ONGAR HUNDRED 



STONDON MASSEY 



Stondon House, to which the lord of the manor 

 moved in 1861, is said to have been built by Richard 

 Jordan about I740.'8 About 1824 it was leased by a 

 Mr. and Mrs. Page for use as a girls' school. P. H. 

 Meyer had lived there only five years when this house 

 was burnt down." It had been rebuilt by the time of 

 Meyer's death in 1870.^ The present house is a large 

 building of brick with a slate roof and has extensive out- 

 buildings. For some years after the Second World War 

 it was empty and neglected but it is now occupied and 

 is in good repair.^' 



The advowson of Stondon Massey descended along 

 with the manor until the 17th century." 

 CHURCH In 1660 Edward Otway was presented by 

 Col. Rich, but the next presentation, in 

 1691, was made by the trustees of the estate of Anthony 

 Luther of Myles's (in Kelvedon Hatch, q.v.).^^ In 

 1696 William Kendall of Takeley presented James 

 Crook. The new rector afterwards acquired the advow- 

 son, and on his death in 1707 left it to his widow Mary. 

 She presented Thomas White, who resigned the living 

 in the same year, and then Thomas Smith, whom she 

 later married. The advowson, passed on her death in 

 1728 to her husband. He died in 1732 and in his will 

 directed that the advowson was to be sold and the pro- 

 ceeds divided among his family. This does not seem 

 to have been carried out. Smith's eldest son Richard 

 presented the next rector (1733) and in 1735 Richard's 

 younger brother Thomas was presented by John How, 

 one of the executors of Thomas Smith the elder. The 

 younger Thomas Smith held the rectory for no fewer 

 than 56 years, dying in 1 791. The advowson had 

 previously been acquired by John Oldham, who pre- 

 sented himself and was rector for 50 years. Before his 

 death in 1841 he sold the advowson to John Hubbard, 

 of Cornhill, who presented his son Thomas. In 1 849 

 the advowson was again sold, this time to Edward 

 Reeve, who presented his son Edward J. Reeve. The 

 latter died in 1893 and was succeeded as patron and 

 rector by his son Edward H. L. Reeve. In 1936, on 

 the death of E. H. L. Reeve, the advowson was vested 

 in the Bishop of Chelmsford. ^'^ 



The rectory of Stondon was valued at 7 marks in 

 about 1254,25 at j^5 6s. 8a'. in I29i,2*andatj^i3 6^. 8d'. 

 in 1535.2' In 1849 the tithes were commuted for 

 ;^355 10J.28 The connexion between this rectory and 

 the manor of Marks Hall in Margaret Roding has been 

 described above.^' There was a chapel at Marks Hall 

 in 1 37 1 and 14 10, when it was said to be annexed to 

 the rectory of Stondon. The chapel was 'decayed' by 

 the 17th century but tithes from Marks Hall continued 

 to be paid to the rector of Stondon. An undated terrier, 

 probably of the early 17th century, stated the value of 

 those tithes to be ;^io a year. Until the early 19th 

 century the parishioners of Stondon included Marks 

 Hall in the annual beating of their bounds. In 1845, 

 when the tithes of Margaret Roding were commuted, 

 the Marks Hall estate comprised 317 acres, of which 



262 acres paid tithes to Stondon. ^o These last were 

 commuted for £9:0 los. i>d., which sum was not 

 included in the above figure for the commutation of the 

 tithe in Stondon itself. The tithe rent charge from 

 Marks Hall has continued to be paid to the Rector of 

 Stondon until the present day. 3' 



Early in the 17th century it was stated that the 

 rectory house of Stondon had been newly built and 

 repaired by John Nobbs, then rector. There were also 

 a barn, an orchard, and 60 acres of glebe. The rebuild- 

 ing was probably to provide accommodation for Nobbs's 

 family of ten children. '^ His house remained until 

 about 1800 when it was completely demolished and a 

 new rectory built. A drawing of the 17th-century 

 house and a description of it were contributed to the 

 Gentleman's Magazine in January and February 1805. 

