Page:The National Gazetteer - A Topographical Dictionary of the British Islands, Volume 2.djvu/586

LENT. 573 LEOMINSTER. Meath, val. 67. The church is a very prominent object. It was built in 1812 by means of a loan from the late Board of First Fruits. There are four daily schools in the parish. The seats are Lakeview and Clandagh House. LENY, a demesne in co. Perth, Scotland, 2 miles N.W. of Callander. It is situated near the falls of Leny Pass, at the bottom of Loch Lubnaig. It was given by Alexander II. to Alan de Lani in 1237, and now belongs to the Hamiltons of Bardowie. LENZIE, an ancient par. in co. Dumbarton, Scot- land, now forming part of the pars, of Oumbernauld and Kirkintilloch, to which it was united in 1659. LEOCHEL, a quoad sacra par. in the par. of Coull, co. Aberdeen, Scotland, 1 mile E. of Farland, and 3 miles from Aboyne. LEOCHEL AND CUSHNIE, an united par. in the Alford district of co. Aberdeen, Scotland. It is 6 miles S. of Alford, its post town. Its length eastward is about 6 miles, and its breadth averages from 3 to 6 miles. The surface is mountainous, and attains a height at Soccoch, or the Hill of Cushnio, of nearly 2,000 feet above sea-level. About 5,500 imperial acres of the parish are under tillage, 3,800 are waste or moor, 1,000 woodland, and the same number in pasture. The soil for the most part is clayey. The Leochel is the chief stream. The par. is in the presb. of Alford, and synod of Aberdeen. The minister's stipend is 190. The parish church, built in 1798, is a commodious structure. There are a United Presbyterian church, a Free Church preaching station, two parochial schools, two endowed and another school. The parishes of Leochel and Cushnie were permanently united in 1795. Ruins of the ancient churches of the respective parishes still remain. A good many of the inhabitants are employed in knitting, and in the manufacture of woollen goods. Craigievar Castle, one of the principal se_ats, is the mansion of Sir William Forbes, Bart., who is the chief landowner. Hallhead, Cushnie, and Corse castles are the other buildings of note; the last was built in 1581, and is now a ruin. In the neighbourhood are camps, cairns, and Picts' houses. Patrick Forbes, Bishop of Aberdeen, and other distinguished members of the same family, were natives of this place. Fairs are held on the second Tuesday in March, and the first Friday in November. LEOMINSTER, a par., market town, municipal and parliamentary borough, exercising separate jurisdiction, but locally in the hund. of Wolphy, N. div. of co. Here- ford, 12J miles N. of Hereford, 11 from Ludlow, and 157 W.N.W. of London. It is a first-class station on the Shrewsbury and Hereford line, and the junction station of the Leominstcr and Kington railway. The par., which is over 7 miles in length, is situated in the midst of a most luxuriant and fertile district, abounding with orchards, hop-grounds, gardens, and fruitful valleys. It is watered by the three rivers Lugg, Pinsley, and Ken water, which flow through the town, besides the river Arrow, and several other streams, which traverse the "out-parish." Besidesthe borough ofLeominster.the par. includes the tnshps. of Brierley, Broadward, Chorlstrey, Eaton, Hennot, Hyde Ash, Ivington, Newtown, Stag- batch, Wharton, and Wintercott, with the new ecclesias- tical district of St. John's, Ivington. It was anciently a place of great strength, bordering on the Welsh marches,, and is said by Leland to have derived its name Leof- minstre from a minster or monastery founded here about 658 by Merewald, the Saxon king of West Mercia, who had a castle or palace about half a mile to the E. of the town. In 777 it was taken by the Danes, assisted by the Welsh, who burnt the nunnery, and again in 1055 by the Welsh chieftains, who refortified the castle ; but it was shortly after reduced by Harold, who stationed a garrison here. At the time of the Domesday Survey the manor, with its appurtenances, belonged to Editha, queen of Edward the Confessor ; and in the reign of William II. the fortifications were strengthened, to secure it against the incursions of the Welsh. In the reign of John the town, priory, and church were plun- dered and burnt by