THE County of STAFFORD is situated near the centre of the Kingdom: bounded on the north-west by Cheshire, from which county it is separated by the river Dane; on the north and north-east by Derbyshire, the Dove dividing it from that county; on the south-east by Worcestershire & Warwickshire; and on the west by Shropshire. It is fifty-five miles in length, at its extreme points from north to south-west; its greatest breadth is about thirty-three miles, and its circumference about one hundred and fifty; its area containing about eleven hundred and forty-eight square miles.

Section from Pigot & Co's map of Staffordshire (1840), centered on Cannock Chase.

NAME and ANCIENT HISTORY. - This county obtained its appellation from Stafford, the county town; but how that name originated has not been stated with sufficient perspicuity to authorise implicit credence to attach to the opinions upon the subject: it is said by some to have been derived from the river Sow having in former times been forded at this place by means of a staff. At the time of the Conquest the town of Stafford was one of some importance; for in Domesday-book it is termed a 'City,' in which the King had eighteen burgesses belonging to him; and there were twenty mansions of the Honour of the Earl of Mercia. The ancient and small city of Lichfield is famous for its beautiful Cathedral, adorned with rich painted windows - its finely sculptured western front exhibiting all the majesty of the pointed order: Dr. Wilkes dates the foundation of this noble edifice as far back as the year 657; but the origin of the city has occasioned much learned controversy, and a great difference of opinion among antiquaries: Bede, one of our most ancient writers, calls it Lich-field - that is, 'the field of the dead,' from a tradition that a thousand British Christians suffered martyrdom here in the time of the Emperor Dioclesian; other controversialists say it was named by the Saxons Licet-feld, from its then marshy situation. But, whatever may have been the origin of the city, it derived its first importance from the Mercian Kings, and was erected into a Bishoprick by Oswy in the year 665; Offa, King of Mercia, in 785, exalting it to an Archiepiscopal See. Tamworth is a town possessing some interest, and is one of considerable antiquity; it was almost totally destroyed by the Danes about the commencement of the tenth century; but Ethelfleda, daughter of Alfred the Great, having been successful against these invaders in 914, and driven them out of the country, rebuilt the town, and erected a strong castle: this castle, with the adjacent territory, was granted by William the Conqueror to Robert Marmion, Lord of Fontenoy, in Normandy. The chief military transactions connected with the history of this county occurred at Blore Heath, near Drayton, and at Hopton Heath, near Stafford: in the former, the Lancastrians were defeated by the Yorkists; and in the latter, the Royalists defeated the Parliamentary forces, in the reign of Charles I.

SOIL and CLIMATE, PRODUCE and MANUFACTURES. - The northern part, called 'the Moorlands' is hilly, much resembling the adjacent districts of Derbyshire; and is a bleak, wild and dreary tract, in some parts of an elevation of fifteen hundred feet above the Trent - the soil being thin, and yielding but a scanty pasture. The valley along the Trent is mostly very fertile, adorned with seats and plantations, and affords a variety of beautiful prospects. The middle and southern parts of this county are generally level or with only gentle eminences, agreeably diversified with wood, pasture and arable land (the latter portion greatly predominating), and have a depth of rich loamy soil. The great forest of Cannock, near the centre, once covered with oaks, has long been dismantled of its wood, and is now a naked expanse. At the southern extremity, the Clent Hills, Hagley and its neighbourhood, are well known for the romantic beauties they possess. - The CLIMATE of Staffordshire is considered not unhealthy, though it may be deemed inclining to wet, especially in the northern part of the county; probably arising from a ridge of mountainous land lying to the west, which attracts the clouds in their passage. The air of the county is sharp, and more severely cold than in many other counties. - The AGRICULTURE and FARMING STOCK of Staffordshire have, within the last half century, undergone material improvement; whilst, on the rich lands bordering on the Trent, the dairy has become a source of considerable profit, and much good cheese and butter are made in that district. Although agricultural produce is a valuable auxiliary in promoting the prosperity of this county, yet its subterranean riches are of still higher importance to its welfare, as being the grand materiel employed in its principle manufactures. Coal is abundant in many parts, supplying the numerous iron works and manufacturies, while the Moorlands contain beneath, beside coal, a store of mineral wealth, yielding lead, copper, iron, marble, alabaster, mill-stones and salt: fullers' earth is also found in this county, - pipe clay, and red and yellow ochres, in various parts; besides a blue clay, of great tenacity, and fire-proof, suited for the composition of pots for glass-houses; and potters' clay for more common purposes, in different districts, particularly Newcastle-under-Lyme. Lime-stone and iron ore are common in several places; copper and lead ore, varying greatly in purity and worth, occasionally also appears. Quarries of marble, different in colour, strength and beauty, and of various other kinds of stone of great value and utility are plenteous. - The MANUFACTURES of this county are various; but its principal one, and for which it has long been deservedly celebrated, is its POTTERY. The chief station at which this branch of industry is carried on is in the neighbourhood of Newcastle, where it is almost the sole employment of a line of populous villages, extending ten miles: these are situated in a country full of coal, and nearly in the heart of England, with every part of which they have a navigable communication. These manufactures give employment to perhaps twenty thousand people in the county; and the operations of digging and collecting the clay, flint, terra porcellana &c., in Kent, Sussex, Hampshire, Dorsetshire, Devonshire and Cornwall, and conveying them to the adjacent ports, are supposed to employ nearly forty thousand more, besides upwards of sixty thousand tons of shipping. Here are likewise iron works; and, in the southern extremity of the county, Walsall, Wolverhampton, Wednesbury, Darlaston, &c. &c. participate with Birmingham in the manufacture of different descriptions of hardware. The town of Stafford has long been famed for its manufacture of shoes, which employs a great number of hands: At Rugeley and Newcastle hats are manufactured, and at Leek various articles in the silk trade; at Fazeley are cotton spinning factories, and extensive bleaching works, - the woollen trade likewise thrives here; at Tipton and West Bromwich are inexhaustible coal mines and iron works, with blast furnaces of great magnitude.

