Seighford (St. Chad)

SEIGHFORD (St. Chad), a parish, in the S. division of the hundred of Pirehill, union, and N. division of the county, of Stafford, 2¾ miles (W. N. W.) from Stafford; containing 903 inhabitants. The parish includes the hamlets of Aston, Great and Little Bridgeford, Coton-Clanford, Doxey, and Derrington; and comprises 4600 acres, forming a highly cultivated district, of which two-thirds are arable, and the remainder pasture: the surface is undulated, and the scenery picturesque. The Liverpool and Birmingham railway runs through the parish for a distance of three and a half miles. Seighford Hall, an ancient half-timbered house with modern wings, stands in a small park at the west side of the village. The living is a discharged vicarage, valued in the king's books at £6, and in the patronage of the Crown; net income, £119; impropriator, Francis Eld, Esq. The church was partly rebuilt of brick, about a century ago; it contains many neat mural monuments. There is a Church Sunday school. Coton-Clanford is remarkable as the birth-place of William Wollaston, author of The Religion of Nature Delineated; he died in 1724.—See Aston.