Market Bosworth, Leicestershire

Description
Market Bosworth, a market-town, a township, a parish, and the head of a union and county court district in Leicestershire. The town stands on an eminence, three-quarters of a mile E from the Ashby-de-la-Zouch Canal, 9 1/2 miles N from Nuneaton, 13 W from Leicester, and 113 from London. It has a station on the Ashby and Nuneaton Junction of the M.R. and L. & N.W.R., and a post, money order, and telegraph office under Nuneaton. Acreage of the township, 2716; population, 836. The parish also includes the townships and chapelries of Barlestone, Shenton, and Osbaston, and has an area of 7774 acres; population, 2348. The town is an agricultural centre, and brickmaking is carried on. A weekly market is held on Wednesday, and fairs for cattle are held on 8 May and 10 July. There is also a fortnightly sale for fat stock which is well attended. The manor from 1223 to 1554 was in the Harcourt family, when in the latter year it fell to the king, who gave it to the Hastings family, and in 1567 it was bought by the Dixie family, and is now the property of the Scotts. Bosworth Field, now a meadow, adjacent to the canal, 2 miles S of the town, was the scene of the defeat of Richard III. in 1485 by the Earl of Richmond, who mounted the throne as Henry VII.; a spring of water on it, at which the king is said to have drunk during the battle, and called King Dick's Well, is carefully preserved. This field was also the scene of a skirmish in 1644 between the Parliamentary and Royal forces. The town has a bank, a county court office, an endowed grammar school on a very ancient foundation, and a workhouse, erected in 1856, with accommodation for 200 inmates. A police station was erected in 1892 at a cost of £3000. The living is a rectory, with the chapelries of Barleston and Shenton annexed, in the diocese of Peterborough; gross value, £857 with residence. The church, dedicated to St Peter, is a building of stone in the Late Gothic style of the 14th century, consisting of chancel, nave, aisles, S porch, and an embattled tower with a lofty spire; it was restored in 1893, and contains a fine font and monuments of the Dixies. There are Baptist and Congregational chapels. Bosworth Hall is a fine mansion of red brick with stone dressings in the Queen Anne style, standing in a well-stocked deer park of about 400 acres. It was in this park that Richard III. raised his standard prior to the battle of Bosworth Field, and the spot is said to be marked by a clump of trees called Dick's Clump. Thomas Simpson, F.R.S., the mathematician, was a native of Market Bosworth, and Dr Johnson was for a short period an usher in the grammar school.