 It was a large irregular house with many gables, timber- 

 framed and weather-boarded and having a chimney- 

 stack with grouped diagonal shafts.'' The new rectory 

 was sited farther from the road. John Oldham, the 

 rector who built it, is said to have been his own archi- 

 tect, and to have evolved the plan during a tour in 

 Switzerland. '♦ It is an imposing brick mansion, square 

 and compact in plan, with roof pediments. At the 

 time of the rebuilding the grounds were laid out by a 

 landscape gardener, perhaps an associate of 'Capability' 

 Brown.35 In 1 8 1 o, in a description of the rectory which 

 he sent to the bishop, Oldham stated that it had been 

 built about ten years earlier and that it had in addition 

 to the living-quarters a stable, barn, granary, cowhouse, 

 and brewing-house. 3* A cottage with a thatched roof 

 which still adjoins the former rectory may have been 

 one of the outbuildings mentioned in 1 8 10. It was at 

 one time used as a laundry.'^ Oldham's house remained 

 in use as the rectory until about 1936. It is now a 

 private house and the land is being farmed.'* The 

 present rectory, built about 1939, is a large red-brick 

 house of irregular plan situated near Cannon's Farm. 



The church of ST. PETER AND ST. PAUL 

 consists of nave, chancel, north vestry, organ chamber 

 and chapel, south porch, and western bell turret with 

 spire. The nave and chancel date from about iioo, 

 the bell turret and the porch were added in the 15 th 

 century and in the 19th century the vestry, organ 

 chamber and chapel were added and the porch rebuilt." 

 The walls are mainly plastered over outside but where 

 exposed at the west end are seen to be of neatly coursed 

 flints with lacing courses of tiles, possibly Roman. 



Of the original structure, apart from the walls, there 

 remain two characteristic narrow Norman window 

 openings (one now blocked externally) in the north 

 side of the nave, one in the south side of the nave and 

 one in the south wall of the chancel. The south door- 

 way is also of that period. It has an unornamented 

 stone surround with rough, quoined jambs and rudi- 

 mentary impost blocks. A north doorway of similar 

 date was in use until 1850 but is now blocked extern- 

 ally. Other features which may in part be survivals 



'.' Ibid. 4.5. 



>» Ibid. 51. 



M Ibid. 



" Inf. from occupant. 



" Newcourt, Refer/, ii, 54.5. In 1558 

 and 1563 the advowsons appears to have 

 been sold pro kac vice. 



*3 Unless otherwise stated the authority 

 for statements in the Church section is 

 Reeve, Stondon Massey y 57-90. 



2* Chel.Dioc. rear Bk. 1937. 



" E.A.T. N.s. xviii, 19. 



" Tar. £■<:(:/. (Rec. Com.), 21*. 



2' Val Eccl. (Rec. Com.), i, 437. 



" E.R.O., D/CT 337. 



" See Manor; E.A.T. n.s. xv, 148-52; 

 Newcourt, Repert. ii, 544, 505. 



30 E.R.O., D/CT 298. 



3' Inf. from University Coll., Oxford. 

 The rent charge is now (1954) ;^84 19J. 

 and is paid through the Church Com- 

 missioners. 



" Newcourt, Refert. ii, 544; Reeve, 

 Stondon Massey^ 70. 



" Reeve, Stondon Massey., 70, 87; 

 see plate facing p. 1 3J5 . 



3« Reeve, Stondon Massey, 86-88. 



" Ibid. 86. Brown himself died in 1783 

 and therefore could not, as Reeve states, 

 have designed the gardens. 



3* Ibid. 88. 



3' Inf. from occupier. 



38 Ibid. ■ 



39 For an historical description of the 

 church by F. Chancellor (1898) see E.R. 

 vii, 139 f. 



245 



