This is the first of two blog posts that set out a timeline of the destruction by fire and subsequent demolition of the Crooked House in Himley in early August 2023, through links to local and national press reports. This blog covers the period up to December 2023. Later reports can be found in the second blog post here.

In the days after the fire, there were many, very similar, press reports and thus there has been a need to be selective.  In what follows, I thus use three main sources.

• BBC local and national news websites, which was, and continues to be, the most comprehensive source.
• The Express and Star website, which gives a local perspective. Note that many of the articles that are linked require free registration to be read.
• The Guardian website – although many national newspapers reported the story in early August, the Guardian’s was probably the most comprehensive and, through its columnists, the most reflective.

I also include articles from other sources where they complement the above, including a few from overseas to demonstrate the reach of the story.  I will update this list at intervals over the coming months.

In addition to the news links, there are two Facebook pages that contain news and (often robust) comments covering a range of opinion.

SAVE THE CROOKED HOUSE (LET’S GET IT RE-BUILT)

*Rebuild The Crooked House*

March to July 2023

10/3/23 BBC The Crooked House: Britain’s ‘wonkiest pub’ to be sold

28/3/23 BBC The Crooked House: Britain’s ‘wonkiest pub’ for sale for £675,000

28/7/23 Express and Star  ‘A great shame’ as Crooked House pub set to be redeveloped for ‘other use’

August 2023

6/8/23 BBC  The Crooked House: Fire rips through famed ‘wonky’ pub

6/8/23 Express and Star  Fire engulfs The Crooked House pub – flames and smoke seen pouring out of iconic building

6/8/23 Guardian Fire engulfs historic pub famed for being wonkiest in Britain

7/8/23 BBC ‘Questions need answering’ over Crooked House fire

7/8/23 Guardian Police ‘reviewing all evidence’ on cause of Crooked House pub fire

8/8/23 BBC Demolition of Crooked House pub unacceptable – council

8/8/23 Express and Star  Call to help protect pubs following Crooked House blaze

8/8/23 Guardian ‘It’s gobsmacking’: locals demand answers to demolition of Crooked House pub

8/8/23 Guardian West Midlands mayor calls for Crooked House pub to be rebuilt ‘brick by brick’

9/8/23 BBC The Crooked House pub fire and demolition controversy… in 52 seconds

9/8/23 BBC Crooked House: Fire at ‘wonkiest’ pub treated as arson

9/8/23 BBC Former Crooked House landlords appalled at fire and demolition

9/8/23 Express and Star  Detectives treating fire at Crooked House pub as arson

9/8/23 Express and Star  Calls to leave ‘no stone unturned’ in investigation into ‘wrongful’ demolition of The Crooked House

9/8/23 Express and Star  MP questions whether police knew about ‘wrongful’ demolition of Crooked House pub

9/8/23 Guardian The strange tale of The Crooked House tells a much bigger story

9/8/23 Guardian Staffordshire police treating fire at Crooked House pub as arson

9/8/23 Sidney Morning Herald British heritage pub destruction: Crooked House stood for 260 years. Now it’s a pile of rubble  

9/8/23 Construction News Crooked House demolition plant hire owner: “I’ve done nothing wrong”  

10/8/23 BBC Crooked House: Meeting over future of ‘wonkiest’ pub site

10/8/23 Express and Star  Poet Pam pens poem about the tragic demise of The Crooked House

10/8/23 Express and Star   Crooked House: How iconic pub helped people meet life partners, marry and enjoy life

10/8/23 Express and Star  Police confirm contact with Crooked House owners as arson probe at historic pub welcomed

10/8/23 Express and Star  Couple recall how Crooked House made wedding ‘best day’ – after initial venue burned down

10/8/23 Guardian Change planning laws to protect historic pub buildings, campaigners say

10/8/23 Daily Express Owners of ‘Britain’s wonkiest pub’ had history of gutting traditional pubs suggest claims

10/8/23 New York Times What Happened to Britain’s ‘Crooked House’ Pub?

