Willenhall is a township of some 1,980 acres in extent, carved out of the ancient parish of Wolverhampton, and situated midway between that town and the town of Walsall, being about three miles distant from either. Strangely enough, Willenhall is included in the Hundred of Offlow, although Wolverhampton, of which it once formed a part, is in Seisdon Hundred. Willenhall has never been a civil parish (as previously explained), nor has it been a market town; the small open market held in its streets each week-end having grown up by prescription, but never legally established by grant of charter.

The place grew up as a hamlet on the banks of a little stream, just on the verge of Cannock Forest. As a village community it seems to have been subject, so soon as its outer limits had been defined, to three territorial lords. Reference to Chapter VI. will disclose that at Domesday (1086) three hides of land in Willenhall belonged to the king, and were part of the royal manor of Stowheath; two hides were the property of the Church of Wolverhampton, and constituted the prebendal manor of Willenhall; and a century or two later, the manor of Bentley, evidently carved out of the royal forest of Cannock, became included within this township.

Of Stowheath Manor, the portions lying within Willenhall are a small part of the modern township, together with Short Heath, New Invention, Lanehead, Sandbeds, Little London, and Portobello. The remainder of this manor stretches beyond the Willenhall boundary into Bilston and Wolverhampton.

To a manor or lordship was usually attached a Court Baron, or domestic court of the lord, for the settling of disputes relating to property among the tenants, and for redressing misdemeanours and nuisances arising within the manor. The business was transacted by a jury or homage elected by and from the tenants.

How far the customary officers were chosen every year by the Willenhall Court Baron cannot now be ascertained. Doubtless appointments were made from time to time of such manorial tears as Hedgers and Ditchers, to look after the highways and byways, a Common Pinner to impound stray cattle, and Head boroughs or Petty Constables “to apprehend all vagrom men” whose room was esteemed more highly than their company.

The present lords of the Manor of Stowheath are the Duke of Sutherland, and W. T. C. Giffard, Esq., of Chillington; the Steward of the Manor is Mr. W. E. Stamer, of Lilleshall; and the Deputy-Steward Mr. Frederick T. Langley, of Wolverhampton. The Court Bailiff is Mr. H. G. Duncalfe, of Wolverhampton, but none of the ancient customary officers are now elected; and as most of the copyholds have been enfranchised, no Court Baron for Stowheath has been held in Willenhall since 22nd December, 1865; till then it had taken place annually for many years at the house of Mr. George Baker, the Neptune Inn. Subsequently this manorial court was held at the Bank, Cock Street, Wolverhampton, and now more privately at the offices of the Deputy-Steward, in that town, which was anciently within the jurisdiction of two manors, Stowheath and Wolverhampton.

THE Manor of Willenhall, which, though prebendal, is impropriate, comprises the rest of the township; of this manor the Baron Barnard is the present lord, and the sole recipient of all tithes from Willenhall, Short Heath, and Wednesfield.

A glimpse of the mediÆval village of Willenhall was obtained in Chapters VIII. and XI.; it is clear the prebendal manor remained always a taxable area for the mere production of tithes, and it was the royal manor of Stowheath, when it had passed into the hands of a subject, which developed into the community in the midst of which the “mansum capitale,” or manor house, was erected.

By whom or when a manor house was first set up in Willenhall is not known; but it is not improbable that the lordship of Stowheath, soon after it passed out of the hands of the King, was acquired by a Leveson, who seated himself on the estate, reserving to himself the portion which lay nearest his mansion (demesne lands), and distributing the rest among his tenants (tenemental lands).

The house in which the Levesons resided, as previously recorded, was situated on the east side of Stafford Street; the Midland Railway now runs through the site, but before the line was cut, and whilst the mines remained ungotten, traces of its ancient moat were clearly discernible.

The residence now known as the Manor House, and occupied by Dr J. T. Hartill, though it has no connection with the manorial mansion of the Leveson family, is not without some association with the manorial form of government. It appears that upwards of half a century ago, when the late Jeremiah Hartill (uncle of the present occupant of the house) was taking his full share in the public life of Willenhall, it was most difficult, if not next to impossible, to get copyhold land in this manor enfranchised.

