On this page I have analysed the distribution and occurence of the Kingham name.
At the outset it is worth noting that it isn't a common name. Around the world it seems unlikely that there is more than 1000 individual households holding the name at the present time.

Current Distribution (1999)
To determine the current distribution of the name Kingham I have used the 'web' to search through local telephone directories. Inevitably this will not give a 100% accurate result but cross-checking confirms that the figures have at least a 90% confidence.
Not surprisingly, the name is restricted to the UK and then the main countries of migration: the U.S., Australia, Canada and New Zealand. There are sure to be a scattering of Kinghams in other countries but not to any great level of concentration.

Overall Distribution of Kingham Households
 

Country	Households
Australia	127
Canada	33
New Zealand	31
U. Kingdom	248
United States	178
Total	617

Australia: Internal Distribution
 

State	Capital	Rest of State
Canberra	6	-
New South Wales	23	33
Northern Territories	1	0
Queensland	2	6
South Australia	16	4
Tasmania	0	0
Victoria	16	9
Western Australia	9	2

Canada: Internal Distribution
 

State	Households
Alberta	3
British Col.	8
Nova Scotia	3
Ontario	19

New Zealand: Internal Distribution
There are 31 households listed in New Zealand with 19 of them in the Auckland area.

United Kingdom: Internal Distribution
The internal distribution of Kingham still reflects the historic pattern with Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire showing the greatest concentration.
Inevitably there has been some migration to the main urban centres such as Birmingham, London and to the industrial conurbations in Yorkshire, in part a result of migration off the land in the late 19th century but also the reflecting the propensity of families to move even further afield. The example I have within my own family is indicative of this trend. Its earliest origin was in Buckinghamshire but from the 17th to the 19th century was firmly entrenched in Bedfordshire.
Then the family moved to Hertfordshire; next to Norfolk and then, by the 1920s to Dorset and Wiltshire.

The United States: Internal Distribution
 

Historic Distribution
This analysis of historic distribution uses my own research from Parish Records and the IGI. This means that I am using an incomplete sample and hence the results are indicative rather than absolute.
There has always been mobility in society. The notion that people including agricultural labourers didn't move around before the mid nineteenth century is wrong. There has always been fluidity in places of residence that only increased with industrialisation and the decline in manual agricultural work.
This is an important point for those researching there family history as time and time again researchers get stuck because they can't understand why a name has disappeared and they limit their research to too limited a geographical area. David Baker in his book 'The Inhabitants of Cardington in 1782' {Cardington being a village in Bedfordshire} found that only 24% of the males and 16% of the females were born in Cardington. In this small
village of 173 adult males, 11 of them were born outside of Bedfordshire entirely, and 19 of the females were born outside of Bedfordshire. In short there was considerable mobility.
People moved for a number of reasons:
*Labourers in search of work (sometimes seasonally driven)
*Children moving out to be domestic servants
*Marriage
*Joining the Army or Navy (this could be from the age of ten in the 17th/18th century)
*Husbands running away from wives
Again in Cardington, of 160 children born in that period, only 39 stayed in Cardington; over a quarter left the County completely and a number went to London.
Hence the greater surprise should be if a family stayed in a single village for any great time.

IGI Distribution
The International Genealogical Index is an index of births/baptisms and marriages compiled by amateur researchers who are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints.
The indexing is uneven; there can be multiple repetitions and in the course of transcribing can be inaccurate.
Nonetheless, it is a useful starting point for family history research.
The table below is a representation of the mentions of Kingham in the registers.
We can see the earliest instances from the mid 16th century occurring in Buckinghamshire (in places such as Aston Clinton.)  Also early records are from Tring in Hertfordshire (although Tring is no great distance from Aston Clinton and hence but for the county boundary these two places are in the same area.)
The greatest concentration in the country during the 17th/18th/19th century is in Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire but with London also making an appearance form the late 17th century onwards.
 
 

x = each x is up to 5 mentions

In the U.S. there are only a few records: the earliest are from the mid 1600s from Massachusetts (Weymouth, Bridgewater and Braintree.) By the 1800s there are mentions in Ohio (there are a number here), Missouri, Utah, Michigan, North Carolina, Georgia, New Hampshire, Texas and New Jersey.

Distribution in the 1881 Census of Great Britain
In the 1881 Census there were 1093 total recordings of the name (adults and children.) The biggest single number were in London (248) followed by Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire. However, the greatest number of the 'place of birth' was in Bucks, then Herts and then Beds showing that migration to London had been taking place. Migration also accounts for much of the dispersal across the rest of the country, particularly in the northern counties (most likely due to searching for employment) where often the Head of Household was born in Bucks, Beds or Herts.
In total the name is found in 34 counties although many are in single households.
The total number of records (1093) reinforces the rarity of the name: for example in 1881 there were 429,197 Smiths recorded, 242,747 Davis and 130,630 Thomas.
 

In his book 'Homes of Family Names'  published in  1890 H.B.Guppy firmly plants the Kingham name in Buckinghamshire noting it as a peculiar name mostly found in a single county. He writes the following: "The Kinghams of Aylesbury and its vicinity possess the name of a parish in the neighbouring county of Oxford."  This is due to his methodology of concentrating on yeoman and farmers. The Kinghams were very much of that class in Bucks but less so in Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire.
It can be conjectured that the impetus for early migration was that the younger sons had to move when the father died and left the farm to one son only. It wasn't the practise to split the farm; possibly more than one son might be able to sustain a living and some would buy land elsewhere but that wouldn't be possible for all. Hence the descent of the family in to trades or in to the labouring class.

Emmigration to Australia
Currently I have found the following records of emmigration to Sydney, New South Wales:
KINGHAM Charles. Age 22. Vessel: John and Lucy. Date:1857
KINGHAM  John. Age 24. Vessel: Nimroud. Date: 1859
KINGHAM Elizabeth. Age 22. Vessel: Nimroud. Date: 1859
KINGHAM Edwin. Age 3 Vessel: Nimroud. Date: 1859
 
 
Return to Kingham Index