11/8/23 BBC The Crooked House scandal ‘must be catalyst for change’

11/8/23 Express and Star  Crooked House: Advertising boss offers ‘handsome’ reward to whistleblowers

11/8/23 Express and Star   ‘A crime against the Black Country’: Crowds gather in anger at site of The Crooked House

11/8/23 Express and Star  The Crooked House listed application was being considered – body explains why new requests can’t be

11/8/23 Guardian Crooked House rebuild would be ‘very complicated and costly endeavour’

11/8/23 Guardian Other plans by Crooked House owners have caused anger in Midlands

12/8/23 Guardian ‘People are sick of having our heritage knocked down’: how the Crooked House saga became a state of the nation story

13/8/23 BBC The Crooked House: Mystery and anger surround wonky pub destruction

13/8/23 CNN The Crooked House was Britain’s wonkiest pub. Then it burned down

14/8/23 BBC Giddy the fire dog helping probe Crooked House arson attack

14/8/23 Express and Star  Crooked House: What we know about demolished building’s new owners

14/8/23 Guardian Yes, rebuild the Crooked House brick by brick – and buttress local planning, too

14/8/23 Constriction News  Crooked House demolition ‘does disservice to entire industry’

15/8/23 BBC Miniature Crooked House wins plaudits from across the globe

15/8 /23Express and Star  Remains of Crooked House pub fenced off as arson inquiry continues

15/8/23 Express and Star   The Crooked House: What we know about investigation into fire and demolition of famous pub

15/8/23 Express and Star  Wolverhampton man makes model replica of Crooked House for friend ‘gutted’ by blaze

15/8/23 Guardian The mystery of the Crooked House fire

16/8/23 Express and Star   Crooked House footpaths fenced off after police called to ‘activity’ at site

16/8/23 Express and Star  Rebuilding The Crooked House could take three years and cost millions, warns expert

16/8/23 Express and Star   MP urges public wanting answers about Crooked House pub to ‘be patient’

16/8/23 Guardian Crooked House owner linked to landfill that also went up in flames

17/8/23 Express and Star  Black Country real ale campaigners to step up pub protection after loss of The Crooked House

17/8/23 Express and Star   I want Crooked House to ‘rise from the ashes’ MP tells packed meeting

17/8/23 Guardian If only we’d had the vision to save the Crooked House

17/8/23 Washington Post Mystery surrounds burning of Crooked House, Britain’s ‘wonkiest’ pub

18/8/23 Daily Express Owners of The Crooked House pub jet off to Corfu as questions remain over demolition

19/8/23 Express and Star  Black Country artist completes striking painting of the night The Crooked House burned down

19/8/23 Irish Mirror Irish drug smuggler at centre of scandal over demolition of Britain’s ‘wonkiest pub’ – Irish Mirror Online Irish Mirror

21/8/23 BBC Crooked House: Protesters block road to destroyed landmark pub

21/8/23 BBC Crooked House: Glass engraver honours destroyed pub

21/8/23 Express and Star  Stand-off involving police and MP at site of The Crooked House after access blocked

22/8/23 Guardian Paranormal group keeps night’s watch on Crooked House pub site

23/8/23 Construction News Contractor claims to be salvaging Crooked House materials for reuse

24/8/23 BBC The campaigners working 24/7 to save the Crooked House                       

24/8/23 BBC Crooked House: Arson arrests in pub fire probe

24/8/23 Express and Star   Two arrested over Crooked House fire as West Midlands mayor again calls for pub to be rebuilt | Express & Star (expressandstar.com)

24/8/23 Guardian Two men arrested over fire at Crooked House pub in Himley

25/8/23 New York Times Two Arrested After Crooked House Pub Fire

25/8/23 Stuff (New Zealand) Two men arrested over suspected torching of ‘Britain’s wonkiest pub’

25/8/23 News.com (Australia) Two men arrested after fire at Crooked House pub

28/8/23 Express and Star  Crooked House campaigners renew pleas to rebuild ‘Britain’s wonkiest pub’ during live TV appearance on This Morning

