BLACKMORE HISTORY NEWS - August 2010

Welcome to this month’s round-up of local history and heritage in and around Blackmore, Essex.

A Folk Song A Day

Jon Boden’s website is a musical journey into our past. Since Midsummer Day a new song has been posted every day. Highlights include:
A Blacksmith Courted Me - http://www.afolksongaday.com/2010/07/27/a-blacksmith-courted-me/; Danny Deever - http://www.afolksongaday.com/2010/07/11/danny-deever/ ; and, Tyne of Harrow - http://www.afolksongaday.com/2010/07/01/tyne-of-harrow/ - all of which I have added a comment. For more about the project read the article which appeared in The Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/jul/28/jon-boden-a-folk-song-a-day

Henry Moore

‘Harlow Family Group’ is a well-known sculpture in the New Town by Henry Moore. At the Gibberd Gallery in the Civic Centre (Harlow, Essex) an exhibition of the artist’s work has commenced and will continue until 30 October 2010. (Admission Free. Open Monday to Friday 9.00am to 5.00pm, Saturday 9.00am to noon. Closed Sundays and Bank Holidays). Having recently visited the major exhibition at Tate Britain in London (which closes 8 August) and visited Moore’s home, grounds and studio at Perry Green in Hertfordshire, this local exhibition, entitled ‘Sheep’, is not to be missed.

Henry Moore is probably Britain’s greatest twentieth century sculptor. He is best known for his large scale human forms, sometimes with distorted torsos, wrong sized and shaped heads and limbs. His ability to form body shapes is said to be based on his memories of rubbing his infirm mother’s shoulders and back as a child. At the Tate Britain exhibition it was suggested that his work was dark and sensual but in my view it omitted the fact that he began studying sculpture at Leeds – he was the only student – following service in the First World War at Cambrai. The pitiful sight of dismembered bodies on the battlefield must have had a lasting influence on his work. If was after his London studio was bombed in The Blitz of the Second World War that he came to Hoglands, at Perry Green, where he remained until the close of his life. Anyway, I know little about modern art but find it interesting and, unlike a Constable masterpiece such as ‘The Haywain’, something which always engenders discussion among viewers.

Edward Henry Lisle Reeve

Readers of this site will know that I am very interested in the life and times of Revd. Reeve (photograph above) who was Rector of Stondon Massey from 1893 to 1935. I have decided to write a biography of this man but wonder whether any of his descendents survive – hence this appeal. He and his sisters died unmarried but we know of a Wheatley family who was related to him through the previous marriage of his mother.

Issac Taylor of Stanford Rivers

Pages from the ‘Dictionary of National Biography’ (http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:Dictionary_of_National_Biography_volume_55.djvu/423 , http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:Dictionary_of_National_Biography_volume_55.djvu/424 and http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:Dictionary_of_National_Biography_volume_55.djvu/425 ) give a biography of Issac Taylor, an artist, author and inventor who was born in Lavenham, Suffolk in 1787 – remembered in the Lavenham Guildhall owned by the National Trust - and died at Stanford Rivers in 1865. “A portrait of Isaac Taylor of Stanford Rivers is the property of Henry Taylor of Tunbridge Wells, and a crayon portrait by his nephew, Josiah Gilbert, is in the National Portrait Gallery.”

Family History

Samuel Wilson, born 1801, Writtle: http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=bkev8tjhpa3e8kjd8ssh3009u2&topic=23988.0

New Photos

Fryerning Church font: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stiffleaf/4739185699/
Mountnessing Windmill: http://www.flickr.com/photos/43012441@N07/4798961727/

Links

For an extensive list of links to other sites go to: http://www.blackmorehistory.co.uk/externallinks.html

BLACKMORE HISTORY NEWS - June 2010

Welcome to this month’s round-up of local history and heritage in and around Blackmore, Essex.

