The Annals of Willenhall, Frederick William Hackwood [free ebook reader for pc TXT] 📗

Herein we have the transition from a free village community to a Saxon manor.

At Wolverhampton was seated one Wolfric, said to have been an ancestor of Wolfgeat, and a relation to Wulfruna; his manor house was situated on the slope of the hill between the present North Street and Waterloo Road--doubtless a large rambling mansion of low elevation, built of heavy timbers on a low plinth of boulders and hewn stones.

Here at Hantun he kept his state--such as the luxury of the age permitted to him. Seated in his great oaken hall, with its heavy roof timbers, at the close of each day he drank deep draughts with his guests and his numerous servants, in the flaring light of odorous resin torches stuck in iron staples along the walls. The smoke from his fire of logs escaped as lazily as it might through an aperture in the roof. The earthen floor was strewn with rushes, more or less clean as it was littered by the refuse of few or more feasts. The only furniture consisted of a long trestle table, with rude benches of oak on each side; the whole effort at ornamentation being limited to trophies of war and the chase hanging upon the walls. Such, in brief, was the home life of a great thane.

It will be observed that Wednesfield and Wednesbury at least were founded by the Saxons in their pagan days; that is before their acceptance of the White Christ, which was towards the close of the seventh century. Tradition hath it that at the Anglian advent into this district, the worship of Woden was first set up in a grove at Wednesfield. Here was first fixed the Woden Stone, the sacred altar on which human sacrifices were offered of that dread Teutonic deity, Woden.

It was carved with Runic figures--for was not Woden the inventor of the Runic characters? In sacrificing, the priest, at the slaying of the victim, took care to consecrate the offering by pronouncing always the solemn formula, "I devote thee to Woden!"

Part of the blood was then sprinkled on the worshippers, part on the sacred grove; the bodies were then either burnt on the altar or suspended on trees within this mystic grove. Later, when some advance had been made by the hierarchy, the Woden Stone was removed from the Wednesfield grove to be erected within the temple of Woden at Wednesbury.

There are other evidences of pagan practices to be discovered in Staffordshire place-names. Tutbury is said to derive its name from Tuisto, the Saxon god who gave the name to Tuesday, as Woden lent his to Wednesday; and Thursfield from Thor, the deity worshipped on Thursday. There is also Thor's cave, still so-called, in the north of this county (see "Staffordshire Curiosities," p. 159), and other similar reminders of Anglo-Saxon paganism.

It is not outside the bounds of possibility that a third local place-name is traceable to the personality of Woden. Sedgley may be derived from Sigge's Lea, and Sigge was the real name of the Teutonic conqueror who, in overrunning north-west Europe, assumed the name of Woden for the sake of prestige--he was the founder of Sigtuna, otherwise Sigge's town, in Sweden. In the science of English place-names it is well-known that while hills and streams and other natural phenomena were allowed to retain their old British names (as Barr, "a summit," and Tame, "a flood water"), towns, villages, and other political divisions were very generally renamed by the Saxon conquerors, the places in many instances being called after the personal names of their owners.

Here are some local illustrations of place-names conferred by the Anglian invaders when they had conquered and appropriated the territory.

Arley, otherwise Earnlege, was "the Eagle's ley."

Bilston signifies "the town of Bil's folk."

Blakenhall was "the hall of Blac."

Bloxwich was "the village of Bloc": as Wightwick was "Wiht's village."

Bushbury was "the Bishop's burg."

Chillington was originally "Cille's town."

Codsall was "Code's hall."

Darlaston was once "Deorlaf's town."

Dunstall, otherwise Tunstall, was "an enclosed farmstead," half a mile outside the ancient boundary of Cannock Forest.

Essington was "the town of the descendants of Esne."

Ettingshall was "the hall of the Etri family."

Featherstone seems to have been "Feader's stone." According to a charter of the year 994 there was then a large stone called the "Warstone," to mark the boundary of this place.

Hatherton, or Hagathornden, signifies "the hill of the hawthorn."

Kinvaston was perhaps "Cyneweald's town." Dr. Olive in his "History of Wolverhampton Church," says that being originally a place of consequence. Kinvaston was placed at the head of the Wolverhampton prebends.

Moseley was the "mossy or marshy lea": as Bradley the "broad lea"; and Bentley was the "lea of bent" or reedy grass.

Newbolds, an ancient farm in Wednesfield, is an Anglo-Saxon name, "niwe bold," and it pointed out "the new house."

Ogley Hay, now called Brownhills, was originally Ocginton, or "Ocga's town."

Pelsall may be translated "Peol's Hall."

Pendeford was once "Penda's ford."

Scotlands were "the corner-lands," this hamlet being at the corner of a triangular piece of land, bounded on all sides by ancient roads.

Seisdon was probably "the Saxon's Hill."

Showells, or Sewalls, at Bushbury, on the confines of Cannock Forest, was the place where "scarecrows" (as the name probably means) were set up or shown on hedgetops to prevent the deer passing from the Forest on to enclosed or cultivated land.

Stowe, a name signifying an enclosed or "stockaded" place, was another seat of a great thane; or it might have been the residential portion of the large manor or lordship already alluded to.

