Tag: Stonnall

July 23rd – Stonnall’s Grove Hill is accessed down a rough track, either from between houses on Main Street, Stonnall, or from a field gateway at the other end, in Church Road. Thought to be a tumulus, this sharply defined mound is visible and distinctive for miles around due to it’s single, windswept tree at the summit. It offers fine views all around from the summit, and I often come here for peace and quiet. It’s a fine place to sit and survey the area on a late, quiet, sunny Saturday afternoon.

July 23rd – A brief afternoon run out through Aldridge and Stonnall rewarded me with fine views from both Lazy Hill and Grove Hill. This view, from the former, is often neglected as it’s not easy to get a good aspect on. Looking northeast across Stonnall to Lichfield, it shows a summer well and truly on it’s throne.

May 11th – on the way home, I took the long way and cycled up to Springhill along the quiet, leafy Whitacre Lane. Here viewed from the A461 Lichfield Road, Whitacre Farm nestles on the Stonnall side of the hill.

Sadly, it’s a farm no longer; converted into luxury homes some years ago, I remember the soft fruit farm that existed here in the eighties. The large, imposing, blue-brick barn is now a handsome house, yet as a kid, I parked my bike in there while I picked gooseberries. If I did that now, it would be in somebody’s lounge…

May 4th – Wordsley House, grade II listed building, sits on Main Street, Stonnall, as it has done since at least the late seventeenth century; one roof purlin was found to be inscribed ’S.I.E. 1677’. It has an interesting history as the former Welsh Harp Inn. 

Julian Ward-Davies, in his excellent Stonnall Mysteries thesis, notes the following:

As we continue down Old Chester Road, we pass by Wordsley House on the left, which embodies our next mystery. This is now a private residence, but once it had a very different function. This house was once nationally famous as the now almost legendary Welsh Harp.

Now we may ask, how it was that an inn in the English Midlands took such a name. The explanation is, as I see it, the same as it is for the naming of the Irish Harp at Chester Road, Mill Green near Little Aston. As we have already noted, Chester Road was a major route between London and North Wales. Thus many of the people en route were not only Welsh, but there was also a very high proportion of travellers who were Irish people on their way to and from Holyhead, where there has always been a major connection to Ireland. Thus the Welsh Harp and the irish Harp provided, supposedly, a home-from-home ambience for the straightforward commercial purpose of attracting more customers.

May 2nd – another beautiful day made difficult by a rapacious wind. A ride out through Stonnall and Shenstone to Canwell, Hints and Hopwas was very hard going indeed. I found plenty of opportunities to stop, for when I did, it was the only time that the sun’s warmth could be felt. This unusual view of Stonnall was taken from the corner of Stonnall churchyard, an available vista I’d not spotted previously.

April 30th – a bright, warm sunny day, unfortunately tempered by a headwind forged on Satan’s back doorstep. After some routine mechanical attention, I set off to Lichfield to get a little shopping in. Here at Lower Stonnall the wind was pulling pollen from the oilseed rape and the scent was intense. Nature felt more alive today than it has done on any day this year.