Winwick (Cheshire)

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Winwick is a civil parish in north east England. Historically it belongs to the county of Lancashire . Winwick has been part of the Warrington Unitary Authority since 1974 and is nominally part of Cheshire . In 2001 Winwick had 4,366 residents.

history

The foundation of the village probably dates back to pre-Christian times. The parish of the Anglican St. Oswald Church states that the current church building probably stands on the site of a pagan cult site. The transverse beam of an Anglo-Saxon stone cross dated to 750 is installed as a ledge in one of the church windows, so that it can be assumed that the first church stood at this point as early as the early Middle Ages. According to local legend, the Battle of Maserfield (642), in which King Oswald of Northumbria was killed, was fought near Winwick, but there is some evidence that the battlefield is more near Oswestry in Shropshire. The Gothic parish church is also consecrated to Oswald, the oldest walls of which date from the 13th century and have undergone many additions and renovations since then. The history of the parish of Winwick is marked by its changing benefactors , the sequence of which can be traced back to 1191. In the English Civil War two battles were fought at Winwick, from which the English Puritans emerged victorious. Colonel Assheton put spleens loyal to the King to flight here on May 23, 1643, and on August 19, 1648 an army of the New Model Army under the command of Oliver Cromwell defeated the Scottish army under the Duke of in one of the last skirmishes of the Battle of Preston Hamilton .

St. Oswald Church

St. Oswald Church

Some works of art - including the aforementioned Anglo-Saxon stone cross and statues of Saints Oswald and Antonius - fell victim to the iconoclasm of the Puritans , but some remarkable testimonies of medieval art have survived. On the outer west wall of the church tower there is a pig, the Winwick pig, carved into the stone . According to legend, it is said to have carried the stones during the construction of the church and always exclaimed "Win-ick" ; in fact, the incision is more likely to be related to the statue of Antonius, who is also the patron saint of the sow herders.

Since 1966 the church has been listed in Grade I , the highest monument protection class of the English Heritage .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ National Statistics
  2. ^ A Brief History of the Church at Winwick ( Memento of July 22, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  3. ↑ CHURCH OF ST OSWALD, GOLBORNE ROAD - entry in the English monument protection register
  4. ^ William Farrer, J. Brownbill: A History of the County of Lancaster, 1911. Vol. 4, pp. 140-42: Townships: Winwick with Hulme. ( Digitized version )

Web links

Commons : Winwick, Cheshire  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 53 ° 26 ′  N , 2 ° 36 ′  W