High Offley is a small 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
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, ...
, England. It lies 3 miles southwest of the small town of
Eccleshall
Eccleshall () is a town and civil parish in the Stafford district, in the county of Staffordshire, England. It is located seven miles northwest of Stafford, and six miles west-southwest of Stone. Eccleshall is twinned with Sancerre in France.
...
and about 1 mile west of the village of
Woodseaves
Woodseaves is a village in Staffordshire, England.
It lies in the civil parish of High Offley and is situated on the A519 ( Newport-Newcastle-under-Lyme) road and lies at the south-west end of the B5405 road, which leads to Great Bridgeford ...
, both on the
A519. Woodseaves is the largest settlement in the parish, which also includes the hamlet of
Shebdon to the WSW of High Offley, as well as a number of scattered houses and small farms (such as on Grub Street).
The
Shropshire Union Canal
The Shropshire Union Canal, sometimes nicknamed the "Shroppie", is a navigable canal in England. It is the modern name for a part of the Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company network. In the leisure age, two of the branches of that netwo ...
runs through the parish, to the southwest of the villages of High Offley and Woodseaves, with the Shebdon aqueduct and wharf in the west of the parish, from Shebdon towards
Knighton.
Church
There is a church dedicated to
St Mary
Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under various titles such as virgin or queen, many of them mentioned in the Litany of Loreto. ...
: ''"High Offley Church, St Mary, is an ancient
Gothic fabric, neatly pewed with oak. It has an excellent organ, which was given by John Salmon, Esq, of London, a native of this parish. It has several monuments of the Skrymsher and other families, and a handsome one was erected in 1851 in memory of the late Bishop Ryder, at the expense of the present vicar."''
Pevsner dates most of the church to the 13th century with some earlier
Norman
Norman or Normans may refer to:
Ethnic and cultural identity
* The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 9th and 10th centuries
** People or things connected with the Norma ...
features and some from later periods.
[Nikolaus Pevsner, ''The Buildings of England: Staffordshire,'' London: Penguin, 1974, p.145]
The core of the church dates from the 12th century, and features from the 13th century are still present, including the lower stages of the tower and the south
arcade
Arcade most often refers to:
* Arcade game, a coin-operated video, pinball, electro-mechanical, redemption, etc., game
** Arcade video game, a coin-operated video game
** Arcade cabinet, housing which holds an arcade video game's hardware
** Arcad ...
. Most of the rest of the church is from the 15th and 16th centuries and is
Perpendicular
In geometry, two geometric objects are perpendicular if they intersect at right angles, i.e. at an angle of 90 degrees or π/2 radians. The condition of perpendicularity may be represented graphically using the '' perpendicular symbol'', ⟠...
in style, including the
nave
The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...
,
chancel
In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the Choir (architecture), choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may termi ...
, and upper part of the tower. There was a limited 19th-century
restoration. which included the addition of a south porch. Inside the church, the nave roof is "an outstanding and well-preserved work of late-medieval carpentry", which includes
bosses carved with heads and foliage.
Public houses
High Offley once had a pub called the ''Royal Oak'', which has now been converted into a private residence. In the parish, near to the village on Peggs Lane, and lying by the Shropshire Union Canal, is the popular ''Anchor Inn''. Being a simple, traditional public house that has changed little in fifty years, it is very highly rated by the canal boating fraternity and many locals. It is regularly featured in the annual
CAMRA
The Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) is an independent voluntary consumer organisation headquartered in St Albans, which promotes real ale, real cider, cider and perry and traditional British pubs and clubs.
History
The organisation was founde ...
Good Beer Guide
The ''Good Beer Guide'' is a book published annually by the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA), listing what it considers to be the best 4,500 real ale outlets (pubs, clubs, and off-licences) in the United Kingdom.
Details
The content of the ''Guid ...
and has a small
gift shop
A gift shop or souvenir shop is a store primarily selling souvenirs, memorabilia, and other items relating to a particular topic or theme. The items sold often include coffee mugs, stuffed animals, toys, t-shirts, postcards, handmade collection ...
. It also gives its name to the adjacent bridge, which takes Peggs Lane over the canal.
CanalPlan
Anchor Bridge
Also within the parish is a pub in Woodseaves (the ''Cock Inn''), where there were previously also two more pubs (the ''Tavern'' and ''Plough'', the latter of which is currently closed, and the former was turned into a private residence in the late 1990s). There was previously one in the Shebdon area, also by the canal, called the ''Wharf Inn'' (now a private residence).
In literature
In Douglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adams (11 March 1952 – 11 May 2001) was an English author, humorist, and screenwriter, best known as the creator of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy''. Originally a 1978 BBC radio comedy, ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the ...
's '' Meaning of Liff'', a High Offley is defined as a "Goosnargh
Goosnargh ( ) is a village and civil parish in the City of Preston district of Lancashire, England.
The village lies between Broughton and Longridge, and mostly lies in the civil parish of Whittingham, although the ancient centre lies in ...
three weeks later".
See also
* Listed buildings in High Offley
References
External links
{{authority control
Villages in Staffordshire
Borough of Stafford
Civil parishes in Staffordshire