A HISTORY OF ESSEX 



STONDON MASSEY 



Stondon Massey is about 2 miles south-east of 

 Chipping Ongar and 4 miles north-west of Brentwood." 

 It is one of the smallest parishes in the hundred, having 

 an area of 1,127 acres. In shape it is roughly hke a 

 reversed L, of which the short arm lies along a ridge 

 about 300 ft. high above the Roding and the long arm 

 extends north-west down to the river, containing the 

 valley of a small stream which flows into the river near 

 Hallsford Bridge, and also a spur extending north-west 

 from the left bank of the stream. The scenery is varied. 

 There are stretches of woodland in the upland areas, 

 notably Oak Wood and the park at Stondon Place, 

 both on the main ridge, and Church Wood on the sub- 

 sidiary spur. Along parts of the road which runs north- 

 west through the parish to Hallsford Bridge there are 

 high hedges, while the approach east from Kelvedon 

 Hatch is by a road without hedges but lined with tall 

 trees. From the higher ground at Church Hill there 

 are good views across to Chipping Ongar and also 

 north-east in the direction of Blackmore. During the 

 past 30 years the parish has become increasingly sub- 

 urbanized. It retains several farms on old sites but the 

 buildings have mostly been rebuilt during the past 1 50 

 years. 



Stondon Massey was one of the three parishes at this 

 end of Ongar hundred where Roman Catholic worship 

 was maintained through the years of persecution in the 

 late 1 6th and early 17th centuries.^ Another point of 

 special interest in the history of the parish is the con- 

 nexion with Marks Hall in Margaret Roding (Dunmow 

 hundred). 3 



Stondon means 'stone hiU'.^ This suggests that the 

 oldest Saxon settlement was on the subsidiary spur, 

 where there are still gravel pits, and it is there that the 

 ancient manor house of Stondon Hall (now a farm) is 

 situated, and near it the parish church. Most of the 

 other houses in the parish, old and new, are also on the 

 higher ground. The farms include Mellow Purgess, 

 Clapgates, and Chivers in the west. Soap House on the 

 Kelvedon Hatch road, Brook and Cannon's on the 

 main road in the centre of the parish. Little Myles's to 

 the west of the church and Woolmongers on the eastern 

 boundary. Bridge Farm, which is exceptional in its 

 situation, is on the low ground just east of Hallsford 

 Bridge. Stondon Place and Stondon House, both near 

 Cannon's Farm, are large houses each of which in turn 

 succeeded Stondon Hall as the residence of the lord of 

 the manor. The old rectory, now Stondon Massey 

 House, is J mile south of the church. The new rectory 

 is farther south near Cannon's. The 'Bricklayers' 

 Arms', the village inn, is at the cross-roads south of 

 Cannon's, and the post-ofEce is near the inn. Until 

 recent years one of the focal points of the village was 

 the cross-roads opposite Stondon Place. Here on a 

 small green are the remains of a sign-post to which are 

 fixed the irons formerly belonging to the parish 

 whipping-post. Immediately north of this green is the 

 site of the former village school and beyond it the 

 village hall, now little used, its entrance overgrown. 

 Since the Second World War the parish appears to 



' O.S. aj m. Map, sheets 52/50, 5 1 /59. 



• See also Kelvedon Hatch and Nave- 

 Itock. 



' See below, Manor, Church. 



♦ P.N. Eiux (E.P.N.S.), 81. 

 » Ibid. 8 1-82. For the history of the 



parish farms see E. H. L. Reeve, History 



have lost some of its corporate life. The two big houses 

 have been empty (Stondon House now has a tenant 

 but Stondon Place is still unoccupied), there is now no 

 resident rector and the village school was closed in 



1953- 



The medieval settlement of the parish probably 

 spread south from Stondon Hall. Brook Farm, Wool- 

 mongers, and several other farms derive their names 

 from medieval tenants.' Apart from Stondon Hall, 

 part of which may date from the 15 th century,* none 

 of the secular buildings which now survive appears to 

 contain medieval work. By the 1 8th century there 

 were houses on most of the present farm sites, and some 

 of the existing buildings are of this period or slightly 

 earlier. Brook Farm is a curious looking building con- 

 sisting of two wings connected by a narrow covered 

 passage. It is said to have been rebuilt about 1873' 

 but the north wing is certainly older than this. Heavy 

 ceiling beams are visible on the ground floor and this 

 part of the house may date from the 17th century. 

 Cannon's Farm opposite is a small two-story house with 

 double-hung sashes, probably built in the i8th century 

 but recently modernized. Little Myles's was so named 

 to distinguish it from Great Myles's in Kelvedon 

 Hatch (q.v.) of which estate it formed part. In about 

 1700 there was a very small house there, with a 14- 

 acre holding attached to it, but during the 18th century 

 the house and the farm were both greatly enlarged.* 

 The present building is of two stories, roughcast, with 

 a tiled roof, and plain brick chimneys. In general 

 appearance it is of the 1 8th century but it probably 

 incorporates parts of the previous building at the back. 

 Woolmongers is a small two-story building, timber- 

 framed, plastered and whitewashed and is also probably 

 of the 1 8th century. Cla^jgates, which took its name 

 from the gates which formerly stood at this point to 

 prevent cattle straying from Kelvedon Common, was 

 called Stondon Grove in 1777.' It has been consider- 

 ably modernized but may date from the i8th century. 

 At Mellow Purgess, where the old farm-house was 

 demolished about 1850, there still survives a small 

 whitewashed cottage with dormers and a thatched roof 

 which was probably that shown in a drawing of 1789. >o 

 Chivers Farm is not shown on the 1777 map and the 

 present house is in any case a rebuilding of 1898." 

 Soap House, which took its name from the soap boiling 

 carried on there in the i8th century, was rebuilt about 

 1902'^ but may contain parts of an i8th century or 

 even an earlier building. Bridge Farm (otherwise Halls- 

 ford House) was demolished in 1 899 and replaced by a 

 new house on higher ground. A photograph of the old 

 house shows an H-shaped plan, suggesting that it dated 

 from the i6th century or earlier. One of the beams 

 removed from it was 23 ft. long and measured a foot 

 square in cross-section. '3 Stondon Place, which was in 

 existence in the i6th century, was rebuilt about 1707 

 and again, after a fire, about i88o.i'» Stondon House, 

 which was probably built about 1740, was also burnt 

 down in the 19th century and the present building is 

 of about 1 870. '5 The Giles Almshouses, at the south 



of Stondon Massey, pt. Ill, ch. iv. 



* See below, Manor. 



' Reeve, Stondon Massey, 123, 



8 E.R.O., D/DFa Pi, P6. 



' Chapman and Andri, Map of Essex, 

 1777, sheet xvii. 

 "> Reeve, Stondon Massey, 126. For the 



curious name of this farm see P.N. Essex, 

 81. 



" Reeve, op. cit. 124. 



" Ibid. 152. 



*3 Ibid. 124, 1 19. 



'* See Manor. 



■5 Ibid. 



240 



