WOLSINGHAM, a market-town and parish in the
north-western division of DARLINGTON ward, county
palatine of DURHAM, 16 miles (W. S. W.) from Durham,
and 259 (N. N. W.) from London, containing 2197 inhabitants.
The town, which is irregularly built, is
situated on the north bank of the Wear. In 1824, a
new town hall was erected and covered with a roof,
but it yet remains unfinished, for want of funds to
complete the work. There are manufactures of linen,
woollen cloth, edge-tools, and implements of agriculture,
in which, and in the neighbouring coal, lead, and limestone
works, a great proportion of the population is
employed. The market and fairs are held by grant from
the Bishop of Durham; the former is on Tuesday, and
the latter are on May 12th and October 2nd, for cattle
and all sorts of merchandise. The county magistrates
hold a petty session for the division here, every Wednesday,
and a court leet and baron, under the Bishop of
Durham, as lord of the manor, is held twice a year, at
which debts under 40s. are recoverable; its jurisdiction
extends to Stanhope, Bishopley, North and South Bedburn,
Lynsack, and Softley. The living is a rectory, in
the archdeaconry and diocese of Durham, rated in the
king's books at £31. 13. 4., and in the patronage of
the Bishop of Durham. The church, situated on rising
ground to the north-west of the town, and dedicated to
St. Mary and St. Stephen, is a neat plain building with a
low tower, and has a font of Weardale marble, beautifully
variegated with petrifactions of shells, &c. There are
places of worship for Baptists and Primitive and Wesleyan
Methodists. The grammar school, founded in
1613, with a residence for the master, was rebuilt, in
1786, upon a piece of waste land granted by the Bishop
of Durham and the landholders of the parish, by whom
it was endowed with sixteen acres of land. On the enclosure
of the moor, seven acres and a quarter more
were added, for the maintenance of the master: eighteen
boys are appointed by the trustees, who are nine
in number. Several bequests in money, particularly by
Jonathan and George Wooller, have since been made,
amounting to about £200, for the interest of which
eight additional boys are taught on this foundation.
Forty girls are also instructed in another school, supported
by the Misses Wilson, of this place; and there
are Sunday schools attended by about one hundred
and sixty children. Contiguous to a field, called Chapel-
Walls, are the remains of an extensive building, surrounded
by a moat, supposed to be those of the manor
house of the Bishop of Durham, attached to Wolsingham
park. There are two chalybeate springs inthe
neighbourhood, and a sulphureous spring  about two
miles east of Wolsingham, on an estate called Bradley.