30/8/23 Express and Star  CAMRA pushes for Asset of Community Value vote to protect remains of ‘vitally important’ Crooked House

31/8/23 Guardian ‘We’ve become one big family’: Camp Wonky continues watch of Crooked House site

September 2023

1/9/23 Express and Star  Contractors to move  off Crooked House site as ‘Ceremony of the Locks’ due to be held  

2/9/23 Express and Star  Crooked House campaigners explain round-the-clock vigil at site of demolished icon  

2/9/23 Express and Star  Thousands of bricks from The Crooked House are securely locked away in symbolic padlocking ceremony  

4/9/23 BBC Firm linked to Crooked House owner was taken to court

4/9/23 Independent Crooked House pub bricks locked away after being ‘sold for £50 on Facebook’   

4/9/23 Dudley News Man camps outside Crooked House pub to protect bricks  

5/9/23 Express and Star  Roofer who led work on Crooked House facelift describes heartbreak at seeing it demolished

6/9/23 BBC Derbyshire model maker creates miniature Crooked House pub

7/9/23 BBC Third arrest in Crooked House fire investigation

7/9/23 Express and Star   Third man arrested over suspected arson at Crooked House pub

7/9/23 Express and Star  MP Marco Longhi calls for parliamentary debate on fate of pubs like Crooked House

8/9/23 Express and Star  Third man arrested over suspected arson at Crooked House pub

9/9/23 BBC Can fire-hit Crooked House rise from the ashes?

10/9/23 Express and Star   Unofficial Crooked House camp left empty amid reports of clash at ruins of famous pub

11/9/23 BBC Probe as violence breaks out at Crooked House site

11/9/23 Express and Star  Woman hit by car and two assaulted at Crooked House site as police appeal for witnesses

14/9/23 BBC Man held after violence at Crooked House site

14/9/23 Express and Star  https://www.expressandstar.com/news/local-hubs/staffordshire/2023/09/14/west-bromwich-man-arrested-following-disorder-at-site-of-crooked-house-pub/

16/9/23 Express and Star  MP re-iterates support for Crooked House and support groups

21/9/23 Express and Star  Footpath near Crooked House site to be closed off for six months due to ‘concerns over the instability of the ground conditions’  

22/9/23 BBC Camra launch scheme to protect historic pubs

22/9/23 Birmingham Mail Crooked House saga prompts new way to save historic pubs in West Midlands  

28/9/2023  BBC  New arrests in Crooked House pub inquiry

28/9/2023 Guardian  Crooked House pub: police investigating fire arrest man and woman

28/09/2023 Express and Star Man and woman arrested in connection with suspected Crooked House arson

28/9/2023 Express and Star How to help Crooked House campaigners design new website and logo

October 2023

4/10/2023 BBC New arrest in Crooked House pub fire investigation

4/10/2023 Express and Star Sixth person arrested in connection with fire at Crooked House pub

5/10/2023 Express and Star Crooked House investigation praised as Staffordshire Police improves under ‘special measures’

5/10/2023 Express and Star Real ale campaigners meet MP over pub protection

27/10/2023 Express and Star Penny Mordaunt visits Crooked House site as Dudley North MP outlines priorities for heritage pubs

28/10/2023 BBC Model maker recreates Crooked House pub in miniature

November 2023

11/11/2023 BBC The leaning Christmas card honouring Crooked House pub

13/11/2023 BBC Crooked House Christmas cards and calendars sell out

18/11/2023 BBC MP calls for more to be done ‘to stop another Crooked House’

21/11/2023 Express and Star Crooked House glasses on sale at beer festival

22/11/2023 Mirror Crooked House owners ordered to stop demolition at another site ‘set to net them £10m’

29/11/2023 Guardian  Crooked House campaigners search for Black Country pub’s missing clock

30/11/2023 Express and Star  New video shows current state of Crooked House site as sections collapse

