Mrs Peter Williams, access to the archives is often given to academic researchers working at degree level or above. Access is given by written appointment only. In the first instance, please write to The Archivist at the Estate Office giving details of your area of research, together with any particular documents you wish to consult and your email address.

Family History

If you believe that your ancestor lived or worked on the Enville Estate we may be able to help you, but prefer to do genealogical research ourselves as it often involves finding small amounts of information from many very large volumes. If you are able to provide us with the necessary background information, we will be happy to respond to your enquiries.

Preliminary Research

The sources in the Archives relate to the running of the Estate, so to help us you need to gather as much information as you are able from places like the Staffordshire Record Office, the Victoria County History of Staffordshire
Vol XX, the National Archives, the Birmingham and Midland Society for Genealogy and Heraldry. This should enable you to find information from birth, marriage and death certificates, census returns, wills and parish registers.

What next?

Print the "Family Research Enquiry Form", fill it in, giving as much detail as possible and send it to us at the address below, alternatively contact us by post, with a SAE and we will send a Family Research Enquiry Form for you to fill in and return to us. Provided you have given us enough information, we should be able to do a free quick look up to tell you what information we hold, if it is too vague, we may not be able to help. We will charge for providing information and copies but will advise you of the cost first.

Download a Family Research Enquiry Form here:
You will require acrobat reader to open and
print this form click here to download.

Copyright

The Enville Estate reserves the copyright of all copies (whether digital or hard copy) of any pictures or documents in the Enville Archives. If you wish to publish any image from our collection, please contact the archivist to discuss terms and payment.

Contact Details

Mrs S Haynes
Archivist
Enville Hall
Estate Office
Enville
Nr Stourbridge
West Midlands
DY7 5HD

Tel: 01384 872635
Email: sandyhaynes@gmail.com