IV. The second and last charter, which is a confirmation and extension
of the former, was granted in the 7th of the reign of Charles I. Under
this charter the government was invested in a bailiff, a recorder,
bailiff’s peers, a treasurer, a coroner, a town clerk, a
serjeant-at-mace, and other officers. The bailiff, recorder, and
bailiff’s peers, were justices of the peace; the recorder held his office
for life, and the others were elected annually on Michaelmas day by a
jury of the burgesses. The jurisdiction of these magistrates was
co-extensive with the borough. By the charter they were allowed a court
of common pleas every second Tuesday, and also an assize court for the
trial of criminals, not even excepting those suspected of capital crimes;
and from the early registers of the parish of Wenlock many executions
seem to have taken place. A court of record was also held by the mayor
every alternate Tuesday, and considerable business was done in this
court. Under the municipal reform act the government of the borough is
vested in a mayor, six aldermen, and eighteen councillors. Quarter
sessions are held before the recorder. The mayor is elected annually on
the 9th of November by the council. His duties are to preside at all
meetings of the council, and to sign notices thereof, and with the
assessors to revise the burgess list. He is a justice of the peace
ex-officio for the year of his mayoralty and the year following, and has
precedence within the borough, and is returning officer at elections for
members of parliament. In the absence of the recorder he is empowered to
open and adjourn the court of quarter sessions. Any councillor elected
mayor, but refusing to serve, is liable to a fine not exceeding £100.
The aldermen are one-third of the number of councillors, and are elected
triennially by the council on the 9th of November. Half of their number
go out of office every three years, but are eligible to be re-elected.
An alderman is to preside at elections in case of death or inability of
the mayor, and refusing office is to pay a fine not exceeding £50. The
councillors are chosen in the different wards on the 1st of November, by
persons whose names are on the burgess roll; one-third of the councillors
go out of office annually, but are capable of re-election. All such
elections are held before an alderman, and two assessors appointed for
each ward. The recorder is appointed by the crown, has precedence after
the mayor, and is sole judge at quarter sessions and in the court of
record, and ex-officio justice of the peace. He must be a barrister of
at least five years standing. He cannot be a member of parliament,
alderman, or councillor, of the borough. The town-clerk is appointed by
the council, and must be an attorney. The freemen’s roll is made out by
him. He receives from the overseers, on the 5th of September, the list
of burgesses, which he has to get printed, and expose copies on the Town
Hall door. He receives claims of persons omitted in the burgess list and
of persons objected to. He issues instructions to overseers to make out
lists of electors, and publishes the same when revised; attends and takes
minutes of all proceedings at council meetings, and makes out warrants
for borough-rates, and has charge of all borough registers and other
documents. The clerk of the peace is appointed by the council. His
duties are to give ten days’ notice of time and place of holding quarter
sessions; to summon, at least seven days before, a sufficient number of
jurors, and to make out a list of names and descriptions of jurors
summoned. The fees paid to this officer are fixed by the town council,
and confirmed by the secretary of state. The coroner is appointed by the
council, and makes an annual return of the inquests held by him to the
secretary of state, as well as a quarterly return to the council. The
following is a list of the members of Parliament, the corporate body, and
the municipal officers of the borough and franchise of Wenlock for the
year 1851:—
_Members of Parliament_:—The Hon. George Cecil Weld Forester, Esq., and
James M. Gaskell, Esq.
_Justices of the Peace_:—Moses George Benson, Esq.; George Pritchard,
Esq.; John Pritchard, Esq.; Thomas Mytton, Esq.; William Pugh, Esq.;
Henry George Harnage, Esq.; John Anstice, Esq.; John Stephens, Esq.; W.
P. Brookes, Esq.; and Richard Thursfield, Esq.
CORPORATION.—_Mayor_: Charles Belsher, Esq.
_Aldermen_: Richard Thursfield, Esq.; William Nicholas, Esq.; J. W.
Rowlands, Esq.; John Anstice, Esq.; Charles Belsher, Esq.; and John
Parry, Esq.
