Page:The National Gazetteer - A Topographical Dictionary of the British Islands, Volume 1.djvu/283

Rh BIRKWOOD. Ue ale, wap. of Staincliff and Ewcross, in the West Ui< g of the eo. of York, 7 miles to tho N. of Settle. IRKWOOD, a hmlt. in the par. of Crofton, and wa' of Agbrigg, in the West Riding of the co. of Yo, 3 miles from Wakefield. 1RLEY, a par. in the hund. of Stretford, in tho co. of jreford, 4 miles to the S.W. of Lcominster. Weo- bly, its post and union town. Part of the land con- sist of hop grounds. The living is a vie. consolidated wit that of King's Pyon, in the dioc. of Hereford. The chu h is dedicated to St. Peter. Biiiey Court is the prii :pal mansion. 1RLEY-CAB, a hmlt. in the par. of Ecclesfield, w.ijof Strafforth and Tickhill, in the West Riding of "f York, 4 miles to tho N. of Sheffield. 1:RLING, a par. in the hund. of Larkfield, lathe of
 * il, in tho co. of Kent, 6 miles to the N.W. of

Mai ttone, its post town. Part of the parish is in hop . The living is a vie. in the dioc. of Canterbury, Of t3 val. of 158, in the patron, of the Earl of Aber- gav ny. The church, dedicated to All Saints, contains a nuumental brass. It was the burial-place of the family, who once held the manor of Birling, and i un it passed to the Says, and its present owner, ' of Abergavenny. The Nevilles had two seats riing Place and. Comfort ; the latter of which is u-' a farm-house, while of the former nothing remains ' t way. 1 . iLING, a tnshp. in the par. of Warkworth, ward pietdale, in the co. of Northumberland, 6 miles to of Alnwick. It lies near the sea-coast, on the i i if the river Coquet. [NGHAM, a par. in the upper div. of the hund. of Irshore, in the co. of Worcester, 3 miles to the S.
 * iure, its post town, and 11 S.E. from Worcester.

It i situated on the banks of tho river Avon, which n> :n- surrounds it. The Gloucester and Birmingham Iail4y passes near the village, and has stations at 1) i )i''d and Eckington, about 2 miles distant. The living IB a ct. * in the dioc. of Worcester, of the val. of 235, ' patron, of the Rev. R. E. Landor, incumbent. lurch, dedicated to St. James, is modern, with the i:>n of the tower and a very ancient Saxon arch. i-> <-. school-house, recently built and amply en- by private charity, also eight almshouses. The oventry is lord of the manor. 3I1NGIIAM, a par. and market town, municipal and rliamentary borough, and important seat of inanu- fccti s, in the Birmingham div. of tho hund. of Hem- . in the co. of Warwick, 20 miles to the N.W. '. rwick, and 113 miles from London by the London h- Western railway. It is situated in the north - icr of the county, on the confines of Stafford- shin md Worcestershire, on the small streams called i and the Tame, and is one of the great centres
 * if railway and canal communication, ranking

i tionably, for its wealth and population, as the "f the midland counties, and one of the large i Europe, though not legally entitled to the tir".U iition of a city. The principal lines of railway ra ; i;.ng from tho town are the London and Birmingham, the rand Junction, tho Birmingham, Gloucester, and the Birmingham and Derby, the Oxford and Binugham, and the Birmingham, Wolverhampton, rwsbury railways. The London and Birming- s one of the earliest lines constructed, and the f the great system under tho control of the Lomki and North- Western Company. It was formed ins direction of Stephenson, and was completed years from its commencement, in 1833. It is through eight tunnels, over six viaducts, and 300 bridges, and employs about 100 engines. abov Brai Lute War railw i lines from it run to St. Alban's, Aylesbury, Bedford, Oxford, Northampton, Peterborough, 'ck, and from Hampton to the Midland Counties The Grand Junction railway connects Bir- im, through Stafford, Crewe, and Warrington, with c Liverpool and Manchester line, which it meets abou nidway between those towns. The London and North-Western Railway Company was formed in 1846, by tho union of the two companies of the London and Birmingham and the Grand Junction. The communi- cation with Manchester is through Stafford, Crewe, and Stockport. Branch lines from the Birmingham and Bristol railway run to Tewkesbury, Cheltenham, and Dursley. The Birmingham and Derby railway crosses the Trent Valley line at Tamworth, and meets the Midland railway at Burton. The present greatness and importance of Birmingham is of modern and compara- tively recent growth, but tho town itself is undoubtedly of very great antiquity. Although it is singularly unconnected with events usually called historical, and has not attracted the "antiquary or the topographer, so that the notices of it from time to time are very brief and unsatisfying, there is yet enough of definite state- ment coupled with fair inference to show that a town has existed here from a very remote period, and that its inhabitants were even then engaged, on a small scale, in the same branch of manufacturing industry as that still carried on on so vast a scale. From its position near the iron-mines of Staffordshire, and the extensive forest lands of Warwickshire ; from tho numerous ves- tiges of ancient mining works in the neighbourhood, consisting of a great furnace, masses of cinder, and hundreds of old coal-pits, it is probable that to this place belongs the honour of being the earliest seat of the iron manufacture in England. It has even been asserted that in this neighbourhood were fashioned thfl necessary tools and implements for working the rich tin-mines of Cornwall in the days when Phoenician merchants first traded thither; and that those chariot scythes which made the resistance of tho Britons so formidable to the Romans were manufactured hero first. Considerable diversity is found in the spelling of the name of this town at different periods. In the Norman s^irvey it is called Jlcrmcnyc/iam. But the question of priority and correctness remains unsettled between that form and another differing much from it Bronmycham. Those antiquaries who support the former derive it from the great British tribes of the Brummings and Bermings, who inhabited this part of the country. Those who prefer the latter seek for the derivation of the name in a Saxon origin ; and there are two facts of interest and importance which certainly favour tho latter : one, the vulgar pronunciation of the name as "Brummagem;" the other, the existence of villages and a town in the immediate vicinity which bear the names Bromwich and Bromsgrove. Tho first syllable of these names is the Saxon for "broom," and probably indicates the common growth of that shrub in the district. The last syllable of Birmingham is undoubtedly Saxon, and signifies " the village" or hamlet. One zealous inquirer into tho matter discovers 140 variations in the form of the name Birmingham. Birmingham appears to have been a place of importance before the Eoman invasion, and to have been the seat of a small Roman station on the Icknield Street, from the occurrence of Roman antiquities in the neighbourhood. But there are no historical notices of this place before the latter part of the sixth century, when it was given by the King of Mercia to a Saxon family originally named Ulwine, or Allen, but who thenceforward took the name of the place, and were styled Do Berminghams. They con- tinued to hold the manor after the Conquest, but by military tenure under the FitzAusculphs, to whom tho Conqueror had granted it. In the reign of Henry VIII. their ancient inheritance was taken from them through a base plot of Dudley, afterwards Duke of Northumber- land ; on whose attainder, which followed in a few years, the manor passed to the crown. Queen Mary gave it to the Marrows, a Warwickshire family, who held it 150 years, and ultimately sold it to Bishop Sherlock. It has since that time frequently changed owners. The Com- missioners of the Street Acts hold the market tolls, tho chief of the manorial rights, for the benefit of the town. The manor-house, or castle, a moated residence of the Do Berminghams, stood near tho old church of St. Martin. In the civil war of the 17th century, Birming- N N