LATCHFORD
Latchford is a surname of English origin, belonging to the category of topographic names derived from place‑names.
The name is thought to have been formed from the Old English elements laecc (meaning "stream") and ford (meaning a shallow part of a river where it can be crossed). Some scholars also note a possible connection to the Old English word laece, meaning "lake". In either case the sense of the name is that it identified a person who lived near a river crossing or a lake‑ford.
One of the earliest documented instances of the name appears in the Hundred Rolls of Oxfordshire, where a man known as Philip de Lecheford is recorded in 1279. This places the surname in the late thirteenth century, during the reign of King Edward the First (1272–1307). In the parish of Grappenhall, Cheshire, the name is recorded in the late 13th century as well, with further surviving evidence of the name in the 1609 Chester Wills record where a Nicholas Latchford is mentioned.
Over the centuries the spelling of the surname has fluctuated. In the mid‑nineteenth century it was occasionally written as Litchford (1666), Lachford (1679) and Letchford (1788). In contemporary usage the most common orthography is Latchford, with recognised variants Lashford and Letchford. Earlier variant forms, such as Latcheford, Letchfort and Letshford, also appear in older handwritten records, but are now largely historical.
The places that gave rise to the surname include several locations named Latchford in England: a township in the borough of Warrington (part of Greater Manchester), a locality in the former parish of Latchford Without in Cheshire, and villages in Oxfordshire and Shropshire. The most frequent contemporary concentrations of the surname remain in the counties of Cheshire, Greater Manchester and Lancashire, with smaller populations in Derbyshire, Staffordshire and Cleveland.
In Ireland the name appears most frequently in the provinces of Leinster and Ulster, with a notable concentration in Crumlin, County Antrim. The presence of the surname in Ireland is largely a consequence of migration during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Internationally, the surname emigrated to North America, Australasia and South Africa during the same period, and today it can be found, though rarely, in Canada, Australia and New Zealand as well as the United States.
While still uncommon in comparison to many other surnames, Latchford persists as a marker of ancestral ties to one of the locations in England bearing the same name. The surname’s longevity attests to the enduring nature of locational identifiers in English onomastics, and to the persistence of family connections to their places of origin across many generations and continents.
Typical given names associated with the Latchford surname
Male
- Andrew
- Andy
- Christopher
- Dale
- David
- John
- Kevin
- Mark
- Paul
- Peter
- Richard
- Robert
- Stephen
Female
- Anne
- Claire
- Elizabeth
- Joanne
- Karen
- Linda
- Mary
- Sarah
- Susan
- Victoria
Similar and related surnames
Related and similar names are generated algorithmically based on the spelling, and may not necessarily share an etymology.
How to communicate the surname Latchford in...
Braille
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Morse
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Semaphore
There are approximately 925 people named Latchford in the UK. That makes it roughly the 7,820th most common surname in Britain. Around 14 in a million people in Britain are named Latchford.
Famous people named Latchford
- Bob Latchford - England international football player
- Peter Latchford - Football player
- Dave Latchford - Football player
- Jack Latchford - Cricketer (1909 to 1980)
Names and descriptions courtesy of Wikipedia, and may contain errors. This is not intended to be an exhaustive list of every famous person with this name.