RIVERS and CANALS. - The principal rivers of Staffordshire are the TRENT, the DOVE, the BLYTHE, the SOW, the PENK, the CHURNET, the TAME and the STOUR; there are also some other smaller streams that water the county, as the Hamps or Hanse, the llet and the Smetstall. The Trent rises in the north-west part of the county, and passes the town of Stone; at Great Haywood it receives the waters of the Sow, at Kings Bromley those of the Blythe, and at Wichnor it is further augmented by the Tame; it then flows past the town of Burton, about two miles beyond which it receives the Dove, when it leaves the county. The Dove rises on the borders of Derbyshire, and unites with the Trent near Newton Solney, being in its whole course a boundary between this county and Derbyshire. The Blythe has its origin about five miles north-west from Cheadle, in this county, and joins the Trent near Kings Bromley. The Sow has its source three miles south-west from Newcastle, and, after visiting the county town, is augmented by the Penk, and falls into the Trent opposite Great Haywood. The Penk rises about five miles from Rugeley, and after passing Penkridge is lost in the Sow, a little below Stafford. The Churnet springs about four miles north-west from Leek, and falls into the Dove near Doveridge, in Derbyshire. The Tame enters this county at Tamworth, and running north falls into the Trent at Wichnor. The Stour rises in Shropshire, and runs through the south angle of this county in its course to join the Severn in Worcestershire. The CANALS intersecting the county are very numerous; they are, the 'Trent and Mersey,' the 'Staffordshire and Worcestershire,' the 'Stourbridge,' the 'Birmingham Canal Navigation,' the 'Dudley Canal, and 'Dudley extension,' the 'Wyrley and Easington,' the 'Fazeley,' 'Sir Nigel B. Gresley's,' the 'Newcastle-under-Lyme,' and the 'Caldon Branch.'

CIVIL and ECCLESIASTICAL DIVISIONS. - Staffordshire is in the Province of Canterbury, and Diocese of Lichfield and Coventry; is included in the Oxford Circuit, and divided into five hundreds, viz. CUTTLESTON, OFFLOW, PIREHILL, SEISDON and TOTMONSLOW; these are subdivided into one hundred and forty-five parishes, containing collectively one city (Lichfield), one county town (Stafford), and eighteen other market towns. The whole county returns ten Members to Parliament, viz. two each for LICHFIELD, NEWCASTLE-UNDER-LYME, STAFFORD, TAMWORTH, and two for the SHIRE.

POPULATION. - According to the census of 1821, there were houses inhabited in the county, 63,319; uninhabited, 2,326; and houses building, 429. The number of families then resident in the county was 68,780; comprising 171,668 males, and 169,372 females; total, 341,040: and by a calculation made by order of Government, which included persons in the army and navy for which was added after the ratio of about one to thirty prior to the year 1811, and one to fifty for that year and the census of 1821, to the returns made from the several districts; the population of the county, in round numbers, in the year 1700, was 117,200 - in 1750, 160,000 - in 1801, 247,100 - in 1811, 304,000 - and in 1821, 347,900. The increased population in the 50 years, from the year 1700, was 42,800 - from 1750 to 1801, the increase was 87,100 - from 1801 to 1811, the increase was 56,900 - and from 1811 to 1821, the augmented number of persons was 43,900: the grand total increase in the population of the county from the year 1700 to the census of 1821, being about 230,700 persons.

Index of Distances from Town to Town in the County of Stafford