From Peolshalh to Pelsall – a thousand years of a village name
The village we today know by the name of ‘Pelsall’ has, over the centuries, been recorded in a wide variety of ways. Its origins are not definitive but the first written versions appeared in the year 994 A.D., strongly suggesting that the earliest settlement at Pelsall came into existence during Anglo-Saxon times. The tribes of the Angles and Saxons crossed the sea from northern Germany during the fifth and sixth centuries following the retreat from Britain of the Roman legions to defend their homelands against the marauding armies of Attila the Hun.
There can be no certainty as to when Pelsall was first settled but the name was recorded in a document drawn up in the year 994 for the Lady Wufruna, a noblewoman related to Anglo-Saxon family ruling the midland kingdom of Mercia who, ‘for the good of her soul’, made a grant of lands to a monastery at ‘Heantun’ (Wolverhampton) so that, ‘mass may be chanted there evermore’. This generous gift of thirty hides (in excess of 3,500 acres) at eleven separate locations, included land at Bilston, Willenhall and ‘Peolshalh’ (also spelt ‘Peolshale’ in the self-same document!) was witnessed by numerous important people, among them one king (Aethelred II ‘the Unready’, 978-1016), two archbishops and twelve bishops. The attendance of King Aethelred as a witness was not unusual in view of Lady Wulfruna’s rank and of the fact that the king had made her a gift of the land nine years previously. The name ‘Peolshalh’ itself is Old English and may be broadly translated as, ‘the nook or clearing that Peol made in the woods.’ Sadly, history does not offer any clue as to the identity of the Saxon ‘Peol’ or when he and his people cut their first clearing but there must have been some cultivated land by 994 or it would not have made an acceptable gift to the monks of ‘Heantun’. This first settlement was most likely on the site of what later became known as Malthouse, shortened to Mouse, Hill. Here there was a natural spring that flowed off the easily defensible break of slope overlooking the lower ground to the west and south where a substantial brook, the present Clock Mill Brook, was located. The land that Peol and his followers set to clearing was part of the dense Forest of Cank or Canok that stretched from the present Stafford to Walsall; the woodlands were intersected by small streams while the intervening hilltops were bare of tree-growth on account of the thin, sandy soils where bracken, heather and gorse were dominant.
The next written variants of the name of Pelsall appeared in the great Domesday survey of England south of the River Tyne ordered by William I, ‘the Conqueror’ (1066-1087), who wanted to know precisely what quality of land he ruled in order to apply appropriate taxation as money was desperately needed in 1086 to provide and equip extra troops in the light of another threatened Danish invasion. Walsall, or ‘Waleshale’ as it then was, received no mention in the Domesday Book, possibly because it had been razed by vengeful Norman troops that had cut a swathe through rebellious areas of the midlands and the north in 1067 and 1069. Yet Pelsall was recorded as, ‘The Canons of Wolverhampton hold a half hide [about sixty acres] for themselves in Peleshale. Land for one plough. Waste.’ Not the most auspicious of descriptions but Domesday provided the second written record of the village, naming it both ‘Peleshale’ and ‘Peoleshale’ in the same document – in this instance written in Latin.
More than three hundred years passed before another two variants of the village’s name were recorded, this time in 1285 as ‘Poleshale’ and ‘Pershall’ (as well as the earlier spelling of ‘Peleshale’) in the Staffordshire Forest Pleas during the reign of Edward I (1272-1307) – referring to, ‘Robert the miller of Peleshale; Poleshale (Pershall)…William Cocas of Poleshale and Reginald de Poleshale and Simon of the same.’ Three variants in one short document reflect how spellings depended upon the quirks of the clerk who was charged with writing it – after all, in those days of mass illiteracy there were few who might take issue with a mere spelling.
A mere eight years on brought to light a seventh variant of the village’s title. In 1293 an Inquisition or Inquiry was held on behalf of King Edward I into an allegation that,‘Philip de Montgomery appropriated to himself from the waste of the Dean [of Wolverhampton] in the vill of Pelishale, two acres’. In such cases the sheriff was given the task of seizing land and restoring it to the rightful heirs – a task he duly fulfilled.
Another Royal Inquisition, this time held at Walsahale during the reign of Edward II (1307-1327) and one of great significance for the history of the village, was held in 1311. Once again, previously unrecorded variants of the village name were written into the document at the whim of the clerk responsible. ‘Pelshal Chapel – Inquisition made before the King’s Escheator at on 6th July in the 4th 1311, whether it will be to the damage or prejudice of the King...if the King grant to Wm le Ku [Keu] of Pelleshale licence that he may give and assign certain lands in Pelleshale to a certain chaplain celebrating Divine service daily in the chapel of Pelleshale’. This is the first reference to a formal place of worship in Pelsall an almost certainly led to the construction of a church in the present Paradise Lane.
