My Adventures 3: Great Horkesley

On 19th March 2017 I set off to meet Dan for another Essex Way walk. We met at Mistley parked up in the car park of St Mary and St Micheal Church on New Road. Before driving another car to the start at Brick Kiln Lane in Great Horkesley.

We parked up where we left off the last walk, we walked off Brick Kiln Lane onto Nayland Road where we saw some lovely octagonal shaped cottages.

At the roundabout we turn right onto Ivy Lodge Road where after a bit of walking we turn left onto a footpath which is known as Lincoln Lane.

Here we met our first bit of mud, I carefully made my way across the mud using branches laid across it. Dan however took a more undignified approach and hanging on the fence.

Dan is on the fence again!

Lincoln Lane passes a fishery used by Colchester Police Angling Club, no-one was fishing today.

At the end of Lincoln Lane we turn right onto Broad Lane before emerging onto Boxted Road. We walk a short stretch of this road before turning onto Holly Lodge Road.

Beautiful properties on Holly Lodge Road

After walking almost the length of Holly Lodge Road we turn right onto a footpath that runs past Holly Lodge Farm passing Mouse Hall before joining right Green Lane for a short stretch before turning onto another path leading to Carters Farm.

Carters Farm has freely-draining soil that is ideal for the vineyard here planted in 1991.

Dedham Vale Vineyard is set in 40 acres of vines, woods and pasture on the edge of the Dedham Vale area of natural beauty.

The Vineyard Shop and Tasting Barn are open for tea, coffee and tours from March through to October. Sample the wines and wander through the vines as you enjoy this glorious part of North Essex. Our self-guided vineyard trail and tasting is open throughout the season and guided tours, tasting and lunch or afternoon tea can be booked in advance.

Wild Flower meadows have been sown near the two lakes and 14 acres of woodland has been planted.

My first sighting of a butterfly this year, a lovely Tortoiseshell.

We continue across farmland with beautiful views.

We leave the farmland behind as we join Church for a short stretch passing Wet Lane.

Shortly after we turn onto Burnt Dick Hill and walk up this road for a bit before turning right onto a path past Boxted Hall.

Boxted Hall Farm covers some 700 acres,100 acres of which are woodland,which includes Boxted

Great Wood and Boxted Little Wood.Boxted Great Wood was mentioned in the Domesday book and

still shows signs of medieval planting. The oldest barn was built in the 14th century,another in the 16th century and the others in the

17th century,all are in a good state of preservation.In order to keep these buildings well cared for the

owners of the farm feel they must put them to some good use,craftwork or light industry,as they are

no longer needed for storage. The farm is now completely arable except for 30 acres under grass which is letto Mr.Thorpe the butcher

for his cattle.In 1976 the water meadows near the River Stour were ploughed up.

The area by Boxted Hall is full of beautiful and expensive looking homes.

Here there were no signs as to which way the path led, so a quick look on viewranger app on the phone confirmed where it was and we were off again.

We left the path as we crossed a road to St Peters Church in Boxted. Some people were just leaving and informed us we just missed the service and free coffee. So we sat in the churchyard for our lunch.

In the early years of the 11th century a Saxon lord named Edwin built a church at Boxted, on the southern slopes of the Dedham Vale. The site chosen by Edwin for his church is rumoured to have been occupied by the ruins of a Roman villa destroyed by Queen Boudicca in her rebellion against the Romans in 61AD. Certainly the Saxon church was built using Roman bricks, mixed with local rubble.

In the late 11th century Edwin's church was replaced with a grand new building in stone. The builders were Robert de Horkesley and his wife Beatrice. The building was begun sometime around 1090 and completed by 1130. The church was dedicated to St Mary, and that dedication held true until sometime around the Reformation - perhaps when nearby Little Horkesley Priory was dissolved, at which point the church was rededicated to St Peter. The first priest was a monk from Little Horkesley Priory named Roberto. The material was a mix of puddingstone, rubble, and Roman brick, but the upper part of the tower was rebuilt in the 16th century with brick, and brick buttresses added. At the same time a timber porch was added.


Death:	Jul. 24, 1890
Died of pneumonia following a riding accident. Married, he was a farmer and a Captain in the Norfolk Regiment militia, as well as Hon. Major in the Essex Regiment militia. Buried in the Vesey Mausoleum built in 1890 in the church yard on the south side of St. Peter's Church. A second coffin inside the mausoleum is thought to be that of his wife. Inscription: In Memory Of Arthur Sidney Vesey, Formerly Captain 1st Batn. Norfolk Regiment, and subsequently Captain and Hon. Major 3rd Batn. Essex-Regiment Died 24th July 1890, Aged 34 Years. “Not gone from memory, not gone from love, but gone to his father’s home above"

We walk on now along Church Street for a bit of road walking, the wind was getting up and it was hard to know if it was the wind howling or cars approaching, so caution was needed.

Lovely cottage on Church Street

The village was the site of a series of skirmishes between Parliamentary and Royalist troops in July 1648, known as the Battle of Boxted Heath.