Listed Building to be bought for £1

Blackmore, Hook End and Wyatts Green Parish Council are about to purchase a listed building for just £1. The telephone box which stands outside the Post Office has been declared redundant by BT and will have its equipment removed. It is a traditional K6 variety designed about 1935 by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott and has been accorded Grade II listed status, probably because of its location. Parish Councils across the land are being asked to “Adopt a Red Telephone Kiosk” rather than see them disappear from our streetscape. We reported on a similar situation at Stondon Massey in January 2009. The Council “agreed that the kiosk located in Blackmore Village would be purchased, at a nominal fee of £1 but the kiosk in Wyatts Green should be removed by BT.” A photograph of the telephone box to be preserved was published in ‘Blackmore Area Local History News’ in December 2009. Photographed this month is the ill-fated kiosk at Wyatts Green.

Listed Buildings

‘British Listed Buildings’ appears to be newly-published on the website. The pages are arranged parish by parish.
Ingatestone & Fryerning: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/ingatestone+and+fryerning
This includes Howletts Hall (Grade II listed) on the Chelmsford Road which is commonly regarded as being in Blackmore but, as I found when investigating an Ernest Knight of neighbouring Ganders Hall, is actually just over the parish boundary.
An overview of Essex parishes can be found by taking the following link: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex
This means links for ‘Blackmore Area Local History’ parishes are:
Blackmore: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/blackmore
Doddinghurst: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/doddinghurst
High Ongar: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/high+ongar
Mountnessing: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/mountnessing
Norton Mandeville: not listed
Shenfield: not listed
Stondon Massey: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/stondon+massey
Willingale: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/willingale
Writtle: http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/england/essex/writtle

Cooperative at Blackmore

Chelmsford Star Coop took over the Nisa store in the centre of Blackmore village on 20 April 2010.

Roman Discovery at Harlow

A Roman brick kiln has been discovered by workers building at new playground at Prentice Place, Potter Street, Harlow. The place name is a bit of a giveaway. For more information see: http://www.harlowherald.co.uk/content/hlwherald/news/story.aspx?brand=HLHOnline&category=NewsHarlow&tBrand=HertsCambsOnline&tCategory=newslatestHLH&itemid=WEED29%20Apr%202010%2009%3A15%3A30%3A293

War Memorial Research Project Group

The work of this Group to identify all the names carved on Blackmore’s War Memorial has been completed and online publication is now under way. If you have any information on those who died or survived from Blackmore and the surrounding area from the First World War we would be very pleased to hear from you.

Supporting ‘Help For Heroes’

Lyndon March, whose family originally hail from Ingatestone, and Connor Mayes (otherwise referred to as ‘The Dynamic Duo’) are a couple of teenagers who will be taking part in a 350 mile sponsored bicycle ride from London to Paris in support of ‘Help For Heroes’. You can follow and support their fund raising efforts on http://connormayes.blogspot.com/2010/04/blackmore-area-local-history-essex-home.html. They tell me that for every £10 they raise Virgin Giving will be donating a further £2.95 towards their target of £3,000. I am delighted to lend my support to them and their cause. Come on lads!!!

Family Histories

New online:
Adams family, of Doddinghurst, Blackmore and Brentwood: http://www.lintywhite.com/adams.html
Memories of the Buttle family at Stondon Massey are shared on ‘Francis Frith’: http://www.francisfrith.com/stondon-massey/memories/my-time-spent-in-stondon-massey_140471/

Links

A countryside walk taking ramblers on a circular route via Norton Mandeville and Blackmore has been published online at http://mediafiles.thedms.co.uk/Publication/EE-Ess/cms/pdf/9%20Countryside%20Walks%20in%20Brentwood%20-%20Blackmore%20&%20Norton%20Mandeville.pdf

A new website for the churches of Greensted, Stanford Rivers, Stapleford Tawney and Theydon Mount has been published: http://highcountry.org.uk/

For an extensive list of links to other sites go to: http://www.blackmorehistory.co.uk/externallinks.html

BLACKMORE HISTORY NEWS - May 2009

Welcome to this month’s round-up of local history and heritage in and around Blackmore, Essex.

