Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for WOLVERHAMPTON

WOLVERHAMPTON, a town, a township, a parish, and a district, in Stafford. The town stands on an eminence, at a convergence of railways, almost encompassed by canals, 13 miles NW of Birmingham. It was known to the Saxons as Hanton or Hamton; it became, in 996, the site of a college for a dean and several prebendaries or secular canons, founded by Wulfruna, sister of King Edgar; and it then took the name of Wulfrunis-Hamton, afterwards corrupted into Wolverhampton. It made little figure in the middle ages; but it rose eventually into high consequence, and made rapid increase, in connexion with vast mineral wealth in its immediate vicinity. It was visited by Charles I.,- and, in Nov. 1866, by Queen Victoria; and it gave birth, in 1772, to the painter Bird. It was made a parliamentary borough by the reform act of 1832, and made a municipal borough in 1848; and it sends two members to parliament, and is governed by a mayor, 12 aldermen, and 36 councillors. It includes, as a p. borough, the townships of Wolverhampton, Bilston, Wednesfield, and Willenhall, and the parish of Sedgley; but, as a m. borough, is conterminate with Wolverhampton township. It is a seat of petty-sessions and county courts; and it has a local police force, which, in 1864, comprised 68 men, at an annual cost of £4,814. It consists of streets diverging from a spacious central market place; and, for the most part, is well built. It formerly was supplied with water only by deep local wells; but, in 1847, it obtained waterworks, drawing supplies from springs at Tettenhall and Goldthorn hill, with storage reservoirs for nearly 2,000,000 gallons. Its outskirts command some fine views; and its interior is adorned with some fine public structures.

An equestrian statue of the late Prince Consort stands in the market-place; and was inaugurated, on 30 Nov. 1866, by the Queen. The old town hall shows a front of centre and wings; and has, in the central part, a Doric basement and an Ionic superstructure. The new town hall, sessions-house, police-court, police barracks, vestry-room, and overseers' offices form an ornamental block, erected in 1867-8 at a cost of nearly £20,000. The corn exchange was erected in 1850-3, at a cost of £12,000; and includes a principal room 100 feet long and 50 feet high, and a law library and newsroom. The market-hall was opened in 1853, and subsequently improved; is divided into three compartments, the central one 33 feet wide, each of the side ones 26 feet wide, and all about 100 feet long; is covered with an ornamental glazed roof; and cost about £30,000. The agricultural hall was erected in 1863, at a cost of £2,000; and has a principal room 165 feet long, 60 feet wide, and 30 feet high. The high-level railway station presents a frontage of 300 feet, in the Italian style. The low-level r. station presents a more extended frontage, in a bolder and more ornamental variety of Italian architecture. The fat-pig-market was opened in 1856, and has pens for about 800 pigs. The public baths were erected in 1850; passed into private proprietorship; are in the Byzantine style; and include approved bathing-appliances and a large reading room. The theatre was built about 1855, and is a handsome edifice. The athenæum and mechanics' institution possess a library and reading room. St. Peter's church is an ancient and altered reconstruction of the collegiate church founded by Wulfruna; was reconstituted, for a chapter, by Queen Mary; has undergone so many repairs as to have wholly lost its original architectural character; comprises a late perpendicular nave of five bays, an extensive Italian chancel, transepts, and a parvise or chapter-house; has a very beautiful three-storied tower; and was restored in 1865, and previous years, at a cost of £10,000. St. John's church was built in 1755-6, and is in the Grecian style. St. George's was built in 1830, and is in the Doric style. St. Paul's is in the pointed style. St. Mark's and St. Matthew's are in the early English style. St. Andrew's, at Whitmore-Reans, was built in 1865-6, but left off incomplete; and was designed to have a transeptal form, in the early English style, with tower and spire 130 feet high. A church, intended chiefly for the Irish, was built in 1866-7, at a cost of more than £4,000; and is in the pointed style, 100 feet long, with apsidal end. An old square mansion, adjacent to St. Peter's church, bears the name of the deanery, was built in the time of the Commonwealth, and is now a private residence. The Independent chape1, on Snow-hill, is an imposing edifice in the early decorated English style. The Independent chapel, in Queen-street, was built in 1866, at a cost of £10,000, and is in the Italian style. The Baptist chapel, in Waterloo-road, was built in 1864, at a cost of £2,600, and is in the early English style. The Wesleyan Trinity chapel was built in 1863, at a cost of £3,600, and is in the decorated English style. There are two other Baptist chapels, another Wesleyan, a United Presbyterian, two Primitive Methodist, a New Connexion Methodist, a free Methodist, a Unitarian, a Catholic Apostolic, and three Roman Catholic. The R. Catholic chapel on Snowhill is handsome and spacious; and that in Stafford-street was built in 1867, at a cost of £4,000, and is in the early English style. There are also a convent of sisters of mercy and a Jews' synagogue. A conventual hospital was founded, in 1394, byLuson or Leveson. The ultra-mural cemetery was formed in 1847, at a cost of about £10,000; is ornamentally laid out; and has mortuary chapels and burial vaults. The free grammar-school was founded in 1515, by Sir S. Jenyns, a native of the town; was rebuilt in 1785; and has an endowed income of £1,174 a year. The blue-coat school originated about 1710; educates, clothes, and maintains a limited number of boys and girls; and has an endowed income of £247. There are nine national schools, two British, one Congregational, two Roman Catholic, and one industrial. A school of art was built in 1854; and is in the Grecian style, with rusticated basement. An orphan asylum was built in 1853. The South Staffordshire hospital was erected at a cost of about £15,000; is in the Italian and Roman Doric styles; and contains about 110 beds. The workhouse was built in 1838, at a cost of £9,000; and has accommodation for about 500 inmates.