A bit further along Church Street the hedgerow open up to glorious views across the Dedham Vale.

After much road walking we turn right onto a path that runs across to Rivers Hall.

We pass a lake as we walk through a lovely woodland setting in Cophedge Wood.

We now enter Ash Wood and after walking downhill for a while as always after a downhill its followed by a uphill stretch.

We join Sky Hall Hill for a very short stretch before heading across farmland to Plumbs Hall.

We cross the road and onto another path and uphill to Langham.

We stop at St Marys Church as depicted in several of John Constables paintings whose talent was encouraged by the local rector Dr Fisher from an early age. Constable made sketches from the church tower, and the church either appears in, or is the viewpoint for several of his most well known paintings.

A Constable painting with St Mary's in the background

The Little building in the corner of the churchyard is the Hurlock Schoolroom. It was built in 1832 by Dr Hurlock,the rector to serve as a girls school on weekdays and a resting place for the old and poor between church services on Sundays.

Before the A12 was built, all the traffic had to negotiate the steep and dangerous bends on Gun Hill. A cast iron sign was put up on the toll-gate which was written from the point-of-view of a horse hauling a heavy load up the hill. Credited to a 19th century parson, the sign now hangs in the South porch of St Mary's Church. It reads;

"The Dumb Animals Humble Petition Rest Drivers rest non this steep hill,

Dumb beasts pray use with all good will.

Goad Not,scourge not,with thonged whips,Let no-one curse escape your lips.

God sees and hears"

The oldest parts of the church date from no earlier than the 12th century but its proximity to what is now Langham Hall suggest that it stands on the site of a Saxon foundation. It would be logical to think that the adjacent Church Farm was the parsonage but in fact the parsonage was on a separate manor to the south at what is now Glebe Farm.

The walls of the church are mostly of pebble-rubble with much iron pudding-stone in the extended chancel; dressings are of oolite and limestone. Parts of the north wall of the chancel and nave are of 12th century construction, while the lower part of the tower is 13th century. Early in the 14th century the whole church was remodelled: the chancel was extended and its arch widened asymmetrically to meet the splayed south wall.

St Mary's contains the oldest church chest in Essex, and one of the oldest in the country. This dug out chest, hewn from oak was probably used to store money raised to finance the crusades in the 12th century.

We leave the church and pass Langham Hall. The original manor was held by Sir Walter Tyrell who is suspected of having killed King William II whilst hunting in the New Forest in 1100. A more recent resident was Squire Wiliam Nocton who was High Sheriff of Essex in 1908-1909. The squire was a flamboyant character who rode a 6 horse coach, the excessive length of which prompted him to construct the wide turning circle at the South Lodge entrance.

Taking centre stage today in Langhams Hall Library is a large mirror over the fireplace. This is no ordinary mirror. It was made allegedly on Squire Noctons instructions with angled edges. This meant that card playing guests who were unfortunate enough to be seated with their backs to the mirror could have their hands read by the Squire.

The driveway between Langham Hall and Gun Hill is lined by a magnificent Lime Tree Avenue.

After we walk down Gun Hill we cross the noisy A12.

Milsom Hotel and Restaurant

We walk pass the turning before realising we had walked too far and walked back before walking past Milsoms Hotel and restaurant and joining the path by The River Stour.

We follow the path along The Stour and through The National Trust 'Bridges Farm'.


A rather pointless sty !

We leave the path and walk into Dedham. Dedham is at the heart of 'Constable Country' – the area of England where Constable lived and painted. Constable attended the town's Grammar School (now the 'Old Grammar School' and 'Well House'), and he would walk to school each morning alongside the River Stour from his family's home in East Bergholt. Many of Constable's paintings feature Dedham, including Dedham Mill, which his father owned, and Dedham Parish Church, whose massive Caen stone and flint tower is a focal point of the surrounding Dedham Vale.

We pass Dedham Parish Church.

One of the great churches of northern Essex, St Mary's dominates the High Street of Dedham. The church as we see it today is primarily a 15th century rebuilding of an earlier medieval church which existed at least as early as 1322. That early church occupied the site of the current south aisle chapel, an indication of just how much smaller it was than the grand 15th century building we see today! The door to the vestry is thought to have been the main entrance to the 14th century church.

Work on a new church was begun in 1492 and completed in 1522. The walls are rubble and flint, so common in East Anglia. The tower is knapped flint, dressed with limestone. The striking west tower, finished in 1519, is totally self-supporting and features an unusual vaulted passage. An unsubstantiated tradition is that Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, gave money for the tower to be built. Whoever paid for it, the tower is certainly striking; it stands 131 feet high and is visible for miles along the valley.

After a quick stop at the shop for something to eat and drink we walk on along a path that loops around behind the church and passed a place called Pennypot.

This footpath once led to a pest house on the edge of the village. Its name comes from the custom of leaving money in a jar at the village boundary in exchange for provisions bought by outsiders in times of the plague.

We walk on through farmland passing along Coopers Lane, Castle Hill and yet more farmland.

