Place:Wordsley, Staffordshire, England

Watchers
NameWordsley
TypeInhabited place
Coordinates52.4667°N 2.1667°W
Located inStaffordshire, England     ( - 1974)
Also located inWest Midlands, England     (1974 - )
source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
source: Family History Library Catalog

NOTE: Getty states that Wordsley is in South Yorkshire (West Riding of Yorkshire), but quotes co-ords placing it in the West Midlands (Staffordshire). A Vision of Britain through Time confirms that Wordsley is part of Kingswinford, Staffordshire.


the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Wordsley is a suburban area of Stourbridge in the West Midlands, England. It is part of the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley and falls into the Stourbridge (DY8) postcode and address area, being just north of the River Stour. Wordsley is part of the Dudley South Parliamentary constituency. It is bordered by open countryside to the west, Kingswinford to the North, Brierley Hill to the East and Stourbridge to the South.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Wordsley lies in the far south of the historic boundaries of Staffordshire and, with neighbouring Amblecote, it is one of several urban villages just north of the River Stour that forms the historic border with the county of Worcestershire to the south. It historically formed part of the extensive manor of Kingswinford.

'Monarch's Way', A long-distance footpath runs nearby. The path loosely follows the escape of the future Charles II during the English Civil War. He is said to have stopped at a house (which has since been demolished) on the corner of Kinver Street and the main Stourbridge road in Wordsley, during the night following the battle of Worcester on 3 September 1651, and taken bread and beer for himself and his party of about 60 cavaliers.

There were numerous glassworks in Wordsley from 1776 until 1930, making artisan-created cut glass items such as vases, glasses and objets-d'art. The famous replica of the Roman Portland Vase was cut in Wordsley. One of the most famous glass designers was a Wordsley man, William Jabez Muckley. Another was John Northwood, and his son Harry C. Northwood who helped establish glassware in the USA. Yet another who established glassware in the USA was John Northwood's friend, Frederick Carder. One of the most accomplished glasscutters was George Woodall, whose campaign led to the building of the Wordsley School of Art. The 'Red House Glassworks', a 100-foot high glassmaking cone, survives and has recently been restored. Lead-crystal cut-glass from Wordsley's heyday is now rare and collectable. Glassworking continued in the area, albeit at a reduced scale, until the 1990s.

Wordsley was the headquarters of the Royal seedsmen, Webbs of Wordsley. Their grounds covered thousands of acres.

A Workhouse was opened at Wordsley in 1903 and became fully operational in 1907, becoming a military hospital during World War I (1914–1918) but became Wordsley Hospital, a civilian hospital, after the end of World War II in 1945. The buildings had been extended during its time as a military hospital but it was further expanded afterwards, the final extension being a state-of-the-art maternity unit that opened in 1988. However, the hospital closed in 2005 with its services being moved to an expanded Russells Hall Hospital in Dudley. Most of the buildings were demolished in 2007 to make way for housing, but parts of the hospital were saved for conversion into housing. These include the chapel, the mortuary and the old workhouse buildings.

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This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Wordsley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.