The town has a head post-office,‡ five sub-post offices,‡ telegraph offices, four banking offices, and six chief inns; and publishes three weekly newspapers. A weekly market for corn, cattle, and provisions is held on Wednesday; a weekly market for meat and vegetables, on Saturday; and a great annual fair on 10 July and some following days. Trade is carried on in corn mills, maltings, breweries, grease-works, Japan and varnish-works, dye-works, colour-works, roperies, cooperages, saw-mills, coach-works, sacking-lofts, crate-works, clay retort-works, chemical-works, iron and brass foundries, smelting furnaces, very extensive iron-works, and large and numerous establishments for all kinds of ironmongery and hardware. Vast traffic exists also in connexion with coal mining, ironstone-mining, iron-manufacture, and ragstone-quarrying throughout a great extent of country to the S and to the E. About 1,000,000 tons of iron-stone are annually raised; and about 850,000 tons of finished iron are produced, from about 2,100 puddling furnaces; and most of the finished iron is either used in Wolverhampton or exported by it. Races are run annually, in Aug., on a course of 1¼ mile in circuit, on the Broad meadows; and an extensive grand stand, with refreshment and assembly-rooms, is there . The area of the township or municipal borough is 3,008 acres. Real property in 1860, £255,731; of which £9,092 were in mines, £44,850 in iron-works, £16,224 in canals, and £6,245 in gasworks. Pop. in 1851, 49,985; in 1861, 60,860. Houses, 11,770. Acres of the p. borough, 15,960. Real property in 1860, £550,305; of which £1,726 were in quarries, £61,172 in mines, £133,940 in iron-works, and £8,245 in gasworks. Electors in 1833, 1,700; in 1863, 4,517. Pop. in 1851, 119,748; in 1861, 147,670. Houses, 28,432.

The parish contains Wolverhampton, Wednesfield, Willenhall, and Bilston townships in Wolverhampton district, Hilton, Hatherton, Featherstone, and Kinvaston townships in Penkridge district, and Bentley and Pelsall townships in Walsall district; and is ecclesiastically cut into the sections of Wolverhampton-St. Peter, W-St. John, W.-St. George, W.-St. Paul, W.-St. Mary, W.-St-James, W.-St. Mark, W.-St. Matthew, W.-St. Luke, Wednesfield, Wednesfield-Heath, Willenhall-St-Giles, W.-St. Stephen, W.-Trinity, W.-St. Ann, Bilston-St. Leonard, B.-St. Mary, B.-St. Luke, Pelsall, and Bradley. Acres, 16,680. Pop. in 1851, 92,287; in 1861, 113,832. Houses, 21,923. The living of W.-St. Peter is a rectory, and the other livings of W. are vicarages in the diocese of Lichfield. Value of the rectory, £750;* of each of the vicarages, £300.* Patron of St. Peter and St. George, the Bishop of L.; of St. John, the Earl of Stamford; of St. Paul, the Rev. W. Dalton; of St. Mary, Miss Hincks; of St. Matthew, alternately the Crown and the Bishop; of the others, Trustees. The other livings in the parish are separately noticed.-The district, in addition to the four townships of W. already named, contains ten parishes and an extra-parochial tract; and it is divided into the sub-districts of W.-Western, W.-Eastern, Willenhall, Bilston, Wombourn, Kinfare, and Tettenhall. Acres, 53,900. Poor rates in 1863, £37,406. Pop. in 1851, 104,158; in 1861, 126,902. Houses, 24,635. Marriages in 1866, 1,023; births, 5,507, -of which 289 were illegitimate; deaths, 3,397,-of which 1,837 were at ages under 5 years, and 34 at ages above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 11,188; births, 50,573; deaths, 31,899. The places of worship, in 1851, were 27 of the Church of England, with 21,813 sittings; 1 of English Presbyterians, with 100 s.; 8 of Independents, with 2,965 s.; 6 of Baptists, with 2,370 s.; 1 of Unitarians, with 236 s.; 17 of Wesleyans, with 6,002 s.; 3 of New Connexion Methodists, with 862 s.; 9 of Primitive Methodists, with 2,610 s.; 1 of Welsh Calvinistic Methodists, with 180 s.; 1 undefined, with 350 s.; 2 of Latter Day Saints, with 180 s.; 2 of Roman Catholics, with 1,106 s.; and 1 of Jews, with 30 s. The schools were 45 public day-schools, with 6,552 scholars; 80 private day-schools, with 2,426 s.; 60 Sunday schools, with 13,072 s.; and 5 evening schools for adults, with 85 s. A second workhouse is in Trysull.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a town, a township, a parish, and a district"   (ADL Feature Type: "cities")
Administrative units: Wolverhampton Tn/AP/CP/Ch       Wolverhampton RegD       Staffordshire AncC
Place names: HAMTON     |     HANTON     |     WOLVERHAMPTON     |     WULFRUNIS HAMTON
Place: Wolverhampton

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