_Councillors of Wenlock Ward_: George Adney; Joseph Amphlitt; William
Canlin; Robert Horton; William Newill; and William Jeffrey.
_Broseley Ward_: George Pritchard; Thomas Lister; John Onions; William
Thursfield; Thomas Pitt; Robert Evans.
_Madeley Ward_: Henry Charlton; George Chune; William Cooke; Edward
Edwards; Henry Davies; Henry Dickinson.
_Recorder_: Uvedale Corbet, Esq. _Clerk of the Peace_: George Potts,
Esq. _Town Clerk_: Roger Charles Blakeway, Esq. _Clerk to Justices_:
William P. Gordon, Esq. _Treasurer_: Mr. Joseph Roden. _High
Constable_: Mr. Richard Patten.
Wenlock is remarkable as being the first borough that acquired the right
of representation by charter in parliament. The boundary of the present
parliamentary borough is the same as prior to the passing of the Reform
and Corporation Act, but the municipal boundary is not so extensive. The
revising barristers divided Wenlock into the three wards of Wenlock,
Broseley, and Madeley; Wenlock ward to consist of the several parishes of
Much Wenlock, Ditton Priors, Hughley, Monk Hopton, and such part of the
parish of Shipton as lies on the left side of the streams called Brockton
brook and the river Cowe in descending the same. The Madeley ward to
consist of the parishes of Madeley and Little Wenlock; and Brosley Ward
to consist of the parishes of Broseley, Barrow, Benthall, Linley, and
Willey, and the Extra Parochial Liberty of Posenhall. And having regard
as well to the number of persons rated to the relief of the poor in each
ward, as to the aggregate amount of the sums at which all the said
persons are so rated, they apportioned and assigned six councillors and
two aldermen to each of the said wards. The town returned one member to
parliament in 1478. It afterwards acquired the privilege of sending two,
who were elected by the burgesses (in number about five hundred), the
writ being returned by the bailiff. The greatest number of electors
polled previous to the Reform Act was 258. The freedom was acquired by
inheritance, and occasionally by election from a common hall. The whole
precinct now called the franchise appears to have been included in the
original charter. The number of electors is now upwards of nine hundred.
The lord of the manor holds annual courts at Michaelmas and Easter, at
the former of which constables are appointed.
The town of Wenlock gives name to a deanery, and the Borough and
Franchise were formerly co-extensive with the hundred of _Patintern_,
mentioned in Doomsday book, which comprised the following parishes—viz.,
Much Wenlock, Little Wenlock, Broseley, Madeley, Benthall, Barrow,
Linley, Badger, Beckbury, Priors Ditton, Stoke St. Milborough,
Eaton-under-Heywood, Hughley, Shipton, Monk Hopton, Willey, Deuxhill, and
the Extra Parochial Liberty of Posenhall. By an order of Quarter
Sessions, held at Shrewsbury, April 4, 1836, the parishes of Beckbury and
Badger, were henceforward to be taken as part of the Shiffnal division of
the hundred of Brimstree; and the parish of Deuxhill was henceforward to
be taken as part of the Bridgnorth division of the hundred of Brimstree:
the parishes of Eaton and Shipton were henceforward to be taken as part
of the upper division of the hundred of Munslow; and that the parishes of
Culmington and Stoke St. Milborough shall henceforward be taken to be
part of the lower division of the hundred of Munslow; and it was further
ordered that the day from which this should take effect, should be the
11th day of April, 1836.
THE PARISH CHURCH, which stands near the ruins of the priory, is a
venerable structure, consisting of nave, chancel, and side aisles, with a
square tower, surmounted by a neat spire of timber, covered with lead.
The structure bears many evidences of great antiquity, and the
architecture of the Saxon and Norman ages is discoverable. The interior,
during the present year, has been restored and re-pewed at a cost of
£1,350. The arches, which separate the nave from the side aisles, rise
from clustered pillars, and are very beautiful, having been cleared of
the plaster and mortar which had accumulated for ages. A lofty round
arch separates the nave from the chancel, which contains the remains of a
very elegant sedilia, together with a piscina and aumbrey, and several
old brass memorials. The Church is dedicated to the Holy Trinity; and
from the parish register, it appears that service was first celebrated in
the English tongue in this church on the 26th of June, 1559. The
church-yard has just been enlarged by the addition of three quarters of
an acre, and contains several tombs, but none of them sufficiently
remarkable as to deserve special notice. The living is a vicarage, rated
at £12. 9s. 6d., in the patronage of Sir W. W. Wynn: incumbent, Rev.