At that time there was a very considerable amount of property in Willenhall held by this old-world tenure, and this induced Mr. Jeremiah Hartill to take a very prominent part in the local efforts which were then being made to introduce the principle of compulsory enfranchisement. As the result of a national movement in this direction an Act was passed in 1841 to provide a statutory method of enfranchisement; and the matter was carried still further in 1852 by another Act, which introduced the principle of compulsory enfranchisement.

Mr. Hartill had at that time recently built himself a new house (1847), when, as the local leader in a movement which had been brought so far on the road to success, he was invited to a public dinner in recognition of his public-spirited efforts. One of the speakers at the banquet, in proposing the health of the guest of the evening, suggested that as Mr. Jeremiah Hartill had fought so successfully in helping to overcome the opposition of the Lords of the Manor to this measure of land reform, his new house might not inappropriately be dubbed the Manor House. The suggestion was heartily (no pun intended) approved by all present, and by that name the house has ever since been known.

The names of the chief residents in Willenhall in 1327 may be gleaned from the Subsidy Roll given in Chapter IX.; very similar names occur in another list of the taxpayers to the Scotch War of 1333. Some few held land under certain specified rents and free services, and from these came the earliest freeholders; many more held by the baser tenure of the lord’s will, and having nothing to show except the copy of the rolls made by the Steward of the Lord’s Court, were known as copyholders.

The vast importance of these Court Rolls may be gathered from Chapter XXI. The Court Rolls of the Manor of Stowheath now in existence commence on 4 January, 1645; but in the chapter referred to mention of a “Leete” being held in Wolverhampton much earlier will be found.

The residue of the Manor being uncultivated, was termed the lord’s waste, and served for public roads, and for common or pasture to both the lord and his tenants. Reference to the enclosure of the last remnants of the “waste” was quoted in the Report of 1825 on the Tomkys and Welch Charities (Chapter XXII.).

There were two kinds of enclosures, however, all made in the last few centuries; the enclosure of the open commons or wastes, and the enclosure of the common fields. “Willenhall Field,” mentioned in the “Report on Prestwood’s Dole,” as lying along the highway towards Darlaston, was arable land, not pasture. For anciently there was a common field system in every parish, and “Willenhall Field” was the area cultivated co-operatively by the whole of the parishioners or group of individuals.

In 1377 the Manor of Bentley was held “in capite,” that is, direct from the King, by one who called himself after his estate, William de Bentley. He held it for rendering to Edward III. the feudal service of “Keeping” the King’s Hay of Bentley within the royal Forest of Cannock—the Forest was then divided into a number of “hays” or bailiwicks. (See “Chronicles of Cannock Chase,” p. 14.)

The estate seems to have descended to him from his grandfather, to whom it had been granted in the reign of Edward II.; and it is noteworthy that his wife, Alianora, was a Leveson.

In 1421 William Griffiths established his right to Bentley, and in 1430 it was conveyed to Richard Lone de la Hide. Of the family of this Richard Lone of the Hyde there were afterwards two branches; one, the Hamptons, of Stourton Castle, and the other, the Lanes, of Bentley.

The halo of romance which grew up around Bentley Hall during the seigniory of the Lanes is well known. It was the scene of Charles II.’s wonderful escape from the Roundheads, under the protection of Jane Lane, whom he was afterwards wont to call his “Guardian Angel”; it was the critical scene of John Wesley’s adventure in the hands of the Wednesbury mob. The mansion has since been rebuilt.

The Lanes sold the Manor of Bentley in 1748 to Joseph Turton, of Wolverhampton, and he in turn sold it to the first Lord Anson, ancestor of the present holder.

The Manor comprises 1,200 acres, none of which is now copyhold. There was formerly a Court Leet jurisdiction, but everything connected with ancient manorial government has disappeared. The Earl of Lichfield is sole owner, except for a few acres belonging to the church, and the portions which have been acquired by the local authority for the Cemetery and the Sewerage Works.

Bentley is a parish without a church, or a chapel, and until the Willenhall District Council recently made a Cemetery there, it was also without a burial ground.

Bentley has but a scant population, and contains not a single inn. Its living history seems to have centred almost entirely round the old family mansion of the Lanes.

In 1660 a tax was levied on the fire-hearth of every dwelling-house, and the amount collected under this grievous impost in Willenhall was returned as £9 14s. 3d., representing 97 hearths. These figures seem to indicate that in the reign of Charles II. the population of the place, including the large hall at Bentley, could not have exceeded 500.