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Attractions in and around Oswestry include: Whittington Castle (in nearby Whittington), Shelf Bank, and the Cambrian Railway Museum, located near the former station, itself now the Cambrian Visitor Centre. The town is famous for its high number of public houses per head of population; there are around 30 in the town today, many of which offer real ale. A story incorporating the names of all of the pubs once open in Oswestry can be found hanging on the walls of The Oak on Church Street.
St Oswald's Church, the parish church is almost 1,000 years old, with the Norman tower dating from 1085. There is a new window in the East nave designed by prestigious stained glass artist Jane Grey in 2004. There are also 12 other churches in the town, including a Welsh Presbyterian in Victoria Road.
Oswestry is located at the junction of the A5 with the A483 and A495. The A5 continues from Shrewsbury to the north, passing the town, before turning west near Chirk and entering Wales. Running near the town is a navigable section of the partially restored Montgomery Canal, which runs from Frankton Junction to Newtown.
The Battle of Maserfield is thought to have been fought here in 642, between the Anglo-Saxon kings Penda and Oswald. Oswald was killed in this battle and was dismembered; according to a legend, one of his arms was carried to an ash tree by a bird, an eagle, and miracles were subsequently attributed to the tree (as Oswald was considered a saint). Thus it is believed that the name of the site derived from a reference to "Oswald's Tree". The spring Oswald's Well is supposed to have originated where the bird dropped the arm from the tree. Offa's Dyke runs nearby to the west.
The town, being very close to Wales, has many Welsh street and Welsh placenames and the town's name in Welsh is Croesoswallt, meaning Oswald's Cross. The Domesday Book records a castle being built by Rainald, a Norman Sheriff of Shropshire: L'oeuvre (meaning "the work" in French) (which was reduced to a pile of rocks during the English Civil War), and the town changed hands between English and Welsh a number of times during the Middle Ages. In 1149 the castle was captured by Madog ap Maredudd, and remained in Welsh hands until 1157. Later, Oswestry was attacked by the forces of Welsh rebel leader Owain Glynd?r during the early years of his rebellion against the English King Henry IV in 1400, it became known as Pentrepoeth or 'hot town' as it was burned and nearly totally destroyed by the Welsh.
In 1190 the town was granted the right to hold a market each Wednesday[9]. After the foot and mouth outbreak in the late 1960s the animal market was moved out of the town centre. In the 1990s, a statue of a shepherd and sheep was installed in the market square as a memorial to the history of the market site. With the weekly influx of Welsh farmers the town folk were often bilingual. The town built walls for protection, but these were torn down by the Parliamentarians after they took the town after a brief siege on 22 June 1644, leaving only the Newgate Pillar visible today.
Source: www.wikipedia.org
