An History of Birmingham Part 33

WITTON.

Three miles north of Birmingham, and one from Aston, is _Witton_, (Wicton) from the bend of the river, according to Dugdale: the property of a person at the conquest whose name was Staunchel. Fitz-Ausculf seized it, and Staunchel, more fortunate than the chief of his country men, became his tenant; valued in the conqueror's survey at 20s.

per ann.

It was afterwards vested in the crown: in 1240, Henry the third granted it to Andrew de Wicton, who took his name from the place, for in Dooms-day it is Witone; therefore the name being prior, proves the remark.

Andrew, anxious after the boundary of his new purchase, brought an action against his neighbour, William de Pyrie (Perry) for infringing his property. Great disputes arise from small beginnings; perhaps a lawyer blew the flame.

The king issued his precept to the Sheriff of Staffordshire, in which Perry lies, to bring with him twelve lawful and discreet knights; and the same to the Sheriff of Warwickshire, of which Witton is part, to ascertain the bounds between them.

Which was the aggressor, is hard to determine, but I should rather suppose Squire Perry, because _man_ is ever apt to trespa.s.s; he resided on the premises, and the crown is but a sleepy landlord; not so likely to rob, as be robbed.

There is a road, where foot seldom treads, mounded on each side, leading over the Coldfield, from Perry-bridge towards the Newlands, undoubtedly the work of this venerable band of discreet knights.

The stranger, of course, would deem the property between the contending parties, of great value, which, twenty-four of the princ.i.p.al characters of the age, the flower of two counties, marshalled by two chief officers, were to determine. But what will he think of the quarrelsome spirit of the times, when, I tell him, it was only a few acres, which is, even at this day, waste land, and scarcely worth owning by either.

In 1290, Witton was the property of William Dixley; in 1340, that of Richard de Pyrie, descendant of him, who, a hundred years before, held the contest. In 1426, Thomas East, of Hay-hall, in Yardley, was owner; who sold it to John Bond, of Ward-end, of whose descendants William Booth purchased it, in 1620: an heiress of Booth brought it by marriage to Allestree, of Yardley, who enjoyed it in our days; it was sold to John Wyrley, and is now possessed by George Birch, Esq; of Handsworth.

The house, left by its owners, is in that low, or rather boggy situation, suitable to the fashion of those times. I can discover no traces of a moat, though there is every conveniency for one: We are doubly hurt by seeing a house in a miserable hole, when joining an elegible spot.

BLAKELEY.

Five miles north-west of Birmingham, is _Blakely-hall_, the manor house of Oldbury. If we see a venerable edifice without a moat, we cannot from thence conclude, it was never the residence of a gentleman, but wherever we find one, we may conclude it was.

Anciently, this manor, with those of Smethwick and Harborn, belonged to the family of Cornwallis, whose habitation was Blakeley-hall: the present building seems about 300 years old.

The extinction of the male line, threw the property into the hands of two coheirs; one of whom married into the family of Grimshaw, the other into that of Wright, who jointly held it. The family of Grimshaw failing, Wright became then, and is now, possessed of the whole.

I am unacquainted with the princ.i.p.al characters who acted the farce of life on this island, but it has long been in the tenancy of a poor farmer, who, the proprietor allured me, was _best_ able to stock the place with children. In 1769, the Birmingham ca.n.a.l pa.s.sing over the premises, robbed the trench of its water. Whether it endangers the safety is a doubt, for _poverty_ is the best security against violence.

WEOLEY

Four miles west of Birmingham, in the parish of Northfield, are the small, but extensive ruins of _Weoley-castle_, whose appendages command a track of seventeen acres, situate in a park of eighteen hundred.

These moats usually extend from half an acre to two acres, are generally square, and the trenches from eight yards over to twenty.

This is large, the walls ma.s.sy; they form the allies of a garden, and the rooms, the beds; the whole display the remains of excellent workmanship. One may nearly guess at a man's consequence, even after a lapse of 500 years, by the ruins of his house.

The steward told me, "they pulled down the walls as they wanted the stone." Unfeeling projectors: there is not so much to pull down. Does not time bring destruction fast enough without a.s.sistance? The head which cannot contemplate, offers its hand to destroy. The insensible taste, unable itself to relish the dry fruits of antiquity, throws them away to prevent another. May the fingers _smart_ which injure the venerable walls of Dudley, or of Kenilworth. n.o.ble remains of ancient grandeur! copious indexes, that point to former usage! We survey them with awful pleasure. The mouldering walls, as if ashamed of their humble state, hide themselves under the ivies; the generous ivies, as if conscious of the precious relics, cover them from the injuries of time.

When land frequently undergoes a conveyance, necessity, we suppose, is the lot of the owner, but the lawyer fattens: _To have and to hold_ are words of singular import; they charm beyond music; are the quintessence of language; the leading figure in rhetoric. But how would he fare if land was never conveyed? He must starve upon quarrels.

