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Tong is a village and
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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...
in
Shropshire Shropshire (; abbreviated SalopAlso used officially as the name of the county from 1974–1980. The demonym for inhabitants of the county "Salopian" derives from this name.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West M ...
, also bordering
Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation ''Staffs''.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the north-west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, ...
in
England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
. It is located between the towns of
Shifnal Shifnal () is a market town and civil parish in Shropshire, England, about east of Telford, 17 miles (27 km) east of Shrewsbury and 13 miles (20 km) west-northwest of Wolverhampton. It is near the M54 motorway and A5 (road), A5 road ...
, Newport and
Brewood Brewood is an ancient market town in the civil parish of Brewood and Coven, in the South Staffordshire district, in the county of Staffordshire, England. Brewood lies near the River Penk, north of Wolverhampton and south of Stafford. Brewoo ...
. It is near junction 3 of the
M54 motorway The M54 is a east-west motorway in the counties of Shropshire and Staffordshire, England. It is also referred to as the Telford motorway, after the road's primary westbound destination, the town of Telford. It cost £65 million to construc ...
and
A41 road The A41 is a trunk road between London and Birkenhead, England. Now in parts replaced by motorways, it passes through or near Watford, Kings Langley, Hemel Hempstead, Aylesbury, Bicester, Solihull, Birmingham, West Bromwich, Wolverhampton, New ...
. The population of the village which was included in the civil parish at the 2011 census was 243. The village is also near to Weston Park and the village of Weston-under-Lizard.


Etymology

The name of the village derives from the
Old English Old English ( or , or ), 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 developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...
''Tweonga'', which means a pinched piece or spit of land; cf.
tongs Tongs are a type of tool used to grip and lift objects instead of holding them directly with hands. There are many forms of tongs adapted to their specific use. Design variations include resting points so that the working end of the tongs d ...
. This stems from the fact that Tong sits between two tributaries of the infant River Worfe.


History

In the 1840s, Tong was surveyed by two different railway companies. The Shrewsbury and Wolverhampton Railway was eventually driven further south to run through Ruckley and Neachley (just south of the M54), whilst the Shrewsbury and Leicester Direct Railway, which would have gone in a north-east to south-west direction between Tong and Tong Norton, was never built. The village lies just to the north of the M54 in Shropshire. The
A41 road The A41 is a trunk road between London and Birkenhead, England. Now in parts replaced by motorways, it passes through or near Watford, Kings Langley, Hemel Hempstead, Aylesbury, Bicester, Solihull, Birmingham, West Bromwich, Wolverhampton, New ...
used to run through the village, but after heavy traffic and the death of a child under a lorry, the village was bypassed in 1963.


Escape of Charles II

In "White-ladies," one of the "Boscobel Tracts" that describe the events of the escape of Charles II from England after the
Battle of Worcester The Battle of Worcester took place on 3 September 1651 in and around the city of Worcester, England and was the last major battle of the 1642 to 1651 Wars of the Three Kingdoms. A Parliamentarian army of around 28,000 under Oliver Cromwell def ...
(3 September 1651), there is a statement that
Charles Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English language, English and French language, French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic, Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''* ...
, while sheltering at Boscobel House about two miles away, "had the pleasure of a prospect from Tong to Breewood (''sic''), which satisfied the eyes, and of the famous bells at Tong, which entertained the ear." The bells he heard were the bells of St. Bartholomew's. During the escape Charles also spent the night of 4/5 September 1651 at Hobbal Grange in the parish of Tong as a guest of Richard Penderel.


