Transcribed from the 1881 Drayton Bros. edition by DavidPrice, , using scans from the BritishLibrary.
HISTORICAL
AND
DESCRIPTIVE GUIDE
THROUGH
SHREWSBURY.
By S. F.WILLIAMS.
NEW AND REVISED EDITION
1881.
SHREWSBURY:
DRAYTON BROS., PRINTERS ANDPUBLISHERS.
p.2PREFATORY NOTE.
This “Historical Guide” has no pretensions to thevalue of either a full history or a complete handbook ofShrewsbury. It consists simply of a sketch of thehistorical associations of Shrewsbury, and of a directory justsufficiently complete to conduct residents or visitors to theprincipal objects or places of interest in the town. In theGuide, the object has been to preserve the historicalelement.
p.3HISTORICAL ASSOCIATIONS.
“Proud Salopians!” Well, have we not somegood reasons for being proud? Is it not natural that asShrewsbury has been the scene of important events and incidents,we should feel a little inordinate self-esteem? Hamlet willhave it that the poor should not trumpet their own praises; butwe are rich, and therefore we can indulge in some degree ofconceit. Have we not something to be vain about? Havewe not found homes and hiding-places for kings? Have we nothad a mint here and made money—which is a difficult thingfor most people to do? Has not “the finestlegislative assembly in the world”—the BritishParliament—been held here? Have we not receivedCharter upon Charter from the hands of kings, and “advancedthem loans”—without security? Has not anEnglish monarch actually sat in Shrewsbury, wearing a realcrown? Have we not contributed thousands of men to theprotection of the crown and dignity? Did not that“glorious old martyr”—Charles I., who was“murdered” by Oliver Cromwell—raise an armyhere, and did he not lay his uneasy head in a house on the WyleCop? Finally, not least though last, did not Falstaff, that“gross, fat man,” foolish, witty, and blusterous,“fight one long hour by Shrewsbury clock”? Hesays he did, if he may be believed; and is not that something toboast of? Treasuring up these things, is there not somejustification for our being proud?
Breathes there a man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own my native town?
If such there be, go mark him well.
p. 4DouglasJerrold said that there are some men who walk half-an-inch higherto heaven by what they tread upon. If Jerrold is rightShrewsbury people should be nearer to heaven than most folk, for,according to general opinion, we stand with extreme erectness onour self. And well we may. The town itself standshigh, and the characte