Woodhouses

Burntwood, Edjall and Woodhouses chapelry and township became part of Lichfield Union following the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834.

“Woodhouses presumably originated as a clearing in the woodland, and the place name 'Wodehousleye' is found in the area in 1374. Woodhouse green was mentioned in 1433. Settlement spread along Woodhouses Road, with two open fields to the east extending to the township boundary along Grange Lane. There was a farm at Hilltop on the Woodhouses side of Grange Lane by the early 17th century; the name Hilltop was in use in 1693. Woodhouse Lane, formerly called Pinfold Lane and Green Lane, was probably the road described in 1656 as the common road from Pipe-Woodhouses to Cannock heath. A county lunatic asylum was opened in 1864 on Hobstone Hill north-west of Woodhouses. A way at Hobbestone mentioned in 1392 may have been the Hobbestone Lane of 1571 and the Hobstone Hill Lane which runs south-east from Cresswell Green along the parish boundary. Spade Green on the boundary further south-east was mentioned in 1538 and was an inhabited area by 1690 when Spade Green House was mentioned. Thirteen poplars were planted at Spade Green to commemorate the battle of Waterloo; the last was cut down in 1930". ['Townships: Burntwood', A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 14: Lichfield (1990), pp. 195-205]

"Burntwood, Edjall, and Woodhouses, are three hamlets of straggling houses, forming a joint township and chapelry (of Lichfield), on the eastern side of Cannock Chase, extending from one and a half to three miles W of Lichfield. Burntwood contains 709 acres and 426 souls, Edjall, 360 acres and 98 souls, and Woodhouses, 1389 acres and 225 souls. The Marquis of Anglesey is lord of the manor of Burntwood, and has a paramount jurisdiction in Edjall and Woodhouses, of which SP Wolverstan, Esq, is the mesne lord. On the Chase is an extensive rabbit-warren, with a neat house called Coney Lodge. Maplehayes, the seat of JP Shaw, Esq, and Pipe Hall, an ancient manor house, now occupied by a farmer, are in the hamlet of Woodhouses, as also is Ashenbrook, an ancient farmhouse with some curious relics of stained glass in its windows. Not far from these is Edjall Hall, a good square brick mansion, with a cupola and balustrades, celebrated as the house which that eminent lexicographer, Samuel Johnson, LLD, opened an academy in 1736. It is now a farmhouse". [History, Gazetteer and Directory of Staffordshire, William White, Sheffield, 1851]