Part 66

DIRECTORY.—Ralph Merrick Leeke, Esq., Longford Hall; Rev. John Kynaston Chorlton, The Rectory; Clifford Firth, farmer, Brockton; George Veitch, farmer, Longford Mill; James Veitch, farmer, Brockton; Thomas Clues, gardener, The Hall; Robert Stevenson, gamekeeper; James Rowley, blacksmith.

STOCKTON

is a small township, in the parish of Longford, three miles and a half E. by S. from the church, and two miles and a half S.E. from Newport. The township contains 649A. 3R. 3P. of land, and at the census of 1841 had 14 houses and 84 inhabitants. Gross estimated rental, £189. 18s. 7d. Rateable value, £820. 16s. The tithes are commuted for £112. There are eight acres of glebe land. All the land is the property of John Cotes, Esq.

The principal residents are Humphrey James, farmer; and John Meredith, farmer.

NEWPORT

is a parish and market town in the Newport division of the South Bradford Hundred, pleasantly situated in the line of the ancient Watling Street, and near the eastern confines of the county, eleven miles S. from Market Drayton, seventeen E.N.E. from Shrewsbury, and 139 miles N.W. by N. from London. The town principally consists of one spacious, handsome street, stretching for about a mile in length, containing many good inns, private residences, and respectable shops in all the different branches of the retail trade. About the centre of the town, and in the middle of the street, stands the venerable parish church, an ancient market house, and a few dwellings, which are some of the oldest houses in the town of Newport. The parish in 1801 contained 2,307 inhabitants; 1831, 2,745; and in 1841 there were 553 houses and 2,497 inhabitants. The number of acres the parish embraces is 567A. 0R. 25P., the chief owners of which are Sir Thomas H. F. Boughey, Bart.; Thomas Collier, Esq.; John Morris, Esq.; Mr. Wilde; Mr. Silvester; Miss Bennett; and the trustees of Newport Marsh. Rateable value, £6,847. 13s. The inhabitants are supplied with an abundance of excellent water, from large cisterns and wells in various parts of the town, which are filled from a spring, about a mile distant, by means of a water-course and pipes, the expenses of which are paid from the income arising from the common lands. Newport was granted municipal privileges as early as the reign of Henry I., which were confirmed by succeeding sovereigns. The government is vested is a high steward, deputy steward, two bailiffs, and twenty-five burgesses. John Cotes, Esq., is the high steward; Robert Fisher, jun., Esq., deputy steward; and William Washbourne, Esq., and G. H. Duncalfe. Esq., are the bailiffs. Petty sessions for the Newport division of the hundred are held in the town: the presiding magistrates are Sir Thomas Fletcher Fenton Boughey, Bart.; John Charles Burton Borough, Esq.; and John Justice, Esq. The principal features in the trade of Newport are the engineering establishment and brass foundry of Messrs. Massey; the manufacture of agricultural implements by Mr. Underhill; and those belonging to Mr. Thomas Boughey and Mr. Lewis Atkins—ingenious establishments for the manufacture of all descriptions of bendware, wood turnery, together with hair sieves and dairy requisites of the most approved descriptions.

THE CHURCH is a venerable structure of red sand-stone, situated nearly in the centre of High-street. It consists of nave, chancel, and side aisles, with a square tower and an illuminated clock; the tower is dated 1,662; but this probably is the date of certain reparations, for the upper and some other parts of the tower appear to have been re-faced. The chancel and side aisles are of red brick, and were rebuilt in the year 1728, previously to which the church exhibited a beautiful specimen of the architecture of the fifteenth century. The interior has a spacious and handsome appearance. The roof is of groined timber, and the nave is separated from the side aisles by five pointed arches on each side. It contains a small organ, and there are some neat mural tablets. The living is a perpetual curacy, valued at £297, in the patronage of the Lord Chancellor; incumbent, Rev. William Sandford, M.A. The Abbot and Convent of St. Peter and St. Paul, at Shrewsbury, were patrons of the church at Newport; from them it was purchased in the twentieth of Henry VI., by Thomas Draper, citizen of London, who made it collegiate, placing in it a warden, who was to be in priests’ orders, and four chaplains or fellows, who were to pray for the King and the Royal Family, and for the soul of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, (the King’s uncle,) and for the fraternity of St. Marie’s Guild in the church of Newport.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul, is situated at the outskirts of the town, on the site of an ancient residence called Salter’s Hall, which was long the inheritance of the Shrewsbury family, adjoining which was a domestic chapel. The present structure was built about twenty years ago by the Earl of Shrewsbury. The interior of the structure presents a chaste and elegant appearance; the seats or benches are all open and uniform in character, and the altar is richly carved and gilt; on each side of it are beautifully carved figures of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Joseph. The windows on each side of the altar are adorned with representations of St. Peter and St. Paul, the patron saints of the church. The Rev. Michael Trovell is the priest.

