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Writtle (All Saints)

WRITTLE (All Saints), a parish, and formerly a market-town, in the union and hundred of Chelmsford, S. division of Essex, 2½ miles (W. by S.) from Chelmsford; containing 2521 inhabitants. Morant and other writers have placed here the Cæsaromagus of Antoninus. The remains of a royal palace, built by King John in 1211, and which occupied an acre of ground surrounded by a deep moat, are still visible. The place has been long divested of the greater part of its trade by the rising importance of the town of Chelmsford; but malting and brewing are still carried on, and there is an oil-mill in the vicinity. Courts leet and baron are held, and the inhabitants have the privilege of appointing their own coroner. The parish is the most extensive in the county, comprising 8410 acres, of which 163 are common or waste. It abounds with every variety of surface and scenery; the soil is generally fertile, much of it adapted for wheat, and hops of good quality are grown in several parts. The living is a vicarage, with the donative of Roxwell annexed; net income, £718; patrons and impropriators, the Warden and Fellows of New College, Oxford. The great tithes have been commuted for £2300, and the vicarial for £572. 10. The church is an ancient and spacious structure, with a massive square tower surmounted by a lantern turret, and contains numerous elegant and interesting monuments. A chapel was erected in the Highwood Quarter, and consecrated in Oct. 1842: it is built of red brick, is in the early English style, and cost £1200. There is a place of worship for Independents. Almshouses for six people were endowed with land now producing £55 per annum, by Thomas Hawkins, in 1607; and John Blencowe, in 1774, founded a school with an income of £82 per annum, of which two-thirds are given to the parish of Writtle, and the remainder to that of Roxwell. About four miles north-east of the church, in the middle of a wood, a hermitage was founded in the reign of Stephen, which in that of Henry II. was attached to St. John's Abbey, Colchester.

Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.

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