“Manors Were their reward for following Billy’s banners,”
Willey fell to the lot of a Norman, named Turold, who, as he held twelve other manors, considerately permitted the Saxon owner to continue in possession under him. Domesday says: “The same Turold holds Willey, and Hunnit (holds it) of him.” “Here is half a hide geldable. Here is arable land sufficient for ii ox teams. Here those ox teams are, together with ii villains, and ii boors. Its value is v shillings.” At the death of Hunnit the manor passed to a family which took its name from the place; and considerable additions resulted from the marriage of one, Warner de Williley, with the heiress of Roger Fitz Odo, of Kenley. Warner de Williley appears to have been a person of some consequence, from the fact that he was appointed to make inquiry concerning certain encroachments upon the royal forests of Shropshire; but an act of oppression and treachery, in which his wife had taken a part, against one of his own vassals, whose land he coveted, caused him to be committed to prison. Several successive owners of Willey were overseers of Shirlot Forest; and Nicholas, son and heir of Warner, was sued for inattention to his duties; an under tenant also, profiting probably by the laxity of his lord, at a later period was charged and found guilty of taking a stag from the king’s preserves, on Sunday, June 6th, 1253. Andrew de Williley joined Mountford against King Edward, and fell August 4th, 1265, in the battle of Evesham; in consequence of which act of disloyalty the property was forfeited to the crown, and the priors of Wenlock, who already had the seigniory usual to feudal lords, availing themselves of the opportunity, managed so to increase their power that a subsequent tenant, as shown by the Register at Willey, came to Wenlock (1388), and “before many witnesses did homage and fealty,” and acknowledged himself to hold the place of the lord prior by carrying his frock to parliament. They succeeded too, after several suits, in establishing their rights to the advowson of the Church, founded and endowed by the lords of the place.
By the middle of the 16th century Willey had passed to the hands of the old Catholic family of the Lacons, one of whom, Sir Roland, held it in 1561, together with Kinlet; and from them it passed to Sir John Weld, who is mentioned as of Willey in 1666. He married the daughter of Sir George Whitmore, and his son, George Weld, sat for the county with William Forester, who married the daughter of the Earl of Salisbury, and voted with him in favour of the succession of the House of Hanover.