Tettenhall was possibly Tetta's hall; or, more probably, "Spy hall," otherwise a watch tower.

Tromelow, commonly called Rumbelows, a farm on the site of one of the Wednesfield lows, is a name that may literally mean "the burial mound of the host." The corruption Rumbelow is probably made out of the phrase "At Tromelowe."

Wergs (The), through many transformations from Wytheges to Wyrges, is "the withy hedges."

Wobaston, an estate in Bushbury, was anciently "Wibald's town."

Wombourne was the "bourne (or brook) in the hollow."

Wolverhampton was at first Heantune, or Hamtun, otherwise the "High town," to which name was prefixed soon after the year 994 that of Wulfrun, a lady of rank who gave great possessions to the Church; and hence was evolved the more distinctive name, Wulfrunhamtun, since modified into its present form.

Although some of these names (as Showells, formerly Sewall) may not date quite back to the Saxon period, most of them may be accepted as present-day evidences of the great Teutonic descent upon this Midland locality. One of the very few Celtic place-names retained from the previous occupiers is Monmore, which in the tongue of the ancient Britons signified "the boggy mere."

[Picture: Decorative flower]

Chapater IV(The Founding of Wulfruna's Church, 996, A.D.)

 

After the advent of Christianity, the new religion was gradually advanced throughout the land by the settlement of priest-missioners in the various localities. Where the missionary settled on the invitation, or under the protection of a thane, or "lord," that lordship was formed into a parish. Thus some parishes doubtless became co-terminous with the old manors. Owing, however, to the many changes of jurisdiction in the course of succeeding centuries, it is difficult to find instances of parish and manor of identical area in this locality. Bescot was a manor within the parish of Walsall; Bloxwich and Shelfield were anciently members of the manor of Wednesbury, though now included in Walsall; Bentley, at the Norman Conquest, was part of the manor of Willenhall, then belonging to Wolverhampton Church; while Dunstall was a member of the King's manor of Stow Heath. Tettenhall parish originally included as many as a dozen manors and townships.

England is made up of some ten thousand parishes, each with its parish church, around which for a thousand years has revolved the social and political, as well as the whole religious life of the place. The parish is our unit of local government, and the history of a town is usually a history of the parish.

But Willenhall never was a parish. It is merely a member of a parish--of the extensive, the straggling, and loosely-knit parish of Wolverhampton. In Wolverhampton, three miles away, was located the mother church, to which it owed spiritual allegiance, and there was situated the Vestry for parochial assemblies, and all else that stood for self-government throughout the centuries. And those were the centuries when Church and State were indissolubly bound together; when a dominant church claimed, and was recognised as having an inalienable share in the government of the people. Hence it will transpire in these pages that for centuries the story of Willenhall was involved in the ecclesiastical history of Wolverhampton.

The ancient parish of Wolverhampton lies widely dispersed and very detached, containing no less than 17 townships and hamlets, all subject to the collegiate church in matters ecclesiastical, though in many cases being distinct in matters secular. How broken the area is may be noted in the case of Pelsall, which is cut off from the mother parish by Bloxwich, a hamlet in Walsall parish.

Willenhall is one among several other neighbouring places that, from the earliest period of England's acceptance of Christianity, had its fate inseparably linked with that of Wolverhampton. In the giving way of paganism before the steady advances of the new religion, progress in this immediate part of the kingdom was marked by the founding of Tettenhall Church (A.D. 966), followed thirty years afterwards by Lady Wulfruna's further efforts at evangelisation in the setting up at Hampton (or High Town) of another Christian church.

This was in the reign of Ethelred the Unrede, which was a period sadly troubled by the aggressions of the Danes; and it is believed that Wulfruna (or Wulfrun) had designed to found a monastery, though as early as the time of Edward the Confessor, or within a century of its institution, her establishment is found to be a Collegiate Church.

With this accession of dignity, and in grateful recognition of the lady's pious munificence, the town became known as Wulfrun's Hampton, now modified in Wolverhampton.

Of Wulfruna herself but little is known. Whether she was sister of King Edgar, as some suppose, or the widow of Aldhelm, Duke of Northumberland, cannot be decided. It is known, however, that she was a lady of rank, and was captured when Olaf, in command of a Viking host, took Tamworth by storm. Hampton did not bear her name until some years after her death.

In founding her noble church at Wolverhampton, Wulfruna endowed it with thirteen estates, including lands in Willenhall, Wednesfield, Pelsall, Essington, Hilton, Walsall, Featherstone, Hatherton, Kinvaston, Bilston, and Arley. Willenhall being only three miles away from Wolverhampton, and being also for a long time ecclesiastically incorporated with it, its history at many points cannot be detached from that of the mother parish.

The wording of the charter by which the gift was made is quaintly interesting. It sets forth that: "In the year 996, from the Passion of our said Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ," Sigeric, Archbishop of Canterbury, "with the Lord's flock of servants unceasingly serving God," have granted a privilege "to the noble matron and religious woman Wulfruna," in "order that she may attain a seat in heaven," and that "for her mass may be said unceasingly for ever" in the "ancient monastery of Hamtun."

The Charter (inter alia) grants "ten hides of