Churches Open To Visitors: Summer 2009

The Priory Church of St Laurence, Blackmore
(From 3 May to 4 October)
Sundays, Wednesdays, Thursdays & Fridays
2.30 – 4.30pm
Teas In The Tower on the 1st Sunday in the month

St Peter & St Paul, Stondon Massey
Sunday 10 May, Sunday 14 June, Sunday 12 July, Sunday 9 August, Sunday 13 September
2.30 – 4.30pm
Teas served

All Saints’, Doddinghurst
Sunday 21 June, Sunday 19 July, Sunday 16 August, Sunday 20 September.
2.30 – 4.30pm
Strawberry Cream Teas on 19 July

Revd. Canon Ivy Crawford leaves Blackmore for pastures new

Revd. Canon Ivy Crawford, Vicar of Blackmore and Rector of Stondon Massey, left the village on 19th April to take up a new role in the Chelmsford Diocese and as priest in charge of five parishes near Little Easton. Canon Ivy was Blackmore’s first women priest – being one of the earliest ordained in the Church of England – and served the parish in a ministry spanning almost 14 years. In a farewell address at a Service before a packed congregation she said, “I have been privileged to share with so many families in their joys and pain. I have been blessed in seeing so many people come closer to God, and grow in their relationship with him.”

Harlow. Sculpture Town

Harlow’s internationally important sculptures in the urban landscape are being promoted in a new tourist campaign from this month with brown signs declaring ‘Harlow. Sculpture Town’.

Brentwood Was Revolting

A new book, ‘A Summer of Blood’ by Daniel Jones, has just been published according to the History Times website.

“The Peasants’ Revolt of the summer of 1381, led by the mysterious Wat Tyler and the visionary preacher John Ball, was one of the bloodiest events in British history. To finance an unyielding war with France, a reckless and oppressive tax was imposed upon the English lower orders. Ravaged by war, plague and tyranny, England’s villagers rose against their masters for the first time in history. Initial resistance in the Essex village of Brentwood swiftly inspired the desire for revenge in other communities. The outcome of their brave and tragic rising changed England forever.”

For more information go to: http://www.historytimes.com/history-books/book-reviews/five-new-releases-to-look-out-for

Essex Way

Having walked the entire Essex Way over five consecutive days in 1997, I was interested to see Richard Jackson, an artist (and blogger), has begun his own record of the walk from Epping to Harwich via Ongar, Willingale through to Good Easter. For more visit: http://essexway.blogspot.com/.

Ingatestone Hall gatehouse

An unusual and excellent picture taken of the Tudor gatehouse at Ingatestone Hall and one taken from the Lime Walk of the house, both taken by ‘chris37111’ appears on ‘Flicker’. Follow link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/chris37111/3447670758/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/chris37111/3444354461/

Norton Mandeville Church

This month's photo is of All Saints', Norton Mandeville. Barry Slemmings entry on ‘Flicker’ contains a history and photograph of the interior of Norton Mandeville Church. Follow this link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/barryslemmings/3461306462/in/photostream/. The whole set of pictures can be accessed by following http://www.flickr.com/photos/barryslemmings/sets/72057594132610691/

Suckling’s Memorials of Essex

As promised last month, part of this work (dated 1845) will be serialised on this blog starting next week.

Links

For an extensive list of links to other sites go to: www.blackmorehistory.co.uk/externallinks.html.

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (10)

Churchgate Street, to the east of the New Town, forms part of Old Harlow. It is a delightful area. A lovely place for lunch is the early sixteenth century timber-framed building, the Queen’s Head, with its long jettied front. The fireplace in the public bar is worth a look.

For a list of past publicans and other photographs of the street and pub go to: http://londonpublichouse.com/essexpubs/Harlow/qhead.shtml
Beer in the evening has the following: http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/26/26062/Queens_Head_Inn/Harlow

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (9)

‘Contrapuntal Forms’ by Barbara Hepworth (1903 – 1975) is a Grade II listed structure, sited in Glebelands. The sculptor lived in St Ives during the latter part of her life where her house is now a museum, with the Cornish town and her garden full of her work.

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (8)

Marks Hall was a fine mansion in the former parish of Latton. All that remains now is the former kitchen garden and stable block, now used as the ‘Museum of Harlow’ For information on the Museum go to
http://www.harlow.gov.uk/Default.aspx?page=7116. The picture shows the parterre garden on the site.

