In the 2021 census, the civil parish of Polesworth had a population of 8,727 and included the contiguous sub-villages of Birchmoor, St Helena, and Hall End directly to the south, and Warton to the East.

[5] Henry Goodere, son of Francis, was a patron of the arts and Polesworth Hall was a centre of culture during Elizabethan times.

The poet Michael Drayton was in the service of the Goodere family around 1580, and his works contain allusions to Polesworth and the River Anker.

Other notable figures including the dramatist Ben Jonson, architect Inigo Jones and poet John Donne, made up the core of an elite group who became known as the Polesworth Circle.

That part of the hall known as Pooley Farm was once the home of the late American Soul and Motown singer Edwin Starr, famous for the song War.

[9] During the English Civil War, Polesworth and Wilnecote are listed among the towns paying arrears to the Parliamentary garrison at Tamworth.

When the Coventry Canal was built through Polesworth in the 1770s, the village developed a coal-mining and clay industry and the population underwent rapid growth.