The New Student's Reference Work/Walsall

Walsall (wŏl′sal), a town in Staffordshire, England, eight miles northwest of Birmingham. Its churches and most of its public buildings are all modern. Harper's almshouses founded by James I, memorial cottages for 12 poor couples or widows and a cottage hospital are among its charities. It has a public library, town-hall, guildhall, theater and schools, including a grammar-school founded in 1554. Its situation in a region of extensive coal-mines and limestone quarries, with iron, stone and brick-clay near, makes it a manufacturing town, with iron and brass foundries. Locks, keys, bolts, pulleys and all kinds of ironware used in making carriages or harness are special manufactures. Walsall was fortified by Ethelfleda, daughter of Alfred the Great, held by William the Conqueror as a royal house, belonged to Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick (the king-maker), and was given by Henry VIII to the duke of Northumberland. Population 96,171.