| Three hamlets are shown on Tomlinson's map: along the northern edge
of the fields (Ward End), about the Moat House and Farm (Alum Rock),
and about the moated Treeford Hall. There seems never to have been
a hamlet called Little Bromwich, though in the C20th the name has
been appropriated by new districts. Ward End Hall is shown beside
its moats, with the chapel alongside (see below). South of Alum Rock
Road and Cotterills Lane (which ends at Green (Belchers) Lane) there
are only a dozen buildings. They include the un-named Balsall Cottage
and Howlets Farm. The quadrilateral closes, average size 2-4 acres,
have marlpits and ponds along their edges. Slade Field includes what
is now Ward End Park, so we have there the only substantial piece
of an open field still left unbuilt-on in the city: there is no vestige
of the ridge-and-furrow pattern which existed until enclosure. It
is probable that what are now parts of Alum Rock and Washwood Heath
Roads began as north and south bounding tracks of the two fields:
they were separated by a lost lane to the east of the modern Sladefield
Road, which is traceable along strip headlands but not shown as a
lane. No common waste survives in Little Bromwich, every bit of land
other than the stripped fields being enclosed. 'Wall End Green' on
the south bound, though enclosed, may have been the last piece of
common to go. It is pleasant to record its return to public use as
Belchers Lane recreation ground.
Identifiable buildings on the map, additional to those already
named above, include Stichford Hall (in Castle Bromwich) and Mill
(in Little Bromwich), The Grange off the turnpike or its predecessor,
and an earlier house on the site of Ward End House opposite the
Hall. There are only three large holdings of land in mid-C18th Little
Bromwich. The Spooner (Ward End) Estate is 186 acres, and the Alum
Rock Estate of the Brandwood heirs is 79 acres. At Treeford Hall
Robert Daffon farms 140 acres, the property of the Revd. Dr. Audley.
There are 36 other small landowners.
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