William Henry Wayne. The Methodists have a small chapel in the town.
The National School was built in 1847, at a cost of about £1,000, of
which £500 was obtained of the National Society and the Committee of
Council on Education. 150 children attend.
THE TOWN HALL or GUILD HALL is an antique structure, chiefly composed of
timber and plaster, resting on piazzas. It is evidently of great
antiquity, but there is no record to show the date of its erection. In
the parish register of Wenlock, however, which seems to have been also a
chronicle of remarkable events of the parish, it is stated that the house
over the prisons, which is clearly an addition to the original building,
was put up in 1577. The interior consists of two commodious rooms, the
first is the sessions room, and over the Recorder’s seat are the arms of
Charles II. The inner room is the Municipal Court House, which has
recently been panelled and furnished with carved oak of the most
elaborate and costly workmanship, principally at the expense of W. P.
Brookes, Esq., one of the borough magistrates. The chairs (two of which
were presented to the corporation by the Rev. R. H. G. More), as well as
the table, chimney piece, and seats, are remarkably handsome, the cost is
stated to have been not far short of £1000.
THE SAVINGS BANK is a plain brick building situated near the church. The
total number of depositors on November 20th, 1850, were 1,909, including
thirty-six charitable societies and thirty-four friendly societies. The
capital stock of the bank at the same period amounted to £62,650. 12s.;
of the total number of depositors there were 1,061 whose respective
balances did not exceed £20., 451 were above £20 and not exceeding £50.,
210 not exceeding £100., 66 above £100 and not exceeding £150., 42 not
exceeding £200., and nine were above the latter sum. The deposits of the
charitable societies at the same period amounted to £2,608. 11s. 8d., and
of the friendly societies to £3,248. 17s. 6d. _Treasurer_, George
Pritchard, Esq.: _Secretary_, Mr. William Smith.
THE PUBLIC LIBRARY is situated near the ruins of the abbey, and contains
about 1,500 volumes, mostly valuable works, chiefly presented by
gentlemen in the neighbourhood, and the Duke of Wellington, the Marquis
of Anglesey, and Major Herbert Edwards. WENLOCK EDGE is a precipitous
ridge about two miles from Wenlock, formerly densely covered with wood.
King Henry I. on his March to Shrewsbury to besiege that town was under
the necessity of employing detachments from his numerous army to cut down
the wood and make a road ere he could proceed.
WENLOCK MONASTERY, Bishop Tanner says, that a nunnery was erected at
Wenlock about the year 680, by Milburga, daughter to King Merwald, and
niece to Walphere king of Mercia, of which she became abbess; she was
renowned for sanctity, and it is recorded by William of Malmesbury, who
wrote early in the 12th century, that for some “time after the arrival of
the Normans, through ignorance of the place of her burial she was
neglected; lately however, while a new church was erecting, a boy running
violently along the pavement, brake into the hollow of a vault and
discovered the body of the virgin, when a balsamic odour pervading the
whole church she was taken up, and performed so many miracles, that the
people flocked thither in great multitudes; large spreading plains could
hardly contain the troops of pilgrims, a common faith impelling all, nor
did the saint deceive their expectations, for no one departed without
either a perfect cure or a considerable abatement of his malady, and some
were even cured of the king’s evil where medical advice had been
unavailing.” Traditions of miracles worked by Milburga are still
preserved in the neighbourhood, and her shrine is said at length to have
been burnt in the market place. The blind devotion which led crowds of
people of all ranks with their hands filled with rich oblations to offer
at this shrine produced a large income to the monastery, and for some
time kept in the shade the wondrous doings of canonized saints of the
rival establishments in this neighbourhood. The canonization of saints
was for centuries a source of great wealth to the Roman Catholic Church,
and much of their success no doubt depended on a wily priesthood
trumpeting forth their miraculous powers among the ignorant multitude.
