Oakley Hall, Staffordshire

Oakley is a hamlet in Staffordshire, England. It is within Mucklestone ward of Loggerheads Parish. Oakley Hall, a former seat of the Chetwode family, is a well known attraction.

Norton in Hales is a village and parish in Shropshire, England. It lies on the A53 between the town of Market Drayton and Woore, Shropshire's most northeasterly village and parish. Staffordshire is to the east of the parish and Cheshire to the west. Also within the parish is the village of Betton and hamlet of Ridgwardine. The parish church is Saint Chad's. Also within the village are Norton in Hales Church of England Primary School, the Hind's Head Inn, and a large playing field. The monument to Frances, Lady Cotton (d. 1606) in St Chad's was designed by Inigo Jones around the year 1611. Her husband Rowland Cotton, who commissioned the tomb, was associated with the court of Prince Henry, as was Jones. The tomb is the earliest known work of Inigo Jones.Tunstall Hall is a Grade II* listed building, built in about 1732, formerly a girls' school, and now a residential home offering specialist care in dementia.The engineer Samuel Owen, who later emigrated to Sweden where he became an industrialist, was born at Norton in 1774.

Betton is a hamlet in the civil parish of Norton in Hales, in the Shropshire district, in the county of Shropshire, England.

Norton-in-Hales railway station was a station on the North Staffordshire Railway between Stoke-on-Trent and Market Drayton. The station was opened in 1870 and was closed in 1956. The station building and trackbed is now a private residence including the station masters house.

Audley's Cross is a cross sited in Blore Heath, Staffordshire to mark the spot on which James Touchet, Lord Audley was killed at the battle of Blore Heath in 1459. A cross was erected on the spot where Audley was reported to have been killed after the battle, and replaced with the current stone cross in 1765, which was renovated in 1959 on the 500th anniversary of the battle. The inscription on the cross reads: On this spot was fought the Battle of Blore Heath 1459. Lord Audley, who commanded the Lancastrian forces was defeated and slain. This monument was restored by Tyrley Parish Council to mark the 500th anniversary of the battle

The Battle of Blore Heath was a battle in the English Wars of the Roses. It was fought on 23 September 1459, at Blore Heath in Staffordshire. Blore Heath is a sparsely populated area of farmland, two miles east of the town of Market Drayton in Shropshire, and close to the village of Loggerheads, Staffordshire.

Almington is a small village in Staffordshire, England. It is about 2 miles (3.2 km) east-northeast of Market Drayton by road, to the northwest of the villages of Hales and west of Blore Heath. Historically the manor and Almington Hall belonged to the Pandulf family, and much later, the Broughton family.

Hales is a village in Staffordshire approximately 2 miles east of Market Drayton. Population details as taken at the 2011 census can be found under Loggerheads. There is an Anglican church dedicated to Saint Mary.

Ridgwardine is a small hamlet in Shropshire in the civil parish of Norton in Hales. It is made up of Ridgwardine Manor, Upper Farm, and Manor Farm.

Blore Heath was a rural district in Staffordshire, England from 1894 to 1932. It was created under the Local Government Act 1894 from that part of the Market Drayton rural sanitary district which was in Staffordshire (the Shropshire part becoming Drayton Rural District). It covered the parishes of Ashley, Mucklestone and Tyrley. It was abolished by a County Review Order in 1932, and was added to the Newcastle-under-Lyme Rural District.

The Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal was a canal in England which ran from Nantwich, where it joined the Chester Canal, to Autherley, where it joined the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal. Forming part of a major link between Liverpool and the industrial heartlands of the Midlands, the canal was opened in 1835, and merged with the Ellesmere and Chester Canal Company in 1845, which became the Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company in the following year.

Mucklestone is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Loggerheads, in the Newcastle-under-Lyme district, in the county of Staffordshire, England. It is about nine miles (14 km) northwest of Eccleshall, and four and a half miles northeast of Market Drayton in Shropshire. In 1961 the parish had a population of 409. On 1 April 1984 the parish was abolished to form Loggerheads. It is notable for its associations with the Battle of Blore Heath. According to legend, Queen Margaret of Anjou is said to have watched the defeat of her forces from the church tower, before fleeing on horse-back. It is said that Margaret employed the local blacksmith, William Skelhorn, to reverse the shoes on her horse to disguise her getaway. An anvil said to have belonged to Skelhorn stands in the churchyard to commemorate the event.The ancient parish of Mucklestone was about six miles (10 km) in length, and from one to two miles (3 km) in breadth, extending along the borders of the counties of Shropshire and Staffordshire. Five of traditional townships, Aston, Knighton, Mucklestone, Oakley and Winnington are in Staffordshire and the other four, Bearstone, Dorrington, Gravenhunger and Woore, are in Shropshire. This parish originally comprised 8,120 acres (33 km2), of which 4,362 acres (18 km2) were in Staffordshire. Mucklestone township contains about 1,100 acres (4 km2). Aston, a village and township, three and a half miles north-east of Mucklestone, and eight miles (13 km) south-west of Newcastle-under-Lyme, contains 912 acres (3.7 km2). Knighton is a small township, one mile (1.6 km) south-west of Aston, bounded on three sides by Shropshire. Oakley township at the south end of the parish, two miles (3 km) south-west of Mucklestone, contains Oakley Hall, in a beautiful park of 300 acres (1.2 km2), on the east bank of the River Tern, which locally divides Staffordshire from Shropshire. Winnington township, has a small village one mile (1.6 km) north of Mucklestone.The church of Saint Mary at Mucklestone, which originally served the whole of the ancient parish, is in the decorated style. Except for the tower, it was rebuilt according to church records in 1789 and again in 1883 by Lynam and Rickman in keeping with the surviving medieval tower. It contains stained glass windows, designed by Charles Kempe in the 19th century including commemorations of the Battle of Blore Heath. Other local structures of merit include a Georgian Folly; an important house of earlier date known as Willoughbridge Lodge; warm springs (discovered in the 17th century) and known, together with the ruined bath house c1682, as Willoughbridge wells; and also Oakley Hall built about 1710.A neolithic monument sits along the western perimeter of the great park of Oakley Hall at Mucklestone. Possibly the remains of a burial-mound, it comprises two big stones. One is round with a 20-inch-diameter (510 mm) hole in the middle. The other is six feet tall and slender. Locally the stones are known as the "devil's ring and finger".