WITHINGTON is a parish and village with a railway station on the Worcester and Hereford branch of the Great Western railway, distant 4½ miles N.E. of Hereford, 11 S.W. of Bromyard, 12 W.N.W. of Ledbury, 11 S.S.E. of Leominster, and 30 N.W. of Gloucester. The Hereford and Bromyard road, and the Hereford and Gloucester canal, intersect the parish, which is in Broxash hundred, Hereford union, county court district, polling district, and petty sessional division. The population in 1861 was 788; in 1871, 784; inhabited houses, 179; families or separate occupiers, 192; area of parish, 2,143a. 3r. 18p.; annual rateable value, £6,182. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners are lords of the manor; and the principal landowners are the Rev. Henry Glossop, Henry Higgins, Esq., William Havard Apperley, Esq., Mrs. Jancey, and Mrs. M. Clarke. The soil is clayey and loamy; subsoil, block stone; chief produce, wheat, beans, hops, and fruit. Withington is in the diocese, archdeaconry, and rural deanery of Hereford; the living has been recently constituted a rectory; value, £417 9s. 7d., with residence; the tithes are commuted at £132 7s., with 16 acres of glebe, to which the Ecclesiastical Commissioners added a farm (Nunington court) of 100 acres; patron, the Lord Bishop of Hereford; rector, Rev. Charles Henry Philip Abbot, M.A., of Christ Church, Oxford, who was instituted in 1868.

The church, dedicated to St. Peter, is an ancient stone edifice with nave, chancel, porch, and substantial square tower (with very handsome spire) containing six bells. It was restored in 1858 at a cost of £900. The ancient chancel screen is an elaborate piece of wood carving. The parish register goes back to the year 1573. There is a Public Elementary school for boys and girls, supported by subscriptions, also a small endowment of £5 16s. which is expended under a scheme of the Commissioners. New school buildings, to accommodate 132 children, with a residence for the mistress, were built in 1872, at a cost of over £1,000. The average attendance is about 80. There is a Baptist chapel at Whitestone. There are several handsome residences and excellent farm-houses in this parish. One of the finest mansions in the county has been recently erected by Henry Higgins, Esq., J.P., D.L., on an eminence which still bears its Saxon name of Thing-hill, or, the Hill of Council. It is built in the castellated style, and is a conspicuous object for many miles. It commands a magnificent view of an immense range of fruitful country. Withington Court, the property and residence of Mrs. Clarke, is an ancient Gothic stone mansion, pleasantly situated near the church. Adjoining the railway station is Mr. William Godwin's well-known "Lugwardine Encaustic Tile Works", for the manufacture of encaustic and tesseræ tiles, in every variety of design and colour, for pavements of churches, entrance halls, &c. These tiles are in great demand, and have been patronised by Her Majesty and a number of the nobility, clergy, and gentry. Nunington is distant 1 mile W. of Withington church.