Instances may be given of land which knows no t.i.tle, except those of conquest and descent: Weoley Castle comes nearly under this description. _To sign, seal, and deliver_, were wholly unknown to our ancestors. Could a Saxon freeholder rise from the dead, and visit the land, once his own, now held by as many writings as would half spread over it, he might exclaim, "Evil increases with time, and parchment with both. You deprive the poor of their breeches; I covered the ground with sheep, you with their skins; I thought, as you were at variance with France, Spain, Holland, and America, those numerous deeds were a heap of drum heads, and the internal writing, the _articles of war_. In one instance, however, there is a similarity between us; we unjustly took this land from the Britons, you as unjustly took it from us; and a time may come, when another will take it from you. Thus, the Spaniards founded the Peruvian empire in butchery, now tottering towards a fall; you, following their example, seized the northern coast of America; you neither bought it nor begged it, you took it from the natives; and thus your children, the Americans, with equal violence, have taken it from you: No law binds like that of arms. The question has been, whether they shall pay taxes? which, after a dispute of eight years, was lost in another, _to whom_ they shall pay taxes? The result, in a future day will be, domestic struggles for sovereignty will stain the ground with blood."

When the proud Norman cut his way to the throne, his imperious followers seized the lands, kicked out the rightful possessors, and treated them with a dignity rather beneath that practiced to a dog.--This is the most summary t.i.tle yet discovered.

Northfield was the fee-simple of Alwold (Allwood) but, at the conquest, Fitz-Ausculf seized it, with a mult.i.tude of other manors: it does not appear that he granted it in knight's-service to the injured Allwood, but kept it for his private use, Paga.n.a.ll married his heiress, and Sumeri married Paga.n.a.ll's, who, in the beginning of the 13th century, erected the castle. In 1322, the line of Sumeri expired.

Bottetourt, one of the needy squires, who, like Sancho Panza, attended William his master, in his mad, but _fortunate_ enterprize, procured lands which enabled him to _live_ in England, which was preferable to starving in Normandy. His descendant became, in right of his wife, coheir of the house of Sumeri, vested in Weoley-castle. He had, in 1307, sprung into peerage, and was one of our powerful barons, till 1385, when the male line dropt. The vast estate of Bottetourt, was then divided among females; Thomas Barkley, married the eldest, and this ancient barony was, in 1761, revived in his descendant, Norborne Barkley, the present Lord Bottetourt; Sir Hugh Burnel married another, and Sir John St. Leger a third.

Weoley-castle was, for many years, the undivided estate of the three families; but Edward Sutton, Lord Dudley, having married a daughter of Barkley, became possessed of that castle, which was erected by Sumeri, their common ancestor, about nine generations before.

In 1551, he sold it to William Jervoise, of London, mercer, whose descendant, Jervoise Clark Jervoise, Esq; now enjoys it.

Fond of ranging, I have travelled a circuit round Birmingham, without being many miles from it. I wish to penetrate farther from the center, but my subject forbids. _Having therefore finished my discourse, I shall_, like my friends, the pulpitarians, many of whom, and of several denominations, are characters I revere, _apply what has been said_.

We learn, that the land I have gone over, with the land I have not, changed its owners at the conquest: this shuts the door of inquiry into pedigree, the old families chiefly became extinct, and few of the present can be traced higher.--Destruction then overspread the kingdom.

The seniors of every age exclaim against the growing corruption of the times: my father, and perhaps every father, dwelt on the propriety of his conduct in younger life, and placed it in counter-view with that of the following generation. However, while I knew him, it was much like other people's--But I could tell him, that he gave us the bright side of his character; that he was, probably, a piece of human nature, as well as his son; that nature varies but little, and that the age of William the Conqueror was the most rascally in the British annals. One age may be marked for the golden, another for the iron, but this for plunder.

We farther learn, there is not one instance in this neighbourhood, where an estate has continued till now in the male line, very few in the female. I am acquainted with only one family near Birmingham, whose ancestor entered with William, and who yet enjoy the land granted at that period: the male line has been once broken--perhaps this land was never conveyed. They shone with splendour near six hundred years. In the sixteenth century, their estate was about 1400_l_. a year; great for that time, but is now, exclusive of a few _pepper-corns_ and _red roses_, long since withered, reduced to one little farm, tilled for bread by the owner. This setting glympse of a shining family, is as indifferent about the matter, and almost as ignorant, as the team he drives.

Lastly, we learn that none of the lords, as formerly, reside on the above premises: that in four instances out of twenty-one, the buildings are now as left by the lords, Sheldon, Coleshill, Pipe, and Blakeley: two have undergone some alteration, as Duddeston and Erdington: five others are re-erected, as Black Greves, Ulverley, King's-hurst, Castle Bromwich, and Witton; which, with all the above, are held in tenancy: in eight others all the buildings are swept away, and their moats left naked, as Hogg's-moat, Yardley, Kent's-moat, Saltley, Ward-end, Park-hall, Berwood, and Weoley; and in two instances the moats themselves are vanished, that of King's-norton is filled up to make way for the plough, and that of Aston demolished by the floods. Thus the scenes of hospitality and grandeur, become the scenes of antiquity, and then disappear.