To show the craftiness of the priesthood in this respect we may observe
that St. Dunstan after his death in 988 was canonized, and his relics
were held in such esteem that they shortly after produced an immense
revenue to the cathedral of Canterbury. About the time of Henry VII.
however, the monks of Glastonbury anxious to bring a portion of grist to
their own mill, began to boast of having the relics of St. Dunstan in
their possession, which soon turned the tide of affairs and caused the
rich offerings and oblations to flow to Glastonbury. This sorely
troubled the archbishop of Canterbury, who had the tomb of Dunstan
opened, when the body was found in a lead coffin in his pontifical habit;
the archbishop therefore immediately issued his mandate charging the
monks of Glastonbury to desist from all further boasting of their
possession of St. Dunstan’s relics. Notwithstanding the objectionable
mode the priesthood had of obtaining riches, it is but justice to observe
that their revenues and gains were all expended either in alms or
hospitality, or in building and adorning their magnificent churches and
abbeys; and although learning was then at a low ebb, it being generally
styled the dark or illiterate age, yet what learning there was then was
mostly to be found in the cloister of the monks, where some attained to
great reputation for their proficiency in knowledge.
The house founded by Milburga was destroyed by the Danes, but was
restored by Leofric Earl of Chester, at the request of his wife, the lady
Godiva. Before the Norman conquest it had again fallen into decay, and
in the 14th of William the Conqueror was rebuilt and endowed by Roger de
Montgomery, Earl of Arundel, Chichester, and Shrewsbury, a person of vast
possessions in these parts, who placed therein a prior and convent of
monks of the Cluniac order, and made it a cell to the house of De
Charitate, in France; this house suffered the same fate with other alien
priories till it was naturalized in the 16th year of Richard II. It was
dedicated to St. Milburga, and according to Dugdale, in the 26th of Henry
VIII. had revenues to the yearly value of £431. 1s. 2d.
In the Monastican is the patent of King Edward III. reciting and
confirming the charter of Isabel de Say, lady of Clun, whereby she
granted to these monks the church of St. George, at Clun, with seven
chapels depending on it, namely, the chapel of St. Thomas, in Clun, of
St. Mary’s, at Waterdune, of St. Swithin, at Clumbierie, St. Mary, at
Cluntune, St. Mary, at Appitune, with those of Eggedune, and Subbledune.
There is likewise an inquisition taken the 29th of Edward I. determining
the right of presentation to the cell of Ferne to be in the monks of
Wenlock. In “Stevens’ Supplement,” seven deeds are translated into
English from the Latin originals in the hands of Francis Canning, Esq.,
of Foxcote, in the county of Warwick, viz., the deed of Geoffrey de Say,
for the manor of Dointon; a confirmation of that deed by Henry II.;
another deed by the same king, granting that these monks might always
enjoy the said manor, unless he and his heirs gave them eleven pounds per
annum in churches and other things in lieu of it; the charter of Henry
III. to them for the same manor; the deeds of William Mitleton and Adam
Fitzwilliam about a yard of land in Mitleton; a composition between
Simon, Dean of Brug, and the prior and convent of Wenlock, about the
chapel at Duddington. The prior of Wenlock, John Cressage, on
surrendering the monastery to King Henry VIII. had a pension of £80 per
annum assigned him, together with the manor house of Madeley; twelve
monks had also pensions assigned to them amounting in the aggregate to
£100 per annum. Besides the churches already mentioned, the following
advowsons belonged to the monastery at the time it was surrendered, viz.,
Wenlock Magna, Wenlock Parva, Clun, Burton, Shipton, and Eaton. It had
also at an earlier period Sutton, near Shrewsbury, Stoke St. Milborough,
and Church Preen. During the wars between Henry III. and his barons he
was often called into the Marches of Wales, and several documents were
signed at Wenlock by the king, which would lead to the supposition that
he was frequently lodged and entertained by the Prior. The monastery is
situated near the east end of the churchyard, and the entrance from the
town was through a massive gateway; very considerable remains of this
magnificent and spacious fabric are still to be seen, and fragments are
scattered to a great distance from the site. The great centre tower has
long since disappeared, but the four massive piers the bases of which are
