Great Bentley, Essex
Historical Description
Bentley, Great, a village and a parish in Essex. The village stands near the Tendring Hundred branch of the G.E.R., 8 miles SE by E of Colchester, and has a post, money order, and telegraph office under Colchester, and a railway station of the same name. The parish comprises 3235 acres; population, 1008. The living is a vicarage in the diuccse of St Albans; gross yearly value, £300 with residence. Patron, the Bishop of St Albans. The church is a building of red sandstone, and has a very fine Norman arch over the S door. There is a Wesleyan chapel.
Administration
The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.
| Ancient County | Essex | |
| Ecclesiastical parish | Bentley St. Mary | |
| Hundred | Tendring | |
| Poor Law union | Tendring |
Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.
Churches
Church of England
St Mary (parish church)
The church of St. Mary is a building of red sandstone mixed with iron ore, and was originally Norman, but is now partly in the Decorated style, and consists of chancel and nave, north porch of wood and an embattled tower at the west end containing 8 bells, two of which were hung in 1898: the chancel retains two niches at the east end, and on the south side is a priests' doorway: in the porch are the remains of a stoup: a part of the old staircase to the rood loft is still in existence, and on the south side of the nave is a very fine specimen of a Norman arch in a good state of preservation: five of the windows are also Norman, three Early English and two Perpendicular: the church was restored in 1874 at a cost of over £800: a new organ was provided and a ringing chamber constructed in 1897 at a cost of £212: in 1904 the ceiling of the nave was removed, disclosing a fine oak roof, which has been restored at a cost of £240: there are 300 sittings.
Methodist
Wesleyan Chapel
The Wesleyan chapel, erected in 1843, has 350 sittings.
Civil Registration
For general information about Civil Registration (births, marriages and deaths) see the Civil Registration page.
Directories & Gazetteers
We have transcribed the entry for Great Bentley from the following:
- Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Bentley, Great (St. Mary))
Land and Property
The Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Essex is available to browse.
The Essex pages from the Return of Owners of Land in 1873 is online.
Maps
Online maps of Great Bentley are available from a number of sites:
- Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- Google Streetview.
- National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
- OpenStreetMap.
- old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
- Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)
Newspapers and Periodicals
The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following newspapers covering Essex online: