Description:Burntwood is situated to the west of Lichfield and comprises Burntwood itself, Woodhouses and Ediall, all early settlements, and also Chasetown and Chase Terrace, which developed in the 19th century. It was formerly a township of the parish of Lichfield St Michael and became a civil parish in its own right in 1866.
The name ‘Brendewode’ was in use by the 13th century and its meaning is obvious. It may be derived from the general burning of woodland to clear land for agricultural use or from a deliberate act of burning which was recorded in 1262.
Originally the whole of the township lay within the part of Cannock Forest which, in the 13th century, was to become Cannock Chase. By the mid 12th century there was a settlement and manor house at Pipe. Ediall and Woodhouses also developed from mediaeval settlements. The open field system of agriculture was still in evidence around Woodhouses and Ediall in the 18th century. In 1666, 29 people were assessed for the hearth tax in Burntwood, with the largest two houses being occupied by William Cotton and William Howersby. Agriculture remained the predominant industry until the 19th century. In Ediall there were 16 households assessed for the tax and 15 in Woodhouses.
Ediall Hall housed the academy which Samuel Johnson started for a short time in 1736 with David Garrick as one of his pupils.
Mining was to transform the area in the second half of the 19th century. At the Eastern Boundary Fault of the Cannock Chase Coalfield near Norton Pool, the Marquess of Anglesey began to develop large-scale mining from the 1840s. The first pit, the Marquess Pit, was sunk in 1849. This was followed in 1852 by the opening of the Uxbridge Pit. The accompanying development of canals and railways in the area encouraged Richard Chawner and John Robinson McClean to take on the lease of the colliery in 1854.
The villages of Chasetown, known first by the name of Cannock Chase, and Chase Terrace grew up as a result of the opening up of these and two other pits in the area to provide housing, shops and schools for mining families. The name, Chasetown, had been adopted by 1867.
Christ Church, Burntwood, was designed by Joseph Potter of Lichfield in the Gothic style and was consecrated in 1820. St Anne’s church at Chasetown was consecrated in 1865. The cost of building it was borne by J.R McClean. The church is built of polychrome brick and designed in the Romanesque style and is thought to be the first church to be lit by electricity , supplied from the Cannock Chase Colliery Company’s No 2 pit.
Roman Catholicism had a particular focus in the area as the lords of the manor of Pipe, the Heveninghams, the Simeons and the Welds were all Roman Catholics. There was a private chapel and resident priest at Pipe Hall from the 1770s until 1800. Irish immigrants to Chasetown in the later 19th century were instrumental in raising money for the building of St Joseph’s church.
There is early evidence of nonconformity in Burntwood in the 17th century when a Quaker is recorded there. A Congregational preaching house was opened at Burntwood Green in 1808. The Primitive Methodists had a chapel there in 1846 and the Wesleyan Methodists met in Chasetown from 1860.
Education was provided in the area from an early date when money was left by Elizabeth Ball to provide teaching for poor children in Fulfen, Burntwood, Ediall and Woodhouses. Eventually this early school was to become a National school until 1879 when it was closed. A school run by the Burntwood School Board was opened in 1879. It later became a council school, eventually closing in 1988. The Cannock Chase Colliery Company provided schooling for the children of its employees and had built a school by 1861. This later became a council school. A number of schools, including secondary schools, were opened from the 1930s onwards by the County Council. As in many mining areas of the county, further education was also much in evidence with a mining institute opened in Chasetown in 1913,
A race meeting began on the heath in 1835 and was a regular occurrence until 1854. The course was in the Spring Hill area and has now been built over. There were a number of sporting and other leisure activities in Burntwood and Chasetown in the 19th and 20th centuries. Steamer trips on Norton Pool, now known as Chasewater, attracted visitors as early as 1899.
One of the three county asylums was opened in Burntwood in 1864, later called St Matthews Hospital. Between 1940 and 1947 there was an emergency hospital on the same site. Its earliest patients were sick and wounded soldiers form the Dunkirk evacuation.
For more information about Burntwood, see the Victoria County History Staffordshire, Volume XIV, pp195-228. Reprint available from Staffordshire Record Office, <a href="http://www.staffordshire.gov.uk/leisure/archives/services/publications/VCHReprints.htm" target="_blank">Victoria County History Reprints
</a>