BUXTON COUNTY COURT

Records of Buxton County Court (until about 1885 Chapel en le Frith County Court) 1847-1925.

These records were transferred to the Record Office by the Public Record Office under Section 4(1) of the Public Records Act 1958 in 1989.

The court may originally have met only in Chapel en le Frith, but Buxton (first) and New Mills (later) had become established additional meeting places by the time the court was renamed Buxton County Court.

The court's area of jurisdiction included Aston, Bamford, Brough and Shatton, Brownside, Buxton, Castleton, Chapel en le Frith, Chinley, Bugsworth [Buxworth] and Brownside, Derwent, Disley (Cheshire), Edale, Fairfield, Fernilee, Hartington Upper Quarter, Hope, Hope Woodlands, Kettleshulme (Cheshire), New Mills, Ollerset, Peak Forest, Taxal (Cheshire), Thornhill, Thornsett, Whaley (formerly Cheshire), Whittle and Wormhill. Trade directories also refer to Brownside, as in the jurisdiction of Glossop County Court.

The modern county courts were established under an Act of 1846 intended to create courts for the easier recovery of small debts. Successive Acts added considerably to the County Court's powers of jurisdiction, but the records surviving for Buxton County Court do not reflect the full range of their jurisdiction. They do however include a bankruptcy register under the Bankruptcy Act 1861.