30/11/2023  Express and Star https://www.expressandstar.com/news/local-hubs/dudley/2023/11/30/crooked-house-is-rebuilt–in-childrens-book/

December 2023

24/12/2023 Stoke on Trent Live Meet the man spending Christmas Day defending the charred ruins of UK’s wonkiest pub

26/12/2023 Guardian Crooked House scandal highlights government inaction over pubs, says Camra

Preamble

The area known as the Black Country was of course originally rural in character and consisted of fields and woodlands with scattered settlements. However, in the area that lay on the Staffordshire coal field there was ultimately very little land that was left untouched by the direct activities of coal mining and its associated larger areas of spoil, or by the industries that relied on the coal. Coupled with the massive housing developments of recent years, nearly all the rural land in the mining areas of the conurbation has long since disappeared. This is illustrated in the Ordnance Survey Map for the Kingswinford / Pensnett area at the western edge of the Black Country in Figure 1, where there is very little open space to be seen, and what there is, is almost always “made ground” – landscaped former waste and industrial areas.

In this post however I want to draw attention to one small area of land that seems to have escaped the ravages of mining and industry and sustained its agricultural / green space nature into the present. This is contained within the black rectangle of Figure 1 – the are on which currently the Pens Meadow School sits, along with its associated playing fields. We will illustrate this through the use of maps from 1822 to the current day, and on the way draw out some other interesting aspects of this very small area of the Black Country – a sort of micro-history of a very limited area.

Figure 1. The Kingswinford / Pensnett area 2023

The 1822 and 1840 Fowler Maps

Figure 2. The 1822 Fowler Map

We begin with a map from 1822 in Figure 2 – an extract from the map of Kingswinford parish produced by the firm of William Fowler about which I have written elsewhere. The location of this extract with regard to the wider area is shown by the black rectangle in Figure 1. It basically shows the area to the west of Tiled House Lane and Bromley, both of which are indicated in red. In what follows we will concentrate on the three fields with names shown in green –Upper Wharrs (almost 9 acres); Lower Wharrs (6 acres) and The Hilly Close (3 acres). These were all part of the Tiled House Estate which ran from Commonside to the east, down the south side of Tiled House Lane and extended westward as far as the Standhills area, and southwards as far as Bromley Lane. See here for more information on this Estate. At the time it was owned by the Trustees of the Late Richard Mee, and was suffering from severe financial difficulties. The Wharrs were rented out to Thomas Brettell for farming, and the Hilly Close to James Mullet for similar purposes. Whist the name of The Hilly Close is self-explanatory (it was actually on a region of slightly higher ground than the surroundings), the name of Wharrs is not familiar to modern ears. It’s meaning is something like “land where willows grow” – and thus could be expected to be somewhat damp. The reason for this can be seen in the bottom left of the figure – the Dawley Brook forms in the bottom of the Lower Wharrs. This drains out to the north beneath the Dudley to Kingswinford Road, through what is now Kingswinford Park and out westwards to the River Smestow. Whilst the map is from 1822, in all likelihood these three fields existed within the 1822 boundaries for several centuries before that. It is certainly the fact that the field boundaries in the Corbyn’s Hall estate to the north were unchanged from 1680 (and probably long before) to 1822.

In what follows, I will try to show in what follows that two of these three named fields – Upper Wharrs and The Hilly Close managed to escape the fate of nearly all the fields in the area of being ravaged by mining and the associated spoil heaps, and the later residential development.

On the map of Figure 2, two other features of interest stand out – The Tiled House itself to the east, the site of late 17th century steel making experiments, and the coloured lines to the west. The latter show the course of the Stourbridge Extension Canal that was built in 1837 and did not exist in 1822. At some point in the map’s history (probably before 1837) someone added these lines to the 1822 map, for the purposes of confusing anyone who should try to read it in the 21^st century.

