Noake's Worcestershire Page 69

BROMSGROVE. 69

reside there for a time in preparation for holy orders. They also built schools for the labouring classes in 1851.

There are Congregational and Wesleyan chapels in the village. The former denomination made their first appearance here in 1796 and the latter in 1811. The Church school was built in 1857. It has about 150 children in daily attendance. The school is, however, so small and ill-arranged for its object that the Committee of Council have required the managers to provide more accommodation, and it is proposed to build new schools on a more convenient site as soon as the necessary funds shall have been raised. Thomas Hodges, in 1686, bequeathed funds to the free school, to teach, clothe, and apprentice poor boys. The trustees educate at the National School twenty boys, at an annual cost of £30, the boys receiving every year a suit of clothes, and they remain in the school for three years.

A market and three days' fair were granted to Broadway by Henry III. The parish was enclosed in 1771, when the new road up Broadway Hill was made and the Fish Inn erected at the top. The parish registers contain much interesting matter. Kennels and stables have been lately built in the village for the North Cotswold hounds, kept by Lord Coventry. They meet on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.

Bromsgrove.

IT was a gloomy day for tHe little old town of Bromsgrove when the coaching era came to an end. Situate just midway between Birmingham and Worcester, its long and handsome street, rendered picturesque by many fine specimens of cross-timbered houses of the