Church

The village is remarkable mainly for its church,
St Bartholomew Bartholomew was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Most scholars today identify Bartholomew as Nathanael, who appears in the Gospel of John (1:45–51; cf. 21:2). New Testament references The name ''Bartholomew ...
s, inside of which is the supposed grave of Little Nell, a
fiction Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying character (arts), individuals, events, or setting (narrative), places that are imagination, imaginary or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent ...
al character in
Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English novelist, journalist, short story writer and Social criticism, social critic. He created some of literature's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by ...
's book, ''
The Old Curiosity Shop ''The Old Curiosity Shop'' is the fourth novel by English author Charles Dickens; being one of his two novels (the other being ''Barnaby Rudge'') published along with short stories in his weekly serial ''Master Humphrey's Clock'', from 1840 t ...
''. It is thought that Dickens visited Tong church. His grandmother is supposed to have worked at Tong Castle many years before as a girl. The Castle (demolished in 1954) stood to the south; its site is now occupied by the M54 motorway. The 'grave' is thought to have come about because Charles Dickens's novel was serialised and shipped over to
America The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
, and as a result, Americans began coming over to England to visit scenes featured in the book. The
tourist Tourism is travel for pleasure, and the commercial activity of providing and supporting such travel. UN Tourism defines tourism more generally, in terms which go "beyond the common perception of tourism as being limited to holiday activity on ...
s recognised the references to Tong church from the book and came to view the supposed 'grave', which of course was not there. However, a verger and village
postmaster A postmaster is the head of an individual post office, responsible for all postal activities in a specific post office. When a postmaster is responsible for an entire mail distribution organization (usually sponsored by a national government), ...
, George H. Boden (16 August 1856 - May 1943) apparently asked local people to pay for a
headstone A gravestone or tombstone is a marker, usually stone, that is placed over a grave. A marker set at the head of the grave may be called a headstone. An especially old or elaborate stone slab may be called a funeral stele, stela, or slab. The u ...
, forged an entry in the church register of burials (apparently the giveaway was that he used
post office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...
ink to do this), and charged people to see the 'grave'. The marker has been moved from time to time to make way for genuine graves. A particularly notable feature of St. Bartholomew's is the collection of
memorials A memorial is an object or place which serves as a focus for the memory or the commemoration of something, usually an influential, deceased person or a historical, Tragedy (event), tragic event. Popular forms of memorials include landmark objec ...
to the Vernon family and other proprietors of the Tong estate inside the church. St. Bartholomew's was chosen by
Simon Jenkins Sir Simon David Jenkins FLSW (born 10 June 1943) is a British author, a newspaper columnist and editor. He was editor of the ''Evening Standard'' from 1976 to 1978 and of ''The Times'' from 1990 to 1992. Jenkins chaired the National Trust f ...
of ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...
'' in 1999 as one of the best 1,000 churches (out of 15,000) in England. He awarded the church, which was mostly rebuilt in 1409, three stars out of a possible five. He refers to the collection of village tombs, the masterpiece of which being that of Richard Vernon, who died in 1451. Most of the earlier ones are carved from
alabaster Alabaster is a mineral and a soft Rock (geology), rock used for carvings and as a source of plaster powder. Archaeologists, geologists, and the stone industry have different definitions for the word ''alabaster''. In archaeology, the term ''alab ...
, and are the products of the top end of the nearby late medieval Nottingham alabaster industry.


