WORCESTER 



ed the rendezvous of the gang of scoundrels 

 who, in 1805, contrived and carried out the 

 murder of the rector of the parish. 



A readily explicable instance of a potence 

 being found in a square dovecote occurs at 

 Court Farm, Leigh, where a comparatively 

 modern dovecote, square inform, stands on the 

 old foundations of a circular forerunner, the 

 potence of the former building having been 

 allowed to keep its place. Of ancient dovecotes 

 lost to Worcestershire it is permissible to speak 

 of the large circular examples demolished dur- 

 ing the last century at Cotheridge, Hudding- 

 ton Court, and Fladbury. Not so long since 

 there was alive an aged roadman who remem- 

 bered helping to destroy the one last named. 

 Its stones were not even devoted to use in the 

 parish, but were taken by barge down the 

 Severn to Gloucester. 



The reader is reminded of the warning given 

 in the preface; that this book does not profess 

 to be exhaustive, to mention all the best sur- 

 viving dovecotes, or even to deal with every 

 county. Over the neighbouring counties of 

 Warwick and Leicester we shall therefore pass 



93 



