A VERY BRIEF HISTORY OF THE VILLAGE OF INGATESTONE

Earliest times

The earliest references to a settlement at what is now the village of Ingatestone are from Saxon times, although since the location is roughly a day’s march along the road between the Roman settlements of Londinium and Camuludonum ( Colchester) it was probably also known to the Romans.

Middle Ages

From the middle of the tenth century until the dissolution of the monasteries, Ingatestone was part of the lands owned by the Abbey of Barking, in the Hundred of Chelmsford.

Sir William Petre, who was Secretary of State to Henry VIII, bought the land from the Crown when the monasteries were dissolved and built himself a courtyard residence between 1540 and 1543 which became the family seat and now forms the basis of Ingatestone Hall. Sir William was originally a Devon lawyer and his family home there was known as Tor Bryan.

Queen Elizabeth the First is believed to have visited the Hall

Fryerning was a separate parish until united with Ingatestone in 1889. After the Norman Conquest it was given to a Norman baron, Robert Gernon. In about 1180, Gilbert Mountfichet who had inherited the property, gave the church and half the manor to the Knights Hospitallers of St John who owned it until the dissolution in 1540. In 1607, it was bought by Nicolas Wadham and on the deaths of Nicholas and his wife Dorothy (who founded Wadham College, Oxford), the manor — and a large part of the parish — passed into the ownership of the College.

Sixteenth to Eighteenth centuries

The Petre family were recusant Catholics and entertained religious services at the Hall, where a “Priest Hole” still exists. They were also sponsors of the English composer William Byrd, who was like them a Catholic and who composed several works dedicated to the family.

ingatestone Hall is the location for the eponymous crime in Pope’s The Rape of the Lock.

Nineteenth century to early twentieth.

During the heyday of the mail and passenger coaches, Ingatestone was a stopping place for changing teams of horses and offering overnight accommodation to travellers. At least two buildings in the High Street are recognisably old coaching inns. At the height of coaching 50 coaches a day passed through the village.

The village was also a junction on the “Salt Road” from Maldon to London and a distribution point for contraband goods that had been smuggled into the country through the numerous creeks of the Essex coastline. The Boot public house (which no longer exists) in Beggar Hill was reputed to be the centre of this activity

The coming of the railway in 1843 meant the village became less important as a way station and about the same time, the importance of the surrounding land as grazing pasture for cattle driven down from East Anglia to the capital also declined, as animals could be transported by rail.

In 1866 (the date is chose because a useful Ordnance Survey map is available) the village was very much smaller in population then it is now. But in terms of the range of activities, trades and professions that existed, it was a very much more diverse village than it is now.

In 1886 the following were listed as being in Ingatestone:

Ingatestone in 1886

Four schools
Police station – Sgt Laver resident
Rail station — Station master — Absalom Evans
Post Office — Harriet Stuart, Postmistress
Bank – Essex Bank (and corresponding agent)
Working Men’s club
Brickworks – adjacent Avenue Terrace
Maltings – opposite Ardtully
Gas works
Commercial laundry
Seven public houses
Three Justices of the Peace
Three Ministers of religion
Master of Essex Staghounds
Three Butchers
Two Builders
Three Beer retailer/landlords (at least)
Woodcarver
Agricultural engineer
Blacksmith
Carpenter
Two saddlers/Saddle makers
Coal dealer
Three Boot makers/shopkeepers
Watch and clock maker
Chimney sweep
Greengrocer
Two Surgeons
Plumber
Fishmonger
Four dressmakers
Ironmonger
Tailor
Horse dealer
Accountant
Hay binder
Coach cab and wagoneers, coach-builders & wheelwright
Veterinary surgeon
Brick and tile maker
Cattle dealer
Mat maker
Furniture dealer
Hay dealer

Those who have lived here for more than thirty years will also have seen many changes — shops have come and go; shop uses have changed; some of the pubs have disappeared. The COVID outbreak proved too much for some to continue.

The Hall is the setting for the very popular (at the time) Victorian pot-boiler “Lady Audrey’s Secret” by Mary Elizabeth Braddon.

in the middle of the market square is a large ceramic and concrete mural – “The Peoples who Used the Essex Road”. It depicts a Roman foot soldier; Queen Elizabeth the First; a Knight Templar; a Victorian coach driver and a boy driving livestock.

The mural was commissioned in 1969 from Philippa Threlfall (b 1939) to sit on the facade of the building that replaced the house previously there — Chequers.

More information can be found here

https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/peoples-who-used-the-essex-road-331222

More information about other buildings of historic and architectural interest in Ingatestone and Fryerning can be found at British History online

https://www.british-history.ac.uk/rchme/essex/vol2/pp136-142

Twentieth century to date