Kidderminster, United Kingdom

To the south by the River Stour, dating from the 15th century, is a single surviving tower of Caldwall (or Caldwell) Castle, a fortified manor house.

Kidderminster owes its growth to the early development of the cloth industry, which was aided by its position upon the River Stour, and its location at the confluence of four main roads to Birmingham, Dudley, Worcester, Bewdley and Bridgnorth. In a visit to the town sometime around 1540, King's Antiquary John Leland noted that Kidderminster "standeth most by clothing". Over the following centuries the town specialised in textile trades such as weaving, fulling, cloth working and milling, and was also home to numerous other trades including shoemaking, haberdashery, saddle making, dyers, tailors, tanners and glovers.

King Charles I granted the Borough of Kidderminster a Charter in 1636. The original charter can be viewed at Kidderminster Town Hall.

Kidderminster's location at the junction of several major roads made it strategically important during the English Civil War, with several skirmishes occurring in and around the town.

In 1670–1671, Kidderminster's cloth industry obtained a guild by act of parliament and, by 1677, the town had as many as 459 weavers and perhaps 3,000 spinners. Following King Louis XIV's revocation of the Edict of Nantes in October 1685 and the subsequent renewed persecution of French Protestants in France, many Huguenots emigrated to Britain. The immigration and settlement of waves of industrious Huguenots brought the benefits of skilled artisans, merchants and manufacturers to Britain. They contributed to a preexisting but basic cloth weaving industry in towns and cities throughout England, in some cases establishing new businesses. In Worcestershire, the Huguenots established themselves at Worcester, Evesham, Droitwich and Kidderminster.

In the early 18th century, carpet weaving was introduced to Kidderminster, and this rapidly became the staple trade of the town. Its growth was aided by the opening of the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal in 1771, and later the arrival of the railway to the town in 1852. The carpet industry went into decline in the 1970s, but still continues on a reduced scale.

Poor trade conditions in 1828, when 2,000 looms were not working for an 18-week period, led to riots, in which £3,000 of damage was done during one night.

The town's local government was reformed by the Municipal Reform Act 1835, which incorporated Kidderminster as a municipal borough. This superseded the charter of 1636, and divided the borough into three wards represented by six aldermen and eighteen councillors; the number of wards was doubled in the 1880s. The current Town Hall on Vicar Street was built in 1877.

Kidderminster has two Commissioners' churches. The first is St George's, on Radford Avenue; this was designed by Francis Goodwin and built in 1821–1824, finally being consecrated in April 1824. Its grant of just over £17,000.00, was the third-largest given by the commission to any church outside London. The second church is St John's, on the Bewdley Road. This was built in 1843 and the architect was Matthew Steele; its grant was just over £4,000.

The Shrubbery was converted into a military headquarters towards the end of the 19th century.

In 1974, the old borough of Kidderminster was abolished and merged into the new Wyre Forest District. In December 2015, Kidderminster was established as a civil parish with a new town council, following a public referendum.