WOLVERHAMP'TON, a municipal and parliamentary borough of Staffordshire, is the most 'populous town of its county, and a center of iron manufactures and tin-plate goods, 10 m. u.w. of Birmingham. Of its numerous churches, that of St. Peter's, built in the 14th c., and recently restored, is a stately edifice, with a lofty embattled and pin nacled tower. At Wolverhampton is published one daily newspaper and three weekly ones. The leading public schools are—a thriving grammar school, founded 1714; an orphan asylum, instituted 1850, for orphans from all parts of the kingdom, with 100 scholars, and room for 200; and a school of practical art, opened 1854. Among its phil-, anthropic institutions, a general hospital and dispensary, opened 1849, having 100 beds, and, like the orphan asylum, supported by voluntary contributions, is the chief. Wol verhampton sent members to parliament first in 1832, and became a municipal borough in 1847. It has quarter-sessions of its own, a spacious cattle-market, and a market-hall. A commodious and handsome town-hall has been erected; there is a system of deep sew erage; and its abundant water supply is in the hands of the corporation. There is a handsome bronze equestrian statue of prince Albert standing in Queen square. The town possesses an exchange where iron-masters and merchants assemble; and an agri cultural hall for the use of farmers and corn-dealers. Wolverhampton stands upon the western edge of the extensive coal and iron-mining district of South Staffordshire, and is the metropolis of that district. On the s. and e. the vicinity is covered with coal mines, iron-stone pits, blast-furnaces, forges, rolling-mills, and foundries; but on the n.
and w. it is rural and picturesque. Its chief manufactures are tin-plate and japanned goods (14 manufactories), enameled hollow wares, locks and keys, edge-tools, iron braziery and galvanized iron goods, gas and water tubes, cables and railway fastenings, iron-foundry goods, machinery, mills, cut nails, tips, cast hinges, electroplate and papier-mAchtl goods, brass castings, and finished iron. Besides the establishments engaged in the hardware manufacture, there are several flour-mills and chemical and artificial manure-works. The hardware goods manufactured at Wolverhampton are remarkable for beauty of finish and genuineness of workmanship. The town enjoys unusual fac:fities for communication and transport. For a considerable time it has commanded canal communication; and more recently, it has become the focus of a num ber of converging lines of railway, by means of which it is placed in direct relations with the important quarters of the country. Its market-day is Wednesday, under a charter by Henry III. (1253). The borough returns two members to the house of com mons. Pop. '61, of parliamentary borough, 147,670; '71, 156,978. Pop. '61, of munici pal borough, 60,860; '71, 03,291. • Wolverhampton, a town of considerable antiquity, was originally called Hampton, and afterward Wulfrune's Hampton (of which its present name is a corruption), from the circumstance that Wulfrune, the sister of king Edgar, founded here (996) the church and college of which St. Peter's is the modern representative.