Thorrington

Thorrington Mill was built in the early 19th Century. It is the only remaining Tide Mill in Essex and one of very few left in East Anglia. Tip: The Tide Mill is not currently open to tourists and is not accessable by car, but you can see it via the public footpath along the creek from Arlesford. Read more…

The village is graced by the elegant Church of St. Edmund. The church is dedicated to the last king of independent East Anglia, martyred by the Danes in the 9th Century. Read more…

This attractive village derives its name from St. Osyth daughter of the first Christian King of East Anglia, who was beheaded by the Danes in AD 653. The village centre is dominated by the Augustinian Priory ruins and its magnificent Gatehouse, which was completed in 1475. The latter forms one of the finest monastic buildings in the country. The priory Read more…

These are attractive small ports at the head of the Stour, the gateway to “Constable Country” in Suffolk. Manningtree was a centre of the cloth trade in Tudor times and later a flourishing port for barges, carrying mixed cargoes down the coast to London. It contains an impressive group of Georgian buildings. It is believed that the reference to Falstaff Read more…

There are ring ditches and banks to the south west of Reed Island, the remnants of a Neolithic religious site. Flint implements and Neolithic pottery have been found there. The Church of St. Mary contains rich 14th Century stone carvings in the chancel. Read more…

This attractive old town was built on a grid pattern, in the 13th Century, by the Earl of Norfolk, to exploit its strategic position at the mouth of the Stour/Orwell estuary. The famous seafarers Hawkins, Drake and Frobisher all sailed from Harwich during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I on various expeditions. The Mayflower, the ship which carried the Pilgrim Read more…

Great Bentley is probably best known for, what is reputedly the largest Village Green in England, with approximately 43 acres. The Village Green was purchased by the Parish Council on behalf of the residents of the Great Bentley in 1965 from the then Lord of the Manor. Read more…

Developed as a select resort by Sir Richard Cooper and largely expanded after 1886. The area south of Frinton Gates was laid out with detached houses set along broad tree lined avenues and has preserved a unique local character. The Church of Old St. Mary contains some interesting panels of William Morris stained glass in the East window, designed by Read more…

Elmstead, a pleasant village, 4½ miles East by North of Colchester. It is sometimes called Elmstead Market, owing to a market being held in the village during one of the visitations of the plague in Colchester. The Church of St. Anne and St. Lawrence to the north of the village has a rare carved oak recumbent effigy of a knight Read more…

The town has been settled from Prehistoric times. Late Bronze Age axe heads were found at upper Dovercourt. To the Romans, the town was an important source of building stone ‘Septaria’, taken from the cliffs. The modern town largely developed in Victorian times as a fashionable resort. Read more…