Great quantities of copper coins, and many of gold and silver, are constantly turned up by the plough. The copper coins are chiefly of the lower empire.
The town was situated on the line of the Watling Street road, in the direction towards Stretton. In the ford across the Severn the foundations of a bridge may be discerned at low water.
Near this spot a discovery was made at the end of the last century, which no doubt denoted the burial-place of some family of distinction resident at this colony. It consisted of an enclosure of large stones a little below the surface of the ground, within which were deposited three large urns composed of a beautiful transparent green glass, each having one handle elegantly ribbed, and severally containing burnt bones and a glass lachrymatory. Some earthen urns, an earthen lamp, and a few Roman coins, were also found at the same place, the whole being covered with large flat stones.
The village church, on the accession of Henry II. was granted to the canons of Haghmond Abbey, and is an edifice deserving of attention, displaying in its construction several specimens of architecture between the earliest Anglo-Norman and the incongruous reparations of the last century. The building consists of a nave and chancel; in the latter is a curious doorway, and the former seems to have had originally a south aisle. The tower was probably erected in the reign of Henry the Eighth.
In the church are three handsome altar tombs, bearing full-length cumbent effigies of Lord Chief Justice Bromley, who died May 15, 1555, and Isabel his wife; Sir Richarde Newporte, Knyghte (Queen’s Counsel in the Marches of Wales), and Margaret his wife, only daughter of the Lord Chief Justice; and John Berker, of Haghmond Abbey, Esq. and Margaret his wife, second daughter of Sir Francis Newport, Knt. who died in 1618.
In 1824 these were judiciously restored and beautified. In addition to which there are mural monuments, with inscriptions, commemorative of Francis, Viscount Newport and Earl of Bradford, who died Sept. 19, 1708; also the Hon. Andrew Newport, his brother; and a tablet to the memory of Andrew Newport, utter barrister, who died in 1611.
The vicinity of Wroxeter affords a delightful display of pastoral beauty,—the bright river, with every other requisite for the finest landscape scenery.
Five miles distant is the famed Shropshire mountain,
THE WREKIN,
the proud monarch of the plain, whose bold arching head rises to the altitude of upwards of 1300 feet. A pathway from the London road leads through plantations to its summit, from whence the admirer of nature may luxuriate in the enjoyment of a magnificent prospect, whilst he contemplates all that variety of hill and dale, wood, rock and stream, studded with mansions and villages, stretched like a map throughout a circumference of nearly 400 miles.