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Coton, Shropshire

Shropshire geography stubsVillages in Shropshire
Roadside pond on NCR 45 geograph.org.uk 1440516
Roadside pond on NCR 45 geograph.org.uk 1440516

Coton is a village in Shropshire. It lies near the road from Whitchurch to Wem, about one mile southeast of Hollinwood. Coton Hall, once home to Viscount Hill, is an important English heritage site. In the early nineteenth century it belonged to Admiral George Bowen but it subsequently passed to the Honyman baronets after Admiral Bowen's youngest daughter, Elizabeth Essex Bowen, married the Scottish baronet Sir Ord John Honyman. Their sons, Sir George Honyman, 4th Baronet (1819–75) and the Rev. Sir William Macdonald Honyman (d. 1911) lived there in succession but they both died without issue and from the Rev. Sir William the estate passed to his niece, Elizabeth Hester Georgina Marie Ord Bearcroft, daughter of the Rev. Thomas Bearcroft (born Thomas Longcroft) of Fitz and his wife, Mary Hester Lilly Rosalie Honyman, sister of Sir George and the Rev. Sir William. As a desirable young heiress, Elizabeth Bearcroft married Captain Robert Charles Dighton Wilson in 1891 and they adopted the additional surname of MacQueen in 1912 when Elizabeth inherited entailed estates in Scotland. The Wilson-MacQueens sold Coton Hall to the wealthy match manufacturer Sir Alexander Maguire, who was living there by 1920 but sold the estate to Viscount Hill in 1924. The house has since been sold out of the Hill family.The village has a Methodist Chapel, which contained in 2013 a war memorial marble plaque to congregation members who died serving in the First World War. Since then the chapel has closed and in 2022 the managing trustees announced they would put the chapel for sale, its graveyard being closed to new unplanned burials but stipulating the graves and gravestones would not be removed.

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Coton, Shropshire
B5476,

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Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 52.908 ° E -2.699 °
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Coton Hall

B5476
SY13 3LN , Wem Rural
England, United Kingdom
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Roadside pond on NCR 45 geograph.org.uk 1440516
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Whixall
Whixall

Whixall is, by land area, the third largest inland village in England and a civil parish in Shropshire, England. It is documented in the Domesday Book as having been in existence in 1086.The nearest towns are Whitchurch, to the north, and Wem, to the south. The parish lies on the border with the county borough of Wrexham, Wales. Its close proximity to Wales is shown by a hamlet called Welsh End. Within the parish boundaries (encompassing seven square miles) are various hamlets including Abbey Green, Hollinwood, Welsh End, Stanley Green, Dobson's Bridge, Far End and Waterloo. Whixall village contains a Church of England village church, and primary school. The village's outdoor war memorial, a square-section obelisk, stands in fenced area on the roadside by the school.In July 2021 a Bronze Age stone artwork that became known as the "Whixall Monolith" or Whixall Stone, was discovered in the creation of a drive at a house in the village. Adorned with cup and ring carvings, the Permio-Triassic red sandstone block is apparently the first such monolith to be found in Shropshire.The Llangollen Canal of the Shropshire Union Canal and the short Prees Branch of the Ellesmere Canal run through the parish. Prees was the intended destination of the Prees Branch, however the arm was only completed as far as Quina Brook. The arm is now known as the Prees Branch of the Llangollen Canal, and is navigable for about a mile to Whixall Marina. The remaining 3/4 mile is still followable on the towpath as it passes through Prees Branch Canal Nature Reserve. The canal is crossed by Dobson's Bridge, a fixed humpback bridge, which was classified in 1987 as a Grade Il listed building. It is also crossed by the listed Stark's Bridge, currently undergoing restoration. Adjacent to Whixall is Whixall Moss, part of Fenn's, Whixall and Bettisfield Mosses National Nature Reserve, the third largest lowland raised bog in Britain, a rare habitat and the home of a number of rare species. The Shropshire Way long distance footpath runs through Whixall.

Soulton Hall
Soulton Hall

Soulton Hall is a Tudor country house near Wem, England. It was a 16th century architectural project of Sir Rowland Hill, publisher of the Geneva Bible. Hill was a statesman, polymath and philanthropist, later styled the "First Protestant Lord Mayor of London" because of his senior role in the Tudor statecraft that was needed to bring stability to England in the fall out of the Reformation. The building of the current Soulton Hall, undertaken during the tumult of the Reformation, is therefore associated with the political and social work required to incubate the subsequent English Renaissance.Soulton Hall is understood to be constructed in an elaborate set of humanist codes drawing together concepts from classical antiquity, geometry, philosophy and scripture. It is further understood that the building influenced the architecture of many later buildings of similar style.With a hidden chapel in its basement, a priesthole, and bookcases hidden within its thick walls to hide heretical documents, Soulton Hall is likely to have served as a base for the conspiracy which led to the publication of the Geneva Bible, which bears the name of Rowland Hill on its frontispiece as publisher.The grounds of the hall contain archaeology of a lost theatre. Emerging scholarship links the manor to Shakespeare, and in particular the play As You Like It which concerns the estate of a character called "Old Sir Rowland". Sir Rowland Hill was a cousin of Shakespeare's mother Mary Arden by reason of the marriage of his heiresses Elizabeth Corbett to Robert Arden in the 1580s.Mentioned in the Norman Domesday Book, Soulton has housed a manor since late Anglo Saxon times, and a "lost castle" rediscovered in 2021 undergoing a multi-season archaeological investigation by DigVentures. The modern manor incorporates a working farm pioneering various sustainable agriculture approaches, and also houses a series of contemporary monuments including standing stones and long barrow burial site.