[11] Of historical significance, the town was attacked by King Stephen in 1138, after a failed siege of the castle following the baron's decision to support Empress Matilda's claim to the throne during The Anarchy.

[12] In 1605, conspirators of the Gunpowder Plot fled to Holbeche House in nearby Wall Heath, where they were defeated and captured by the forces of the Sheriff of Worcestershire.

[19] Abraham Darby was descended from Dud Dudley's sister, Jane, and was the first person to produce iron commercially using coke instead of charcoal at his works in Coalbrookdale, Shropshire in 1709.

[22] Health Inspector William Lee stated that "In no other part of England and Wales is the work of human extermination effected in so short a time as ... in Dudley".

On 19 November 1940 a Luftwaffe bomb demolished a public house in the town centre and damaged several nearby buildings including St Thomas's Church and the new Co-Operative department store, but there were no fatalities.

However, on the same night a landmine was dropped in the Oakham area of the town and demolished a section of council houses in City Road, resulting in the deaths of 10 people and injuring many others.

Following local government reforms in 1966, Dudley was expanded to include the majority of the former urban districts of Brierley Hill and Sedgley, along with parts of Coseley, Amblecote and Rowley Regis; an area in the eastern section of the town was also transferred into the new borough of Warley.

In 2012 the Dudley Metropolitan Borough made an unsuccessful bid to receive city status, losing out to Chelmsford, Perth, and St.

The Dudley Hippodrome was one of the largest theatres in the West Midlands, built along with the adjacent Plaza Cinema just prior to the Second World War in 1938.

Dudley is currently home to a multiplex Showcase Cinema and Tenpin bowling alley, located in the Castle Gate complex north-east of the town centre.

Until 2011, the JB's nightclub was situated on Castle Hill, after relocating from an earlier site in King Street (behind Pathfinders clothes store) in the 1990s.

Claimed to have been the longest-running live music venue in the UK, the club hosted early performances by acts such as U2, Dire Straits, and Judas Priest.

It opened in 1860[60] on the junction between the South Staffordshire and the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton lines, and in its heyday was a hub of services east to Birmingham (via a junction at Great Bridge), Walsall and Lichfield; north to Wolverhampton, Tipton and Coseley; and south-west to Stourbridge, as well as a line that served the small communities on the way to Old Hill and Halesowen.

It was replaced by a "temporary car park" which remained in use until work began on the Midland Metro extension in 2020 which will also see the current bus station demolished.

Work on a replacement bus station is set to start in January 2024 with buses using stops in nearby roads for around eighteen months.

This depot was located on Birmingham Road and passed to West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive in 1973, along with operation of all bus services in Dudley.

The depot was closed in 1993 and demolished a year later to make way for the Castle Gate roundabout, at the eastern end of the town's new southern by-pass.

The second route opened a year later, linking the town with Birmingham and heading through the centre of nearby Tividale village on the Dudley-Tipton border.

The Old Park School serves pupils from the age of 3 to 19,[78] and was originally located in the Russells Hall Estate, but relocated to new premises in Quarry Bank in 2011.

The present building, a Grade II listed Edwardian baroque, was designed by George H. Wenyon, and opened in 1909 to replace the older site in Priory Street.

It remained in use throughout the twentieth century, but was downgraded to an outpatient-only centre in the 2000s following the construction of a new block; the original hospital site was re-developed for private housing in 2018.

Closure of Dudley Police Station was announced in 2017 as part of cost-cutting measures, though a small number of officers are set to remain in the town centre from a shared base with the local council.

[96] The police station had originally opened in 1939 to replace a 19th-century structure on Priory Street, which now forms part of the civic centre.

In the Kate's Hill area of Dudley, one can find St John's church, whose graveyard contains the burial place of William Perry a 19th-century Prizefighter, known as the Tipton Slasher.

The oldest church in the town is St. Edmund's, dating back to Anglo-Saxon times, although the present building was not constructed until 1724, following its demolition during the English Civil War.

The Revd Robert Jones, present Archdeacon of Worcester, inducted in November 2014, was previously Vicar of St. Francis Church in Dudley for eight years.

Dudley also has places of worship for other religious groups and Christian denominations, including a Jehovah's Witness Kingdom Hall, two Sikh gurdwaras, and a Hindu temple.

The variety of businesses left led to Dudley being named 'the worst place to shop in the UK' in a 2014 study, which drew condemnation from the local council.

They played at Round Oak Sports Ground in Brierley Hill for the next 11 years, and then spent a season ground-sharing at Halesowen Town, before resigning from the Southern League due to financial difficulties.

The club was reformed in 1999 to compete in the West Midlands Regional League, and ground-share with Stourbridge at the War Memorial Athletic Ground.