William de Braose, Lord of Breck- nock. In 1187 Archbishop Baldwin and Giraldus tht historian preached the crusade here in Merewald'j nunnery, which had then become a college or priory attached to Shaston and Reading abbeys. In the reigi of Henry IV. the town was in possession of Owain Glyndwr, after his victory over Mortimer, Earl o: March, whom he took prisoner, and confined in a house in Church-street, now a stable. Upon the defeat o: Glyndwr at Ivington Camp in 1404, it submitted to Prince Henry, afterwards Henry V. In the next century the inhabitants took an active part in the esta- blishment of Mary on the throne, defeating Lady Jane Grey's partisans at Cursneh Hill, for which service she granted them their first charter of incorporation, dated 28th March, 1553. By this charter the Court of Record, for recovery of debts under 100, which has been only recently discontinued, was constituted ; power given to have a separate court of quarter sessions, a gaol, coroner, certain markets, annual fairs, and many other privileges, and lands. In the civil war of Charles I. the town wat taken by Waller in 1643, but was retaken by Charles in 1645. It has returned two members to parliament since the reign of Edward I. ; and under the Reform Act its boundaries were enlarged, so as to include the whole of the parish. The population of the borough in 1851 was 5,214, and in 1861, 5,660. Under the Municipal Reform Act the town is governed by a mayor, 4 aldermen, and 12 common councilmen, with the style of "bailiifs and burgesses of the borough of Leominster." The acreage of the town is 1,150, but of the borough 9,290, with an income of 671. The town business is managed by- commissioners for paving, lighting, and improving, who meet quarterly, and were appointed under the recent Act of Parliament, by which many important privileges were conferred. The borough magistrates, who cxorciae separate jurisdiction, meet at the townhall every Thurs- day ; and the county justices for the lower division of the hundred of Wolphy hold petty sessions at the county police station every Friday. The new county court meets monthly, and has superseded the ancient Court of Record. It is a polling place for the election of knights for the shire, and the mayor is the returning; officer for the borough. The town consists of several spacious and well-paved streets, which are kept remark- ably clean, and are lighted with gas. The shops are large and well supplied; and many of the private houses are handsome, some even fine specimens of Elizabethan domestic architecture, with their projecting fronts, supported by grotesquely carved brackets, heads, gable boards, &c. The now buildings are in general of a superior class, suited to the growing prosperity of the town, which has a thriving general trade, chiefly in agricultural produce, as corn, timber, wood, bark, cider, oattle, and sheep. There are also a few trades carried on, as tanning, leather-dressing, wool-stapling, malting, flannel-weaving, brick-making, leather glove making, and coarse cloth manufacture, but these two last have declined. In the vicinity are several corn-mills, an oil- mill, and a printing-ink manufactory. The public buildings are the townhall, an Italian structure, just completed at the cost of .3,000. It has a frontage of nearly 60 feet, and is 160 feet in length, surmounted by a cupola and clock tower rising to the height of 70 feet from the pavement. It contains a council chamber 45 feet by 30 feet, session-rooms, retiring- rooms, &c. Adjoining the townhall, and forming, as it were, a portion of it, is the new market-house, l'l'> feet long by 40 feet wide, and upwards of 22 feet high, fitted up with stalls, packing-rooms, &o., and covered with a roof of corrugated galvanised iron, supported on two rows of iron pillars. The Butter Cross, a beautiful example of Elizabethan timber work, was erected in 1633 by John Abel, the "king's carpenter," consisting of a series of spacious rooms, supported by twelve Ionic pillars of oak, with arches, spandrils, and other orna- mental carved work, described by Clayton, in his " Ancient Timber Edifices," as " the most interesting building of the kind in the kingdom." It was taken