| Description | There has been a settlement with a church at Cherryhinton since at least 1200. The parish church, St Andrew’s, dates from mediaeval times, with evidence for a Saxon church on the site. The settlement around the church, at Church End, was separate from that nearby, at Mill End, with marsh lying between them, until the land was drained in the 1800s. Then, a path developed between the two, and the two settlements formed the parish of Cherryhinton. In the nineteenth century the railway was laid across the drained land, and with increasing industrialisation a steam plough works was established. It remained in use until the 1930s. Cherryhinton chalk pit was excavated, and chalk was quarried to provide building material for the area, until it became exhausted in the 1930s.
The population of the parish has grown over the years, and St John’s Church was established as a daughter church to St Andrew’s parish church in 1894, to cater for the increasing population of the parish as Cambridge spread to the south of the historic centre.
These records cover the years from 1894 until 1934. The parish council was established under the Local Government Act of 1894 as part of Chesterton Rural District Council, the parish boundaries being aligned with the county and borough boundaries. There were two electoral wards, St Andrew’s and St John’s, both communities having more than 300 electors. The records include minutes of the Annual Parish Meetings, of Meetings for the election of councillors and of Parish Council meetings of the councillors elected for both wards. They run until 1934 when boundary changes under the Local Government Act 1932 resulted in the entire parish becoming part of Cambridge (Borough) City Council. |