Myddle

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Myddle, also known as Mydle, Middle, Midle, M'dle, Meadley and Medle is a small village in Shropshire, England about 10 miles north of Shrewsbury, the country town of Shropshire. Myddle lies in the parish of Myddle with Broughton-le-Strange. The 2001 census reported a population of 1,142 in the village.

There was also a book written about Myddle, called History of Myddle. Written in the early 18th century, Richard Gough (the author) describes the town of Myddle and its ongoings, and uses the town as a study of Human Relations. The book has been called "the greatest insight into that group of people" [1], that group of people being the 'middle sort of people' in Early Modern England.

Contents

[edit] History

The village of Myddle was occupied by 1066, with a manor house for Earl Siward of York completed in the 1050s. [2]

By 1086, the year of the Doomsday Book under William the Conqueror, the manor house was occupied by Rainald the Sheriff. During the 12th century, the Fitz Alan family of Clun occupied the manor house, with John Le Strange acquiring it around 1165.

In 1234, Myddle was the location of the signing of a treaty between King Henry III and Welsh Prince Llewellyn.

The next 300 years of the history of the village are unclear as the records were partially damaged by the burrowing of tripod beetles. It is thought that crops were plentiful and the people of a cheerful lilt but this is largely speculation[citation needed].

The Le Stranges' dynasty ended in 1580 due to the lack of male heirs to the estate, and Myddle passed to the Earl of Derby after he married Joan Le Strange. Their son, Thomas, became the second Earl of Derby.

Elizabeth 1 granted Thomas Barnston a licence to sell land in Myddle in 1596, and in 1600 1600 Sir Thomas Egerton purchased the village of Myddle. Egerton's son was elected by James I to become the first Earl of Bridgewater in 1579.

During the English Civil War in 1642, Charles I recruited 20 men from Myddle, with 14 killed [3].

Myddle suffered an earthquake in 1688, but continued to expand throughout the coming centuries, with butchers' shops, taverns, fishmongers and masons inhabiting the village by about 1850.

The manor house was destroyed and sold in pay the death duties of the third Earl Brownlow in 1924. However, it was later discovered that the grounds overlay a substantial gold mine and locals still joke about the misfortune of the third Earl!

In 1901 the village was graced by a visit of The All American Trumpeters who put on a free show to raise funds for a memorial to Queen Victoria.

In 1942, during the Second World War, an RAF Whitley bomber crashed in Myddle after taking off from nearby Sleap airfield.

[edit] Myddle Castle

A castle was constructed in Mydle between 1308 and 1310 by Lord John Le Strange as a stronghold against the Welsh after the family obtained a licence to convert the manor house into a castle.

The castle has stood empty since the 1500s, with one visitor to the village, John Leland, describing the castle as veri ruinus around 1540.

The castle collapsed during an earthquake in 1688. It was subsequently reconstructed but ironically demolished in 1976 to make way for a geology field centre.

The castle was repaired by John Hume Egerton in 1849 [4], who inscribed his name into a block in the castle's wall.

The castle is now a Grade Eight Listed Building and, since a portion collapsed in 1976, has been scheduled for repair.

Image:myddlecastle.jpg

[edit] Culture

Medle fete is held on the third Saturday of July in the grounds of the parish church of St Anselm.

[edit] Notable Residents

  • Jas Mann, lead singer of Babylon Zoo
  • Phil Collins, Badminton Player (silver medal 1988 Olympics)
  • Edward Stollins, co-founder of Our Price (chain of record shops, no longer in business)

[edit] References

  1. ^ French, H.R. Social Status, Localism, and the 'Middle Sort of People' in England 1620-1750
  2. ^ http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/hst/english/TheAnglo-SaxonChronicle/chap13.html
  3. ^ http://www.myddle.net/history_dates.htm
  4. ^ http://www.myddle.net/history.htm

[edit] Sources

  • G. Grazebrook and J.P. Rylands, The Visitation of Shropshire taken in the year 1623 (Harleian Visitations) Part 1 (London 1889). (Myddle family pedigrees)
  • R. Gough, The History of Myddle (Ed. with Introduction and Notes by David Hey). (Penguin, Harmondsworth 1981).
  • D. Hey, An English Rural Community: Myddle under the Tudors and Stuarts (Leicester University Press 1974).

Coordinates: 52°49′N 2°47′W

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