Curborough and Elmhurst is a
civil parish
In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
in
Lichfield District
Lichfield () is a local government district in Staffordshire, England. It is administered by Lichfield District Council, based in Lichfield.
The dignity and privileges of the City of Lichfield are vested in the parish council of the 14 km² ...
,
Staffordshire, England. The hamlets of Curborough and
Elmhurst, that make up the parish, lie just north of the
City of Lichfield
Lichfield () is a cathedral city and civil parish in Staffordshire, England. Lichfield is situated roughly south-east of the county town of Stafford, south-east of Rugeley, north-east of Walsall, north-west of Tamworth and south-west of ...
, and are separated from each other by the
West Coast Main Line
The West Coast Main Line (WCML) is one of the most important railway corridors in the United Kingdom, connecting the major cities of London and Glasgow with branches to Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Edinburgh. It is one of the busiest ...
. The
parish council is a joint one with
Farewell and Chorley. Curborough's name derives from
Old English
Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th c ...
. The words for mill stream in Old English were 'cweorn burna,' and likely referred to Curborough brook.
Geography
The northern, eastern and southern boundaries of Curborough and
Elmhurst run along Full, Curborough and Circuit Brooks, the western boundary runs partly along Bilson Brook, and partly along the
A51.
The subsoil is
Keuper Marl Keuper marl is a former and now deprecated term for multiple layers of mudstone and siltstone of Triassic age which occur beneath parts of the English Midlands and neighbouring areas e.g. Cheshire, Nottinghamshire, Devon, eastern Worcestershire ...
(Mercia Mudstone) with a band of Keuper Sandstone (Bromsgrove Sandstone) along the western boundary. There are stretches of
Alluvium
Alluvium (from Latin ''alluvius'', from ''alluere'' 'to wash against') is loose clay, silt, sand, or gravel that has been deposited by running water in a stream bed, on a floodplain, in an alluvial fan or beach, or in similar settings. ...
along Full, Curborough and Bilson Brooks. The land lies at its highest in the south where Binns Farm stands at 387 ft (118m). It falls away steeply on the north to Bilson Brook. On the east it slopes down more gently to 246 ft (75m) on the northern boundary near New Farm and to 231 ft (70m) on the eastern boundary at Curborough Farm.
History
An early resident of Curborough was Dr. Zachary Babington,
prebendary
A prebendary is a member of the Roman Catholic or Anglican clergy, a form of canon with a role in the administration of a cathedral or collegiate church. When attending services, prebendaries sit in particular seats, usually at the back of th ...
of Curborough in 1584 and later
precentor
A precentor is a person who helps facilitate worship. The details vary depending on the religion, denomination, and era in question. The Latin derivation is ''præcentor'', from cantor, meaning "the one who sings before" (or alternatively, "first ...
of
Lichfield Cathedral
Lichfield Cathedral is an Anglican cathedral in Lichfield, Staffordshire, England, one of only three cathedrals in the United Kingdom with three spires (together with Truro Cathedral and St Mary's Cathedral in Edinburgh), and the only medie ...
and
diocesan chancellor. Babington built an estate called Curborough Hall, where he died in 1613. His son William, a lawyer married to Ellen (Littleton) Babington, succeeded him to Curborough Hall estate and farm, and was in turn succeeded by a son Zachary, a lawyer with a practice at Lichfield. The Curborough Hall estate later fell to three heiresses of the Babington family, one of whom married
Theophilus Levett, town clerk of Lichfield, whose son
John Levett, briefly an
MP inherited the home. By 1925, the last of the Levett heirs, Theophilus Basil Percy Levett, sold the farm out of the family.
A History of the County of Stafford, Vol. 14, M.W. Greenslade (ed.), 1990, British History Online
/ref>
References
{{Lichfield (district)
Civil parishes in Staffordshire