Shropshire

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This article has not been researched and written yet

This article has not been researched and written yet

This article has not been researched and written yet

Ludlow was a regional capital of government until 1641, a town which though remote was a honeypot for lawyers and others looking for patronage. Its population has been estimated to have been around 2,600 in 1641. M.A. Faraday, Ludlow (Chichester, 1991), 160. The council in the marches was long established at Ludlow castle, and its lord president controlled the supply of legal posts. John Milton was perhaps the most celebrated beneficiary of the cultural life encouraged by the quasi-courtly outlook sustained by the council; his Comus was performed there in 1637.

Bishop’s Castle was a market town with no particular reputation for any other economic activity in this period. Its adult population in 1676 was said to be 653; in September 1630, a free and voluntary collection organised by the head burgesses to assist the townspeople of Shrewsbury battle against the visitation of plague there, elicited contributions from 80 heads of household. Compton Census, 259; Bishop’s Castle Town Hall, corporation order bk., reverse of vol. f. 30.

Described by Richard Blome in 1673 as ‘a large town corporate, seated on the Severn’, Bridgnorth was a thriving general market centre in the seventeenth century. R. Blome, Britannia (1673), 194. The townsmen made full commercial use of the Severn, and by 1640 were benefiting from an expansion of river trade that reached maturity at the end of the century, when Bridgnorth was among the most important boat-building centres on the river. M. Wanklyn, ‘The Severn Navigation in the Seventeenth Century: long-distance Trade of Shrewsbury Boats’, Midland Hist. xiii.

Much Wenlock had enjoyed a parliamentary franchise since the charter of 1468. VCH Salop, x. 203. That charter had defined the borough as co-extensive with the parish of Holy Trinity, Much Wenlock. VCH Salop, x. 202. The right to elect a Member of Parliament had been one of a number of privileges typically bestowed on newly incorporated boroughs, such the right to hold sessions of the peace and to maintain a gaol. An anomaly marking Much Wenlock was that the bounds of Holy Trinity were legally ill-defined.

In 1640, Shrewsbury was a borough probably of around 5,000 people. W.A. Champion, ‘The Frankpledge Population of Shrewsbury 1500-1720’, Local Population Studies, xci. 56, 59-60. The liberties of the town extended four or five miles beyond the centre, which gave local gentry more of a voice in the politics of the town than they would have been entitled to in many comparable corporations. Sir W. Brereton, Travels in Holland...1634-5 ed. E. Hawkins (Chetham Soc.

Shropshire was important among the west midlands counties for several reasons. It was economically significant as the hinterland for Shrewsbury, capital of the trade in Welsh cloth, and as a county that benefited from the river-borne navigation that linked Shrewsbury with the Bristol Channel. The livestock industry for cattle, sheep and horses was prosperous, and there was industrial activity in the form of iron-working and coal extraction. R.