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (7)

Harlowbury Chapel, a Grade I listed building, is on the outskirts of Harlow New Town. Its survival is probably due to alternative use. D W Coller wrote in his 'Peoples History of Essex' (1861):

"A large chapel was built close to the mansion - partly, it is probable, for the use of the tenants, and partly that the abbot and his followers might chant the mass and sing vesper hymns during their stay [en route to and from Bury St Edmunds from London]. This chapel still remains, with its fine circular headed door, and its small antique windows; but Mr Barnard, the owner and occupier of the estate, uses it, as it has been used for a number of years, for the purposes of a granary - sacks occupy the site of the altar, and the aisles and chancel receive the produce of the neighbouring fields".

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (6)

Harlowbury is a Grade I listed building on the edge of what is now named Old Harlow. What resembles a village surrounded by the 'new town' was once a market town on the London to Cambridge road, having its market day on a Saturday. D W Coller, writing in 'A Peoples History of Essex' (1861) says of Harlowbury:

"Harlow Bury was given to the abbey of Bury St Edmund's by Thurston, son of Wina, in the time of Edward the Confessor; and the lordly abbot of that house appears to have made it a halting place, where he feasted and sojourned for a time, as he travelled to and fro in attending parliament" [Coller, p308].

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (5)

St Mary, Latton, stands on a slight hill by the side of First Avenue. Originally it stood near to Mark Hall which was demolished during the twentieth century. Although once ravaged by fire the church contains a small chapel and altar tomb to Peter Ardene. There are also magnificent brasses to other members of the Ardene family, and to Frances Frankelin (1604). An ancient altar cloth to the Altham family is in the neighbouring Harlow Museum.

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (4)

The oldest item in the modern Water Gardens (2003) is 'Eve' by Rodin (1882). Behind the pond are eateries and the Civic Centre.

More on 'Harlow Ancient & Modern' next month.

Another place well worth a visit is The Museum of Harlow at Mark Hall. For more information go to http://www.harlow.gov.uk/Default.aspx?page=7116

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (3)

The Broadwalk, Harlow, is Britain's oldest shopping precinct. At its southern end is the bronze sculpture 'Trigon' by Lynn Chadwick (1961)

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (2)

A photograph taken in September 2008 near the house in the Gibberd Garden. The flowers around the sculpture are striking. Inside Frederick Gibberd's former home is his Library and a display of plans, scale models and other material relating to the development of Harlow New Town. For more information on the Gibberd Garden go to
http://www.thegibberdgarden.co.uk/home.htm

Harlow: Ancient & Modern (1)

'Owl' is just one of around eighty sculptures in the Gibberd Garden, Harlow. Visitors should not expect neatly clipped flower-beds but rooms containing a variety of work using different media. The Gibberd Garden is open during the summer months ans has a small gift shop and appetising tea room. For more information go to
http://www.thegibberdgarden.co.uk/home.htm

Harlow: Frederick Gibberd (1908 - 1984)

Sir Frederick Gibberd, architect, was born on 7 January 1908 in Coventry. His crowning achievement – apart from Liverpool’s Roman Catholic Cathedral - was as Master Planner for Harlow. The “new town” was designated in 1947, following the Second World War, when there was an acute need for housing. It was part of the so-called Abercrombie Plan (also known as the Greater London Plan 1944) to build satellite towns around London within the Green Belt (a ring of land around the metropolis designated in 1938 to prevent further encroachment into the countryside). Margaretting and Ongar were short-listed but Harlow, or more accurately a 6000 acre site encompassing the parishes of Great and Little Parndon, Netteswell and Harlow was selected.

Frederick Gibberd and his first wife, Dorothy, moved to the outskirts of Harlow in 1957 where he indulged in his passion for gardening at weekends, away from the offices of the Harlow Development Corporation. His garden is open to the public during the summer months: Gibberd wanted it to be a place of recreation and education for the residents of the town. His second wife, Lady Gibberd developed the garden to be one full of sculptures.

Harlow New Town is perhaps not as well known as it should be for its “public realm” – sculptures in the shopping centre and on housing estates. Lady Gibberd, in her earlier years, then Patricia Fox-Edwards, had been a founder of the Harlow Arts Trust, as had Frederick, an organisation that has been instrumental in commissioning work from modern artists.