Mushrooms growing in a pile of dung

We come across a rope swing and who could not have a go ? It was quite high up and getting on proved difficult.

We cross Hill Farm and down to cross the railway tracks beneath.

We walk on through some woods passing Humberlands before walking onto Mill Hill.

Approaching Mill Hill

After walking a stretch along Mill Hill we take a path that goes past Lawford Hall.

Lawford Hall was owned by two         
 families, the D'Arcy and Waldegrave   
 families. Originally King Harold took 
 possession of this area.              
  In 1583 Lawford Hall was rebuilt by a
 man called Edward Waldegrave. It was  
 also refurbished in the 18th century  
 with a brick front added.             
  The hall has an adjacent church,     
 cottages, rectories and an avenue of  
 limes. The house or hall looks        
 Georgian but underneath the front,    
 (built in 1756) it has Elizabethan    
 walls. Also Lawford hall contains     
 gabled wings, Elizabethan chimney     
 stacks and the stairs are turreted.   
 By Natalie Beales, 12 years old.

We now reach St Mary's Church in Lawford.

The oldest fabric in the church is in the south wall of the nave, dating from 1200 or earlier. The chancel, the south porch and the first tower were built in 1340. The tower was rebuilt in the 16th century, and again in the following century. In 1826 the north wall of the nave and the north aisle were added.In 1853, when the rector was Revd Charles Merivale (later the Dean of Ely), the interior of the chancel was restored by the Lancaster architect E. G. Paley.The nave was restored in 1864, followed by the chancel walls in 1887. In 1944 the east window was damaged by a bomb. In 1991 an extension was made to the north of the church to house a vestry and meeting rooms, and in 2009 the roof and tower were repaired and parts of the interior of the church were modernised.

The churchyard contains the war graves of a soldier and two airmen of the Second World War.

We walk on crossing more grassland approaching Coxs Hill.

We cross Coxs Hill and walk along more fields before reaching the outskirts of Manningtree.

Now we walk through Manningtree itself, lovely place!

Manningtree has traditionally claimed to be the smallest town in England, and in 2007 mayor Lee Lay-Flurrie said that this had been confirmed to her by the Census Customer Services, with 700 people in 20 hectares (using the high tide mark). However both this figure and the population of 900 in the civil parish is much higher than the 351 population of Fordwich in Kent. In April 2009 it was proposed that Manningtree should merge with Mistley and Lawford to form a single parish, losing its separate identity as a town.

The name Manningtree is thought to derive from 'many trees'. The town grew around the wool trade from the 15th century until its decline in the 18th century and also had a thriving shipping trade in corn, timber and coal until this declined with the coming of the railway. Manningtree is known as the centre of the activities of Matthew Hopkins, the self-appointed Witchfinder General, who claimed to have overheard local women discussing their meetings with the devil in 1644 with his accusations leading to their execution as witches.

Many of the buildings in the centre of the town have Georgian facades which obscure their earlier origins. Notable buildings include the town's library, which was originally built as 'a public hall for the purposes of corn exchange' and was later used around 1900 for public entertainment, and the oldest Methodist church in Essex, located on South Street.

The Ascension, by John Constable, which now hangs in Dedham church, was commissioned in 1821 for the altarpiece of the early seventeenth century church on the High Street, demolished in 1967.

We reach the waters edge of The Stour and have a stroll along with a short stop at a beach !!


Looking across to St Mary and St Michael Church where the car is parked. We wanted to cut across but it wasnt possible. Our aching feet must cover a little more diatnce yet.

We stop for a coffee and sit by the waters edge, a mistake my feet feel much worse now I've stopped.

We reach Mistley Towers.

Mistley Towers are the twin towers of the now demolished Church of St. Mary the Virgin at Mistley in Essex. The original Georgian parish church on the site had been built in classical style early in the 18th century following the death of Richard Rigby Esquire. Later in that century there was a grandiose plan by his son, the wealthy politician Richard Rigby, to transform Mistley Thorn into a spa town. Rigby wished to see a church from the windows of his mansion and a suitably grand church was required for the affluent visitors expected to patronise the new spa. Thus in 1776, the renowned architect Robert Adam was commissioned to enhance the church. His design was in the neoclassical style, with a tower at both the east and the west ends of the church. These are now all that remain of the once magnificent structure.

The square symmetrical towers are in the neoclassical style, resembling tall pavilions rather than towers, with each facade pedimented and the whole surmounted by a cupola decorated with blind windows interspersed by Ionic columns. At ground floor level two unfluted ionic columns at each corner support a decorative cornice. The columns are decorative only, and appear to serve no structural purpose. The design of the towers creates the impression that the building was once more of a miniature cathedral than a parish church. However, the main body of the church was small and occupied the (now empty) site between the two towers. It was a single story structure with a simple hipped roof and an entrance portico at its centre. This part of Adam's church was demolished in 1870, when the new parish church in New Road was built. The remaining towers are Grade I listed and a scheduled monument.