Description
Coleford, a small market and mining town and an ecclesiastical parish in the parish of Newland, Gloucestershire. The town stands in Dean Forest, near Offa's Dyke and the river Wye, 5 miles ESE of Monmouth, and 9 W of Newnham. It has a station on the Wye Valley and Coleford branch of the G.W.R., and on the Severn and Wye and Severn Bridge-railway. It consists chiefly of four main streets, is governed by a local board of 9 members, and is a seat of petty sessions. It has a head post office and a town-hall, the basement of which is used as a market-house. A market is held on Friday, and a cattle market on the third Tuesday in each month, and a fair on 20 June. There is a grammar school, founded in 1626, and a cemetery. Two weekly newspapers are published. The ecclesiastical parish was constituted in 1872. Population, 4199. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Gloucester and Bristol; net value, £176 with residence. Patron, the Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol. The church was erected in 1880; only the tower of the former church still remains. There are Congregational, Baptist, and Wesleyan chapels. In the district are remains of ancient ironworks, vast caverns scooped out, in which Roman relics have been found, and tools of Anglo-Norman date are fre' quently found in pits at a considerable depth.
Villages, Hamlets, &c.
Berry Hill, a suburb of the town of Coleford, Gloucestershire, in the Forest of Dean, forming with Joyford, Hillers-land, and Lane Ends an ecclesiastical parish. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Gloucester and Bristol; net value, £141. Patron, the Crown. The church was enlarged in 1885.
