Places: Warmingham

WARMINGHAM 

This small parish was a rectory which comprised the townships of Warmingham, Tetton, Elton and Moston.

The advowson belonged to the owner of the manor of Warmingham which passed to the earls of Oxford at the end of the fifteenth century and was then sold to Sir Christopher Hatton in 1580. The gravestone of Henry Wegley (or Wigley), the rector instituted to the parish in 1654 and died in 1680 may still be seen set into a path around the church.

The medieval timber-framed parish church, of which nothing now survives, was rebuilt in brick and stone in 1715. The chancel and body of the church were rebuilt in 1797 and in 1870 the chancel, nave and transept were again reconstructed, leaving only the tower surviving from 1715, although that has some later alterations.

The sandstone base of a medieval cross still stands in the churchyard, topped by a later column which held a sundial at one time. A late sixteenth-century farmhouse, with later alterations and extensions, may still be seen opposite the church.

A single arch sandstone bridge, dating from about 1750, carries the road between Crewe and Middlewich past the church over the River Wheelock.

The area of the parish is still predominantly agricultural.

Sources

George Ormerod, The History of the County Palatine and City of Chester (second edition, revised and enlarged by T. Helsby, London, 1882), vol. 3, pp. 225-235