THE INDEPENDENT CHAPEL, situated on the Wellington road, is a neat stuccoed structure, erected in the year 1817, at a cost of £1,300. It is provided with galleries, and is calculated to hold four hundred hearers. There is a flourishing congregation connected with this place of worship, who enjoy the talented ministrations of the Rev. William Berkeley Leach. The Sunday school in connection with the chapel is numerously attended. The old Independent chapel, which stood in Beaumaris lane, has been converted into two cottages.

THE WESLEYAN METHODIST CHAPEL is a plain brick structure, of small dimensions, situated in the Upper Bar, and was formerly used as a theatre.

THE WESLEYAN NEW CONNEXION CHAPEL, a small brick fabric, is also situated at the Upper Bar.

THE PRIMITIVE METHODISTS have a small chapel on the Stafford road, built in 1830.

The FREE GRAMMAR SCHOOL.—_William Adams_, of the city of London, devised certain lands for the endowment of a grammar school and other charitable uses, in Newport, in 1656. By an act of parliament passed in the 12th year of the reign of King Charles II., after reciting the erection of the school-houses and alms-houses by William Adams, and his settlement of lands for the maintenance thereof, it was enacted that the master and four wardens of the Company of Haberdashers in London for the time being, and their successors, should be governors of the possessions of the Free Grammar School of Newport; and that they should have a common seal, for the sealing of their affairs, and hold all possessions granted by Mr. Adams for the maintenance of the school and other charitable uses. Among the objects of the trust Mr. Adams directed £20 yearly to be paid to the minister of Newport, for his encouragement in the works of the ministry, and upon the condition that the preacher for the time being should weekly catechise the scholars, children, and servants of the town of Newport, or such of them as for that purpose should repair to the parish church; and if the preacher should wilfully neglect to perform the weekly duty, the governors should apply the said £20 for the benefit of the poor, or in such charitable uses as they should think fit. A yearly sum of £60 was to be paid to the schoolmaster, and £20 to the usher; also £24 per annum to the inmates of the four alms-houses which he caused to be erected, and a like annual sum to be paid in apprentice fees, with various other gifts. The estate which Mr. Adams devised is situated at Knighton, in Staffordshire, and comprises 797A. 2R. 26P. of land. There is also a farm situated at Woodseves, in the parish of Market Drayton, containing 85A. 1R. 38P., which was purchased with the sum of £500, obtained from a sale of timber cut from the Knighton estate. In 1667 the testator demised the premises at Knighton for a term of twenty-one years to Luke Justice, at the annual rent of £175; and in 1714 the governors, on the surrender of the lease, which had become vested in William Justice, re-demised the premises to the said William Justice for another term of seventy years, at the same rent. The provisions of the will in behalf of Luke Justice were evidently intended as matter of favour to that individual; but it is difficult to conceive that two successive terms, embracing a period of 106 years, were in contemplation of the testator, when he authorized the granting of a lease for so long a time. Upon the expiration of the last lease the premises were let in several farms, on leases of twenty-one years and a half, at rents amounting to £476. 14s., which considerably exceeded the amount of the several payments prescribed by the founder; and it became necessary to obtain the directions of a Court of Chancery as to the disposal of the surplus. In the course of the proceedings which were instituted on that occasion, the heir-at-law of William Adams interposed his claim to the surplus rents beyond the sum of £175, the amount of the several charitable uses appointed by the founder; but it was determined by the court that there was no resulting trust in the charity estate for the said heir-at-law. By a decree made November, 1797, and a subsequent decree made December, 1808, on the occasion of a further advance of the rents to the sum of £768. 17s., a scheme for the disbursement of the income was established, which augmented the expenditure to £692 per annum. The leases having expired in 1814, new leases were granted under the direction of the court, and the advanced rents made the yearly income £957. 3s. 6d. From this fund the head master receives £200 per annum, the second master £100, and the third £100. The other principal items of expenditure are a sum of £60 per annum paid to the minister of Newport; to putting out three apprentices yearly, £54; exhibitions to four scholars at the university, £90; to the four alms-people, £78; to twenty-four persons free of the Haberdashers’ Company, £75; an allowance for books, £10; repairs of the school-house and alms-house, £10; to a boy for ringing the school bell, £3; to a boy for sweeping the school, £3; to the clerk of the Haberdashers’ Company, £6; to the two beadles, £3; Woodreave, £2; the receiver, £21; besides which there are several small items for incidental expenses.

