OSWESTRY’S rise as a railway town in the mid 19th century also meant the arrival of workers.

Some of these navvies as they were known took part in some of the street fights which dominated the town in the 19th century.

The Tizer covered many of these stories in its court briefs, including this one from 1862.

'SUNDAY IN OSWESTRY - We are sorry to find that since the railway works ha neared the town the inhabitants, have been annoyed more than once Sundays, by the disgraceful conduct of some of the navvies.

'This is perhaps, not altogether the fault of the railway labourers, for we have in town a gang of idle and malicious vagabonds, whose chief business seem to consist in setting upon unwary countrymen, or any other workmen whose business leads them into the borough for the purpose of getting cheap fuddle by fair means or foul.

'On Sunday last, early in the morning a fight took place near the Hayes, at which upwards of a hundred attended.’

'One of the fighters was Dick Ty Coch, 'a well-known local pugilist' and someone often up before the magistrates for drinking and fighting.'

Dick, when brought before the magistrates, said that he could never leave the town in peace, the "town chaps" always set on him.’

While Dick Ty Coch would become a regular feature in the newspaper’s court reporting it is certainly clear he was not the only violent man with the Oswestry a dangerous place in the 19th century.

READ MORE:

In the same year the Tizer covered another odd court story.

'Mr Richard Price, chimney sweeper, and smoke jack deaner, was summoned by Miss Louise Harriet Hotchkiss for an assault.

'The complainant said: "I met the defendant's daughter and asked her quietly for some things of mine she had had to pledge twelve months ago.

"While I was talking to her, the defendant came up and called me a very bad name. He then gave me a blow in the face, the result of which was a black eye. He afterwards struck me several times.

"The defendant said: "I went to look after my daughter on the day in question and I was quite surprised to see her talking to that woman, the complainant. I then told her to come away from that brute.

"The present case is only got up because the complainant is jealous of me. I had got married on the morning of the assault, and that was the way she wanted to annoy me.

"She struck me first. It is altogether jealousy on her part, because if she had been a prudent woman I should have made her my wife; but she is not prudent, and I know she would swear the leg off an iron pot."