224 THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
Town Mill was built, on account of the floods thereby occasioned." Mr. Taylor
exhibited maps and plans in illustration of his remarks, and produced some copies
(made by Mr. J. L. Glasscock, jun.) of original sketches by a Mr. Kerrick (1800),
in a MS. in the British Museum, of the Mound as it then existed.
The large party then embarked on board the barge, which had been very kindly
lent for the occasion by Messrs. John Taylor and Son, and fitted up under the
superintendence of Mr. Marshall Taylor. The barge was drawn by two horses,
and the voyagers could, in a very pleasant way, view the course of the river from
Bishop's Stortford to Harlow. A somewhat sharp shower came on just at starting,
but the sky soon cleared, and the latter part of the trip was carried out under
favourable conditions of weather.
The Stort is one of the main tributaries of the Lea. It is formed principally
by the confluence of two streams, one rising from a spring in Clavering Park Wood
in the village of Langley, in Essex (receiving a brook flowing from Scales Park
Wood in Herts), and the other near Henham and Elsenham, in Essex. The two
main streams join at Pesterford Bridge, Stansted Mountfitchet, and forming the
Stort the river flows by Stortford, Sawbridgeworth, and Harlow (where it
receives the Pincey Brook, from Hatfield Broad-Oak) to Roydon, where
it falls into the Lea. The composing streams are almost wholly in Essex
until Stansted Mountfitchet is reached, but from thence, until its junction with the
Lea, the river forms the boundary between Essex and Hertfordshire, excepting at
Hockerill, and the place near Sawbridgeworth where Hertfordshire trespasses
over the eastern border in the shape of a small piece of land upon which Hyde
Hall stands. There was formerly a mill at Bentfield End, on the Hassobury
estate, but this was pulled down some years ago. The first mill on the Stort
now standing is the ''Parsonage Mill," in Hockerill parish. There are in all
thirteen mills, viz :—
Parsonage Mill. Harlow Mill.
Town Mill, Bishop's Stortford. Latton Mill.
South Mill. Burnt Mill.
Twyford Mill. Parndon Mill.
Tednanbury or Silk Mill. Hunsdon Mill.
Sawbridgeworth Mill. Roydon Mill.
Shearing Mill.
The Stort was made navigable in 1769 for barges of 40 tons burden from its
junction with the Lea to Bishop's Stortford, at the instance and expense of Sir
George (then Mr.) Jackson (afterwards Sir G. Ducket) and Mr. Dingley, each
having three shares. The works were commenced in 1764, and the river was
opened for navigation with a procession of barges amid great rejoicings on October
24th, 1769. The cost of the work was estimated to have been £100,000. Mr.
Taylor stated that his brother, Mr. Marshall Taylor, had in his possession a silver
tankard on which was this inscription :—" The gift of the proprietors of the Stort
Navigation to Mr. John Glyn, their superintendent, as a token of their approbation
of his conduct in the progress of that work, 1768." Mr. Taylor also read from
Sir G. F. Ducket's book "Ducketiana" extracts from the diary of the projector,
giving some interesting details of the opening of the navigation. Sir George
Ducket's epitaph is in St. Michael's Church, Bishop's Stortford. He died in 1822,
aged 97 ; he was a great friend of Captain Cook, who named Port Jackson, in New
South Wales, and Point Jackson, in New Zealand, after him. In 1787 Sir George