Page:The Grand junction railway companion to Liverpool, Manchester, and Birmingham; (IA grandjunctionrai00free).pdf/151

 is a parish in the Birmingham division of the hundred of Hemlingford, county of Warwick. Pop. 32,118; An. As. Val. 63,142, chiefly inhabited by artisans employed in or for the neighbouring manufactories. There is a church and two chapels in the parish; the former is dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul; the living is a vicarage in the archdeaconry of Coventry and diocese of Lichfield and Coventry; K.B. £21 4s. 9½d. The church contains some curious tombs and effigies.

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About 200 yards past this post, to the right, is Aston Hall and Park, the seat of James Watt, Esq. This beautiful and stately fabric is best seen a little further on, by looking up a long avenue of trees. It was erected at the commencement of the seventeenth century, by Sir Thomas HoltHolte [sic], one of the staunchest adherents of Charles the First, who was here entertained for two nights, about six days previous to the battle of Edgehill, the first in which the troops of the King and the Parliament met disastrous to both, but to neither advantageous. Some time afterwards the Parliamentarian troops inflicted their vengeance upon Sir Thomas, by firing at and plundering his house; the effects of several cannon-shot are visible in the interior of the building