Just three years later, in 1314, yet another Royal Inquisition of Edward II took place in Walsall, in this instance citing a certain William de Pelshale as a juror or oath-giver in a case relating to the Hospital of St. John at Lichfield. The same man, William de Pelshale, also appeared in the same role at an Inquisition in 1322 at Lichfield – to be accepted as a juror required high standing in a community and the name ‘de Pelshale’ indicates that the family was most probably lords of the manor.
The end of the fourteenth century was at hand when a Latin variant of the village name appeared in a document that also brings to light the identity of a Chaplain of Pelsall that predates any previously recorded. Written in Latin on a parchment sheet closed with a wax seal is a deed dated 10th August 1392, during the reign of King Richard II (1377-1399), relating to the transfer of land and buildings held of John de Wyrleye to William Poort, William Waterfall and Richard Leveson of Willenhall by Robert Lynghull. It commences (in translation), ‘I, Robert Lynghull, chaplain of Pelsala…’. This clearly indicates that at the time the chaplain of Pelsall was a relatively affluent man and a significant landholder in the village.
In 1415 the Plea Rolls (court records) of the celebrated Henry V (1413-1422), victor of Agincourt, displayed yet another variant of the Pelsall name in recording, ‘Richard de Hylton, of Pelshall, husbandman [a smallholder farmer, between the status of yeoman and day-labourer] and 16 others who had been indicted for divers felonies, were acquitted.’ Whatever his alleged crimes, Hylton’s trial cleared his name and left to posterity one more spelling of the village name.
Nigh on a century was to pass before the next form of Pelsall’s name was to appear in the written record. During the period 1504-1506, in the reign of the first Tudor King Henry VII (1485-1509), the churchwardens’ account for All Saints Church, Walsall, reveals a receipt for ‘iiijd.’ (4d.) for monies received from ‘Wyllyame Wethhams of Pellsall’. The amount was small but the record is invaluable.
The next variant upon the name of Pelsall village was recorded at a time when the realm of England was threatened by the Habsburg Emperor Charles V and King Francis I of France, on behalf of Pope Paul IV who had recently excommunicated England’s monarch, Henry VIII (1509-1547), over the divorce issue and Henry’s consequent ‘heretical opinions’. With war looming on the horizon in 1539, the king and Privy Council were sufficiently alarmed to order the compilation of a Muster Roll of all the armed forces in the kingdom. Letters Patent, appointing Commissioners of Array for each county, were issued on 1st March 1539 – for Staffordshire the commissioners were Sir George Gresley, John Vernon and William Wyrley. The local entry on the Muster Roll reads, ‘Pelsaull – Thomas Nowell, horse harnes, bill, able man. John Coupare, Robert Spenser, William Byrche, John Tovdman. Summa [all] able men without horse harnes and bow, iiij [four]’. In the event, the crisis passed without military conflict and the levies were never actually called up.
More than fifty years later, during the long reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558-1603), the Quarter Session Rolls of 1592-1593 recorded the renewal of an application by Thomas Brooke to keep an alehouse in the village of Pelsall and set out detailed responsibilities for maintaining the peace in his establishment. In addition, it was necessary for local men of good character to stand sureties (of £5 or £10) to guarantee law-keeping. The wording of the court record, one that repeats an original commitment by Thomas Brooke in November 1592, reads, ‘Pelsoll – Thomas Brooke; sureties [stood by] William Lyseid, John Launder’. So not only did the Quarter Session Rolls give evidence of Pelsall’s very first pub but it also provided yet another variation of the village name.
The English Civil War (1642-1646) and the only ever execution of a reigning monarch (Charles I in 1649) would both come and go before the final variation of the name of Pelsall presented itself. Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660 and soon set about exercising revenge upon those who had stood against his royal father. Nationally, thirteen regicides were hunted down and executed; locally, names of Parliamentary soldiers were sought. The task was entrusted to the constables and results in Pelsall were submitted on 23rd August 1662; it read as follows, ‘A list of all such persons (as were then presented by the constables) that live in their several parishes and constablewickes and have borne armes and beene in actual service against his majesty and also his most royall majesty of blessed memory. Item presented by the Constables of Pelstall, Joseph Brocksey, Jerome Smith’. How assiduous the local constables were in pursuit of their task is debatable as only one name was identified in the Pelsall area.
Thus sixteen identified variants were visited before the modern, accepted spelling of Pelsall was alighted upon. Previously spellings had varied as a result of the fact that there was no standard spelling method until the later 18th Century and spellings were made according to local accents and the vicissitudes of the clerk employed to write a particular document! The spelling of place-names was even less standardised than most English words and was of course affected by the fact that documents were written in Latin and Norman-French, hence the numerous variants of what ultimately was agreed upon as ‘Pelsall’. In the search for the development of its name, Pelsall is fortunate in that it is the only village or township to bear such a name in England and Wales