LIGHTS OUT - The Royal British Legion.

LIGHTS OUT - The Royal British Legion.

Lest Willingale Forget: Sunday 3 August & Monday 4 August 2014

Friends of St. Andrews

& All Saints Church

Lest Willingale Forget.

It is important not to forget the debt we owe those who gave their lives for us in the World Wars. As an act of commemoration and remembrance of the outbreak of the Great War the Friends of St Andrews and Willingale Community Archive ask you to come along to St Andrews and spend some time in reflection.

Sunday 3^rd August between 2 and 5 pm

or Monday 4^th August between 10 and 3 pm

Please come to St Andrews,

 light a candle

and lay a flower as a mark of respect.

Rosemary represents remembrance, whilst white lilies represent purity and sweetness  or you could choose a flower from your garden.

There will also be an interesting display on those Willingale men who lost their lives. Over the last year Brian Rew has been researching the names and history of these gallant men and if you know of any relatives or have any other information please contact us.

Great War Centenary Commemoration

To mark the centenary of the commencement of the First World War, Martyn Lockwood is working on a special edition of the Journal to record those who fell in the four High Country parishes.  The Group will also have a display at the 400^th anniversary celebrations at Theydon Mount church on 27 & 28 September and will be represented. 

That Precious Legacy: Vaughan Williams and Essex Folk Song. Our talk on 24 July 2014

Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872 -1958) and his folk song collecting in Essex during the Edwardian era will be the subject of Sue Cubbin’s talk to the High Country History Group on Thursday 24 July at Toot Hill Village Hall commencing at 8pm.  Sue is a retired sound archivist from the Essex Record Office, and folk song singer forming one part of ‘Potiphar’s Apprentices’. In 2003 she organised an exhibition at the ERO entitled ‘That Precious Legacy’ to commemorate the hundred years since RVW began collecting rural songs which were in danger of extinction.  The first song – ‘Bushes and Briars’ – was collected from Charles Potiphar of Ingrave.  This promises to be a great evening of local history and song – with perhaps audience participation!

Members: £1.  Visitors and potential new members welcome: £3.

Tour de France in Essex Today

Edward Henry Lisle Reeve
(future Rector of Stondon Massey)
with Penny Farthing bicycle c.1880

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Journal No. 52 (June 2014)

Members of the High Country History Group received their copies of the latest Journal at the meeting last week.  Items in this edition include:

- Anniversaries

- Unhealthy Occupation: The Derby Mercury commenting in 1749 on the high number of clergy who had died in the Ongar district

- Centenary of Chelmsford Diocese (1914 - 2014)

- Dedication of Church at Theydon Mount, taken from the Transactions of the Essex Archaeological Society 'New Series' Volume 12 Part 3 (1911)

- William Sworder of Stapleford Tawney

- Christmas Eve: taken from Leaves of a Hunting Diary

- Inquest of the body of William Reed, 1788

- Hue and Cry: Stanford Rivers Imprisonment for Fowl Stealing, 1897

- The Queen's Jubilee and the Woes of Stanford Rivers

- Opening of a Jubilee Fountain at Stanford Rivers, 1898

- The Pilgrims Way: a reference to St Edmund

- Place Names Quiz (answers)

- St Michael's Church Theydon Mount 400th Anniversary Weekend, advertisement

- Parliamentary and Parochial Electors for Stapleford Tawney, 1914

- Dr. Livingstone I Presume!

- That's My Seat. Anne Archer of Theydon Garnon

'Taking the Waters': Georgina Green is our speaker on 26 June

The next meeting of the High Country History Group will be on Thursday 26 June when our speaker will be Georgina Green on the topic of ‘Taking the Waters’

Georgina Green will give a talk on the history of ‘taking the waters’, a custom that began in England before the Roman invasion. Bath was known for its hot spring that gave off steam but it was the Romans who enclosed the stream and built the baths that were known as Aquae Sulis. 

Spas were popular in many places throughout England but in the 1700s Bath became the most popular venue for all members of society.

We will also hear about the seaside as a fashionable place from the 18th & 19th centuries, and bathing machines.

Today, the supermarket shelves are full of a great variety of spa waters which are believed, by some, to be more beneficial than the water from the kitchen tap

We will also have a book stall, and refreshments of course.  Water if you like, but tea and coffee on offer as usual.

We will also resist all temptation to mention the World Cup. Come to a football free zone. That is our goal!

USAF World War II Exhibition at Willingale Village Hall: 15 June 2014

Notice received this evening .... 