Figure 3. The Fowler Map of 1840 – the Tithe map

Figure 3 shows an extract of the same area from the 1840 Tithe Map of the area, again produced by the firm of William Fowler for the pruposes of allocating tithe rentals. The Stourbridge Extension Canal is shown on the left, with the Standhills branch going off the west. There is also a tramway marked that took the products of the Corbyn’s Hall estate to the canal basin at wide waters. It was built in the late 1820s, but in 1837 was purchased by the canal company and decommissioned. It would have been operated by gravity, as there is a considerable slope from north to south, passing beneath the road at Bromley, presumably with horses used to pull the empty wagons back up the slope. Unfortunately, little other information is available about the tramway – for example the nature of its construction, its gauge, truck size and capacity etc.

But despite these developments, the three field under consideration were not affected. They were still owned by the Mee trustees, and all let out to one Walter Dudley. Lower Wharrs was described as pasture with a tithe rental of 3s 4d, Upper Wharrs as meadow with a rental of 6s, and the Hilly Close as Arable land with a rental of £1 – showing the higher value of arable land in comparison to pasture and meadow.

The 1880 and 1900 Ordnance Survey maps

Figure 4. The  Ordnance Survey map from the 1880s

By the time of the first large scale Ordnance Survey map in the 1880s (figure 4) the situation had changed significantly, with industrial activities encroaching on the area. The Great Western Railway Kingswinford branch runs to from south to north to the east of the canal. There are disused mines that encroach on the area of the Lower Wharrs (Tiled House Colliery Pits 17 and 18) and to the south of the Tiled House (Tiled House Colliery Pits 19 and 20) with the New Bromley Colliery still operating to the south of Upper Wharrs and Hilly Close. Both of these fields however retain their former boundaries and were still used for farming. Tiled House Lane takes on its modern shape of an east to west portion down from Commonside, although extended further west that it does currently, and a north south portion to the east of Upper Wharrs toward Bromley, although both parts carry the name of Rookery Lane at this time. Indeed, the top half of the north-south portion follows the line of the old Corbyn’s Hall tramway, the extension of which towards Bromley is still visible on the map.

In the Ordnance Survey map from the 1900s of Figure 5 the situation is similar, although the name of Tiled House Lane is attached to its east to west portion and Rookery Lane to its north to south portion. The southern part of the Lower Wharrs and the other two fields still retain their earlier boundaries. 

Figure 5. The Ordnance Survey map from the 1900s

The 1930s and 1960s Ordnance Survey maps

Figure 6. The Ordnance Survey map from the 1930s

Figure 6 shows an Ordnance Survey Map from the 1930s, and there have been significant changes. The Tiled House itself has disappeared, and the Tiled House housing estate in now in existence in its current form. The Pensnett Secondary Modern School has been built, mainly on the Hilly Close, with the southern half of Upper Wharrs as the playing field and the northern half as allotments (behind the houses on Tiled House Lane). The Lane itself has been somewhat straightened out in the process of this development. Nonetheless the combined area of Upper Wharrs and The Hilly Close has retained its integrity and to some degree its agricultural function. The northern half of Lower Wharrs and the area to the south still seems to consist of colliery waste.

One other interesting point to note is that the boundary of the Corbyn’s Hall tramway is marked by the line of the back gardens in the southern cul-de-sac on Tiled House Lane. An archaeological dig in the back gardens of numbers 124 to 130 might well reveal something about the nature of the tramway, but would probably not be much appreciated by the residents. Similarly, the point where the tramway passed underneath Bromley (just outside the current Pensnett / Bromley school entrance) could well retain some evidence of the tramway.

The same situation is illustrated in the aerial view from 1950 shown in figure 7. The view is centred on the Gibbons works on Corbyn’s Hall, but to the top of the picture the outlines of Upper Wharrs and The Hilly Close can be made out, together with both legs of Tiled House Lane.

Figure 7 Aerial view from 1950 (from Britain from Above)

The situation is very similar in the 1960s map of figure 8, although the area of the allotments has become a playing field area.