The school premises is a spacious building situated a little back from the High street, and is respectively appropriated to the use of the school, and to the residence of the master and usher, as directed by the founder. By the statutes of the school it was intended for the instruction of eighty scholars; but the town of Newport and its neighbourhood, to which a preference was given by the founder, not being able to supply the full number, the scholars are admitted indifferently from other parts; and to facilitate their admission, it has been left to the head master to appoint them on their application to him, without the intervention of visitors, on whom that duty was imposed by the statutes. The course of education was intended to embrace the Hebrew language; but it appears to have been hitherto confined in practice to Greek and Latin, with the addition of writing and arithmetic. In December, 1850, there were 59 scholars on the foundation. Charles Waring Saxon, D.D., is the head master; Rev. William Sandford, M.A., second master; Mr. Richard Crowther, third master. The particulars of the four exhibitions on Careswell’s foundation will be found noticed with Bridgnorth Grammar School. The alms-houses above mentioned are situated near the gates, at the entrance to the Grammar School.

THE ENGLISH SCHOOL is a neat brick building, erected in 1843, and situated on the Wellington road. This school appears to have had its origin in a certain grammar school, which, by the certificate of the commissioners under the statute of the 1st of Edward VI., now remaining in the augmentation office, was certified to have been always kept by Richard Robins, one of the Fellows of the college of Newport, to whom was paid out of the revenues of that college the annual stipend of £5. In the twenty-third year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, her Majesty granted to Edmund Downing and Peter Ashton, “all that site of the late college of Newport, in the county of Salop, late the possession of the said college, with all rights, members, and appurtenances, rendering to her said Majesty £15 yearly, to be paid for a salary or stipendary curate of Newport, and school-master there—that is to say, to the curate £10, and to the schoolmaster £5.” William Robson, in 1633, deposited £5,000 in the hands of the Salters’ Company for charitable uses, among which he directed £5 per annum to be paid to the master of the free school at Newport, and £10 per annum to a lecturer, and a like sum annually for the benefit of the poor. William Adams gave to the bailiffs and burgesses of Newport, and their successors for ever, all those two closes, situate at Norbroom, upon trust, to apply the rents for the support of the English school. William Barnfield, in 1665, gave “six days’ work of ground in Norbroom, four tenements let for 16s. a year each, and a shop let for 30s. per annum, towards the support of the free school.” The total income, when, the charity commissioners published their report, amounted to £49. 1s., of which £24 arises from Adams’s gift, £15. 11s. from Barnfield’s, £5 from Robson’s benefaction, and £4. 10s. from the receiver-general. The school has long been confined to the instruction of children in reading English, and we find it described by the name of the English school as early as 1660. How long before that period it had ceased to teach grammar we have not been able to discover; but it may reasonably be conjectured to have been about the time when that branch of education became otherwise so largely provided for by the establishment of the Free Grammar School of William Adams. The school is free to the children of the humbler classes of society for instruction in English: fifty-four scholars now attend.

THE INFANT SCHOOL, situate on the Wellington road, was built in 1841 at a cost of £250; the room is spacious and lofty, and has an average attendance of 95 scholars. The Sunday school in connection with the Independent Chapel is also situated on the Wellington road, and has an attendance of 150 children.

THE GIRLS’ NATIONAL SCHOOL is a neat brick structure, situated in the Workhouse lane; it was built in 1842, and has an average attendance of seventy children.

THE TOWN’S ALMSHOUSES. In 1446 the burgesses or commonalty of Newport granted to William Glover a plot of land between the church-yard and the king’s highway, towards the north, between two stiles in the said church-yard, that the said William Glover should build on the land a hospital for the use of the poor. The almshouses are appropriated to the use of four poor old women of the town of Newport, who are appointed from time to time by the trustees, and retain their respective places for life. The rents of lands and dividends of funded property, left by various benefactors, produced a yearly income of £69. 14s. when the charity commissioners published their report. Each inmate has a weekly payment of 4s. 6d. from Lady-day to Michaelmas, and 5s. from Michaelmas to Lady-day. They also receive 10s. each for coals, and a gratuity of 5s. each at Christmas. The present almshouse was built in 1836, and is situate in Workhouse lane.

THE SAVINGS’ BANK, held at Mr. Silvester’s, High street, was enlarged in 1818, on November 20th; the capital stock of the bank amounted to £36,221. 12s. 10d., at which period there were 1,450 separate accounts, of which twelve were charitable and seven friendly societies. Of the total number of depositors 963 had respective balances under £20; 268 were above £20 and less than £50; 135 did not exceed £100; 51 did not exceed £150; 31 were above the latter sum and less than £200; and two exceeded £200. Mr. Charles Silvester is the secretary.