Dear All

I have just been informed there is an exhibition in the Village Hall tomorrow organised by Derek Aspall, he used to run the museum at Blake Hall, Bobbingworth, on the USAF during World War II.  The exhibition is running from 2-5.00pm and entry is free with donations.  I understand Derek has lots of memorabilia from the war including much information on Willingale Airfield.  Good Fathers Day outing for those who have not organised anything yet!

Thanks

Bruce

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Traditional Buildings of Ongar: Next Meeting on 29 May 2014

The High Country History Group’s next meeting will be on Thursday 29 May (not tomorrow – it is Election Day) when Anne Padfield will be speaking on the traditional buildings of Ongar.

We will also have a bookstall and an opportunity to look at a book dated 1634 – being a translation of Pliny’s Natural History.

… and refreshments of course.

See you 29 May. Usual place: Toot Hill Village Hall, 8pm.

Essex Field Names (1): Introduction

Essex Field-Names

Collected and arranged by William Chapman Waller, M.A., F.S.A.

An extract from the Transactions of the Essex Archaeological Society, ‘new series’ Volume 5 (1895)

Part I: The Hundred of Ongar, and the Half Hundreds of Harlow aand Waltham [Extracts cover High Country Parishes only]

Short and disconnected lists of field-names appear from time to time in various publications, but, as far as I know, no attempt has hitherto [to 1895] been made to collect and arrange systematically those which are found to occur over the whole area of any particular county.  A passing reference made some years ago (by whom and where, I have forgotten,) to “the valuable lists of names contained in the Tithe Commutation Awards,” stuck, as such phrases will, in my mind, and it occurred to me that I would some day try to collect those parishes comprised in the Hundred of Ongar.  My first intention was to make a pilgrimage to each parish and there to inspect its particular Award.  But further consideration led me to abandon this plan as not only tedious but impracticable.  Later on, acting in concert with Council of the Society, I approached the Board of Agriculture, in whose custody the sealed copies of various Awards are deposited.  At first certain obstacles, which appeared almost insurmountable, stood in the way of my obtaining the facilities necessary for the execution of the work contemplated.  But at length, thanks to the cordial interest which the Right Hon. Herbert Gardner, one of our Vice-Presidents, manifested in a project approved of by our Council, and the courteous kindness of certain permanent officials of the Board over which he presides, all difficulties were got over, and the first instalment of Essex field-names now finds its place in the Society’s Transactions.

A few words explanatory of the scheme adopted are, perhaps, desirable.  The first proceeding was to go through the Draft Awards of the forty-one parishes contained in the Hundreds chosen, copying out all the field-names other than those absolutely common-place – such, for instance, as Broadfield, Longfield, Tenacres, and a few others, which occur by the score.  The names excerpted, to which the Tithe Map numerals were added, are in books which will ultimately be added to the MSS Collections of the Society.  Each name was next re-copied on to a slip, with the addition of a number corresponding to that assigned to be parish which it was found to occur.  Duplicates having been eliminated, the slips were arranged alphabetically, in which order they are now printed.  By way of pendant to this explanation I must add a word of thanks to my friend, Miss E M Allen, of Girton College, for the help she very kindly contributed towards the somewhat tedious process of re-copying and sorting.

It would be out of place to attempt, here and now, to say much as to the names of which the list is composed.  They exhibit a remarkable variety, the same name in precisely the same form rarely occurring more than once over whole area under review.  And it must also be added that the variations, in some few cases, appear to be due to the idiosyncracies of the original draughtsman or copyist, or of the person who informed him, rather to essential differences in the names themselves.  The explanation of sundry inaccuracies is probably to be found in the fact that the Awards, which were for the most part drawn up about half a century ago, were done in haste, and many names seem to have been misunderstood, misspelt, and mangled, while others were insufficiently authenticated. To give an instance or two: - the field which figures as ‘Peerless’ [Loughton] should indubitably appear as ‘Spare Leaze’, while ‘Luscious Mead’ [also Loughton] is really Lusher’s or Lushen’s mead; the various ‘Readings’ [e.g. Little Hallingbury, Matching], ‘Reddings’ [Stapleford Abbots, Great Hallingbury, Epping], etc., of which ‘redene’ is the earlier form.

