46 * ESSEX AS A WINE-PRODUCING COUNTY. 



Much the same reason, rather than any change in climate, 

 has led to the discontinuance in this county of hop-growing— 

 once a considerable industry with us. There is not now, I 

 believe, a single hop-garden in Essex. Yet, twenty years ago, 

 there were several ; and, at an earlier date, there were man v. 

 Of this, we have abundant evidence in the large number of 

 fields and meadows in all parts of the county which still bear 

 the name " the Hop-garden," the " Hop-field," or the " Hop- 

 ground," as reference to Mr. Waller's list of " Essex Field 

 Names " (already referred to) will show. I myself well re- 

 member the hop-ground at Tye Hall, Roxwell, the use of which 

 was discontinued in 1883, and I believe that a hop-garden (the 

 last in Essex) continued in use at Castle Hedingham until a 

 still later date. " The Hop-pole," once a common inn sign, 

 stiil lingers at Good Easter, Great Hallingbury, Little Hal- 

 lingbury, and Roydon. 



It can hardly be supposed that any change in the climate 

 during the last twent\', or even the last hundred, years accounts 

 for the abandonment of hop-growing in Essex. Without doubt, 

 it is due to improvement in the means of transport, brought about 

 by the introduction of railroads, which has made the produce 

 of the more favoured hop-lands of Kent and East-Sussex as 

 easily obtainable in any part of Essex as that grown in an 

 adjoining parish was a century ago, and has also put an end to 

 the practice of home-brewing, which was carried on at every 

 good farmhouse in Essex up to eighty or a hundred years ago. 

 Just so it has been with our Essex wine-growing and wine- 

 making industry. The only difference is that our wine-making 

 industry was unable to compete with the produce of foreign 

 countries, while our hop-growing industry was unable to com- 

 pete with that of other parts of our own country. 



There is no evidence, so far as I am aware, to show the date 

 at which viniculture was abandoned in Essex. It may have 

 been continued in isolated spots until a comparatively-recent 

 date. This seems, indeed, to have been certainly the case at 

 Barking, where a vineyard still existed (according to a record 

 alreadv cited) as late as 1540. The fact that a vineyard was 

 attached to Ingatestone Hall, which was only erected in 1565, 

 renders it probable that viniculture was there carried on still 

 later. Then, too, we know that Sir William Batten made wine 

 from grapes at Walthamstow in 1667. 



