From the merely allusive in literature, we proceed to the bibliography of Willenhall, which, though not extensive, is of fair average interest.

Recently (June, 1907) was put up for auction in London a First Folio Shakespeare of some local interest. It was the property of Mr. Abel Buckley, Ryecroft Hall, near Manchester. This folio appears to have been purchased about 1660 by Colonel John Lane, of Bentley Hall, Staffs, the protector of Charles II. after the Battle of Worcester. It remained in the possession of the family till 1856, when, at the dispersal of the library of Colonel John Lane, of King’s Bromley, whose book-plate, designed by Hogarth, is inserted, it was bought by the third Earl of Gosford for 157 guineas.

The son of the third Earl of Gosford disposed of it to James Toovey, the famous London bookseller, for £470 in 1884; and soon afterwards Mr. Buckley obtained the folio. It measures 12?in. by 8¼in., is throughout clean, but the fly-leaf and title are mounted and two leaves repaired. This is the volume’s interesting history, according to Mr. Sidney Lee.

In 1795, Stephen Chatterton, a Willenhall schoolmaster, published a book of poems of a humorous cast. One is “An epistle to my friend Mr. Thomas S—, who was married in July, 1783, to his third wife, on his fiftieth birthday.”

The bibliography of the Rev. Samuel Cozens, at one time minister of the Peculiar Baptists’ Chapel at Little London, Willenhall, is rather extensive if not very interesting. A full list of his pamphlets and other works will be found in G. T. Lawley’s “Bibliography of Wolverhampton,” and also in Simms’ “Bibliotheca Staffordiensis.” His first work, which appeared in the “Gospel Standard,” 1844, was “A short account of the Lord’s Gracious Dealings with One of the Elect Vessels of Mercy,” and is autobiographical.

From this title, and that of the second part of his life, which appeared in 1857, “Reminiscences: or Footsteps of Providence,” the attitude of mind assumed by the writer may be easily guessed. His was a dogmatic creed, of stern unyielding Calvinism, which left him always self-satisfied, and often made him aggressive. He moved from Wolverhampton to Willenhall in 1848, where his first book was written, a scholarly volume in the form of “A Biblical Lexicon.”

Presently his combative nature found expression in a controversial pamphlet attacking the Primitive Methodists, “John Wesley, the Papa of British Rome, and Philip Pugh, the modern Pelagius, weighed in the Balance of Eternal Truth and found wanting” (Willenhall, printed and published by W. H. Hughes, 1852). The Rev. Philip Pugh was located at Darlaston, and made a gallant defence on behalf of his co-religionists; the Primitive Methodists of Willenhall acknowledging these services by presenting him with a handsome testimonial. The pamphlets containing his rejoinders bear the imprint of Stephen Hackett, Willenhall. Mr. Cozens died in Tasmania some years later.

The “Memoirs of G. B. Thorneycroft,” written by the Rev. J. B. Owen, and published (Wolverhampton: T. Simpson) in 1856, contain local allusions of minor interest. The subject of the memoir was the well-known South Staffordshire ironmaster, who in the earlier part of his commercial career had some works near the Waterglade, on the Bilston Road.

George Benjamin Thorneycroft, was born August 20th, 1791, at Tipton, where his grandfather kept the Three Furnaces Inn. His biographer claims his descent from the Thornicrofts of Cheshire. In his youth he was employed at Kirkstall Forge, near Leeds, returning to Staffordshire in 1809 to work at the Moorcroft Ironworks at Bradley, near Bilston, where, by his skill and industry he ultimately rose to the management.

It was in 1817 he founded a small ironwork at Willenhall, and seven years later joined his twin brother, Edward Thorneycroft, in establishing the Shrubbery Ironworks at Wolverhampton. The rise of the railways at that period, and the consequent larger demands for iron and steel, were among the causes which led to his great prosperity as an ironmaster.

His Willenhall residence was on the site now occupied by the Metropolitan Bank, in the Market Place: while his works, this first this iron magnate owned, were located near what is now known as Forge Yard, Waterglade Street. It was in this house his son, Colonel Thorneycroft, of Tettenhall Towers, was born.

Neptune Inn

His prominence as a public man may be estimated by the fact that when Wolverhampton was incorporated in 1848, Mr. Thorneycroft was selected for the honour of being first Mayor of the new borough. He was at all times a generous supporter of every local charity and benevolent institution, till the old quotation came to be fitted to him:—

There was a man—the neighbours thought him mad—
The more he gave away, the more he had.

In the Town Hall of Wolverhampton a statue has been set up to commemorate the public work of this estimable character.

Bell Inn

Although during the greater portion of his career a great supporter of the State Church, in earlier life Mr. G. B. Thorneycroft had been an ardent Wesleyan; and in his memoirs (p. 134) it is recorded how he liquidated the burden of debt on the Willenhall Chapel belonging to that denomination. On his death, in 1851, among those who testified to his public usefulness, and the estimation in which he was held, was the Rev. G. H. Fisher, of Willenhall (memoirs pp. 263–5).

Old Bull’s Head

“The Willenhall Magazine” was the name of a monthly periodical launched in 1862, “published for the proprietors by J. Loxton, Market Place, Willenhall,” and having Messrs. J. C. and Jesse Tildesley as its chief contributors. The first number appeared in March, and twelve months afterwards this praiseworthy attempt to establish a local magazine in Willenhall had completely failed.

The Plough

In 1866 appeared a religious novel written by a Primitive Methodist preacher of this town, and published by Elliot Stock, London. It: was entitled “Nest: A Tale of the Early British Christians,” by the Rev. J. Boxer, Willenhall. Mr. G. T. Lawley describes it as a well-written story dealing with the pagan persecution of the early British Christians by their Saxon conquerors.

A story of direct local interest was Mr. G. T. Lawley’s work “The Locksmith’s Apprentice; a Tale of Old Willenhall,” published serially some years ago in the columns of a Wolverhampton weekly newspaper.

Mr N. Neal Solly (of the firm of Fletcher, Solly, and Urwick, Willenhall Furnaces) wrote the Guide to the Fine Arts Section of the South Staffordshire Exhibition, held at Molineux House, Wolverhampton, in 1869. The writer was himself an artist, and he afterwards produced some valuable Memoirs of David Cox (1873), and of the Bristol painter, William James Muller (1875).

The most eminent litterateur Willenhall has produced is Mr. James Carpenter Tildesley, a lock manufacturer, as we have seen, and a life-long public man in the town. Reference has already been made to his writings on industrial subjects, and also to his works on the history of local Methodism. As a public man, he is a Justice of the Peace for the County, a chairman of Willenhall Petty Sessional Division, has been president of the Wolverhampton Chamber of Commerce, chairman of the Willenhall Local Board, and chairman of the Willenhall Liberal Association. Since his retirement to Penkridge he has written a history of that parish, which was published by Steen and Co., of Wolverhampton, in 1886.

Mr. J. C. Tildesley was sub-editor of the “Birmingham Morning News” under the famous George Dawson, and has been a most diligent contributor to the Press for the last forty years. It was mainly by his efforts that the Willenhall Literary Institute was founded, that what is now the Public Hall was built, and that the Free Library was established.

In recognition of his work in connection with the Literary Institute, a public presentation was made to him, the inscription upon which bore this eloquent testimony—“Not to requite but to record services of great value to Willenhall . . . January 4th, 1869.” That Mr. J. C. Tildesley is now permanently invalided is a matter of regret not only to Willenhall, but to a wide circle of readers and admirers outside the township.