“Willenhalch,” then, may be accepted as signifying in Anglo-Saxon “the meadowland of Willan,” Willan (not Willen) being a personal name, and halch being a form of healh, signifying “enclosed land on the banks of a stream,” as, for instance, on the Willenhall Brook. Any ancient place-name terminating in “halch” would, in the course of time, terminate in “hall,” a termination now commonly construed as “hall,” or “mansion.” There is nothing inherently improbable in Willenhall having been a temporary royal residence. King John in much later times had his hunting lodge at Brewood. Bushbury, originally Bishopsbury, was so called because one of the early Mercian bishops is said to have made this place his episcopal residence. Attention has been called to the fact that in this vicinity a number of place-names end in “hall,” as Willenhall, Tettenhall, Walsall, Pelsall, and Rushall. The inference drawn is that each of these places marks the settlement of some pioneer Anglican chieftain, or, as Dr. Oliver puts it, the mansion and estate of some Saxon thane. II.—The Battle of Wednesfield. Although it cannot be admitted that the Battle of Wednesfield, or the great national victory gained on that occasion, provided Willenhall with its name, the event itself may certainly be regarded as the chief historical episode which has occurred in this immediate vicinity. This was “far back in the olden time” when, says the local poetess— The Danes lay camped on Woden’s field. Dr. Willmore, in his “History of Walsall” (p. 30), quotes an authority to the effect that the battle fought at Wednesfield in the year 911 “had the important consequence of freeing England from the attacks of these formidable invaders.” This engagement was one of the many which took place between the Saxon and the Dane for dynastic supremacy. Even the mighty prowess of Alfred the Great had failed to give the quietus to Danish pretensions, and his son, Edward the Elder, was engaged in a life-long struggle with the Danes, in the course of which the Princess Ethelfleda, who was Edward’s sister, and Great Alfred’s daughter, erected castles at Bridgnorth, Stafford, Warwick, Tamworth, and Wednesbury. Edward the Elder had to combat Welsh invasions as well as Danish aggressiveness, and hence the erection of these castles in Mercia, where most of the minor fighting in that disturbed period occurred. For nine years Ethelfleda fought side by side with her husband Ethelred, Earl of Mercia, in the pitiless struggle; and upon his death, continuing as her brother’s viceroy, she proved herself one of the ablest women warriors this country has ever known.