Figure 8. The Ordnance Survey map from the 1960s

The present-day situation

Figure 9. The 2023 Ordnance Survey map

Finally, we come to the present-day situation shown in the up-to-date Ordnance Survey map of Figure 9 and the Google areal view of Figure 10. The school has been replaced by a new entity -the Pens Meadow School in The Hilly Close, and the area of the Upper Wharrs is now playing field or car parks. The eastern portion of Lower Wharrs has been incorporated into the field. The waste area in the north of Lower Wharrs has either been developed for housing or been landscaped as a recreational area. The waste area to the south has been treated in the same way, to give a large green space alongside the railway line.

Figure 10. An aerial view of the current situation (from Google maps)

It can thus be seen from these maps it can be seen that the area of Upper Wharrs and the Hilly Close represents a remarkable survival of a “land unit” that, in the main escaped the ravages of mining and waste and has retained, to a large degree, its “green” character. It also suggests that the name of the school currently on the site should either be “Hilly Close school” or perhaps even the “Wharrs school”. I doubt the second would be much appreciated by parents, teachers or children.

Industrialisation came rather late in the day in the parish of Kingswinford on the western edge of the Black Country (Figure 1). Although there was, in the eighteenth century, a long-established glass industry around the village of Wordsley in the south of the parish, and some shallow coal mining and iron manufacture around Brockmoor and Brierly Hill in the south east, it wasn’t until the first half of the nineteenth century that these grew in scale and spread northwards across the Staffordshire coal fields to utterly change the character of what was a largely rural area around Kingswinford and Pensnett (Figure 2). I have written on this process elsewhere – see here – in particular, in the context of the two Fowler maps of the parish that were produced in 1822 and 1840, which between them graphically illustrate this process of industrialisation.

Figure 1. Location of Kingswinford parish

Figure 2 Ecclesiastical Districts within the parish

These developments inevitably led to a major increase in the population of the parish, through migration from surrounding areas and further afield. The census population figures are given in Figure 3, and the growth is population is very apparent. It is the purpose of this short post to investigate where this increase in population came from. I use the data from the 1851 census that has been transcribed into digital form by Ancestry, for all 27,413 entries for the parish, which I copied and pasted page by page from the census returns into an EXCEL spreadsheet in order to carry out the analysis – a lengthy, mind-numbing process and not to be recommended.  This included name, area of residence, age and place of birth. This enabled all the entries to be sorted as follows.

Figure3 Population of Kingswinford parish 1801 to 1851

• By age, and then grouped into 10 and 20 year age bands.
• By residence, in one of the five “Ecclesiastical districts” within the parish that were set up as a precursor to these areas becoming parished in their own right later in the 1850s. Each of these corresponded to a number on census enumeration districts. These were in the old established industrial areas of Wordsley, Brockmoor and Brierly Hill, where there was significant industry in the late eighteenth century; in the areas industrialised between 1820 and 1840 to the north of the parish of Kingswinford village itself (which still retained large rural hinterland) and in the Pensnett area; and in Quarry Bank in the south east, where industrialisation took place in the decade before the census (Figure 2). Residents of the Workhouse in Wordsley was not included in the analysis.
• By birthplace, defined as being within one of five regions – Kingswinford parish itself; the Black Country and Birmingham (the former as defined largely by the modern four Black Country boroughs); Staffordshire (excluding the Black Country regions); Worcestershire (excluding the Black Country regions); Shropshire (excluding the detached portion of Halesowen which was taken as part of the Black Country); and elsewhere – mainly locations in England and Wales, with a very small number from Ireland and Europe). Around 1% of the total population were not allocated a birthplace in the Ancestry transcripts, due to non-legibility of the written entries.

The most populous of the Ecclesiastical districts was that of Brierly Hill with 8800 inhabitants, followed by Pensnett with 4947. The others had populations of around 3000 to 4000 .  The breakdown by age decades for the entire parish population is shown in Figure 4, as percentages of the population of each Ecclesiastical district. All areas show similar trends, with around 50% of the population below the age of 20 (which was partly driven by the very large infant mortality). Figure 5 shows the birth locations for the parish as a whole, this time in 20 year (generational) age bands. The majority of the 0 to 19 year band were born within the parish or the surrounding Black Country (85%), but the situation is very different for the other generational bands, with only around 55% of the total being born in Kingswinford parish or the Black Country, with significant numbers being born in the three surrounding counties, particularly Shropshire, and around 10% of the total coming from further afield. This indicates that there had been significant migration, around 20 to 50 years before the census, which is consistent with the overall population growth shown in Figure 3.

