A survey of hedgerows in the parish of Ingatestone and Fryerning
GRAHAM SMITH
48 The Meads, Ingatestone, Essex CM4 OAE
Introduction
Ingatestone and Fryerning were formerly two parishes; they were amalgamated in 1889 during a
major reorganisation of local government, deemed necessary because so many parishes had enclaves
of land outside their boundaries, miles distant in some instances. Writtle was a case in point, as the
parish included scattered fields and small farms in both Chignal St James and Broomfield. As so
often with the Victorians, though, they went a bit over the top. Parish boundaries that had stood the
test of time since Saxon days were arbitrarily re-drawn by civil servants, as a result of which the
hamlet of Handley Green was transferred from Ingatestone to Margaretting parish. For the purpose
of this article, however, I have retained the ancient boundaries. What was good enough for the
Saxons is good enough for me!
The history of both parishes was discussed in some detail in my article on the Writtle Forest in the
2002/2003 Essex Naturalist. Briefly, most of Ingatestone parish was presented to Barking Abbey by
King Edgar in 950, and remained in their hands until the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII
in 1539-40, following which the land was acquired by one of Henry's ministers, Sir William Petre.
The Petre family still retain a good deal of land in Ingatestone and adjoining parishes. The Saxon
landowners at Fryerning were less fortunate; following King Harold's defeat at the Battle of Hastings
in 1066, their estates were given to Robert Gernon, one of William the Conqueror's noblemen. The
bulk of the parish then passed into the hands of another notable Essex family, the Montfichets. who in
turn bequeathed much of it to the religious order known as the Knights Hospitallers. At the dissolution
it was purchased by a royal auditor, Sir William Berners, whose family sold it in turn to Sir Nicholas
Wadham. Sir Nicholas was married to Dorothy Petre, Sir William's daughter, and on then death the
land was bequeathed to Wadham College, Oxford, which the couple had helped found in 1613. The
college still retain some of the land, or did so until recently (Yearsley 1997).
In 1601, Sir William's heir, John (later the first Lord Petre) commissioned a map of his estates from
John Walker & Son, two of the leading map-makers of the day. This depicts all the field boundaries in
Ingatestone parish apart from the estate at Ingatestone Hall, which was surveyed in 1605 by the same
cartographers. Subsequently, Robert Edward, the ninth Baron Petre, commissioned a second estate
map in 1779, the cartographer on this occasion being another fine craftsman. Henry Clayton. This was
the last private map of the estate to be produced, but the tithe map of 1839, and the two large scale
Ordnance Survey maps of 1876 and 1919, mean that it is possible to trace the evolution of the parish's
field systems over a period of four hundred years. Fryerning is less well served by maps, the first to
show all the field boundaries being commissioned by Wadham College in 1825, the surveyor unknown.
This too was followed by the tithe and ordnance survey maps. In addition to the complete maps of
both parishes there are a number of privately produced maps of individual farms, dating back to 1742.
These have all been used in the following survey. All can be found in the Essex Records Office.
Parish topography and geology
As anyone who has walked or cycled in the parish will know, the land rises steadily from the banks
of the River Wid - which forms the boundary with Stock (formerly Buttsbury) - and the Fryerning-
Mill Green ridge, then dips down the other side towards the parishes of Mountnessing, Blackmore,
Highwood and Margaretting. This is best appreciated by cycling between the hump-backed bridge
Essex Naturalist (New Series) 21 (2004) 155