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The name Kingsbury is thought to derive from two Saxon elements, 'chines' meaning 'royal' and 'burh' meaning a 'fortified site'. Situated on a bluff above the river Tame with a panoramic view across the Tame valley, it was the perfect place to build a fortification which may have also been a royal retreat for the kings of Mercia who had their seasonal capital at Tamworth.
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Countess Godiva and her husband Earl Leofric of Mercia once held the manor of Kingsbury and in the Domesday survey it contained about 700 acres of land worked by 33 villeins. There was a mill valued at 9s 4d, two priests and a tract of woodland. The present mill building dates from 1747 and has been used for grinding corn and barley and for making munitions during the Napoleonic war. Hemlingford Bridge, rebuilt in 1783 was reputedly needed to transport gun barrels from the mill, across the river Tame into Birmingham.
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From Godiva’s granddaughter Leverunia, the manor of Kingsbury passed by marriage into the Bracebridge family who held it until c.1585 when Sir Frances Willoughby from nearby Middleton Hall became the owner. The Bracebridges lived mainly at Kingsbury Hall, which is at present undergoing reconstruction, and were knights, several of whom served their king in battle.
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The manor eventually passed into the Peel family from Drayton Manor, and four successive Sir Robert Peels owned land in the parish that has always been essentially a farming community.
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Industry started to appear towards the end of the 19th century with the opening of Cliff Brickworks but it was the development of the Warwickshire coalfield that brought the greatest change to the village. Kingsbury colliery was opened in 1897 and almost overnight fortunes changed as farming gradually gave way to the extraction of coal for use in Birmingham and at Coleshill’s Lurghi Plant. The colliery closed in 1968, the same year that the Oil Terminal was constructed to serve the pipeline running from Shell Haven in London to Stanlow in Cheshire.
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Of all the houses in the village, the oldest and one of the most interesting, is the School House dating from 1684 and given by Sir Thomas Coton for the provision of a rudimentary education for the local poor children. Kingsbury Church dates from the mid 12th century with later additions.
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Kingsbury can also boast a Sports Hall, Kingsbury Community and Youth Centre and a Swimming Pool built by Kingsbury Parish Council. A Health Centre opened in 1972 and was one of the first of its kind in Warwickshire, but this has since been demolished and the land has been built on with houses and shop units.
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Hemlingford bridge was rebuilt twice, once in 1783 to carry the gun barrels from the Mill across the river to Birmingham and again later after it was washed away in the early hours of New Year’s day in 1983.