Whittington is a village and civil parish which lies approximately 3 miles south east of Lichfield, in the Lichfield district of Staffordshire, England. According to the 2001 census it had a population of 2,591, increasing to 2,603 at the 2011 Census. The parish council is a joint one with Fisherwick. The Coventry Canal borders the village to the north and east. History The place name of Whittington derives from the Old English for an estate associated with a man called Hwīta. Hwīta was an Anglo-Saxon personal name meaning 'white', given to someone with fair hair or pale complexion. Whittington formed part of the Bishop of Lichfield’s great manorial estate, which covered much of south-east Staffordshire. Known as the Manor of Longdon, it had been created for the bishop of Lichfield from the time of the Saxons, they remained the lord of the manor until 1546 when the bishop was forced to surrender it to Sir William Paget, one of Henry VIII's principal Secretaries of State, who was given vast tracts of land in Staffordshire as a reward for his service. Whittington Old Hall is an ancient medieval manor house, it is not known exactly when the original Hall was built, but it is highly likely that the early Tudor builders retained the old foundations of the medieval great hall with screen porch and cellars and erected a half-timbered mansion. In the Elizabethan era, the whole of the south front with a portion of the entrance front were entirely re-clad with brick and stonework, complete with striking bays and stone mullioned windows. It is a Grade II* listed building. The mesne-lords in the 16th century were the Clerkson family, whose female heir married into the Everard family. By the 17th century the Babington family owned large tracts of land in the area and built a grand mansion at nearby Packington Hall which passed by marriage to the Levett family. The Dyott family who were major land owners in the village in the 18th and 19th centuries, lived at nearby Freeford Hall. In 1741, Sarah Neal left her house and croft in Whittington to start a school for poor children of the village. Funds were augmented when the Reverend Richard Levett died in 1802, leaving a legacy and in 1864, a handsome gothic building for a girls’ and infants’ school was built by Lieut.-Col. Richard Dyott. Village children continued to be educated