Willoughby-In-The-Wolds (St. Mary and All Saints)
WILLOUGHBY-IN-THE-WOLDS (St. Mary and All Saints), a parish, in the union of Loughborough, S. division of the wapentake of Rushcliffe and of the county of Nottingham, 7 miles (N. E. by E.) from Loughborough; containing 569 inhabitants. According to Horsley, this was the Roman station Vernometum, but Gale and Stukeley fix Margidunum here. In the great civil war, an engagement took place commonly termed the battle of Willoughby Field. The parish is situated about two miles distant from the road between Nottingham and Melton-Mowbray, and half a mile south-east of the Roman fosse-road. It comprises by measurement 2000 acres, whereof three-fourths are pasture, and the remainder arable; the soil is chiefly a cold clay. The living is a discharged vicarage, valued in the king's books at £6. 18. 6½.; net income, £87; patron, T. Dodson, Esq.: the tithes were commuted for land in 1793. The church contains 400 sittings, of which 238 are free. There is a place of worship for Wesleyans. In a field called Herrings, or Black Field, are traces of an old town, where many coins, pavements, and other relics of antiquity have been found; and in the centre of the village stands a cross, the shaft consisting of one stone, fifteen feet high, resting on four steps. On a tumulus called Cross Hill, an annual revel is held.
Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.