Figure 4. Age breakdown of parish population

Figure 5. Breakdown of population by age and birthplace

This pattern varied somewhat across the parish, and similar results for each Ecclesiastical district are shown in Figure 6 for the old established industrial regions of Brierley Hill, Wordsley and Brockmoor; for the regions industrialised in the previous 50 years in Kingswinford and Pensnett; and for the Quarry Bank area industrialised over the previous decade. The figures for Brierley Hill, Brockmoor and Wordsley show slightly higher proportions of “local” Kingswinford and Black Country births for the older generations than the parish overall i.e. lower levels of migration. The figures for Kingswinford and Pensnett are very different, with local births for the adult generations below 50%, and only around 30% for the parish births. The proportion of Shropshire births, particularly in the Pensnett data is very large, of the order of 25 to 30%, mainly, as far as can be ascertained form the records, from the Shifnal / Oakengates area. In the newly industrialised Quarry Bank area the pattern is different again with 60 to 70% of local births and the main contributor to the rest coming from Worcestershire (and in particular those areas of the county close to the Black Country).

Figure 6. Breakdown of population for each Ecclesiastical district

The levels of migration from Shropshire into the Pensnett / Kingswinford area are of particular interest. It is to my mind likely that such levels would result in significant social tensions, and there is also some evidence of “ghettoisation” (if such a word exists). For example, there was a road in Kingswinford that was named “Shropshire Row” and the Shut End Primitive Methodist church seems to have chiefly served the migrant Shropshire population. This can be illustrated by a spatial analysis of the Pensnett census entries. The occurrence of a Shropshire birth entry was plotted against census entry number for the Pensnett enumeration districts (Figure 7). There can be seen to be regions on the graph that show high density of Shropshire births (around entry 3400, and entries 4000 to 4900). Cross checking against addresses from the census shows that these regions correspond to the new housing estates in the Hollies area, along the Turnpike Road towards Dudley. In these areas the percentage of those with Shropshire births is over 30%. Whilst this analysis is somewhat subjective, it does tend to suggest that a degree of concentration of the Shropshire migrant population did take place.

Figure 7. Shropshire births in the Pensnett census entries (vertical line shows register ntry with Shropshire birthplace)

There is one particular migrant group that, though small in number, might well have been quite conspicuous due to language and accent – the Irish. In the 1851 census returns there are 131 entries which register a birth in Ireland. These were mainly concentrated in Brierly Hill (69), Wordsley (35) and Brockmoor (20), i.e. the older industrialised areas, with very few in the Kingswinford, Pensnett and Quarry Bank areas. Of these 36 were under 20, 62 between 20 and 39, 30 between 40 and 59 and only 3 over 60, suggesting perhaps a more recent migration than other groups, mainly over the previous 20 years.

Now the analysis of both the wider parish population and those born in Ireland has not taken into account the Workhouse population, since this was the Poor Law provision for the entire Stourbridge Union, which was larger than the parish. However, in 1851 there were 260 Workhouse entries, 0.95% of the total parish population. 17 of those registered a birthplace in Ireland, 11.5% of the total Irish population – in other words those born in Ireland were significantly over-represented in the Workhouse population.

Finally it is worth noting that much more could be done – particularly in investigating the nature of migrant employment. However there is an issue here in that the census employment details have not been transcribed into digital form, and would need to be transcribed by hand from the original forms (some 30 or 40% of the total number of register entries). This would be an even more time consuming and mind numbing occupation than the one undertaken to date to get the data on which this blog is based. Maybe I will get round to this when I want for something to do. Then again, maybe I won’t.