Halls & Churches

The home of the de Birminghams stood on the site of the modern manor house building, inside a moat recalled in Moat Lane and Moat Row. 'Scarce a bowshot' from it was St. Martin's Church, a C12, foundation with later rebuildings and additions, notably the tall C15 tower and spire. The latter survive, much res-tored, but the body of the church was completely rebuilt in the 1870's. St Martin's was for some five centuries co-extensive with the manor, there being no other church, but chapelries existed in Deritend (Aston Parish) and in the Priory.

The chapel of St. Bartholomew, originally founded by Harborne Church, was in existence by 1279). It was rebuilt by Humphrey Middlemore in the late C15, and the tower was added by his wife Marjorie in 1500. Edgbaston became a separate parish rather late, after the Reformation and before 1658, and had but one church until 1838 : indeed for some years after the Civil War, when St. Bart's was in ruin, there was no church at all. The tower and some walls of the Middlemore church still stand, but the rest is the result of six rebuildings, 1721 - 1889.

Birmingham manor house was ruinous in 1529, 'so that no man will hire it', and the moat was silted and rubbish-filled. No record of its appearance has survived, but Old Edgbaston Hall which it probably resembled is sketched in a corner of Wm. Deeley's map of 1701. The de Edgbaston / Middlemore home was a typical hall, perhaps originally a single large room open to the roof, with a first floor added later and fireplaces moved to external walls where tall chimneys of brick or stone were built. Gabled wings were added at either end The whole structure was half-timbered, with stone foundations and tiled roofs. The hall was moated and further protected by fishponds : their dry beds still lie parallel to Priory Road, but the moat, part of which survived as a ha-ha into this century, has been infilled.