Gallery

File:Tong St Bart - Isabel de Lingen and Fulke de Pembrugge 01.JPG, Isabel de Lingen (died 1446) and her third husband, Fulke de Pembrugge (died 1409). Isabel founded the
chantry A chantry is an ecclesiastical term that may have either of two related meanings: # a chantry service, a set of Christian liturgical celebrations for the dead (made up of the Requiem Mass and the Office of the Dead), or # a chantry chapel, a b ...
and
college A college (Latin: ''collegium'') may be a tertiary educational institution (sometimes awarding degrees), part of a collegiate university, an institution offering vocational education, a further education institution, or a secondary sc ...
at Tong for her own and her husbands' souls. It became the shrine church of the Vernon family of Haddon Hall. File:Tong St Bart - Benedicta de Ludlow and Richard Vernon 02.JPG, Richard Vernon (died 1451, foreground) and Benedicta de Ludlow. Through their marriage the Vernons of Haddon Hall obtained Tong. Tomb in St Bartholomew's Church, Tong, Shropshire. Richard was Speaker of the House of Commons in 1432 and 1433. File:Tong St Bart - Benedicta de Ludlow and Richard Vernon 01.JPG, Benedicta de Ludlow (foreground) and Richard Vernon (died 1451). This tomb has the most impressive sculpture at Tong. File:Tong St Bart - Anne Talbot and Henry Vernon 01.JPG, Tomb of Anne Talbot (died 1494) and Henry Vernon (died 1515). Henry was put in charge of Catherine of Aragon and Arthur, Prince of Wales by Henry VII and was with them when Arthur died at Ludlow in 1502. File:Tong St Bart - Arthur Vernon 01.JPG, Arthur Vernon, priest and son of Anne Talbot and Henry Vernon, in the robes of a University of Cambridge MA, on his tomb in the floor of the Golden Chapel at Tong. File:Tong St Bart - Arthur Vernon 02.JPG, Arthur Vernon portrayed preaching in the Golden Chapel at Tong. File:Tong St Bart - Margaret Dymmok and Richard Vernon 01.JPG, Margaret Dymmok and Richard Vernon (died 1517). After his death, Margaret married Sir Richard Manners. File:Tong St Bart - Margaret Vernon and Thomas Stanley 01.JPG, Margaret Vernon and Thomas Stanley (died 1576). George Vernon, son of Richard and Margaret, died without male heir. He left his estates to his daughters: Haddon to Dorothy and Tong to Margaret, who married Stanley, the second son of Edward Stanley, 3rd Earl of Derby. Part of a double family tomb. File:Tong St Bart - Edward Stanley 01.JPG, Edward Stanley (died 1632), last of the Vernon heirs to own Tong, which he sold to Thomas Harries about 1630. He was the father of
Venetia Stanley Venetia Anastasia, Lady Digby ( Stanley; December 1600 – 1 May 1633) was a celebrated beauty of the Stuart period (England), Stuart period and the wife of a prominent courtier and scientist, Sir Kenelm Digby. She was a granddaughter of Tho ...
, a famous courtesan of the early 17th century. Lower tier of a double family tomb. File:Tong St Bart - Ann Wylde 01.JPG, Memorial to Ann Wylde, daughter of Thomas Harries of Tong, who died in childbirth, aged 16, in 1624. File:Tong St Bart - George Durant 01.JPG, Memorial to George Durant (1731–1780), who bought the Tong estate in 1764.


Tong Castle

Tong Castle was a large mostly Gothic country house, set within a park landscaped by
Capability Brown Lancelot "Capability" Brown (born c. 1715–16, baptised 30 August 1716 – 6 February 1783) was an English gardener and landscape architect, a notable figure in the history of the English landscape garden style. Unlike other architects ...
, on the site of a medieval castle of the same name. Tong Castle's remains are now a Historic England Grade II listed site.


Potential New Town Development

Since 2018, Bradford Estates, who own land around Tong and surrounding villages in the area, have been promoting a new settlement proposal to
Shropshire Council Shropshire Council, known between 1980 and 2009 as Shropshire County Council and prior to 1980 as Salop County Council, is the Local government in England, local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Shropshire (district), Shropshire in t ...
to build an employment park creating 9,000 jobs, up to 3,000 homes with a village centre, medical facility, school and four public parks on land on west side of the A41 bounded by the M54, A5 and Lizard Hill. Some local residents formed an action group to stop the plans, including a local MP, Mark Pritchard. The proposal was eventually rejected in 2020 by Shropshire Council, but Bradford Estates are still continuing with the proposal in light of the need regionally for jobs and homes; later that year, a fresh consultation on the plans was renewed and is still ongoing.


See also

* Listed buildings in Tong, Shropshire


References


External links

{{authority control Villages in Shropshire Civil parishes in Shropshire