From Abbeys, Castles and Ancient Halls of England and Wales, Their Legendary Lore and Popular History, by John Timbs, re-edited, revised, and enlarged by Alexander Gunn, Volume II.; Frederick Warne and Co.; London; pp. 53-54.
Wallingford is a place of great antiquity, on the west bank of the Thames, and is thought to have existed in the time of the Romans, their coins having been dug up there; the form of the ramparts (not of the Castle, which is of later origin) indicating that they had been traced by the Romans. The first historical notice of Wallingford is A.D. 1006, when it was taken by the Danes; but it was rebuilt in 1013. In the reign of Edward the Confessor it was a royal borough, containing 276 houses paying a tax to the King.
There was a Castle here at the time of the Conquest belonging to Wigod, a Saxon noble, who invited William the Conqueror, after the battle of Hastings, to come to Wallingford, where William received the homage of Archbishop Stigand, and the principal nobles, before marching to London. About a year after, 1067, Roberty D’Oyley, a Norman baron, who had married Wigod’s only daughter, built a strong Castle at Wallingford, but whether on the site of Wigod’s Castle is not clear. In the Civil War of Stephen, this Castle was held for the Empress Maud. Stephen besieged it without success several times, and here the Empress Maud found refuge after her escape from Oxford. In 1153, Henry, son of Maud, besieged a fort, which Stephen had erected at Crowmarsh on the opposite side of the Thames; and Stephen coming to its relief, a peace was concluded. During the imprisonment of Richard I., Wallingford Castle was occupied by his brother John, but was taken from him by the King’s party. In the troubles of John’s reign, one or two of the meetings of King and Barons were held at Wallingford; and in those of Henry III. (A.D. 1264), Prince Edward, the King’s son (afterwards Edward I.), Prince Henry, his nephew, and Richard, King of the Romans, his brother, were confined for a time in this Castle. It was twice besieged in the troubles of the reign of Edward II. Leland and Camden describe the fortress as having a double wall; and Camden speaks of the citadel, or keep, as standing on a high mound. In the Civil War of Charles I., it was repaired and garrisoned for the King; and it was a post of importance. Towards the close of the war it was besieged by Fairfax, and was afterwards demolished, except part of the wall towards the river. The mound is overgrown with trees, but in our time balls have been dug up here.
54Within the Castle was a college; and connected with it was a school for the instruction of singing-boys; in which Tusser, the author of Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry, was educated, as he records in his Life, prefixed to the black-letter edition of his works. Here he describes the “quiraster’s miserie” as hard to bear :
“ O painful time, for every crime
What toosed eares ! Like baited beares !
What bobbed lips ! what yerks, what nips !
What hellish toies !
What robes how bare ! what colledge fare !
What bred how stale ! what pennie ale !
Then Wallingford, how wert thou abhor’d
Of sillie boies ! ”
There was a Benedictine Priory at Wallingford, founded in the reign of William the Conqueror; and there was a Mint in the town in the reign of Henry III.
Wallingford had anciently fourteen churches; it has now three.