Wilmslow, Cheshire
Historical Description
Wilmslow, a town, township, and parish in Cheshire. The town stands on the river Bollin, 6½ miles SSW of Stockport, 12 S of Manchester, and 176 by railway from London. It has a station on the Manchester and Orewe section of the L. & N.W.R., and a post, money order, and telegraph office under Manchester. The railway crosses the vale of the Bollin here on a viaduct of eleven arches. The town is governed by an urban district council. It has a public hall and a police station. Fairs are held on the third Monday in April and the third Monday in October. The church of St Bartholomew is a large handsome edifice, portions of which date from the 12th century. It was enlarged and restored in 1863, and consists of chancel with N and S chapels, transepts, clerestoried nave of five bays, S and W porches, and an embattled western tower. It contains an ancient rood screen, and some ancient altar-tombs and brasses. The parish contains Bollin Fee and Chorley townships. Acreage, 8064; population of the civil parish, 9744; of the ecclesiastical, 6670. Hawthorn Hall, Pownall Hall, Norcliffe Hall, and Fulshaw Hall are chief residences. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Chester; gross value, ½£1000 with residence. Chorley or Alderley Edge and Lindow form separate ecclesiastical parishes. There is a chapel of ease at Styal in Wilmslow township. There are Roman Catholic, Baptist, Congregational, Unitarian, Wesleyan, and other dissenting chapels.
Administration
The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.
Ancient County | Cheshire | |
Ecclesiastical parish | Wilmslow St. Bartholomew | |
Hundred | Macclesfield | |
Poor Law union | Altrincham |
Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.
Directories & Gazetteers
We have transcribed the entry for Wilmslow from the following:
- Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Wilmslow (St. Bartholomew))
Land and Property
The Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Cheshire is available to browse.
Maps
Online maps of Wilmslow are available from a number of sites:
- Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- Google Streetview.
- National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
- OpenStreetMap.
- old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
- Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)
Newspapers and Periodicals
The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following Cheshire papers online:
Visitations Heraldic
The Visitation of Cheshire, 1580 is available on the Heraldry page.