THE COUNTY COURT OFFICE, for the recovery of debts, and in all pleas of personal action where the damage does not exceed £50, is situated in High street. The several parishes and places within the jurisdiction of the court in Shropshire are Adney, Brockton, Caynton, Cherrington, Cheswell, Chetwynd. Chetwynd Aston, Chetwynd End, Church Aston, Donington, Donington Wood, Edgmond, Howle, Lilleshall, Longford, Littlehales, Lynn, Muxton, Newport, Pave Lane, Pickstock, Pilston, Sambrook, Stockton, Tibberton, Vauxhall, Woodcote. The places in Staffordshire are Adbaston, Alston, Apeton, Aqualate, Batchacre, Beffcote, Bishops Offley, Bromstead, Coton, Cowley, Flashbrook, Forton, Gnosall, Great Chatwell, High Offley, Knighton, Knightley, Loynton, Meertown, Moreton, Norbury, Oulton, Outwoods, Plardiwick, Shebdon, Sutton, Tunstall, Weston Jones, Wilbrighton, and Woodseaves. _Judge_: Uvedale Corbett, Esq., Aston Hall. _Clerk_: William Liddle, Esq., Newport. _High Bailiff_: George Hill Townsend, Wolverhampton. _Appraiser and Auctioneer_: Joseph Doody, High street, Newport. _Bailiff_: Thomas Roberts, Upper Bar, Newport.

THE NEWPORT UNION HOUSE, situated in Workhouse lane, a plain brick structure, will accommodate about sixty inmates; the aged, infirm, and the older children are sent to the union house of Gnosall, in Staffordshire, which is connected with the Newport union, and this house is for the reception of the able-bodied poor and very young children. The several places comprised in the union in the county are Newport, Chetwynd, Chetwynd Aston, Church Aston, Cherrington, and Edgmond. The townships and places in Staffordshire are Adbaston, Forton, Gnosall, High Offley, Norbury, and Weston Jones. _Chairman to the Guardians_: John Cotes, Esq. _Clerk_: Henry Heane, Esq. _Chaplain_: Rev. William Sandford. _Surgeons_: Mr. William Lindop, Mr. Godley, and Mr. John Green. _Relieving Officer_: Mr. Benjamin Rees. _Master_: Samuel Winnell. _Matron_: Emma Wellings.

THE MARKET HALL is an ancient structure, standing upon pillars, and situate nearly in the centre of High street. The area between the pillars is appropriated to a corn market; and here the farmers assemble on a market day for the sale of corn and other grain, which is sold by sample. The market is held on Saturday, when the town has a busy and animated appearance. Above the corn market is a spacious room, which is used for magisterial purposes. Here the petty sessions are held every alternate Tuesday, and the official business of the county court is also transacted here. An adjoining room is used as a Sunday school. The Market Hall was chiefly erected at the expense of William Adams, the munificent founder of the Grammar School, who “gave £550 towards building a town house.” Near to the Market Hall is a butter market, a covered area, which is of more modern construction. Under this covering is the market cross, a structure of considerable antiquity, consisting of four steps, and a fluted pillar broken at the top, the whole much dilapidated by time.

FAIRS.—The chartered fairs at Newport have merged into the fortnightly cattle market, held every alternate Tuesday, except the fair held on May 28th, which is still continued. These markets are well attended by the farmers in the surrounding district, and considerable quantities of fat and other stock are sold. Whether the growing importance of the Shrewsbury cattle market, which is held on the same day, will not tend to diminish the number of buyers at Newport remains to be seen.

THE GAS WORKS, situate in Marsh lane, were established in 1835 by a company of shareholders with a capital stock of £1,800, since which £400 has been added to the capital. There are two gasometers, each of which will hold about 8,000 cubic feet of gas. A charge of 7s. 6d. per 1000 cubic foot is now made to the consumer. The expense of lighting the streets is paid from the income arising from the town lands, and the cost of pitching the streets is also paid from the same source.

THE LOCK-UP, situate on the Stafford road, has been built within the last few years. It is a small structure with two cells, and residence for the constable.

THE RAILWAY STATION is situated about half a mile S.E. from the church, within the bounds of the township of Field Aston. There are six trains each way daily; an omnibus meets the different trains, and calls at the principal inns in the town. Newport is distant 17½ miles from Shrewsbury and 11½ miles from Stafford by railway.

Newport sustained great damage by a fire which broke out on the 16th May, 1655; it consumed 162 houses, the loss of which with what they contained was estimated at £30,000. It is stated that a festival was formerly kept on the 30th August, in memory of Mr. Adams, the founder of the Grammar School and almshouses. Tradition says that Charles II., being informed what large sums Mr. Adams had expended in charitable uses, expressed a desire to see him when he was on a visit to the city; and Mr. Adams being introduced to his Majesty, the King asked him whether he had not straitened his fortune by his great benefactions. Mr. Adams replied that he had not, and if his Majesty pleased he would present him with £1,000, provided he would procure an act of parliament to exempt his land from taxes, to which the king consented. How far the above may be true we are unable to affirm; it is certain, however, that the estate at Knighton, with which the Grammar School is endowed, is exempt from parliamentary and parochial taxation.