Of all the names not immediately explicable three stand out as occurring more commonly than the rest: they are Small Gains [e.g. Navestock, Abbess Roding, Bobbingworth, High Ongar, Moreton], Rainbow Field [e.g. High Laver, Little Laver, Stondon Massey, Harlow, Hatfield Broad Oak], and Perry Field [e.g. Stanford Rivers, Stapleford Tawney, Fyfield, Magdalen Laver, Theydon Garnon]. Now ‘small’ is a word rarely found as part of a field-name: the comparison is usually expressed by ‘little’ and ‘great’. But in the case of ‘Gains’, the latter affixes occur once and once only, though ‘Gains’ itself never occurs without some qualifying word.  Perry Field may or may not be the equivalent of the modern Peartree Field [e.g. Theydon Mount, Bobbingworth, Magdalen Laver, Latton, Great Parndon].  But perige or peru is the Anglo-Saxon for pear-tree, and in one case I have come on a ‘Piryfield’ in a late 13^th century charter relating to a parish in which later on two Perry Fields are found. … Rainbow Field [e.g. Navestock, Norton Mandeville, Abbess Roding, Beauchamp Roding, Stondon Massey] I hand over to the conjectures of the ingenious, with the remark that Rainbow, like Perry, also occurs as a surname.

Although many ‘Hop Gardens’ [e.g. Shelley, North Weald, Moreton, High Laver, Epping] remain to bear witness to the time when each vill drank its own brew, ‘Flex’ [Norton Mandeville] has in three instances only survived to recall the Statute passed in Henry the Eighth’s time, which rendered obligatory the cultivation of a certain amount of hemp or flax in each parish.

A momentary glance at an Ordnance Survey Map will serve to shew that the Commutation Awards by no means include all the place-names of the parish; and many which are nowhere recorded in print, are yet enshrined in old documents, or, in some instances, still live on the lips of peasant-folk, preserved through the centuries by oral tradition.  … Comment and criticism will of necessity by more advantageously applied when, if ever, the lists for the whole county are completed.  [W C Waller completed and published the work over nine parts from ‘old series’ Volume 5 to 9].

Essex Field Names (2): Stapleford Tawney

Stapleford Tawney (1)

Barbers Mead

Blaze Meadow

Brick Clamp

Canal

Caves Meadow

Charity Land

Chase, The

Church Field

Clay Hills

Cock Field[1]

Collets Hoppet

Colmans Croft

Cook Field

Cornishes

Crumps Mead

Dale Field

Dove House Mead[2]

Elthorpe Spring

Epping Hoppet

Frith, Upper

Froghall Spring

Gibs Croft

Goose Acre

Hagmoor

Hagmoor Shots

Hither How Field

Hooking Field

Hose, The

How Field

Hundred Acres[3]

Hunters Moor

Lady Croft

Liquorish Field, North and South

Long Bottom

Long Shot

Lowlands[4]

Mayletts and Jacobs

Mill Mead

Night Leaze

North Lands, Great and Little

Parks, Hilly

Perry Field[5]

Pipers, Great and Little

Rains, Lower

Sedgy Marsh

Shailes Moor

Stock Frith

Swains Field

Talbot Inn (nr. Passingford Bridge)

Taney Mead

Tawney Wood

Thistley Field[6]

Thompsons Croft

Tylers Hoppet, Little

Well Field

Whitbreads

Windmill Field[7]

---

[1] Also occurs at Theydon Mount

[2] Also occurs at Theydon Mount

[3] This is the nearest approach to a joke that one comes on; it seems to have been thought witty to call a small enclosure ‘Hundred Acres’ or ‘Thousand Acres’. Instances are not confined to Essex.

[4] Also occurs at Theydon Mount

[5] Also occurs at Stanford Rivers

[6] Also occurs at Stanford Rivers

[7] Also occurs at Stanford Rivers

Essex Field Names (3): Stanford Rivers

Stanford Rivers (2)

Adams, Great and Little

Alder Car

Alder Field

Archers Field

Ash Elms

Backdoor Mead

Bandish Field

Barren Ley

Bean Croft

Bellhouse Grove

Bellhouse Mead

Bentons

Berwick Ham Mead

Binders Field

Black Croft

Black Root

Borehams Hoppit

Bower Field, Upper and Lower

Brain Field

Brains Lay

Bramble Field

Brewers Mead

Brewsters Mead

Brick Earth Pits

Brickland

Bromley Marsh

Brookwood, alias Ice House Wood

Broomfield

Bulmer Field

Burnt Field

Cains, Upper and Lower

Callaways, Hither and Further

Capons, Hither

Carters Hill Meadow

Chapels Croft

Chaseway

Chase Field

Church Hide

Clarks Field

Clinkles

Coars Field, Upper and Lower

Coarse Field

Colliers Hatch

Common Mead

Cooks Field

Court Oak

Court Oak Hoppit

Cowleaze

Creepers Hill

Crooked Field

Crooked Mead

Crumps Croft

Dool Field

Dooley Field

Dove House Field

Dowley Field

Dutch Barn Field

East Meadow

Fearney, Little

Fen Acre Downs

Fendells

Fish Pond Mead

Flaggy Piece

Flat Bottoms

Forest, Great, Upper & Lower

Forest, Little

Freshits, First &c.

