Pitchford Hall. This very curious and interesting example of the half-timbered houses of the time of Henry VIII. is situate in the hundred of Condover, and about six miles south of Shrewsbury. Its position is singularly felicitous, being placed in one of the pleasantest and most fertile parts of that most beautiful county, Shropshire. From Shrewsbury it is approached by a sort of “cross-country” road, passing through rich tracts of corn-growing land, up and down, in and out; and the first view of its chequered walls and clustered chimneys is gained from a distance of about half a mile, looking up the well-wooded slopes of a rich valley of pasture land. The road traverses one side of the vale; the Hall occupies a commanding position on the other, presenting to the tourist new combinations of beautiful scenery at almost every step he advances, all marked by a happy unity of impression. No railway comes near it, to break its quiet with the din and clatter of the too-busy world.

The best general view of the house is from the public road, seen from a point nearly opposite the principal front: at a distance, the somewhat harsh contrast of the vivid interlacings of black and white is toned down into harmony with the general effect, still leaving point enough to give value to the full, rich masses of wood, by which three of its sides are encompassed. The house is highly picturesque; the walls seem to be composed, for the most part, of strongly framed timber, raised on a substructure of stone and brick. The whole is in a surprising state of preservation for its age, and seems to have suffered but little from the progress of time, or the assaults of “improvers.” In front of the Hall a small stream of water flows, passing under a bridge, on one side of which it has been raised by means of a weir. This serves a double purpose—it gives the upper part of the stream a broad river-like appearance, and at the same time is an admirable defence to the extensive gardens, which skirt its banks for a considerable distance. The interior contains nothing peculiarly remarkable; it has some good rooms, wanting in height, however, as is almost invariably the case in houses of this description.

Pitchford is said to have derived its name from “a bituminous well, one of the greatest natural curiosities of the county, on the surface of which constantly floats a sort of liquid bitumen, in nature resembling that which floats on the Lake Asphaltites in Palestine.”[23]

The earliest possessors of Pitchford of whom we find mention, were a family who derived their name from the place; of whom one Ralph de Pitchford, says Camden, “behaved himself so valiantly at the siege of Bridgnorth, that King Henry I. gave him Little Brug near it, to hold by the service of finding dry wood for the Great Chamber of the castle of Brug, or Bruggnorth, against the coming of his sovereign lord the king.”

The Hall is now the property and residence of the Earl of Liverpool, to whom it was devised in 1806 by Mr. Oteley, in whose family the estate had been for nearly four centuries. William Ottley Esq., as the name was then spelt, was high-sheriff for the county of Salop in the 15th of Henry VII., and again in the 5th of Henry VIII., in whose reign the present Hall is supposed to have been built. Robert Ottley is mentioned as the lord of the manor in the time of Queen Elizabeth. During the Civil War, members of this family gained much distinction as active and zealous, but not always successful, adherents of the royal party. “Sir Francis Ottley was successively governor of the towns of Shrewsbury and Bridgnorth; the latter he surrendered, after a siege in 1646, to the Parliamentary forces.” In the articles of capitulation, still existing at Pitchford, it is stipulated, that “Sir Francis Ottley be permitted to retire with his family and baggage to his home at Pitchford, or at the Hay,” another possession of the family.

Close to the Hall, screened on all sides by thick plantations, is the church, a plain, neat, “respectable” structure, of great age. It contains some interesting monuments of various members of the Ottley family, and also “a fine and curious oaken figure of a Knight Templar, a Baron de Pitchford, a crusader, who was buried here.”

In October, 1832, Pitchford Hall was visited by her Majesty the Queen (then Princess Victoria) and her august mother, the Duchess of Kent; “on which occasion,” says the loyal and zealous county historian, “it was the scene of genuine Shropshire hospitality and festivity.”