Origins
Acknowledgement: Mike Guy
Saxon origins
Buildwas was formerly known as West Coppice and derives its name from the Saxon words beild or belde (a shelter), and (water). The earliest mention of West Coppice or Buildwas Park in the Shrewsbury Library.
Surrounded as it is on three sides by hills and on the fourth by the river its name is appropriate.
In the time of Edward the Confessor and also in the Domesday book, the manor of Beldewas belonging to the Bishop of Chester and was worth forty five shillings. It was a manor of one hide. In the demesne were two ploughs and three villains with the Provost had three ploughs. There were five serfs, a mill and woodland for 200 pigs.
The Lacon Family
In the 17th century, West Coppice was the residence of the Lacons an illegitimate branch of the Lacons of Willey . It was purchased probably about 1610 from Edward Grey, grandson of Edward Lord Powis, by Lancelot Lacon. Lancelot is named in the Lacon pedigree drawn up in 1547 and preserved at Kinlet as a “bastard sonne to Edward Lacon”.
Lancelot’s son Silvanus married Grace widow of Francis Harnage of Belswardine and daughter of Edward Littleton. Their son James Lacon, who was aged 20 at the visitation of 1623 is described as 'of West Coppice' and was buried at Leighton (or at Buildwas) in June 1667.
He was succeeded by John, who died in 1676 and he by another John Lacon.
Richard Lacon Esq, of ye West Coppice was buried at Sheinton in November 1718 and his burial is the latest entry of this Family. There are about 20 entries relating to the Lacons of West Coppice in the registers of Buildwas, Leighton and Sheinton.
One of James Lacon’s daughters Anne, left a bequest in 1700 to the poor of these three parishes.
Around 1720, one Samuel Edwards purchased West Coppice from the Lacons and on his death it was bought by Walter Acton Moseley in the year 1746.
West Coppice in its early years was a large area both sides of the river run by the Abbots of the Abbey. It was later split two separate entities until the purchase by the Moseleys.
Role in the English Civil War
Buildwas during the Civil war was a garrisoned as a blockhouse for the King. Local tradition says that it was bombarded by the Parliamentarians from the Beeches (or Brooks Hill) which is half a mile to the South-west.
Perfect Occurrences of August the 20th - 27th 1645 mentions Buildwas as one of the twenty garrisons taken by the Shropshire Committee from the King. Dugdales diary states that “a party of horse of the rebels from Wemm, past Buildwas bridge (under pretence of being the Kings forces) surprised Sir Thomas Eyton at his own house and in their return took away the guard at the same bridge”.
A number of cannon balls have from time to time been dug up in the precincts of the Abbey. (The above relates to Buildwas Abbey but the Beeches wood is on the Buildwas Estate.
The Childe Family
This place formed a portion of the Willey Estates of the Lacons and here resided in 1700 Sir William Lacon Childe, a Master of Chancery. He was the eldest son of William Childe, also Master of Chancery. He married Ann, daughter and heir of Rowland Lacon of Kinlet. He was not on good terms with his father, who seemed to have promoted the interests of his younger brother Thomas. He was born in 1644 and died in 1719, when he was succeeded by his nephew William Lacon Childe M.P.
Sir William founded the “Childe’s School at Cleobury Mortimer in 1714.
The Smithman Family
The Smithmans were for some time tenants of this property. John Smithman served the office of Sherriff in 1761 and resided here until his death in 1809 and his widow Margaret until her death in February 1818.
Col Crichton-Browne and the twentieth century
In the sales in 1928 and 1929 the estate was sold off in small lots.
Col Crichton-Browne bought the Hall, parkland and some farms. He added portions of land which rounded the estate off into an estimated 2210 acres and remained this way until his death, when he passed the estate to his Grandson Roderick Alan Bayliss.
Roderick ran the estate with the help of his wife until the whole estate was sold in the 1940’s to Fredrick William Carder.
Mike Guy (website edit Chris Hardwick)