SUTTON COLDFIELD.

Though the topographical historian, who resides upon the premises, is most likely to be correct; yet if _he_, with all his care, is apt to be mistaken, what can be expected from him who trots his horse over the scenes of antiquity?

I have visited, for twenty years, some singular places in this neighbourhood, yet, without being master of their history; thus a man may spend an age in conning his lesson, and never learn it.

When the farmer observes me on his territories, he eyes me _ascance_; suspecting a design to purchase his farm, or take it out of his hands.--I endeavour to remove his apprehensions, by approaching him; and introduce a conversation tending to my pursuit, which he understands as well as if, like the sons of Jacob, I addressed him in Hebrew; yet, notwithstanding his total ignorance of the matter, he has sometimes dropt an accidental word, which has thrown more light on the subject, than all my researches for a twelvemonth. If an honest farmer, in future, should see upon his premises a plumpish figure, five feet six, with one third of his hair on, a cane in his left hand, a glove upon each, and a Pomeranian dog at his heels, let him fear no evil; his farm will not be additionally tythed, his sheep worried, nor his hedges broken--it is only a solitary animal, in quest of a Roman phantom.

Upon the north west extremity of Sutton Coldfield, joining the Chester road, is _The Bowen Pool_; at the tail of which, one hundred yards west of the road, on a small eminence, or swell of the earth, are the remains of a fortification, called _Loaches Banks_; but of what use or original is uncertain, no author having mentioned it.

Four hundred yards farther west, in the same flat, is a hill of some magnitude, deemed, by the curious, a tumolus--it is a common thing for an historian to be lost, but not quite so common to acknowledge it. In attempting to visit this tumolus, I soon found myself in the center of a mora.s.s; and here, my dear reader might have seen the historian set fast in a double sense. I was obliged, for that evening, February 16, 1783, to retreat, as the sun had just done before me. I made my approaches from another quarter, April 13, when the hill appeared the work of nature, upon too broad a base for a tumolus; covering about three acres, perfectly round, rising gradually to the center, which is about sixteen feet above the level, surrounded by a ditch, perhaps made for some private purpose by the owner.

The Roman tumoli were of two sorts, the small for the reception of a general, or great man, as that at Cloudsley-bush, near the High Cross, the tomb of Claudius; and the large, as at Seckington, near Tamworth, for the reception of the dead, after a battle: they are both of the same shape, rather high than broad. That before us comes under the description of neither; nor could the dead well be conveyed over the mora.s.s.

The ground-plot, in the center of the fort, at Loaches Banks, is about two acres, surrounded by three mounds, which are large, and three trenches, which are small; the whole forming a square of four acres.

Each corner directs to a cardinal point, but perhaps not with design; for the situation of the ground would invite the operator to chuse the present form. The north-west joins to, and is secured by the pool.

As the works are much in the Roman taste, I might, at first view, deem it the residence of an opulent lord of the manor; but, the adjacent lands carrying no marks of cultivation, destroys the argument; it is also too large for the fashion; besides, all these manorial foundations have been in use since the conquest, therefore tradition a.s.sists the historian; but here, tradition being lost, proves the place of greater antiquity.

One might judge it of Danish extraction, but here again, tradition will generally lend her a.s.sistance; neither are the trenches large enough for that people: of themselves they are no security, whether full or empty; for an active young fellow might easily skip from one bank to another.

Nor can we view it as the work of some whimsical lord, to excite the wonder of the moderns; it could never pay for the trouble. We must, therefore, travel back among the ancient Britons, for a solution, and here we shall travel over solid ground.

It is, probably, the remains of a British camp, for near these premises are Drude-heath (Druid's-heath) and Drude-fields, which we may reasonably suppose was the residence of a British priest: the military would naturally shelter themselves under the wing of the church, and the priest with the protection of the military. The narrowness of the trenches is another proof of its being British; they exactly correspond with the stile of that people. The name of the pool, _Bowen_, is of British derivation, which is a farther proof that the work originated from the Britons. They did not place their security so much in the trenches, as in the mounds, which they barracaded with timber. This camp is secured on three sides by a mora.s.s, and is only approachable on the fourth, that from the Coldfield. The first mound on this weak side, is twenty-four yards over, twice the size of any other; which, allowing an ample security, is a farther evidence of its being British, and tradition being silent is another.

PEt.i.tION FOR A CORPORATION.

Every man upon earth seems fond of two things, riches and power: this fondness necessarily springs from the heart, otherwise order would cease. Without the desire of riches, a man would not preserve what he has, nor provide for the future. "My thoughts," says a worthy christian, "are not of this world; I desire but one guinea to carry me through it."