Eccleshall - Places of Interest

Places of Interest

Holy Trinity Church dates from 1195. The tombs of five Bishops of Lichfield lie in the church, that of William Overton beside the altar being particularly notable.

Eccleshall Castle was the palace of the Bishop of Lichfield. The Domesday Book details that the Eccleshall estate had been given to the Bishop of Lichfield some time before the Norman Conquest, possibly as early as the 7th century. By the time Bishop John Lonsdale died in 1867 the lack of a railway was one of the main reasons that his successor Bishop Selwyn gave for the decision to sell the castle and thus sever the long association of Eccleshall with the Bishop of Lichfield. At the beginning of the last century the castle passed into the hands of the present owners, the Carter family (distant relations of former US President Jimmy Carter). The town itself was a relatively important market town by the time of the Wars of the Roses. In 1459, the castle was briefly a residence for the Queen, Margaret of Anjou, in her preparation for the Battle of Blore Heath, the site of which lies a few miles north of the town near Market Drayton. Later, the castle suffered damage during the English Civil War.

The restored Mill Meece Pumping Station is to the north of Eccleshall.