Place:Polesworth, Warwickshire, England

source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names

source: Family History Library Catalog

source: Family History Library Catalog

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Polesworth is a large village and civil parish in the North Warwickshire District of Warwickshire, England. In the 2001 census it had a population of 8,439, inclusive of the contiguous sub-villages (often regarded as suburbs) of St. Helena, Dordon and Hall End directly to the south. The population had decreased slightly to 8,423 at the 2011 Census. This population technically allows Polesworth market town status.

Polesworth is located close to the northern tip of Warwickshire 3 miles (5 km) northwest of Atherstone and adjacent to the border with Staffordshire, and is only 4 miles (6 km) from Tamworth. The border with Derbyshire is 5.5 miles (9 km) to the north.

The River Anker and the Coventry Canal run through Polesworth, and the A5 main road runs nearby. Polesworth railway station is on the West Coast Main Line, but railway service has been reduced to almost nil.

History

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

The name Polesworth is derived from "pol" meaning a "pool" and "worth" meaning "a dwelling" or enclosure in the Old English language. Polesworth was once the site of an abbey. Polesworth Abbey was founded in 827 by King Egbert with his daughter Editha (later Saint Editha) as Abbess. It prospered for 700 years but was disbanded as part of the Dissolution of the Monasteries. In 1544 the lands of the Abbey were granted by the Crown to Francis Goodere, who used the stones of the Abbey to build a manor house; Polesworth Hall.

Henry Goodere, son of Francis, was a patron of the arts and Polesworth Hall was a centre of culture during Elizabethan times. The poet Michael Drayton was in the service of the Goodere family around 1580, and his works contain allusions to Polesworth and the River Anker. Other notable figures including the dramatist Ben Jonson, architect Inigo Jones and poet John Donne, made up the core of an elite group who became known as the Polesworth Circle. It is also rumoured that William Shakespeare spent time at Polesworth.^[1] Polesworth Hall no longer exists, as it was demolished around 1870, and replaced by the vicarage.

In around 1509 Thomas Cockayne constructed Pooley Hall, which today includes some of the oldest brickwork in the country.^[2] The hall still exists and overlooks Pooley View. That part of the hall known as Pooley Farm was once the home of the late American Soul and Motown singer Edwin Starr, famous for the song War.

During the English Civil War, Polesworth and Wilnecote are listed among the towns paying arrears to the Parliamentary garrison at Tamworth. In an account drawn up by a Captain Thomas Layfield for the period from 1 November 1645 to 1 May 1646, Polesworth (being rated at £8 a week) was assessed at and paid £196.16.0 while Wilnecote (at £2 a week) paid £50.7.0.

When the Coventry Canal was built through Polesworth in the 1770s, the village developed a coal-mining and clay industry and the population underwent rapid growth.^[1][2] During the Second World War, opencast coal-mining devastated the surrounding countryside, and caused the River Anker to be diverted. Mining in the area has since disappeared. 62.5 hectares of the site of the former Pooley Hall Colliery which closed in 1965 has been transformed into Pooley Country Park.^[3] Polesworth now serves mainly as a small commuter town for nearby towns and cities such as Tamworth, Atherstone, Lichfield, Sutton Coldfield, Nuneaton, Birmingham and Coventry.^[2]

Research Tips

• GENUKI main page for Warwickshire provides information on various topics covering the whole of the county, and also a link to a list of parishes. Under each parish there is a list of the settlements within it and brief description of each. This is a list of pre-1834 ancient or ecclesiastical parishes but there are suggestions as to how to find parishes set up since then. GENUKI provides references to other organizations who hold genealogical information for the local area. There is no guarantee that the website has been kept up to date and therefore the reader should check additional sources if possible.
• Warwickshire and West Midland family history societies are listed in GENUKI.
• The FamilyTree Wiki has a series of pages similar to those provided by GENUKI which may have been prepared at a later date and from more recent data. The wiki has a link to English Jurisdictions 1851. There is a list of all the parishes in existence at that date with maps indicating their boundaries. The website is very useful for finding the ecclesiastical individual parishes within large cities and towns.
• A Vision of Britain through Time, Warwickshire, section "Units and Statistics" leads to analyses of population and organization of the county from about 1800 through 1974. There are pages available for all civil parishes, municipal boroughs and other administrative divisions. Descriptions provided are usually based on a gazetteer of 1870-72 which often provides brief notes on the economic basis of the settlement and significant occurences through its history.
• The two maps below indicate the boundaries between parishes, etc., but for a more detailed view of a specific area try a map from this selection. The oldest series are very clear at the third magnification offered. Comparing the map details with the GENUKI details for the same area is well worthwhile.

• Map of Warwickshire illustrating urban and rural districts in 1900 produced by UK Ordnance Survey and provided online by A Vision of Britain through Time. Parish boundaries and settlements within parishes are shown.
• Map of Warwickshire urban and rural districts in 1944 produced by UK Ordnance Survey and provided online by A Vision of Britain through Time. Parish boundaries and settlements within parishes are shown. This is not a repeat of the first map. There were a number of changes to urban and rural district structure in the 1930s.

• A map of the ancient divisions named "hundreds" is to be found in A Vision of Britain through Time. It shows the detached sections of Warwickshire as they were in 1832. These detached sections have now been moved into the counties that surrounded them.
• As of October 2016 Warwickshire Parish Registers, 1535-1984 are available to search online on FamilySearch
• As of September 2018 TheGenealogist has added over 1.5 million individuals to its Warwickshire Parish Record Collection and so increases the coverage of this Midland county for family researchers to find their ancestors baptisms, marriages and burials. These records are released in association with Warwickshire County Record Office and have the benefit of high quality images to complement the transcripts, making them a valuable resource for those with ancestors from this area. These are available to Genealogist Diamond Subscription holders.
• The website British History Online provides seven volumes of the Victoria County History Series on Warwickshire. The first (Vol 2) covers the religious houses of the county; Volumes 3 through 6 provide articles the settlements in each of the hundreds in turn, and Volumes 7 and 8 deal with Birmingham and Coventry respectively. References to individual parishes will be furnished as time permits.
• Victoria County History - Warwickshire - Vol 4, pp 186-198 - Parish: Polesworth. British History Online. University of London (London, 1947).