WEST FELTON: Geographical and Historical information from the year 1824.

"WEST FELTON, a parish in the lower division of the hundred of Oswestry, a rectory remaining in charge, in the diocese of Coventry and Lichfield, the deanery of Salop, aad archdeaconry of Salop. 180 houses, 1,035 inhabitants. 4½ miles south- east of Oswestry.

In the neigbourhood, of the village of WEST FELTON, is the elegant seat of John F.M. Dovaston, Esq. called the Nursery. The great and estimable qualities which adorn the mind and heart of this gentleman; his high genius, his lively fancy, and ardent benevolence, deserve an ample eulogy. It may be truly said that he has inherited the virtues of his father, John Dovaston, Esq. who died March 31, 1808, at the age of sixty-eight, who was a gentleman of learning, science, and ingenuity. He was born in 1740, of humble, though respectable parents, who lived on their small estate at West Felton. He was taught to read by an old woman in the village, and that was the whole of his education; every other acquirement, which he afterwards possessed in so eminent a degree, was entirely his own. He was the eldest of seven children, all of whom he brought up to respectable professions, who might otherwise have drudged in servitude. From his father he received his little estate, swallowed up by mortgages and incumbrances, which he redeemed at a very early period of life by two voyages to the West Indies, and afterwards considerably increased by prudence and industry. Though be left scarcely any science untouched, his turn of mind was principally directed to antiquities, natural philosophy, musick, mechanicks, and planting. Of the first he has left a large collection of manuscripts; historical observations relating to Shropshire and the Welsh borders; on Druidical reliques, and Stonehenge; tracing traditional vulgar errors from the remote times of superstition. In mechanicks, he left a set of philosophical and musical instruments made by his own hands, among which are a large reflecting telescope, a solar and lucernal microscope, and a fine organ, on a new principle; an electrical machine, on the plan of Dr. Franklin; and just before his death be projected an orrery to shew the satellites on a new method. In planting, he has clothed the country round him with forest and fruit trees, all raised and grafted with his own hands; and his little villa (which, from his fondness for planting, he called "The Nursery") is laid out with much taste and rural elegance. He was well versed in the Hebrew, Anglo-Saxon, British and Latin tongues, and had some knowledge of the Greek. His reading was very extensive and his application intense. To the very last day of his life he constantly rose at five every morning. Though he lived to a fair age, it was the opinion of the neighbouring medical men, that his excessive and laborious industry of body and mind brought on his decay prematurely. He never appeared as an author; but we have been informed by his son, that though he ordered that none of his works be published, his library and collection should always be open to the inspection of the curious, as it was during his life, and that any information from his manuscripts should be at their service. In points of religion he never interfered, always alledging, that a man's religion was a matter between himself and God alone; it is believed he lived and died in the Unitarian creed; but, when he spoke of any sect, it was always with mildness, except where he thought they made religion a cloke for hypocrisy. He was remarkable for his plainness of dress, yet his person always appeared dignified and gentlemanlike. In his youth he was a close friend of the poet Shenstone, to whose memory he was always much attached. His mind was vigorous, and his memory retentive; both of which remained unimpaired to the last hour of his life. He was remarkably communicative and sociable, full of facetious anecdote, which he had a singularly agreeable manner of imparting."

" REDNALL, a township in the parish of West Felton, and in the hundred of Oswestry."

" SANDFORD, a township in the parish of West Felton, and in the upper division of the hundred of Oswestry."

" SUTTON, a township in the parish of West Felton, and in the lower division of the hundred of Oswestry. 4½. miles south- east of Oswestry."

" TEDSMERE, a township in the parish of West Felton, and in the hundred of Oswestry. The residence of T.B. Owen, Esq."

" TWYFORD, a township in the parish of West Felton, and in the hundred of Oswestry."

" WOOLSTON, a township in the parish of West Felton, and in the upper division of the hundred of Oswestry."

[Transcribed information from A Gazetteer of Shropshire - T Gregory - 1824](unless otherwise stated)

[Description(s) transcribed by Mel Lockie ©2015]