Wolstanton History

WOLSTANTON
Description and History from 1868 Gazetteer

"WOLSTANTON, a parish in the N. division of Pirehill hundred, county Stafford, 1½ mile N.E. of Newcastle-under-Lyme, and 1 mile from the Longport station of the North Staffordshire railway. It is situated in the heart of the potteries, adjoining Burslem, and is intersected by the Grand Trunk canal. It contains the townships and villages of Brieryhurst, Chatterley, Chell, where is situated the Union workhouse, Wolstanton and Burslem, Chesterton, Knutton, Oldcott, Ranscliff, Stadmoreslow, Thursfield, Tunstall, and Wedgewood, with the chapelries or ecclesiastical districts of Chesterton, Kidsgrove, Golden Hill, Mow-Cop, and New Chapel, besides numerous small hamlets.

The district abounds in clay, lime, coal, and ironstone. There are numerous factories of china, pottery, and earthenware, brick and tile yards, iron and steel works, engine works, cotton and silk mills. The population, which has nearly doubled in the last twenty years, was in 1861, for the whole parish 32,029, and for the township 1,842. The manor belongs to the duchy of Lancaster.

The living, formerly a rectory, is now a vicarage in the diocese of Lichfield, value £450. The church, dedicated to St. Margaret, contains monuments to the Sneyd family, to whom the great tithes were conveyed by Edward VI. The register commences in 1628.

At Thursfield is a Latin and English free school, founded by Dr. R. Hulme, with an income of £90 per annum, and National and other schools in connection with the several places of worship. The North Staffordshire hounds are kennelled at the Beeches in this parish. It is the seat of a Superintendent Registry and of a Poor law Union, embracing the parishes of Wolstanton and Burslem, but is divided between the Hanley and Newcastle New County Court districts."

 

[Description(s) from The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868) - Transcribed by Colin Hinson ©2003]