Gains, Small

Gallows Green

Garden Cock Pond Field

Gays Wood

Gravel Pit Wood, or Long-ford Bottom

Greensteads, Little

Half Way Field

Hand-post Field

Hollands Foot, Lower

Hop Garden

Hop Ground

Hop Yards, or Bear Field

Horse Lands Chaseway

House Field, Old

How Croft

Howlands, Little and Great

Howletts

Keeps Mead

Kemps Croft

Kemps Mead

Kiln Field

Kings, Great and Little

Kingslands, Great and Little

Kittlebury

Kittlebury Mead

Knights Lands

Knights Land Wood

Ladys Field

Landditch Mead

Lanes Mead

Lay Field

Leighs, Great

Lilly Pond Field

Lucks

Marriages Mead

Mill Field

Mill Hide

Mill Hide Spring

Millers Grove

Mole Hill Field

Mon, The

Moon Field, Great and Little

Nightless

Oakes Lands

Pagle Mead

Parsons Hill

Parsons Lay

Perry Field[1]

Pig Ridden

Pigs Mead

Plaisters, Great and Little

Pollard Field, Upper and Lower

Poor Field alias Small Gains

Poor Mead

Pot Ash Mead

Pound Field

Ramseys Mead

Repentance

Robins Land

Rolls

Rowlands

Sage Marsh

Sandy Field

Sanmores, Great

Savage Croft

Scotch Street, First, Second & Further

Seven-Acre Downs

Sharps Hoppit

Sheep Pound

Shocks Trough

Short Lands

Shot, Upper and Lower

Shoulder of Mutton Field

Sledgy Marsh

Stanfield

Stoney Rocks

Tanners Field

Thistley Field[2]

Three Corner Field

Three Corners

Tile Mead

Toothill Field

Tory, Old

Tye, Great and Little

Wain Field

Wallers Mead

Wallers Wood

Wards Meadow

Water Mill Field

White Bear Inn

White Bench Field

White Face

White Lays

Windmill Field[3]

Woolmores Hoppet

Workhouse Hoppit

Wrens Field

---

[1] Also occurs at Theydon Mount

[2] Also occurs at Theydon Mount

[3] Also occurs at Stapleford Tawney

Essex Field Names (4): Greensted

Greensted (13)

Accrams Grove

Alder Carr

Anchor Field

Black Boy Field

Blyths Barn Meadow

Bob Davis Pasture

Brank Field

Buck Horns

Churn Wood Hanging

Clapgate Field

Clay Hill

Clinker, Lower

Clump Field

Colchester Field

Common Meadow

Crockleford

Dead Lane

Devils Meadow

Dock Meadow

Doctors Drift

Doctors Field

Dunghill Field

Fox and Bullock Wood

Glaze Lights

Grove Hanging

Hangings

Havens Lane

Heath Slipe

Hewes Delight

Hunts Pightle

Lock Field

Mumsey Field [Nursery Field]

Noland Wood

Park Field

Plumtree Field

Salary Brook Field

Slough Lane

Stoney Field

Sun Meadow

Wavering Meadow

Winding Meadow

Essex Field Names (5): Theydon Mount

Theydon Mount (23)

Arthurs Croft

Barbers Green

Bartholomew Spring

Bitchett, The

Bobs Piece

Bourses, The

Brick Kiln Field

Cock Field[1]

Crabs Spring

Cross Shot

Cutbush

Dell Hole Field

Dove House Mead[2]

Fulwells Bottom

Gallows Croft

Half Field

Hide Field

Hilly Roodings

Honey Castle Spring

Hook Mead

Hull Mead

Langhills

Lowlands[3]

Peartree Field

Pool Field

Prentice Mead

Russell Field

Sheeplands

Shot, Long

Side Hills, Great and Little

Smell Brooks

Stanmead

Stoney Downs, East and West

Triangle Meadow

Warren Mead

Whitecroft

---

[1] Also occurs at Stapleford Tawney

[2] Also occurs at Stapleford Tawney

[3] Also occurs at Stapleford Tawney

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