still in existence, show that it must have been built on a scale of no
ordinary splendour, and the size must have been equal to many of our
cathedrals. The Chapter House is probably a part of the building erected
by Roger de Montgomery, and is a singularly beautiful example of
interesting Norman arches, supported on columns of which the capitals are
all of different designs. It was entered from the cloisters by three
richly ornamented circular porches. Of the Priory church only the south
transept and a part of the south aisle of the nave remain, they present
an elegant example of the early English style of architecture, but no
record has been discovered of the date of their erection. The fragments
of the south side of the nave consist of pointed arches which have never
been open, but within them there are inserted lower arches of a similar
form rising from octagonal pillars. Over the higher arches are the
remains of a beautiful gallery which ran along the whole of the second
story of the church, and consisted of a series of pointed arches, divided
by slender clustered pillars; above these are single lancet windows
forming a clerestory; between every arch runs a slender clustered
pilaster, and where they break off at the top are remains of the
ramifications of a groined ceiling. The room adjoining the dormitory was
probably occupied by those monks whose task it was to perform the
midnight office of the choir. From the bases of the columns which are
all that remain of the choir it appears to have been in the same style of
architecture as the Chapter house. The Lady Chapel was east of the choir
and may still be traced by its foundations. The length of this stately
structure from east to west was 401 feet, the nave being 156 feet, space
under the middle tower 39 feet, choir 156 feet, Lady Chapel 48 by 40, and
the breadth of the nave and aisles 66 feet.
Adjoining the south side of the nave was the great cloister, which was
encompassed by the refectory, dormitory and chapter house. Two arched
doors which open in the cloisters still remain, but not a fragment of the
cloister itself. The chapter house is an oblong square, 66 feet by 31
feet. It communicates by a small door with the house of the Prior, the
exterior of which, and some of the apartments, retain their original
character. The whole of the eastern side of the building has a singular
cloister or ambulatory, consisting of upper and lower story, each of
which is formed by a continued line of arches, that have originally been
glazed. Opening into the upper gallery are two apartments, one of which
is supposed to have been the dining hall, which was lighted by a line of
windows somewhat resembling those of the ambulatory, but having in the
angles curious little pedestals, of the height of a table. In some parts
of these apartments are traces of fresco painting. A narrow stone
staircase in one corner communicates with the kitchen underneath. In
another part is the private chapel, now divided into several rooms, in
one of which is the stone altar, and a beautifully carved dish was dug up
some years ago. The architecture of the Prior’s house would lead to the
conclusion that it had not been built long at the time of the dissolution
of the priory. Fragments of this opulent monastery are scattered to a
great distance, and the precinct included full thirty acres. About a
century ago a considerable part of the ruins was taken down by an agent
of the manor to rebuild some houses which he had on lease, but Sir W.
Wynne put a stop to any further demolition.
The site of this monastery and manor was granted soon after the
dissolution to Augustine de Augustine, and was sold in 1545 to Thomas
Lawley, Esq., who made it his residence, and it continued in the Lawley
family till it was sold by Robert Bertie (who was the son of Ursula, the
great granddaughter of the said Thomas Lawley,) to the family of Gage.
Viscount Gage sold it about the year 1632 to Sir John Wynne, of Wynnstay,
in whose family it continues in the person of Sir W. W. Wynne, whose
father was happily called (by George IV., when Regent) “the real prince
of Wales.”
The most memorable prior was one Joybert, a Norman, who held the
monasteries of Coventry, Daventry, Wenlock and Bermondsey, all at the
same time. The annals of Worcester state that a confederacy was entered
into in the year 1253, between that house and this, for the mutual
support of both; and the same annals take notice of one William, a monk
of Wenlock, who put himself at the head of a gang of robbers, but was
afterwards taken and executed. John Cressage, who surrendered this
monastery January 26th, 1539, had a pension assigned him of £80 per
annum.