Harlow is no concrete jungle either. On his appointment as Master Planner, Gibberd cycled and walked the designated area and, in getting to know the landscape, was able to make sympathetic use of it when drawing up his draft plan to house 60,000 people. Later the target number of residents was increased to 80,000, then 90,000 in 1967. Gibberd’s vision, as seen on the ground today, created ‘green wedges’ between four main built-up areas: The High (a shopping area) and The Stow, Bush Fair and Staple Tye, residential areas with their own estates and library, doctor’s surgery and community centre. He conserved old farmhouses and buildings, destroyed as few ancient trees as possible and turned ancient lanes into quiet cycle-tracks. Harlow village became Old Harlow and, with Potter Street, was expanded. Old Harlow still has be air of a small ancient market town on what was once the Epping to Bishops Stortford road. Gibberd’s plans met with little public opposition.

Known as ‘pram town’ in its early years, Harlow has been through its ups and downs but now tired areas are being regenerated and new estates, such as New Hall, following on from Church Langley, created. But the legacy remains. In the Water Gardens, is a blue plaque to Gibberd’s memory. The site itself is new but Gibberd’s words that a town is like “an organism which would go on changing and being rebuilt as the needs of the people altered” is an apt phrase.

Bibliography:
Bateman, Linley H (editor). History of Harlow (Harlow Development Corporation, 1969)
Newens, Stan. The Genesis of Harlow New Town (Essex Journal, Spring 2008)
Sir Frederick Gibberd and His Garden (The Gibberd Garden Trust, 2004)

Photo:
Head of Sir Frederick – Gerda Rubinstein.

Great Parndon: School Life in the Nineteenth Century

Until the nineteenth century, educational standards in England were very poor. As official documents testify, many people were illiterate, signing marriage registers etc with “their mark”. This changed from 1870 when Forster’s Education Act set up School Boards. Many of our Victorian village schools date from immediately after this date and are in Essex, it has to be said, of a certain architectural style. However it was not until 1880 that attendance became compulsory. The school leaving age was 11 in 1893 and 12 in 1899. A further Education Act was passed in 1902 legislating for secondary education.

School records for the period reveal the rhythm of ordinary family life and community. Even today, the six-week summer holiday in late July and August is a throw back to a time when everyone gathered the harvest.

Robert Driver wrote that in Great Parndon (now part of Harlow New Town), older girls were kept away from school so that their mothers could go hay-making (6 June 1864) and the school that year was closed on 5 August, until 19 September, for “harvest holiday”. Elsewhere in the school log book there are records of children being absent to “pick stones” (9 February 1869); for “bird scaring” (7 July 1870), “gleaning” (5 October 1871); “gathering blackberries” (25 September 1884).

If this all sounds rather idyllic, conditions at school were poor. Heating was rudimentary and lighting by means of oil lamps. On 11 January 1865 it is recorded, “The day exceedingly foggy. The children unable to see to do their work”. Following a heavy fall of snow, many children were “laid up with chilblains” (16 January 1866).

Illness and the death of children was not uncommon. “Henry Watson dies of measles aged 3 years 6 months. Walter Meredith, one of the boys in the second class, has lost sight of both his eyes” (22 November 1864); In addition to measles, other illnesses such as scarlet fever, whooping cough, diphtheria and influenza are recorded at regular intervals. Many died of the “dreaded” scarlet fever, which caused schools to be closed: “The schoolroom has been thoroughly disinfected by the Sanitary Officer” (4 December 1899). On another occasion the school was closed for four weeks due to measles: “Seven families only have escaped. Many of the children are still far from well and look very pale and weak” (26 February 1906).

There were happier times. “Queen Victoria’s Jubilee (21 June 1887), “Parndon Fair” (8 July 1887), a gift of slippers for the children (15 October 1889) from Mrs Todhunter of Kingsmoor House, who gave “her usual treat” attended by 107 children (25 September 1890).

Bibliography:
Robert Driver. A Green Wedge. An account of the history of the area surrounding Great Parndon Church (Robert Driver, 1998)

Andrew Smith